What is new in Stanton's interpretation and in her attitude towards the text?
Using the Garden of Eden story to understand and argue issues of gender relations is not new. What is new is Elizabeth Stanton's take on the story. Unlike many of her predecessors, Stanton, in my opinion, looks at the story more scientifically, as a means of making the point that women and men are equal and were created so. She bring in other scientific elements to argue the importance of women. She recognizes that the earth requires women for procreation and the continuation of our species. I also love how she notes that at the present men come from women and asks, "shall his place be on of subjection?" She goes so far as to mention Darwinian evolution and the problems it causes with the Biblical interpretation. I feel that most commentators would not even touch this subject and I admire Stanton for not ignoring it.
Strangely enough, Stanton writes that the first 3 chapters of Genesis contain two stories! Before this, I had not read a commentator who made that observation. Instead of trying to reconcile the first three chapters to make them fit as one, she delves into Israelite history and Biblical authorship. She cites the scholarship of her day, which had been analyzing the Bible, and declares that Moses did not write Genesis. She continues in outlining details of history and Israelite record-keeping like a Biblical scholar. She even analyzes down to the very words in Hebrew and brings in elements of the Documentary Hypothesis (<http://imp.lss.wisc.edu/~rltroxel/Intro/hypoth.html>).
According to Stanton both of these stories cannot be true and she chooses to side with the one in chapter 1 of Genesis because "second story was manipulated by some Jew, in an endeavor to give "heavenly authority" for requiring a woman to obey the man she married" (she said that so well that I had to quote it). In the first story no dominion of men over women is given in creation, they are equal and have equal dominion over the earth. "No lesson of woman's subjection can be fairly drawn from the first chapter of the Old Testament."
The aforementioned Jewish author, according to Stanton, had to find a way to counter the equality in the first chapter and effect subordination, thus, he introduced a spirit of evil (a spirit which existed before man and therefore was not caused by women and they are no the origin of sin). I don't know exactly why Stanton goes into what she believes to be a false story of the creation (that is the Garden of Eden story), but I suppose it is to have an answer for critics and give further evidence to her point.
In support of Eve, Stanton argues her case, like a defense attorney. First by declaring Eve's equality with or even superiority over Adam. Stanton notes the phrase "This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh" and comments that this is a statement of equality coming from Adam. Again in "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and cleave unto his wife", Stanton states that there is no subjection, but rather a declaration that women are to be the head of the home. She further supports Eve's superiority in lasting traditions, like call the the Fall the "fall of man" rather than the fall of woman. It is Adam who is seen as the guilty party. Then by defending Eve's actions. She notes that the command not to eat the fruit was given to the man before the woman was made. Eve is getting the story secondhand. The snake is interpreted as Satan, an angel or seraphim, and as such his word may have seemed superior to the story Adam told her. Also, Adam did nothing to stop even though, according to Stanton, he was standing right next to her.
Some of her interpretations are similar to other commentators Like, "in God's image meaning a male and female-ness of God, ergo there is female in the Godhead. Additionally, she does make the assumption that the snake was Satan. Perhaps this was for the sake of her audience that likely already held that assumption. Either way, I wish she had gone back to the original text as far as reading that the snake is just called a snake.
Stanton is not denying that God curses Eve to subjection in this story, but rather argue that this story and the one and chapter 1 contain evidence that Adam and Eve were created as equals. She treats the text differently than many of the commentators we've read have. She analyzes it as both a sacred text as well as historical one. The implication of the former being that it is authoritative and true on matter of belief. Yet, she recognized that it is a Near Eastern text, handed down for generation, prone to misinterpretation and additions of stories that can be misinterpreted. Rather than taking one side or the other, she seeks a reconciliation of science and history with the Bible. She could have very easily taken the Bible it was and used it to argue the equality of women. Instead she analyzes the Bible by bringing in science and scholarly observations. By doing this, she gives herself more authority and her evidence for equality is more established.
[Next (in our text book titled Eve and Adam), Stanton analyzes a passage from 1 Timothy which discusses the ideal role and appearance of women in the Christian society. Stanton makes a good point: "It
appears very trifling for men, commissioned to do so great a work on earth, to
give so much thought to the toilets of women." In her opinion, Paul's rules are too strict and she wonders what he would say if he had seen the strong women of the 19th century. Maybe he would have thought differently. I am impressed that she attempts to view this work within its historical context.]
Very nicely done. You clearly enjoyed this reading, which makes critiquing it even more difficult.
ReplyDeleteStanton has brought to bear on the subject all that was recently available to her toward the end of the 19th century from scientific knowledge to developing academic biblical studies.
“I don't know exactly why Stanton goes into what she believes to be a false story of the creation (that is the Garden of Eden story), but I suppose it is to have an answer for critics and give further evidence to her point.”
She does it for the same reason that Hassan focuses on the creation of women in the Qur’an. For both, women’s rights depended on creational equality as portrayed in scripture. When someone asked Willie Sutton why he robbed banks, he answered “That’s where the money is.”
“According to Stanton both of these stories cannot be true and she chooses to side with the one in chapter 1 of Genesis because "second story was manipulated by some Jew, in an endeavor to give "heavenly authority" for requiring a woman to obey the man she married" (she said that so well that I had to quote it).”
It’s interesting to compare her idea that the Garden story was deliberately “manipulated” to give patriarchy divine sanction to the reading of the story as an etiology of male domination seen as a consequence of the woman’s punishment analogous to snakebite. In other words Stanton still holds to the conventional reading of the story as ‘the Fall’, including the snake as Satan, so has to pick away at it in bits and pieces, some more valid than others.
“In her opinion, Paul's rules are too strict and she wonders what he would say if he had seen the strong women of the 19th century.”
This reminds me of Grimké’s remark where it appears that the “strong women of the 19th century”, of which she was assuredly one, remain oppressed (think of the description of American women by the pro-slavery advocates): “… now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and says, the being he has thus deeply injured is his inferior.”