Lynn H. Cohick and Amy Brown Hughes, Christian Women in the Patristic World: Their Influence, Authority, and Legacy in the Second through Fifth Centuries (Ada, MI: Baker Academic, 2017).
One theme that stands out in Cohick & Hughes’ Christian Women in the Patristic World is that of women exercising their agency in a patriarchal world via novel, creative, and subversive ways; this short reflection will focus on four female figures: Thecla, Perpetua, Felicitas, and Blandina to illustrate this creative agency[1].
Starting with Thecla, we see a woman who rejects the Roman status quo and ‘place of women’ by her refusal to marry,[2] but also in her insistence on modesty in public and through her self-expression.[3] Second, after initially being refused baptism by Paul – over fears that she still may yet fall into temptation – Thecla later declares herself to have been baptised after her ordeal in the pool with the seals; a claim Paul accepts.[4] When Thecla is faced with fighting in the arena naked, as to humiliate her, she maintains her dignity and agency by telling the Roman governor “…that God has clothed her with salvation” and seeming to imply that she is the one truly clothed whilst the arena crowd – lacking God’s clothing – are the truly naked ones.[5] Further, during the story of Thecla we can see Roman women in the arena exercising their agency when they, in spite of Roman tradition, begin to cry out against the horrors they are witnessing in the arena with Thecla and the miscarriage of justice.[6]
With Perpetua, we see a woman exercising her agency by assuming the persona of a male when she is forced to face ‘the Egyptian’ in the arena and she is rubbed with oil by the young men, becoming male herself and defying traditional gender expectations.[7] As well, Perpetua shows her agency via her numerous rejections of her father’s pleas to drop her Christian witness and make sacrifices, thus defying the traditional Roman custom of pietas.[8] As Perpetua’s situation becomes more desperate, so do her father’s pleas, but she holds fast to her beliefs and agency, and is even unmoved by his final jailcell appeal.[9] Finally, Perpetua’s agency is demonstrated in her inversion of traditional expectations of what a woman should attend to; traditionally, this would be “…sustaining the family’s wealth, land, and progeny”[10] but Perpetua’s focus is on “…the eternal fate of her family members.”[11]
With Felicitas, we see a woman exercising her agency by asking for an early delivery of her baby so that she might meet her death on her terms alongside her fellow Christians, and not be executed later alongside criminals and the like.[12] As well, Felicitas shows agency via her rejection of traditional Roman expectations for women when she delivers a tongue-lashing to her captors and tormentors when they threaten that her suffering will only increase because of her obstinacy,[13] and through the self-image she holds – not of a slave-girl but a Christ-like figure giving birth to a child.[14] With Blandina, we see her agency by her refusal to break under torture and resistance to death so that she may also die on her terms,[15] her refusal to break while in the arena,[16] and – most importantly – through her subversion of the destruction of status and humanity that is the arena through her mothering.[17]
Questions for Theoretical discussion:
- Is part of the reason that we haven’t heard a great deal about the female martyrs and ‘mothers’ because they are actually far more subversive than men? Do their stories and their witness challenge the position of men in the Christian narrative?
- In the end, was targeting the Roman familial system and attempting to subvert it the right course for Christians to follow?
- Is Christianity ashamed of the role of women in its past? Is it a matter of shame over the way Christianity has treated women? Is it straight-up misogyny? Does the existing gender arrangement inside the Church currently offer more equal status or is there still a way to go?
Footnotes
[1] Lynn H. Cohick and Amy Brown Hughes, Christian Women in the Patristic World: Their Influence, Authority, and Legacy in the Second through Fifth Centuries (Ada, MI: Baker Academic, 2017). See page 55.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid. See page 56.
[5] Ibid. See page 58.
[6] Ibid. See page 59.
[7] Ibid. See page 90.
[8] See page 95.
[9] Ibid. See page 100 & 101.
[10] Ibid. See page 101
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid. See page 107.
[13] Ibid. See page 108.
[14] Ibid. See page 110.
[15] Ibid. See pages 159 & 160.
[16] Ibid. See page 160.
[17] Ibid. See page 161.
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