The Woman's Bible
Encyclopedia
The Woman's Bible is a two-part book, written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton
and a committee of 26 women, and published in 1895 and 1898 to challenge the traditional position of religious orthodoxy that woman should be subservient to man
. By producing the book, Stanton wished to promote a radical liberating theology
, one that stressed self-development. The book attracted a great deal of controversy and antagonism at its introduction.
Many women's rights
activists who worked with Stanton were opposed to the publication of The Woman's Bible; they felt it would harm the drive for women's suffrage
. Although it was never accepted by Bible
scholars as a major work, it became a popular best-seller, much to the dismay of suffragists who worked alongside Stanton within the National American Woman Suffrage Association
(NAWSA). Susan B. Anthony
tried to calm the younger suffragists, but they issued a formal denunciation of the book, and worked to distance the suffrage movement from Stanton's broader scope which included attacks on traditional religion. Because of the widespread negative reaction, including suffragists who had been close to her, publication of the book effectively ended Stanton's influence in the suffrage movement.
countered those who would put her in her place by quoting other Bible passages, or by challenging the original interpretation of the scripture. In 1849, Mott wrote Discourse on Woman which discussed Adam and Eve
, the activities of various women who appear in the Bible, and argued that the Bible supported woman's right to speak aloud her spiritual beliefs. Independently from Mott, Lucy Stone
determined for herself that the male-dominant interpretations of the Bible must be faulty—she worked to learn Greek and Hebrew and thereby gain insight into the earlier Bible translations which she believed would contain wording more favorable to women's equality. In New York, aided by Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton helped draft the Declaration of Sentiments
in 1848 and included two Resolutions which protested against man's usurpation of rights relating to her position in church and to her role under God. By the 1850s, Mott had become expert at disarming men who used Scripture against her. At the National Women's Rights Convention
in 1852, and again in 1854, she stood up to debate men who came prepared with Scripture in hand. Reverend Henry Grew
told the 1854 convention audience that the Bible proved men were naturally superior to women. He was countered point-by-point by Hannah Tracy Cutler
, then in broad societal and political terms by Mott who began by saying: "It is not Christianity
, but priestcraft that has subjected woman as we find her. The Church and State have been united, and it is well for us to see it so."
In 1881, 1885 and 1894, the Church of England
published a Revised Version
of the Bible, the first new English version in over two centuries. Stanton was dissatisfied with the Revised Version's failure to include recent scholarship from Bible expert Julia Smith. She wrote:
Stanton assembled a "Revising Committee" to draft commentary on the new Bible version. Many of those she approached in person and by letter refused to take part, especially scholars who would be risking their professional reputations. Some 26 people agreed to help. Sharing Stanton's determination, the committee wished to correct biblical interpretation which was biased against women, and to bring attention to the small fraction of the Bible which discussed women. They intended to demonstrate that it was not divine will that humiliated women, but human desire for domination. The committee was made up of women who were not Bible scholars, but who were interested in biblical interpretation and were active in women's rights. Among the more famous members of the international committee were Augusta Jane Chapin
, Lillie Devereux Blake, Matilda Joslyn Gage
, Olympia Brown
, Alexandra Gripenberg
, Ursula Mellor Bright
and Irma von Troll-Borostyáni.
In 1890 at the formation of the National American Woman Suffrage Association
(NAWSA), Stanton was elected president. She left such duties to Susan B. Anthony and instead traveled to Europe for two years. While there she met with women who shared her views, and she gathered critical observations about the place of woman in the Bible. In Greenbank, Bristol
, Stanton met with English suffragist Helen Bright Clark
, and spoke to a group about the Bible position of woman. Clark questioned whether Stanton's liberal views had shocked some in attendance, and Stanton replied: "Well, if we who do see the absurdities of the old superstitions never unveil them to others, how is the world to make any progress in the theologies? I am in the sunset of life, and I feel it to be my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear ..."
