Pub Date : 2024-03-01DOI: 10.1163/15685152-20240002
Cindy Dawson
This article analyzes violence against the body of Woman Jerusalem in Ezek. 16 and 23 from a New Materialist perspective. As a methodology, New Materialism forges new paths when considering the female body and agency: namely, literal and literary bodies possess the ability to transform their literal and literary worlds, even when—especially when—these bodies become entangled in violent acts. This article therefore considers Woman Jerusalem’s violated body from two perspectives. The first is the perspective of Ezekiel-the-exiled-priest and the centrality of Woman Jerusalem’s body in his theological project of identity building. The second is the perspective of Ezekiel-the-iconoclast and the ability of Woman Jerusalem’s body to survive his acts of violence and reemerge as an intercessor. Such continuity has profound significance for the evolving Zion tradition, which follows the body of Woman Jerusalem to the other side of exile and there reconsiders the relationship between Yahweh, Jerusalem, and her human inhabitants.
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Pub Date : 2024-02-29DOI: 10.1163/15685152-20240001
Isaac T. Soon
This article argues that the washing that removes blemishes and wrinkles in Eph 5:26–27 is intelligible against wider ancient Graeco-Roman and early Christian conceptions of transformational waters. Ancient Mediterranean traditions tell of special waters that change human skin complexion, prolong life, and remove impairment. Ancient Graceo-Roman medicine indicates that for many women in the Mediterranean, blemishes such as freckles and wrinkles were non-ideal epidermal conditions that women tried to cover up and/or remove through various topical substances and applications. In light of this context, Christ’s washing of the church can be viewed as a cosmetic hydrotherapy designed to remove undesirable blemishes and wrinkles and conform the body to an ideal youthful female complexion, which the author equates with holiness. Christ is the church’s cosmetological kyrios, transforming his household into the ideal physique by washing them. The wider Mediterranean culture concerning women and transformative waters is not only background material that makes intelligible the bathing in Eph 5:26–27 but it shows the household code’s participation in what Margaret MacDonald calls “ideologies of masculinities.” Whatever cultural modifications or progressive advancements might be found in the household code, the Ephesian author’s use of the metaphor of Christ washing the bride fundamentally enshrines the control a husband has over his wife’s body. While the author of Ephesians portrays Christ’s cosmetic hydrotherapy as dealing primarily with sin, because it is embedded within a wider discourse about gender, it is also a transformative water that reinforces and bends the gender of early Christian believers.
{"title":"Christ’s Cosmetic Hydrotherapy: Blemishes, Wrinkles, and Transformational Waters in Ephesians 5:26–27","authors":"Isaac T. Soon","doi":"10.1163/15685152-20240001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685152-20240001","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000This article argues that the washing that removes blemishes and wrinkles in Eph 5:26–27 is intelligible against wider ancient Graeco-Roman and early Christian conceptions of transformational waters. Ancient Mediterranean traditions tell of special waters that change human skin complexion, prolong life, and remove impairment. Ancient Graceo-Roman medicine indicates that for many women in the Mediterranean, blemishes such as freckles and wrinkles were non-ideal epidermal conditions that women tried to cover up and/or remove through various topical substances and applications. In light of this context, Christ’s washing of the church can be viewed as a cosmetic hydrotherapy designed to remove undesirable blemishes and wrinkles and conform the body to an ideal youthful female complexion, which the author equates with holiness. Christ is the church’s cosmetological kyrios, transforming his household into the ideal physique by washing them. The wider Mediterranean culture concerning women and transformative waters is not only background material that makes intelligible the bathing in Eph 5:26–27 but it shows the household code’s participation in what Margaret MacDonald calls “ideologies of masculinities.” Whatever cultural modifications or progressive advancements might be found in the household code, the Ephesian author’s use of the metaphor of Christ washing the bride fundamentally enshrines the control a husband has over his wife’s body. While the author of Ephesians portrays Christ’s cosmetic hydrotherapy as dealing primarily with sin, because it is embedded within a wider discourse about gender, it is also a transformative water that reinforces and bends the gender of early Christian believers.","PeriodicalId":512256,"journal":{"name":"Biblical Interpretation","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140414940","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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