A Year of Biblical Womanhood

by Rachel Held Evans

  On that note, I’m really proud of Rachel for taking on this project. It was a good life experience for both of us. Kinda like the time that my best friend Doug and I pushed a stalled car half a mile on the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York in the middle of the night, amidst heavy traffic, until the cops arrived to help. I wouldn’t want to do it again, but it makes for a good story to tell grandchildren someday.

  I’m glad we did it, and I’m glad it’s over.

  Some rabbis say that, at birth, we are each tied to God with a string, and that every time we sin, the string breaks. To those who repent of their sins, especially in the days of Rosh Hashanah, God sends the angel Gabriel to make knots in the string, so that the humble and contrite are once again tied to God. Because each one of us fails, because we all lose our way on the path to righteousness from time to time, our strings are full of knots. But, the rabbis like to say, a string with many knots is shorter than one without knots. So the person with many sins but a humble heart is closer to God.

  At the end of my year of biblical womanhood, my string was full of knots. Like any other year, this one had been full of grudges and judgments, hypocrisy and fear, careless words and forgotten truths. And like any other year, it had yielded surprising moments of forgiveness and grace, insights and friendships. Anne Shirley liked to say that “tomorrow is fresh, with no mistakes in it.”6 And at Rosh Hashanah, the Jews believe, the world gets a fresh start. So, on the final day of the project and the first day of a brand-new year, I made my way to Laurel-Snow wilderness west of town to watch my sins wash away.

  A vast 2,259-acre forest marked by the deep gorges of the Cumberland Plateau, Laurel-Snow was known for years as Pocket Wilderness. If you want to know how long a person’s lived in Rhea County, ask him how well he knows Pocket. For those of us who grew up in this town, the trails and creeks and old mining caves that make up its rugged and verdant landscape are an indelible part of our shared history. I know a lot of people who skipped their first rock across Richland Creek, smoked their first joint at Buzzard Point, and had their first kiss under Laurel Falls. We’ve gotten caught out there in countless thunderstorms. We’ve sprained our ankles on silver maple roots. We’ve gone skinny-dipping in the swimming holes. We know Pocket like we know our mother’s scent . . . so don’t trust anyone who calls it the Laurel-Snow State Natural Area to tell you how to get around.

  Dan and I went together, partly because we needed the four-wheel drive on his Explorer to get up the winding gravel road that leads to the entrance of the forest, but mostly because this was a big day for both of us, and we couldn’t think of a better way to spend it than in each other’s company.

  To my delight, September 30 turned out to be my favorite day of each year: the first day of the season in which you can get away with wearing a sweater. The sun shone brightly in a cloudless fall sky, but a chilly wind whipped through the cove, making all the trees shiver and sigh. Everything felt so alive, so connected. It was as if the earth itself knew that a new year had begun, and it was whispering with excitement.

  We started down the sun-dappled path along the creek, and as any good space should inspire people to do, we looked up. Light poured through the leaves, bright with the first flush of color. Squirrels and birds leapt from limb to limb. The ridge to our right towered over us, making us seem suddenly small in comparison. We passed giant boulders, the old mine shaft, a tree across the path. The creek got louder and louder as we walked along. We were getting closer to the spot I had in mind.

  I wore a sweatshirt and a brimmed, cadet-style hat and carried a handmade wool satchel I’d bought from Marta, the Tabitha of Bolivia. In the satchel was the portion of challah I’d set aside for my sacrifice, which I’d gone ahead and braided and baked so that it looked like a mini loaf of bread, the shofar, and my well-worn copy of the Book of Common Prayer.

  “How about here?” Dan asked as we passed the swimming hole.

  “It needs to be by rushing water,” I said. “I’ve got a spot in mind.”

  “What about this?” he said a few minutes later as we came upon a narrower section of the creek where white water crashed over the mossy rocks.

  “Nope. I know just where I want to go,” I said.

  Finally, I saw it: a wide expanse of water where a path of dry, flat rocks crossed right over the creek and formed a sort of ridge between slow-moving water at the top and the cascading water at the bottom.

  Just as I’d remembered it.