In 1893, Matilda Joslyn Gage took time out from her participation in the Revising Committee to write Woman, Church and State, a book which challenged traditional Judeo-Christian teaching that women were the source of sin, and that sex was sinful. Gage wrote that the double standard for morality hurt both sexes. Gage differed from most of the women on the Revising Committee in that she did not feel that the Bible, once interpreted in a more true, original form, would support women's rights. Gage determined that the Church had acted against women's interests in important ways: from Roman Catholic canon law, to Scripture, to its advocacy of celibacy and more. Especially troubling to Gage was the story of Adam and Eve.
On August 1, 1895, the first part of The Woman's Bible was published, covering the Pentateuch
(the first five books of the Bible): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers
, and Deuteronomy. The text went through seven printings in six months; it was a best-seller. In January 1898, the second part was published, covering the rest of the Old Testament
as well as all of the New Testament
. It included a Preface written by Stanton in which she acknowledged that "Both friend and foe object to the title." Nevertheless, she praised the Revising Committee for showing "a more worshipful reverence for the great Spirit of All Good than does the Church." Stanton wrote:"We have made a fetich of the Bible long enough. The time has come to read it as we do all other books, accepting the good and rejecting the evil it teaches."
..." Some were put off just by its prejudicial, sacrilegious title, especially those who did not take the time to read the book. Others countered the book's more extreme conclusions one by one in public fora such as letters to the editor
. One female reader of The New York Times
wrote to decry The Woman's Bible for its radical statements that the Trinity
was composed of "a Heavenly Mother, Father, and Son", and that prayers should be addressed to an "ideal Heavenly Mother". Mary Seymour Howell, a member of the Revising Committee, wrote to The New York Times in defense of the book, saying that its title could be better understood as "The Woman's Commentary on the Women of the Bible". Stanton countered attacks by women readers, writing "the only difference between us is, we say that these degrading ideas of woman emanated from the brain of man, while the church says that they came from God."
Susan B. Anthony, Stanton's best and most faithful collaborator, concluded after years of working for women's rights that the concentration on one issue—votes for women—was the key to bringing success to the movement. The women's organizations had too varied a membership to agree on anything more complex. Stanton insisted, however, that the women's rights conventions were too narrowly focused; she brought forward a variety of challenging concepts in the form of essays for Anthony to read to the audiences. When Stanton made known her interest in completing The Woman's Bible, Anthony was unhappy at the futility of the effort, a harmful digression from the focused path which led to woman suffrage. Anthony wrote to Clara Colby to say of Stanton "of all her great speeches, I am always proud—but of her Bible commentaries, I am not proud—either of their spirit or letter ... But I shall love and honor her to the end—whether her Bible please me or not. So I hope she will do for me."
At the NAWSA convention January 23–28, 1896, Corresponding Secretary Rachel Foster Avery
led the battle to distance the organization from The Woman's Bible. After Susan B. Anthony opened the convention on January 23, Avery surprised Anthony by stating to the more than 100 members of the audience: Avery called for a resolution: "That this Association is non-sectarian, being composed of persons of all shades of religious opinion, and that it has no connection with the so-called 'Woman's Bible', or any theological publication." The motion was tabled until later, and motions were made to strike Avery's comments from the official record. A complete account of Avery's remarks were reported the next day in The New York Times.
The opinion of NAWSA delegate Laura Clay
, expressed in her Southern Committee report on January 27 that "the South
is ready for woman suffrage, but it must be woman suffrage and nothing else," was typical of responses to The Woman's Bible conflict. Most suffragists wanted only to work on the right to vote, "without attaching it to dress reform, or bicycling, or anything else ..."
On the afternoon of January 28, a list of Resolutions was put to a vote. The first seven were passed without comment. The eighth was Avery's proposed dissociation with The Woman's Bible, and its presence caused an active debate. Anna Howard Shaw
, Alice Stone Blackwell
, Henry Browne Blackwell, Carrie Chapman Catt
and others spoke in favor, while Lillie Devereux Blake, Clara B. Colby, and more spoke against it. Anthony left her chair to join the debate against the resolution, and spoke at length, saying "Lucretia Mott at first thought Mrs. Stanton had injured the cause of woman's rights by insisting on the demand for woman suffrage, but she had sense enough not to pass a resolution about it ..." A majority of 53 to 41 delegates approved the resolution, an action which was seen as a censure of Stanton, and one which was never repealed. Avery's opening report of January 23 was adopted with the part about The Woman's Bible expunged.
