The Woman of Valor:
A Former Soviet Union Russian Jewish PerspectivePart I
Rev. Ilya Lizorkin
Stellenbosch University
M. Phil. in Bible Interpretation
Hermeneutics and Exegesis of the Bible
To Pnina Lizorkin,
A humble sage, who has the courage and
perseverance to be for me the mouthpiece of
God’s Chochmah.
It is nothing, but worthless religiosity when we concern ourselves with offering God worship but are unmindful of the sociopolitical implications of our religion”[1].
Desmond Tutu
OUTLINE
Introduction
a. Preliminary thoughts
b. Eshet Hayil in Jewish and Christian context
c. Contribution of feminism
d. Strategies and methodologies
My Social Location
a. Short intro into the ideological criticism
b. Former Soviet Union location
c. Russian Jewish location
d. Male location
e. Christian Ministerial location
Eshet Hayil as Literature
a. Integrity of the book
b. Acrostic structure
c. Chiastic structure
Red Shadow Perspective
a. Reading
b. Implications in general
c. Examples of implications for women
d. Examples of implications for men
Red Chuppah Perspective
a. Reading
b. Examples of implications for women
c. Examples of implications for men
Conclusion
a. Strategy and methodology review
b. The real Woman of Valor
c. Comparison and contrast
d. Final remarks
Introduction
Preliminary thoughts
My goal in writing this paper is to present my own understanding of the Eshet Hayil passage, and to draw out real life implications of its teachings from a distinctly Former Soviet Union Russian Jewish Perspective. As I write this paper, I am mindful of my own interpretive concerns as a person with a particular background and a particular present social location. I will attempt to show how the true message of Eshet Hayil can prove to be a liberating force to both men and women who would seek God’s Chochmah above all in the adventures, mazes and labyrinths of their lives.
There are several main ways one can interpret the identity of the Woman of Valor: “Does the description refer to a wife and a mother who has actually lived, or is the passage describing all the qualities every woman should be striving to attain, or is the “noble wife” a personification of wisdom…”[2] Furthermore does the Real Woman interpretation imply that the woman should stay home or is it giving the women authorization to be actively engaged in life outside of the home? Yet another interpretive option that I will seek to set forth as the most likely one combines two seemingly opposite views. It says that indeed the Woman of Valor is personification of Wisdom, but the portrait drawn is based on the life of real woman during the time of its composition. There are, also, several secondary interpretations of this passage that are mostly characteristic of Jewish Mysticism, such as the identity of the woman as the Sabbath Queen or the Shekinah Glory.
The implications of the conclusions are especially thought-provoking with regards to God’s design for His creation order, the roles of men and women, and contemporary issues facing the church pilgrimaging in the world. Almost with any interpretive option that I presented in the paragraph above, there are pluses and minuses with regards to the practical implications. We would look at some of those main implications in some detail in the later sections of this paper.
Perhaps one of the best summaries and short introductions that could be given for what is known as Eshet Hayil (the Woman of Valor) passage is provided by Derek Kidner, who with simplicity and yet tremendous literary force summarizes it in his short commentary: “In the second passage, that ‘A to Z’ of wifely virtues…we meet many of the qualities that have colored the whole book. Here is a woman who leaves nothing to chance; who uses her organizing ability, her skilful hands, her business sense and every minute of her time, to create a ménage where nothing is second rate or insecure, where wisdom and faithfulness abound; where help is at hand for the hard-pressed and where the family bonds are affectionate and strong. At the root of it all, we are told, is the fear of the LORD. It is the picture of Godliness that is severely practical, of values that are sound and humane, and of success that has been most diligently earned.”[3]
The concluding section of the book of Proverbs is not simply an addendum to the book, instead it functions as the summary, the desired end, the culmination. It not only functions as the crown of the book, but it also looks like one. Not one, but two Hebrew poetic methods (chiasm and acrostic) are used to express all the beauty of finally finding Wisdom and establishing life with her. These literary tactics converge in the same place to establish the crucial importance and enormous dignity afforded to the passage by its author both human and divine.