  “This is it!” I said, and we maneuvered our way down the steep bank.

  Dan helped me find the perfect spot—a sunbathed rock right between two little waterfalls—and then went exploring up the creek to give me some privacy for my Tashlich ceremony.

  The Tashlich (literally, “casting”) is a tradition dating back to the Middle Ages in which the sins of the repentant are ceremonially cast into the deep, ever-flowing currents of God’s grace. It is a time of both penitence and celebration as a year’s worth of shortcomings and failures are acknowledged, accepted, and then washed away so that life can begin again, fresh, with no mistakes in it.

  I began my Tashlich ceremony by sounding the shofar, which promptly sent a flock of birds fleeing for their lives. Then I sat down and worked my way through the Litany of Penitence in the Book of Common Prayer, which begins, “Most holy and merciful Father: I confess to you and to the whole communion of saints in heaven and on earth, that I have sinned by my own fault, in thought, word, and deed; by what I have done, and what I have left undone. I have not loved you with my whole heart, and mind, and strength. I have not loved my neighbors as myself. I have not forgiven others as I have been forgiven.”

  Then I took out the challah and began tearing it into little pieces. With each crumb, I acknowledged a sin I’d committed during the year.

  Some of these sins were specific to the project: I’d grown petulant and impatient over simple household tasks, I’d judged other women for choosing lifestyles that differed from my own; I’d complained; I’d indulged; I’d thrown books across the room; I’d put a lot of pennies in that jar; I’d failed to appreciate how much Dan sacrificed for the project and how much crap my friends and family put up with to help me get through; I’d been vain about my appearance and obsessed with trivial things while women around the world suffered from atrocities I could help prevent; I’d held grudges against those who criticized my work; I’d looked down on those who interpreted the Bible differently than I; I’d gotten angry at God and demanded answers rather than simply asking questions with patience and with faith; I still hadn’t taken out my recycling.

  Others were sins that I’ve struggled with all my life: I’d obsessed over what people thought of me; I’d assumed that money would fix everything; I’d failed to listen well; I’d steamrolled; I’d confused my wants with needs; I’d prioritized work over relationships; I’d gossiped; I’d worried; I’d feared; I’d doubted the goodness in others and in myself; I’d done injury to the world through my carelessness, my neglect, my unkind words, and my self-centeredness.

  I held each crumb between my fingers until I had fully forgiven myself for the sin that it represented. Then I cast them, one by one, with abandon, into the rushing water below. Some I held on to longer than others. Some I watched get washed down the river and swirled about in the eddies. By the time I finished, the fish had lots of challah to eat, and somehow, I’d grown lighter.

  “Who is a God like you?” the traditional Tashlich prayer asks, “who pardons sin and forgives the transgression . . . You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy. You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:18–19).

  To conclude, I closed my eyes, breathed in the damp, cool air, and focused with a centering prayer. I chose grace as my sacred word, but under the warm sunlight, the water rushing beside me and the trees clapping their hands around me, it became something other than a word, something that expanded my con
sciousness, so that for a brief moment I thought I could feel my roots commingling with the roots of everything else in the world. I opened my eyes and let the blue sky, the yellow leaves, and the gray water become my prayer.

  God had long ago forgiven me, but with this prayer, I had forgiven myself for all I had done and all I’d left undone. I was starting fresh.

  I sounded the shofar to let Dan know I was finished. (He’d been collecting discarded soda cans and trash from the crannies in the rocks to throw away bless his heart.) We climbed our way back up the bank and headed down the trail.

  “Let’s say what we are thankful for,” I suggested as we stomped through the forest, holding hands. “Like the things we are thankful for from the project.”

  “You mean that it’s over?” Dan asked with a grin.

  “No, I mean things like, ‘I’m thankful that the turkey turned out so great on Thanksgiving, and I’m thankful that we had nice weather for my time in the tent.’ ”

  “Oh, I see what you mean. Well, I’m thankful for that French toast BLT you learned to make.”

  “I’m thankful for Ahava,” I said.

  “I’m thankful that we could put Chip in the mail and send him back,” Dan said.

