And Also Some Women
June 16, 2023 5:14 AM Subscribe
Hosts Junia Joplin and Anne Thériault recently finished their 5 episode podcast And Also Some Women, which examines the stories of biblical women with a lively assortment of guests and scholars of feminist theology.
This is the first podcast from Broadview, the oldest continuously published magazine in North America. The progressive Christian publication, which is affiliated with The United Church of Canada, focuses on stories about spirituality, justice and ethical living.
In addition to the podcast audio (about 30 minutes per episode), each episode page below includes a link to a PDF transcript of the episode, as well as links to sources and transcripts of the full interviews with each guest.
Episode 001 - Mary Magdalene discusses the many characterizations of Mary Magdalene, and how general perceptions of her diverge from the biblical text. Guests include preacher and historian of Christianity Diana Butler Bass; biblical scholar Elizabeth Schrader Polczer; and life coach, sex worker and former pastor Nikole Mitchell.
Episode 002 - Bad Girls of the Bible: Jezebel, Delilah and Salome reexamines three women from the Bible associated with schemes, promiscuity and deception, and evaluates the basis of those reputations. Guests include professor of the Bible Amy Kalmanofsky; former dominatrix, writer and editor with a focus on Jewish life Rivka Gheist; and professor of religion F. Scott Spencer.
Episode 003 - Mary, Mother of Jesus examines the way Mary's politics may have shaped Jesus' narrative and the way the church has used her virginity to enforce patriarchal values. Guests include AJ Levine who teaches at Hartford International University for Religion and Peace; Anglican priest and professor of the New Testament Dorothy Lee; and Dominican sister and president of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago Sister Barbara Reid.
Episode 004 - Old Testament Women: Miriam, Deborah, Esther highlights three women of the Old Testament who get relatively little attention in Christianity, despite stories involving escape, murder and sabotage. Guests include
professor of religion and also women, sexuality and gender studies Susan Ackerman; author of Transforming: The Bible and the Live of Transgender Christians and the executive director of Transmission Ministry Collective Austen Hartke; and professor Marion Taylor, who teaches the Old Testament.
Episode 005 - All About Eve goes back to the beginning, and offers some alternate interpretations of what the Old Testament tells us happened in the garden of eden. Guests include professor of classical Judaica Reuven Kimelman and doctoral student at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago River Needham.
This is the first podcast from Broadview, the oldest continuously published magazine in North America. The progressive Christian publication, which is affiliated with The United Church of Canada, focuses on stories about spirituality, justice and ethical living.
In addition to the podcast audio (about 30 minutes per episode), each episode page below includes a link to a PDF transcript of the episode, as well as links to sources and transcripts of the full interviews with each guest.
Episode 001 - Mary Magdalene discusses the many characterizations of Mary Magdalene, and how general perceptions of her diverge from the biblical text. Guests include preacher and historian of Christianity Diana Butler Bass; biblical scholar Elizabeth Schrader Polczer; and life coach, sex worker and former pastor Nikole Mitchell.
Episode 002 - Bad Girls of the Bible: Jezebel, Delilah and Salome reexamines three women from the Bible associated with schemes, promiscuity and deception, and evaluates the basis of those reputations. Guests include professor of the Bible Amy Kalmanofsky; former dominatrix, writer and editor with a focus on Jewish life Rivka Gheist; and professor of religion F. Scott Spencer.
Episode 003 - Mary, Mother of Jesus examines the way Mary's politics may have shaped Jesus' narrative and the way the church has used her virginity to enforce patriarchal values. Guests include AJ Levine who teaches at Hartford International University for Religion and Peace; Anglican priest and professor of the New Testament Dorothy Lee; and Dominican sister and president of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago Sister Barbara Reid.
Episode 004 - Old Testament Women: Miriam, Deborah, Esther highlights three women of the Old Testament who get relatively little attention in Christianity, despite stories involving escape, murder and sabotage. Guests include
professor of religion and also women, sexuality and gender studies Susan Ackerman; author of Transforming: The Bible and the Live of Transgender Christians and the executive director of Transmission Ministry Collective Austen Hartke; and professor Marion Taylor, who teaches the Old Testament.
Episode 005 - All About Eve goes back to the beginning, and offers some alternate interpretations of what the Old Testament tells us happened in the garden of eden. Guests include professor of classical Judaica Reuven Kimelman and doctoral student at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago River Needham.