Stanton did not attend the 1896 convention; she was 80 years old, obese, and bedridden. She acknowledged the controversy stirred by the publication of the first part, but continued writing the second part of the book, and she worked on her autobiography Eighty Years & More: Reminiscences 1815–1897. She wrote to her longtime friend Reverend Antoinette Brown Blackwell in April, 1896 to observe: "Our politicians are calm and complacent under our fire but the clergy jump round the moment you aim a pop gun at them 'like parched peas on a hot skillet'".
in the Bible until 1964 when Margaret Brackenbury Crook published Women and Religion, a study of the status of women in Judaism
and Christianity. Subsequent works by Letty Russell and Phyllis Trible furthered the connection between feminism
and the Bible. Today, biblical scholarship by women has come into maturity, with women posing new questions about the Bible, and challenging the very basis of biblical studies
.
Stanton herself was marginalized in the women's suffrage movement after publication of The Woman's Bible. From that time forward, Susan B. Anthony took the place of honor among the majority of suffragettes. Stanton was never again invited to sit in a place of honor on stage at the NAWSA convention.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early woman's movement...
and a committee of 26 women, and published in 1895 and 1898 to challenge the traditional position of religious orthodoxy that woman should be subservient to man
Sexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
. By producing the book, Stanton wished to promote a radical liberating theology
Liberation theology
Liberation theology is a Christian movement in political theology which interprets the teachings of Jesus Christ in terms of a liberation from unjust economic, political, or social conditions...
, one that stressed self-development. The book attracted a great deal of controversy and antagonism at its introduction.
Many women's rights
Women's rights
Women's rights are entitlements and freedoms claimed for women and girls of all ages in many societies.In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behaviour, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed...
activists who worked with Stanton were opposed to the publication of The Woman's Bible; they felt it would harm the drive for women's suffrage
Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage or woman suffrage is the right of women to vote and to run for office. The expression is also used for the economic and political reform movement aimed at extending these rights to women and without any restrictions or qualifications such as property ownership, payment of tax, or...
. Although it was never accepted by Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
scholars as a major work, it became a popular best-seller, much to the dismay of suffragists who worked alongside Stanton within the National American Woman Suffrage Association
National American Woman Suffrage Association
The National American Woman Suffrage Association was an American women's rights organization formed in May 1890 as a unification of the National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association...
(NAWSA). Susan B. Anthony
Susan B. Anthony
Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. She was co-founder of the first Women's Temperance Movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as President...
tried to calm the younger suffragists, but they issued a formal denunciation of the book, and worked to distance the suffrage movement from Stanton's broader scope which included attacks on traditional religion. Because of the widespread negative reaction, including suffragists who had been close to her, publication of the book effectively ended Stanton's influence in the suffrage movement.
Background
In the early 19th century advocates of women's rights began to accumulate rebuttals to arguments used against them founded on traditional interpretations of Bible scriptures. Lucretia MottLucretia Mott
Lucretia Coffin Mott was an American Quaker, abolitionist, social reformer, and proponent of women's rights.- Early life and education:...
countered those who would put her in her place by quoting other Bible passages, or by challenging the original interpretation of the scripture. In 1849, Mott wrote Discourse on Woman which discussed Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve were, according to the Genesis creation narratives, the first human couple to inhabit Earth, created by YHWH, the God of the ancient Hebrews...