  “I’m thankful for the opportunity to go to Bolivia.”

  “I’m thankful for safe travels.”

  “I’m thankful for silence.”

  “I’m thankful for ‘Dan is Awesome’ signs.”

  “I’m thankful for you.”

  We went back and forth like this for fifteen minutes, until I wasn’t sure where my thanks ended and his began. When we reached the end of the trail, we exchanged a high five and a “Team Dan and Rachel!” Then we got into the truck and took the winding gravel road back home.

  Three days later, I’m in the hydraulic chair at Market Street Hair and Nails, explaining to a roomful of foil-wearing women the difference between the English word helpmeet and the Hebrew phrase ezer kenegdo. At first, only Tiffany, my perky blond stylist, seems to care much about my year of biblical womanhood, but by the time I get to the part about camping out in the front yard during my period, the whole place has gone silent, save the roar of a hair dryer two chairs over.

  “He kept a hatchet under the bed?” Tiffany asks to a chorus of giggles. “Oh, my word. What on earth did he plan to do with that?”

  With each snip of the scissors, I feel lighter and chattier, and Tiffany skillfully shapes what remains of my hair into a cute, chin-length bob. I don’t have enough to donate to locks of love, but that’s okay. Ridding the world of my unruly “glory” seems charitable enough.

  By the time I get to Rosh Hashanah, Tiffany has pulled off my cape, dusted off my shoulders, and spun me around to face a brandnew me talking back at myself in the mirror.

  Or is it just the old me again?

  Or someone entirely different?

  A chorus of “Oooooh!” and “You look good, girl!” fills the room.

  And for the first time in 368 days, I look the way I feel—like a true woman of valor.

  Acknowledgments

  * * *

  THIS IS THE SORT OF PROJECT THAT TAKES A VILLAGE, AND I could not have undertaken it without the help, encouragement, wisdom, and talent of some extraordinary men and women of valor.

  I am blessed to have an agent, Rachelle Gardner, who often understands my ideas before I do, even crazy ideas like this one. Thank you, Kristen Parrish, for sticking your neck out for this project and bringing so much color and life to it with your enthusiasm and creativity. Thank you, Jim Chaffee, for telling me like it is, yet making me feel like a champion. Thanks to Kristi Henson, Jason Jones, and Jennifer Womble for making this project a priority, right from the beginning.

  I am grateful beyond words for my readers at rachelheldevans. com, who inspired me to write this book and whose comments, criticisms, stories, and questions made it what it is. Our little online community feels like home to me in so many ways. Your honesty and grace are rare gifts that I hope never to take for granted.

  Thank you, Ahava, for being my go-to girl on everything Jewish. You brought this book to life and have forever changed how I read the Bible. I never expected a source to become such a good friend. Eshet chayil! Thank you, Hillary McFarland, for what you do and who you are. Thank you, Mary Kassian, for being so funny and honest and delightful, even when we disagree. Thank you, Jackie Roese, for being brave for the rest of us.

  I am grateful for hosts: Flora Mainord, Janet Oberholtzer, Dave and Maki Evans and Chloe, Mary King, Levi and Lydia Stoltzfus, Andrea Rodriguez and World Vision Bolivia, Brother Brendan and St. Bernard Abbey, the West Knoxville Society of Friends.

  I am grateful for teachers: Scot McKnight, John Stackhouse, Ellen Davis, Peter Enns, Carolyn Custis James, Rabbi Wayne Dosick, Carol Newsom, Sharon Ringe, and of course, Martha Stewart.

  I am grateful for knitters, and seamstresses, and cooks: Jan Vanderwall, Darlene Bruehl, Robin Meloncon, Kelli Grandy, Courtney Shenkle, Lauren Ange, Cheryl Fields, Jane Ardelene, and Betty Palmer.

  I am grateful for friends: Monika Barger, Tony and Dayna Falzone (Addy, Aury, and Dany), Brian and Carrie Ward (Avery and Adi), Chris and Tiffany Hoose (Early and Willa).

