Summary Of A Year Of Biblical Womanhood

In the book A Year of Biblical Womanhood: How a Liberated Woman Found Herself Sitting on Her Roof, Covering Her Head, and Calling Her Husband Master, author Rachel Held Evans records a year in which she pursues a life of absolute biblical womanhood. Through depictions of her own experiences and analyzing scripture, Held Evans concludes that an unconditional model of biblical womanhood does not exist, a much needed reassurance for many religious women. In response to the ever-growing notion of biblical womanhood within Christian culture, Held Evans, a self-identified politically progressive feminist and evangelical Christian, vows to devote one year of her life to living out the notion of literal biblical womanhood in order to further study
Her experiences of literal, biblical living as a woman are at times humorous yet telling of her primary conclusion of biblical womanhood. The conclusion is twofold: one finds what they search for in the Bible, and the notion of biblical womanhood is nonexistent, or at least no overarching blueprint for biblical womanhood exists. Personally, I found Held Evans’ concluding thoughts (and, of course, her experiences of literal living leading up to these conclusions) most important, as well as interesting. I, like Held Evans, was raised in an evangelical Christian culture, and many members of my hometown attempt biblically literal lives such as biblical womanhood. While I am no longer a part of the religiously influenced community my relatives and family friends live in, I still wish to derive a sense of meaningful and fulfilling life enhanced by some type of religious or spiritual influence. Although I have yet to find a specific place or feeling of influence, I often feel conflicted by people who uphold one religious (often biblical) lifestyle as supreme and nonnegotiable, especially as a woman who constantly receives conflicting or dual messages on how to live life as a whole (a common experience for most women). Held Evans’ states that “we all go to the text looking for something, and we all have a tendency to find it,” and, pertaining more to the topic of religion and gender, “If you are looking for verses with which to oppress women, you will find them. If you are looking for verses with which to liberate and honor women, you will find them” (296). Therefore, one will find what they wish to find when one searches for biblical reasoning. Held Evans’ experimentation with biblical womanhood and her