, the activities of various women who appear in the Bible, and argued that the Bible supported woman's right to speak aloud her spiritual beliefs. Independently from Mott, Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone was a prominent American abolitionist and suffragist, and a vocal advocate and organizer promoting rights for women. In 1847, Stone was the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a college degree. She spoke out for women's rights and against slavery at a time when women were discouraged...
determined for herself that the male-dominant interpretations of the Bible must be faulty—she worked to learn Greek and Hebrew and thereby gain insight into the earlier Bible translations which she believed would contain wording more favorable to women's equality. In New York, aided by Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton helped draft the Declaration of Sentiments
Declaration of Sentiments
The Declaration of Sentiments, also known as the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments, is a document signed in 1848 by 68 women and 32 men, 100 out of some 300 attendees at the first women's rights convention, in Seneca Falls, New York, now known as the Seneca Falls Convention...
in 1848 and included two Resolutions which protested against man's usurpation of rights relating to her position in church and to her role under God. By the 1850s, Mott had become expert at disarming men who used Scripture against her. At the National Women's Rights Convention
National Women's Rights Convention
The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the National Women's Rights Convention combined both male and female leadership, and...
in 1852, and again in 1854, she stood up to debate men who came prepared with Scripture in hand. Reverend Henry Grew
Henry Grew
Henry Grew was a Christian teacher and writer whose studies of the Bible led him to conclusions which were at odds with doctrines accepted by many of the mainstream churches of his time...
told the 1854 convention audience that the Bible proved men were naturally superior to women. He was countered point-by-point by Hannah Tracy Cutler
Hannah Tracy Cutler
Hannah Maria Conant Tracy Cutler was an abolitionist as well as a leader of the temperance and women's suffrage movements in the United States. Cutler served as president of the Ohio Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association...
, then in broad societal and political terms by Mott who began by saying: "It is not Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
, but priestcraft that has subjected woman as we find her. The Church and State have been united, and it is well for us to see it so."
Revising Committee
Church of England
The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...
published a Revised Version
Revised Version
The Revised Version of the Bible is a late 19th-century British revision of the King James Version of 1611. It was the first and remains the only officially authorized and recognized revision of the King James Bible. The work was entrusted to over 50 scholars from various denominations in Britain...
of the Bible, the first new English version in over two centuries. Stanton was dissatisfied with the Revised Version's failure to include recent scholarship from Bible expert Julia Smith. She wrote:
Stanton assembled a "Revising Committee" to draft commentary on the new Bible version. Many of those she approached in person and by letter refused to take part, especially scholars who would be risking their professional reputations. Some 26 people agreed to help. Sharing Stanton's determination, the committee wished to correct biblical interpretation which was biased against women, and to bring attention to the small fraction of the Bible which discussed women. They intended to demonstrate that it was not divine will that humiliated women, but human desire for domination. The committee was made up of women who were not Bible scholars, but who were interested in biblical interpretation and were active in women's rights. Among the more famous members of the international committee were Augusta Jane Chapin
Augusta Jane Chapin
Augusta Jane Chapin was a Universalist minister, educator and activist for women's rights. She was born in Lakeville, New York, the eldest of eleven children, to Almon Morris Chapin and Jane Pease....
, Lillie Devereux Blake, Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Electa Joslyn Gage was a suffragist, a Native American activist, an abolitionist, a freethinker, and a prolific author, who was "born with a hatred of oppression".-Early activities:...
, Olympia Brown
Olympia Brown
Olympia Brown was an American suffragist. She is regarded as the first woman to graduate from a theological school, as well as becoming the first full time ordained minister...
, Alexandra Gripenberg
Alexandra Gripenberg
Alexandra Gripenberg, also known as Alexandra van Grippenberg, was a Finnish social activist, author, editor, newspaper publisher, and elected politician, and was a leading voice within the movement for women's rights in Finland at the turn of the 20th century...
, Ursula Mellor Bright
Ursula Mellor Bright
Ursula Mellor Bright was a women's suffrage campaigner.Her father was Liverpool merchant Joseph Mellor; he died when Ursula was very young. Her mother married Thomas Blackburn, a Liverpool surgeon. She was a daughter of John Pennington of Hindley, Lancashire...
and Irma von Troll-Borostyáni.
In 1890 at the formation of the National American Woman Suffrage Association
National American Woman Suffrage Association
The National American Woman Suffrage Association was an American women's rights organization formed in May 1890 as a unification of the National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association...