Christine Roy Yoder of Colombia Theological Seminary laments the Church’s perception of the book of Proverbs: “The book of Proverbs is largely lost as a source of guidance and inspiration for the contemporary Christian church. The book is featured rarely in the lectionaries and, when it is, the readings are either from the longer didactic poems of chapters 1-9 (e.g., 1:22-31; 8:1-4, 22-31) or the alphabetic acrostic in 31:10-31. Similarly, Proverbs (and wisdom literature more broadly) receives relatively little attention in adult and youth church education programs. This neglect is striking given that the primary purpose of the book is the formation of human character; indeed, no other biblical book is more relevant for moral education. Moreover, many of the book's concerns figure prominently among those of today's church and society, e.g., how may people navigate faithfully and wisely through a world of competing claims? How do we understand individual and communal moral responsibility and teach it to the next generation? How might we reflect ethically and theologically about everyday matters like relationships, work, wealth, and poverty?”[4] I hope in some small way to rekindle in the reader a desire to appropriate the entire book of Proverbs[5] to his or her theology of life.
The theme of wisdom in the “wisdom literature,” especially in the book of Proverbs has very strong connections with the themes of the Law and Covenant. In His great covenant love YHWH gives Israel the gift of the Torah. Indeed it is his pledge to them of His faithfulness. To live by the Torah means to live the life of wisdom. Both Wisdom and Torah are symbolically bound around the body and retained at all cost (Deut.6:7; Prov.1:9). In His great Covenant love Christ gives Himself up for his church. He becomes the Wisdom-Word-Torah of God to his New Covenant people (1-Cor.1:30).
Eshet Hayil in Jewish and Christian context
The charge that was often leveled against the Christian faith in the past by its Jewish critics still stands today: “Judaism is a religion of the deed, Christianity is a religion of the Creed.” Even though such a charge is at best one-sided, there is a painful ring of truth to it. Throughout two millennia, the Christian Church in many ways[6] concentrated on hammering out religious dogmas. This of course is not the only thing that the church was doing, but in many ways this was the epicenter of its activity. It did so, first, by defining what those dogmas were and later by protecting their doctrinal purity. So it does not come as a surprise that the book that is unapologetically concerned with right living would not be on the bestseller list of the Christian psyche. In the Christian world, the book of Proverbs is either not studied enough or studied in truncated fashion, which often leads to overlooking its essential message. Certainly the charge cannot be leveled against the Christian community that it does not know Proverbs at all. Every Christian is able to quote at least a few passages from this book; many will be able to sum up its major themes. But it would certainly take many believers by surprise to hear of someone committing to life-long study of this book. I do not mean to say that the book of Proverbs has never been studied or loved in some corners of the Christian community; I am rather referring to the more popular level. Our passage is a good example. Indeed the use of Eshet Hayil may be called seasonal in that it is only thought to concern young men who are looking for a bride, and young women who strive “to be all God wants them to be.” Once the marriage takes place, of course the husband and wife would both look to this chapter for inspiration to righteous, but sadly only female conduct.