I would be very interested to know if they cover the Apostle Junia, notable for being a female Apostle, and also being misnamed and misgendered in many modern translations of the Bible. Lots of very difficult questions to dig into prompted by Junia.
posted by Merus at 5:33 AM on June 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Merus at 5:33 AM on June 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
Also, I promise to give other people a chance to talk, but note that many of the guests approach these topics from a Jewish perspective. I don't think I adequately captured that in the post, so apologies there.
I haven't gotten to listen to all five episodes yet, but I really appreciated their approach in linking to source documents and providing full interviews with the guests. They also have discussion questions on each page. That might feel a little "youth pastor voice" and alienating to recovering bible study camp survivors, but I like having the leads for follow up research so readily available.
posted by the primroses were over at 5:59 AM on June 16, 2023
I haven't gotten to listen to all five episodes yet, but I really appreciated their approach in linking to source documents and providing full interviews with the guests. They also have discussion questions on each page. That might feel a little "youth pastor voice" and alienating to recovering bible study camp survivors, but I like having the leads for follow up research so readily available.
posted by the primroses were over at 5:59 AM on June 16, 2023
Mary the Tower is a pretty wonderful handle.
posted by Lookinguppy at 7:18 AM on June 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Lookinguppy at 7:18 AM on June 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
Thanks for posting this. I've only listened to the first episode so far, but looking forward to the rest. I've read a couple of Diana Butler Bass's books recently and found them interesting. I haven't read her People's History of Christianity, which I see is on archive.org.
Fascinated to hear there is a Complete Idiot's Guide to Mary Magdalene!
Beth Allison Barr's book The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth talks about both Mary Magdalene and Junia, among others.
posted by paduasoy at 5:15 PM on June 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
Fascinated to hear there is a Complete Idiot's Guide to Mary Magdalene!
Beth Allison Barr's book The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth talks about both Mary Magdalene and Junia, among others.
posted by paduasoy at 5:15 PM on June 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
Listened to all episodes now. I hope they get a chance to make more.
I definitely preferred the episodes that focused on one character at a time. The episodes with three stories felt fairly superficial, and only gave one guest's perspective on each story. Still some good bits to be found in each, but the episodes on Mary Magdalene, the Virgin Mary and Eve were noticably richer.
I really liked the discussion of Eve and the idea that gender roles/gender inequality is part of being in a cursed, fallen world. Another section that got my attention and merits further reading on my part is the segment talking about the ways feminist theologians have misrepresented the history of that period of Judaica in an effort to position Jesus as more feminist than textual evidence actually supports (from the Virgin Mary episode).
I'm a religious studies dilettante at best, but this kind of textual analysis of the literary and historical aspects of religious texts is always interesting to me.
Looks like I can get that Beth Allison Barr book from my library, so thanks for the suggestion paduasoy. I also have Women in the Qur'an: An Emancipatory Reading on my to read list. I think it would be fascinating to include some Muslim scholars if they get to do a second season of this podcast.
posted by the primroses were over at 6:05 AM on June 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
I definitely preferred the episodes that focused on one character at a time. The episodes with three stories felt fairly superficial, and only gave one guest's perspective on each story. Still some good bits to be found in each, but the episodes on Mary Magdalene, the Virgin Mary and Eve were noticably richer.
I really liked the discussion of Eve and the idea that gender roles/gender inequality is part of being in a cursed, fallen world. Another section that got my attention and merits further reading on my part is the segment talking about the ways feminist theologians have misrepresented the history of that period of Judaica in an effort to position Jesus as more feminist than textual evidence actually supports (from the Virgin Mary episode).
I'm a religious studies dilettante at best, but this kind of textual analysis of the literary and historical aspects of religious texts is always interesting to me.
Looks like I can get that Beth Allison Barr book from my library, so thanks for the suggestion paduasoy. I also have Women in the Qur'an: An Emancipatory Reading on my to read list. I think it would be fascinating to include some Muslim scholars if they get to do a second season of this podcast.
posted by the primroses were over at 6:05 AM on June 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
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My interest in this podcast is in the textual analysis and history, since I'm personally agnostic, but it obviously also highlights views and interpretations from religious perspectives.
I think critical responses to the ideas brought up by this project could be very interesting, but I'd request that people who just want to complain about the Bible/Christianity/religion in general without engaging with the specific subjects of the podcast (feminist theology, textual analysis of gender in the Bible, history of scriptural analysis, the stories discussed, etc.) remember that there's an open Metatalk thread for tiresome rants.
posted by the primroses were over at 5:24 AM on June 16, 2023 [2 favorites]