INTRODUCTION
⚖ Most scholars today agree that women internationally step by step became second rate citizens and lost all their power, autonomy, independence, rights and consistently assigned a passive role in the society as soon as Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and especially Islam) became widespread. The gendering of those religions is oppressively male . The creator in Genesis is presented as an Old Male Sovereign Outsider who relate to the world by way of command. It is a male story of power, a story of hierarchical command and control. Religious discrimination against women is still alive and thriving! The texts of the Torah, Bible and Quran preach discrimination against women, degradation and subjugation of women, and even violence against women! They teach that women are not only inferior, but also must obey men, because God tells us that men are their masters.
The texts of these so-called holy books systematically ensure a second-class status for women! And all these things are forced upon us by a Loving God, and preached by the prophets of this very same Loving God. Jews, Christians, and Muslims all berate women for causing humanity to be driven out of paradise. As a result of the original sin of the first woman, people lost the gift of immortality, had to work hard to find food, and were no longer blessed with the ability to interact directly with God Genesis, chapter 3. The fault of this first and original sin rests heavily upon the shoulders of womankind, justifying all manner of religion-justified nastiness directed against them.
The Quran tells the followers of Islam that women are inferior to men, and require punishment for even suspected disobedience...
Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. Then if they obey you, seek not a way against them. Lo! Allah is ever High, Exalted, Great.
Quran 4:34
This verse in the Quran has done more than any other to justify discrimination against women, to justify their inferior position, as well as actually encouraging violence against women.
ORTHODOX JEWISH MORNING PRAYER:
Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the universe,
who did not make me a Gentile,
who did not make me a Slave,
who did not make me a Woman.
As mentioned earlier religious discrimination against women is still alive and thriving even today, in the 21st century! This prayer is said every morning by many fundamentalist Jewish men around the world and it is just one of many examples to show the hierarchical command and control of Abrahamic religions. Women here are viewed as inferior as Slaves and God is portrayed as a Sovereign Male King of the Universe.
Bible:
Verses that are quoted below are from the revised New International Version of the Bible, a favorite of evangelicals who describe themselves as liberal. Similar verses from Torah, Older Testaments and especially Quran are much worse and preach discrimination against women beyond imagination that we are not even going to post their passages here.
TO THE WOMAN GOD SAID:
I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you. Genesis 3:16
A WIFE IS A MAN’S PROPERTY:
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
Exodus 20:17
DAUGHTERS CAN BE BOUGHT AND SOLD:
If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as male servants do. Exodus 21:7[/INDENT]
A RAPED DAUGHTER CAN BE SOLD TO HER RAPIST:
If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives. Deuteronomy 22:28-29
COLLECTING WIVES AND SEX SLAVES IS A SIGN OF STATUS:
He [Solomon] had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. 1 Kings 11:3
USED BRIDES DESERVE DEATH:
If, however the charge is true and no proof of the girl’s virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. Deuteronomy 22:20-21
WOMEN, BUT ONLY VIRGINS, ARE TO BE TAKEN AS SPOILS OF WAR:
Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. Numbers 31:17-18
MENSTRUATING WOMEN ARE SPIRITUALLY UNCLEAN:
When a woman has her regular flow of blood, the impurity of her monthly period will last seven days, and anyone who touches her will be unclean till evening. Anything she lies on during her period will be unclean, and anything she sits on will be unclean. Anyone who touches her bed will be unclean; they must wash their clothes and bathe with water, and they will be unclean till evening. Anyone who touches anything she sits on will be unclean; they must wash their clothes and bathe with water, . . . The priest is to sacrifice one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering. In this way he will make atonement for her before the LORD for the uncleanness of her discharge. You must keep the Israelites separate from things that make them unclean, so they will not die in their uncleanness for defiling my dwelling place, which is among them. Leviticus 15: 19-31
A WOMAN IS TWICE AS UNCLEAN AFTER GIVING BIRTH TO GIRL AS TO A BOY:
A woman who becomes pregnant and gives birth to a son will be ceremonially unclean for seven days, just as she is unclean during her monthly period. ‘ On the eighth day the boy is to be circumcised. Then the woman must wait thirty-three days to be purified from her bleeding. She must not touch anything sacred or go to the sanctuary until the days of her purification are over. If she gives birth to a daughter, for two weeks the woman will be unclean, as during her period. Then she must wait sixty-six days to be purified from her bleeding. ‘When the days of her purification for a son or daughter are over, she is to bring to the priest at the entrance to the tent of meeting a year-old lamb for a burnt offering and a young pigeon or a dove for a sin offering. Leviticus 12: 1-8
A WOMAN’S PROMISE IS BINDING ONLY IF HER FATHER OR HUSBAND AGREES:
When a man makes a vow to the LORD or takes an oath to obligate himself by a pledge, he must not break his word but must do everything he said. When a young woman still living in her father’s household makes a vow to the LORD or obligates herself by a pledge and her father hears about her vow or pledge but says nothing to her, then all her vows and every pledge by which she obligated herself will stand. But if her father forbids her when he hears about it, none of her vows or the pledges by which she obligated herself will stand; the LORD will release her because her father has forbidden her. . . . . A woman’s vow is meaningless unless approved by her husband or father. But if her husband nullifies them when he hears about them, then none of the vows or pledges that came from her lips will stand. Her husband has nullified them, and the LORD will release her. Her husband may confirm or nullify any vow she makes or any sworn pledge to deny herself. Numbers 30:1-16
WOMEN SHOULD BE SEEN NOT HEARD:
Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. 1 Corinthians 14:34
WIVES SHOULD SUBMIT TO THEIR HUSBAND’S INSTRUCTIONS AND DESIRES:
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Colossians 3:18
IN CASE YOU MISSED THAT SUBMISSION THING:
Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Ephesians 5:22-24
MORE SUBMISSION – AND CHILDBEARING AS A FORM OF ATONEMENT:
A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety. 1 Timothy 2: 11-15
WOMEN WERE CREATED FOR MEN:
For if a woman does not cover her head, she might as well have her hair cut off; but if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, then she should cover her head. A man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man. For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. 1 Corinthians 11:2-10
SLEEPING WITH WOMEN IS DIRTY:
No one could learn the song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for they remained virgins. They follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They were purchased from among mankind and offered as first-fruits to God and the Lamb. Revelation 14:3-4
This short list above is just a sampling of the Bible verses that either instruct or illustrate proper relationships between men and women. Fundamentalists believe that the texts of Torah, Bible and Quran are the literally perfect word of the Almighty, essentially dictated by God to the writers. To believe that these holy books is the literally perfect word of God is to believe that women are tainted seductresses who must be controlled by men.
Traditional rules that govern male-female relationships are grounded more in property rights than civil rights. Men essentially have ownership of women, whose lives are scripted to serve an end—bearing offspring. It is very important to men that they know whose progeny they are raising, so sexual morality has focused primarily on controlling women’s sex activity and maintaining their purity and value as assets. Traditional gender roles and rules evolved on the presumption that women don’t have control over their fertility. In other words, modern contraception radically changed a social compact that had existed for literally thousands of years.
Some people don’t welcome change. Modern scholars now challenge such fundamentals as a historical Adam and the special status that Abraham’s God gave to straight males. Fundamentalists are fighting desperately to hang on to certainties and privileges they once saw as an Abrahamic birthright. If they can’t keep women in line, it’s all over. The future ends up in the hands of cultural creatives, scientists, artists, inquiring minds, and girls. It’s horrifying.