Various forms of rabbinical Judaism, however, historically placed much of its interest in the application of the Bible to life, hence the lengthy and to modern eyes, especially non-Jewish modern eyes, boring, and at times senseless discussions of the Talmudic personalities, many of which deal with incredibly detailed and seemingly irrelevant things. Jewish tradition sees “…five main images of women in the Tanakh: the Eshet Hayil, the woman of Proverbs 31 and elsewhere; the Imahot, the women who act in the holy history of the Jewish people and its God; the Ra´ya, the woman of the Song of Songs; the Isha, the woman as a legal category; and the Anusa, the woman as victim. There are also some subcategories, including: the Isha Zara, the woman who is not a blood member of the people; the Zona, the sexually active woman unencumbered by a legal relationship to a man; and the No'efet, the whoring wife.”[7] The only real woman, however, who is referred to in the Hebrew Bible as a Woman of Hayil is Ruth. She is commended for her loyalty, persistence and resourcefulness (Ruth 3:10-11). Boaz assures Ruth (v.11) that it is a common knowledge in the community that she is indeed a woman of Hayil.[8]
Sometime in recent history, in the desire to enrich Sabbath family worship, the reading/singing[9] of Eshet Hayil became a traditional part of the Sabbath Liturgy, where the literal view is taken and the husband and the children rise up to sing of the qualities of the wife and the mother of the house employing the very words under our consideration.”[10] Throughout the rabbinical writings, Eshet Hayil is referred to in passing and one finds an overabundance of biblical women who in the minds of the Talmudic authors are Eshet Hayils of their generation and their place. Shulamit Valler in her article entitled “Who is Eshet Hayil in Rabbinic Literature?” recalls the following Talmudic connection with Sarah, one of the Eshet Hayils of the Hebrew Bible: “The representation of Sarai as a female figure who delivers God’s intentions to Abraham places her on a higher spiritual plane than him. Indeed, Sarah is mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud as one of seven woman prophets (B.Meg.14a). An extreme expression of the spiritual superiority attributed to her is recorded in Gen. R. 47a, in a debate between Rav Aha, a Palestinian Amora of the fourth generation, and some anonymous sages about the connection between verses from Gen.17:15-16 and Prov. 12:4. This is the debate: ‘And God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name”’ (Gen.17.1). ‘A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband’ (Prov.12.4). Said Rav Aha, “Her husband was crowned through her, but she was not crowned through her husband.” The rabbis said, “She was master of her husband. In every other context the man gives the orders. But here, ‘In all Sarah says listen to her voice’ (Gen.21.12).”[11]
However, it is not true that Judaism has always and at all times in all of its movements treated this passage with appropriate care. German feminist scholars Loise Schottroff, Silvia Schroer, and Marie-Theres Wacker in their work entitled Feminist Interpretation: The Bible in Woman’s Perspective comment on the Septuagint translation of this Hebrew poem that may express the view traditionally accepted by the rabbis of the time. They write: “The Septuagint could not bear the elevated valuation and praise of woman at the end of Proverbs 31 and has significantly changed the text in 31:28 and following. It is not the woman who fears YHWH, but it is the sensible woman who is to be praised; she is to extol the fear of YHWH and it is not she, but her man who is to be honored at the city gate.”[12] The abovementioned references are not the only examples of diminishing the dignity and role of women in the Jewish mostly extra-biblical texts. The truth is that Judaism’s official commentaries cut both ways in their positive and negative statements and teachings with regards to women.
“Throughout the Hebrew Bible, the term Hayil refers broadly to the quality of strength and is used of men who are soldiers, officers or brave warriors. These persons are able-bodied, courageous, and loyal to their service…elsewhere the term Hayil refers to wealth, property and profits from trade. Men with Hayil in these contexts are professionals, managers of property, landowners and community leaders. Generally, then, the men with Hayil are men of power and capacity…yet, when a woman with Hayil is identified as the subject of Proverbs 31:10-31, her title is variously translated us “a good wife,” “a capable wife,” “a good housewife,” “a true lady,” “a wife of many parts,” or an “ideal wife.” With some exceptions, there is a notable reticence to use the same language of “substance,” power, and wealth for her as is used for her male counterparts, despite all evidence to the contrary.”[13] It is common knowledge that young women who are well educated, well trained, accomplished, smart and can in many other way be characterized as Women of Substance, in spite of their beauty are not attractive to men looking for a wife. They can in many cases end up in the old maid category. Men generally feel threatened by the strength of a woman. Men feel that a woman has to be weaker than they are, so that they can be the “man of the house” providing and benefiting their wives and as such feel that they are worth something. The picture here is different, however. The worth of a man does not come from being productive or being “the man of the house”, but in being married to a woman who is Eshet Hayil.