Far More Precious Than Jewels

Book excerpt: Using interpretation from modern critical scholars, rabbis, and feminist scholars, Katheryn Darr offers a fascinating book that provides new ways of understanding the stories of four biblical women. The author studies Ruth, a foreigner from Moab who became the ancestor of Israel's King David; Sarah, who lost hope of bearing a child yet she became the mother of Isaac and the entire Hebrew nation; Hagar, who was mistreated by Sarah, her boss, yet survived under persecution; and Esther, a Jewish queen of Persia who preserved her people despite a conspiracy at court. The Gender and the Biblical Tradition series brings to a wide audience important new discoveries concerning women and the Bible, ancient Israel, and early Christianity. The books explore the role of sexuality within the biblical tradition and document the continuing influence of biblical treatments of gender on subsequent life and thought.