Читать книгу Blessing the Curse? - Ksenija Magda - Страница 9

This leads to an inevitable question about the role of women in bringing about these death-dealing structures of the world. Having come through some male-inflicted pain in my own life, and having spent the better part of my life working with women who have had to cope with immense male-inflicted pain, it is difficult to talk about the curse as a female problem. I would much rather skip this section. But if we want to find freedom, we need to have a thorough look at the sins of Eve.

In contemporary society, women are often portrayed as victims of patriarchal systems. The establishment of a pater familias has developed into an array of male-dominated structures that domineer women. Though women might not be formally excluded in some cultures today, they experience what is commonly described as a “glass ceiling” experience. Women are invited to contribute to projects, but they are excluded from positions of decision-making or power. Yet rather than describing women as victims of patriarchal processes, the UN suggests that we call them survivors. I think this paradigm shift lines up with the biblical story. If women and men are created as equals, then they are equals made in the image of God, and they are also equals in sin.

Although the Bible ascribes the initial sin to Adam, we grew up being told that it was the woman’s fault. Women lead men astray. Women trick men into their own ruin. It is women’s fault when men abuse them. That woman was dressed inappropriately – that is why she was raped. That woman was abandoned by her spouse and left alone with the children because he could not listen to her complaining. Women are mass murderers because they choose to abort babies. The list is long.

Historically, men have either described women as feeble and ontologically inferior, on the one hand, or sneaky, strong, evil, seductive, and manipulative, on the other. Women have been called many names. Not long ago, a Croatian bishop blamed women for the way boys had become feminine because they had to grow up in single-parent homes. He never mentioned abuse in the home or the fact that men abandon their families!^[8] Often, these examples are underlined by Bible verses, and women grow up with these Scriptures hanging above their heads, waiting for them to come tumbling down with the wrath of God. From early on, a girl learns that something is wrong with her and her body. While boys may sit as they want, a girl has to learn to keep her knees together. In my own country, I have seen mothers prefer sons to daughters, and I have heard women and men in the Balkan region call their daughters sine (son).

I met a woman who was hardly five when her mother stripped off her panties because she repeatedly forgot to keep her knees together while playing alone in the house. She was made to sit for hours in the corner like this until her father came home, when her mother lifted her dress to expose her nakedness to her father. This grown woman sat crying like a baby in my office, unable to decide what had hurt her more – her mother’s action, or her father’s silent acceptance of the abuse. “I was hoping my father would take me and clothe me and make it right again,” she sobbed. But this never happened. She was left alone, ashamed, angry, and confused about this great “sin” for years to come. In this story, we see a woman and man abusing a little girl just for being a little girl.

Recently, I did some internet research on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in Africa and came across a Kenyan woman who is a passionate proponent of this gruesome practice that is inflicted on young girls simply because it is a tradition. Many mothers send their girls through the painful ordeal of FGM and pay for it, which from my Western perspective seems utterly incomprehensible, but should not be.^[9] On a trip to the US, I sat down with a woman in a high governmental position, who could not understand my desire for women’s equality – particularly women in leadership. She gave me an angry cannonade of insults about women who she knew who had made it to the top: “They are the worst! They are worse than men, a hundred times! If I had the say, I would never allow a woman to sit high up on the ladder!”

These examples all suggest that, as the saying goes, women might be their own worst enemies. As mentioned in the introduction, I have hardly ever come across any student who thought that working with women in the church was important or who wanted to prepare for work with women. As a student myself, I remember praying to God about my ministry and asking God to place me anywhere – just not with women. Evidently, God has a great sense of humour!

My resistance to women’s work bothered me, but eventually it dawned on me that the problem isn’t so much that men don’t like women, but that women don’t like themselves. The more I investigated this phenomenon, the more I saw how much of the pain and ugliness of the world has been unloaded on women.

In considering the problem of women as both victims and perpetrators of female suffering, it is important to look at the initial sin of wanting to be like God and the structures and hierarchies that have been created by this sin. Though women have also wanted to be like God, they have encountered objective obstacles to engaging that war head-on.