(NAWSA), Stanton was elected president. She left such duties to Susan B. Anthony and instead traveled to Europe for two years. While there she met with women who shared her views, and she gathered critical observations about the place of woman in the Bible. In Greenbank, Bristol
Greenbank, Bristol
Greenbank is a small informal district in the city of Bristol, England nestling between Easton to the south, Eastville to the west and north west, Fishponds, Clay Bottom and Rose Green to the north, and Whitehall to the east. It is however part of the official Easton Ward for elections...
, Stanton met with English suffragist Helen Bright Clark
Helen Bright Clark
Helen Bright Clark was a British women's rights activist and suffragist. The daughter of a radical Member of Parliament, Clark was a prominent speaker for women's voting rights and at times a political realist who served as a mainstay of the 19th century suffrage movement in South West England...
, and spoke to a group about the Bible position of woman. Clark questioned whether Stanton's liberal views had shocked some in attendance, and Stanton replied: "Well, if we who do see the absurdities of the old superstitions never unveil them to others, how is the world to make any progress in the theologies? I am in the sunset of life, and I feel it to be my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear ..."
On August 1, 1895, the first part of The Woman's Bible was published, covering the Pentateuch
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
(the first five books of the Bible): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers
Book of Numbers
The Book of Numbers is the fourth book of the Hebrew Bible, and the fourth of five books of the Jewish Torah/Pentateuch....
, and Deuteronomy. The text went through seven printings in six months; it was a best-seller. In January 1898, the second part was published, covering the rest of the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
as well as all of the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
. It included a Preface written by Stanton in which she acknowledged that "Both friend and foe object to the title." Nevertheless, she praised the Revising Committee for showing "a more worshipful reverence for the great Spirit of All Good than does the Church." Stanton wrote:"We have made a fetich of the Bible long enough. The time has come to read it as we do all other books, accepting the good and rejecting the evil it teaches."
Reaction
At its introduction, The Woman's Bible was widely criticized in editorials and from the pulpit. Stanton wrote that "the clergy denounced it as the work of SatanSatan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
..." Some were put off just by its prejudicial, sacrilegious title, especially those who did not take the time to read the book. Others countered the book's more extreme conclusions one by one in public fora such as letters to the editor
Letter to the editor
A letter to the editor is a letter sent to a publication about issues of concern from its readers. Usually, letters are intended for publication...
. One female reader of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
wrote to decry The Woman's Bible for its radical statements that the Trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
was composed of "a Heavenly Mother, Father, and Son", and that prayers should be addressed to an "ideal Heavenly Mother". Mary Seymour Howell, a member of the Revising Committee, wrote to The New York Times in defense of the book, saying that its title could be better understood as "The Woman's Commentary on the Women of the Bible". Stanton countered attacks by women readers, writing "the only difference between us is, we say that these degrading ideas of woman emanated from the brain of man, while the church says that they came from God."
Susan B. Anthony, Stanton's best and most faithful collaborator, concluded after years of working for women's rights that the concentration on one issue—votes for women—was the key to bringing success to the movement. The women's organizations had too varied a membership to agree on anything more complex. Stanton insisted, however, that the women's rights conventions were too narrowly focused; she brought forward a variety of challenging concepts in the form of essays for Anthony to read to the audiences. When Stanton made known her interest in completing The Woman's Bible, Anthony was unhappy at the futility of the effort, a harmful digression from the focused path which led to woman suffrage. Anthony wrote to Clara Colby to say of Stanton "of all her great speeches, I am always proud—but of her Bible commentaries, I am not proud—either of their spirit or letter ... But I shall love and honor her to the end—whether her Bible please me or not. So I hope she will do for me."
At the NAWSA convention January 23–28, 1896, Corresponding Secretary Rachel Foster Avery
Rachel Foster Avery
Rachel Foster Avery was a corresponding secretary of the National American Woman Suffrage Association during the late 19th century.-Biography:...
led the battle to distance the organization from The Woman's Bible. After Susan B. Anthony opened the convention on January 23, Avery surprised Anthony by stating to the more than 100 members of the audience: Avery called for a resolution: "That this Association is non-sectarian, being composed of persons of all shades of religious opinion, and that it has no connection with the so-called 'Woman's Bible', or any theological publication." The motion was tabled until later, and motions were made to strike Avery's comments from the official record. A complete account of Avery's remarks were reported the next day in The New York Times.