  Thank you, Mom, for being the kind of woman who refuses to fit into a box—for loving football, despising potlucks, traveling the world, reading biographies, surviving cancer, escaping legalism, being everyone’s favorite fourth-grade teacher at Dayton City School, and teaching your girls to have compassion for “the least of these.” Thanks to Dad for being the kind of man who celebrates and affirms such women. Thanks to Amanda for being a little sister I look up to, and to Tim for having the good sense to marry such a kind, wise, and Christlike person.

  Thanks most of all to Dan—for your patience, your wisdom, your sense of humor, your support, your spontaneous bursts of “Team Dan and Rachel!” What an uncommon joy it is to be part of a happy marriage, for better or worse, richer or poorer, computerized baby or Levitical purity laws. May you ever be praised at the city gate!

  Notes

  * * *

  Introduction

  1. Elisabeth Elliot, Let Me Be a Woman (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House, 1976), 54.

  2. Theopedia, s.v., “Complementarianism,” http://theopedia.com/Complementarianism.

  3 “Core Beliefs: The Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood,” The Council on Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, http://www.cbmw.org/Danvers.

  4. A. Roberts and A. Donaldson, eds, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, v. 4 (4), trans. S. Thelwall (Ages Software), 1997.

  October

  1. Warren St. John, Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer: A Journey into the Heart of Fan Mania (New York: Crown, 2004), 1.

  2. From the New American Standard Bible; emphasis is added.

  3. Tina Fey, Bossypants (New York: Reagan Arthur, 2011), 39.

  November

  1. Martha Stewart, with Sarah Carey, Martha Stewart’s Cooking School: Lessons and Recipes for the Home Cook (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2008), vi.

  2. Martha Stewart, Martha Stewart’s Homekeeping Handbook: The Essential Guide to Caring for Everything in Your Home (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2006), 9.

  3. Using Paul’s instructions in Titus 2 to argue that a woman’s work is restricted to the domestic sphere is quite a stretch. By the same logic, his instructions in 1 Timothy 3:4–5 that a male leader in the church should “manage his own household” (NASB) would have to mean that a man also cannot work outside of the home.

  4. John Piper and Wayne Grudem, Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, 2nd ed. (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1991), 366, 375.

  5. Debi Pearl, Created to Be His Help Meet (Pleasantville, TN: No Greater Joy Ministries, 2004), 210.

  6. Jennie Chancey and Stacy McDonald, Passionate Housewives Desperate for God (San Antonio: Vision Forum, 2007), 145.

  7. Martha Stewart, Martha Stewart’s Cooking School: Lessons and Recipes for the Home Cook, 38.

  8. Martha Stewart, Martha St
ewart’s Homekeeping Handbook: The Essential Guide to Caring for Everything in Your Home (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2006), 31.

  9. Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God, and The Spiritual Maxims (New York: Cosimo, 2006), 16.

  10. Ibid., 61.

  11. Martha Stewart, Martha Stewart’s Cooking School: Lessons and Recipes for the Home Cook, 149.

  12. Ibid., 437-445. All pie-related quotes in this chapter are from this selection.

  December

  1. Sad to say, virginity tests are still a reality for women in many parts of the world today. See http://www.amnesty.org/en/for-media/press-releases/egyptian-women-protesters-forced-take-%E2%80%98virginity-tests%E2%80%99-2011-03-23.

  2. http://www.visionforumministries.org/home/about/biblical_patriarchy.aspx.

  3. http://www.bibletopics.com/biblestdy/92b.html.

  4. To learn more about the biblical patriarchy movement, see Kathryn Joyce, Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement (Boston: Beacon Press, 2009).

  5. Names have been changed to protect privacy.

  6. Nicola Slee, Praying Like a Woman (Oxford: SPCK2006), 36–37.

  7. Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art (New York: North Point Press, 1995), 18.

  8. Ibid., 22–23.

  January

  1. Bruce Waltke, The Book of Proverbs: Chapters 15–31(Grand Rapids:Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2005), 517. The quote from Erika Moore comes from an unpublished paper titled “The Domestic Warrior” submitted for OT 813, Proverbs, to Brucke Waltke, Westminister Theological Seminary, 1994 (p. 18).