One primary obstacle is biological. Though this may sound discriminatory, women are biologically different from men. Their sexual relationships happen within them, and they conceive life and bear children into the world. Though this is a privilege, it is also a huge disadvantage in a world that is structured by sin.^[10] I am not suggesting that this biological difference assumes any traditional gender roles. It is not possible to determine what is biologically determined and what is socially constructed, so I will not engage in this discussion. Yet because women bear and tend children, they are often more dependent on other people’s nurture and help. They also have a relational bond and feel responsible for the children that were part of them. Men are not as intrinsically dependent on women, and their children have never lived within them, which changes the nature of their relational bond. Giving birth is an amazing experience for women, but it is also a position that makes women more vulnerable than men. Put like this, God’s curse to Eve makes a lot of sense: “I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you” (Gen 3:16).

This “curse” of the biological challenge for women extends beyond giving birth. Women handle enormous changes within their bodies on a regular basis as they live with varying hormonal levels and experience menstrual pain. Moreover, women can never enter a sexual relationship freely or thoughtlessly, since the “What If?” question is always on their minds: What if I get pregnant? Do I want children with this man? Do I want children in this stage of life? How will this child change my life? Will I be able to handle the change? Is this man reliable as a father? Can I rely on him to help care for our child? Contraception makes sexual relationships easier for women, but they introduce another set of questions about risks, health issues, and moral and religious concerns.

In responding to these challenges, women have become strong, resourceful, and responsible. And yet the ability to bear life has also made women more vulnerable, especially in hierarchical systems that run on material possessions and exploitation, which are driven by power rather than oriented toward life.

While caring for children does not lead one up the ladder, it does have some benefits. Though children are a burden when they are little, they are an asset when they grow up. There is only so much one man can do, but having others do the work for him frees him for climbing up the hierarchies. Acquiring grown slaves is the one way to generate a fast profit, but raising your own children is a less expensive way to acquire a loyal work force, especially in rural societies that are supported by land and food production. Children are still the best and surest retirement investment, as they can continue to work when the parents grow old and feeble. Thus in hierarchical systems, women and children become commodities that enable men to climb up hierarchical ladders. Though this generalization has become more nuanced in our technical, urban age, the rhetoric of culture around the world suggests that is not far off the grid.

All hierarchies depend on myths to uphold them. Though these differ from place to place, they carry the same essential message. The recent Twitter hashtag, “What Women Hear In Church,” reveals the role of the church in perpetuating these myths that uphold the structures of sin.

There is a wide perception that Croatian women in rural regions consider it acceptable for a man to beat them “if they deserved it.”^[11] Though rural women in Croatia tend to be Catholic, I have seen enough evangelical cases to know that denomination is not the defining role. Usually, in Christian counselling, these women are advised to “keep quiet and carry their crosses as God intended it,” because this is their calling to benefit their families. This myth of the adult woman who deserves to be punished physically by her husband reveals deep-seated convictions about women’s place in the Slavonian hierarchy, as the women are taught that it is acceptable for men to beat women when it is for their own good. This myth gives men the right to determine when women have behaved out of line and when they need to be punished. The myth also reveals that women accept the conviction that men can determine these things, even if they may occasionally disagree with their judgment.

This myth has several other implications that the church has failed to consider. The church teaches these women to put up with abuse because marriage is God-ordained, and so it must be maintained by any means. The church also teaches these women that men own them and can do what they want with them (“A man is king in his own castle!”). Thus their relationship is not the partnership described in Genesis, but that of a master and a slave, where women are commodities rather than a people.

Historically, at the Council of Mâcon in 585, the church discussed whether women had souls, and only one voice weighed in their favour. Some argue against this council, since only Protestants refer to it, and it has disappeared from official books, but I am encouraged that at least there was a majority (although tight) in the church who looked at this teaching and saw where it was going.^[12] All these myths suggest that women are to blame for the violence that is inflicted on them when they have done something to make men angry. In this way, man’s sins are blamed on the “woman who you gave to me” (Gen 3:12).

As natural victims in the structures of sin, women and their children often suffer trauma, with varying levels of severity depending on the level and type of abuse (physical, psychological, or both). But victimization often leads to lashing out, finding ways to retaliate against the perpetrator, or to let off steam against those who are weaker. Children who grow up in abusive homes become collateral damage, believing that violence is the only reaction to the excessive anger they feel.

But in all this, women are not innocent. They are also guilty of vicarious violence, particularly the violence of passive aggression. From a biblical perspective, women also succumb to the desire to be God. I have recognized at least three ways that women struggle for a deified position.