The opinion of NAWSA delegate Laura Clay
Laura Clay
Laura Clay , co-founder and first president of the Kentucky Equal Rights Association, was a leader of the American women’s suffrage movement...
, expressed in her Southern Committee report on January 27 that "the South
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
is ready for woman suffrage, but it must be woman suffrage and nothing else," was typical of responses to The Woman's Bible conflict. Most suffragists wanted only to work on the right to vote, "without attaching it to dress reform, or bicycling, or anything else ..."
On the afternoon of January 28, a list of Resolutions was put to a vote. The first seven were passed without comment. The eighth was Avery's proposed dissociation with The Woman's Bible, and its presence caused an active debate. Anna Howard Shaw
Anna Howard Shaw
Anna Howard Shaw was a leader of the women's suffrage movement in the United States. She was also a physician and the first ordained female Methodist minister in the United States. Her birthday is celebrated as Anna Howard Shaw Day, as an alternative to St. Valentine's Day.-Early Life:Shaw was...
, Alice Stone Blackwell
Alice Stone Blackwell
Alice Stone Blackwell was an American feminist, journalist and human rights advocate.-Biography:The daughter of Henry Brown Blackwell and Lucy Stone, she was born in East Orange, New Jersey....
, Henry Browne Blackwell, Carrie Chapman Catt
Carrie Chapman Catt
Carrie Chapman Catt was a women's suffrage leader who campaigned for the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution which gave U.S. women the right to vote in 1920...
and others spoke in favor, while Lillie Devereux Blake, Clara B. Colby, and more spoke against it. Anthony left her chair to join the debate against the resolution, and spoke at length, saying "Lucretia Mott at first thought Mrs. Stanton had injured the cause of woman's rights by insisting on the demand for woman suffrage, but she had sense enough not to pass a resolution about it ..." A majority of 53 to 41 delegates approved the resolution, an action which was seen as a censure of Stanton, and one which was never repealed. Avery's opening report of January 23 was adopted with the part about The Woman's Bible expunged.
Stanton did not attend the 1896 convention; she was 80 years old, obese, and bedridden. She acknowledged the controversy stirred by the publication of the first part, but continued writing the second part of the book, and she worked on her autobiography Eighty Years & More: Reminiscences 1815–1897. She wrote to her longtime friend Reverend Antoinette Brown Blackwell in April, 1896 to observe: "Our politicians are calm and complacent under our fire but the clergy jump round the moment you aim a pop gun at them 'like parched peas on a hot skillet'".
Legacy
Stanton wished for a greater degree of scholarship in The Woman's Bible, but was unable to convince Bible scholars of her day to take part in what was expected to be a controversial project. Scholars continued to avoid addressing the subject of sexismSexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
in the Bible until 1964 when Margaret Brackenbury Crook published Women and Religion, a study of the status of women in Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
and Christianity. Subsequent works by Letty Russell and Phyllis Trible furthered the connection between feminism
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
and the Bible. Today, biblical scholarship by women has come into maturity, with women posing new questions about the Bible, and challenging the very basis of biblical studies
Biblical studies
Biblical studies is the academic study of the Judeo-Christian Bible and related texts. For Christianity, the Bible traditionally comprises the New Testament and Old Testament, which together are sometimes called the "Scriptures." Judaism recognizes as scripture only the Hebrew Bible, also known as...
.
Stanton herself was marginalized in the women's suffrage movement after publication of The Woman's Bible. From that time forward, Susan B. Anthony took the place of honor among the majority of suffragettes. Stanton was never again invited to sit in a place of honor on stage at the NAWSA convention.
External links
- The Woman's Bible at American Treasures of the Library of Congress
- Draft of Elizabeth Cady Stanton's The Woman's Bible, ca. 1895., 151 pages scanned, Library of Congress
- The Woman's Bible at Project Gutenberg