About the Author
Sarah S. Forth earned an M.A. in Religion from the Earlham School of Religion in Richmond, Indiana, and a Ph.D. in Theology with an emphasis in women’s studies in religion from the joint doctoral program of Northwestern University and Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois.
She has taught courses in biblical studies, eco-feminism, spirituality, theology, and world religions. She was an assistant professor in the M.A. Program in Feminist Spirituality at the Immaculate Heart College Center, Los Angeles, and adjunct faculty at California Lutheran University, Thousand Oaks, and the University of California, Los Angeles. Sarah’s interest in religion is more than academic, however.
In Eve’s Bible she describes how she became interested in the Bible.
I had been living in a yoga ashram for about four years when I picked up the Bible and was startled by how familiar it sounded. The rebellious followers of Moses in the wilderness and the dim-witted disciples of that rabbi, Jesus: I knew those guys! They were all around me in the ashram. In fact, I was one of them: anxious to touch the Divine, falling short in my efforts, whining, miffed, mystified.
As much as I liked the ashram, I decided it was time to check out my own religious tradition and see what more it had to offer. Eighteen months later, I was enrolled at a tiny Quaker seminary taking my first course in the Hebrew Bible. That was more than 25 years ago.
I wish I could say that first moment of recognition was the start of a long, satisfying love affair with the Bible, but honestly? I’ve been more than a little ambivalent about this relationship.
To me, the Bible’s stories about women nestle inside one another like Russian matreshki dolls. My immediate response to the Bible’s focus on men was, “Unfair!” But when I looked closer at the women who were there, I got excited. There were women prophets, a queen or two, pious and spunky heroines, and protective mothers.
But wait a minute. Some of these women are less than ethical–they lie, trick, steal, and deceive–and too many are victims. Something felt terribly wrong.
Then I realized that even the “good” women were valued primarily for their capacity to bear children. And those tricksters? They, too, were merely part of the plan to continue the male line.
But that still wasn’t the whole story. Looking yet again, I discerned something subversive about some of these women. They may have played their part in the patriarchal game plan, but at times they turned it on its head.
Ultimately I concluded that if I read cautiously, there was enough to salvage and use.
Sarah has written Eve’s Bible to help other women decide what meaning biblical writings have for them.