The role of women in society has been a topic of debate for centuries, and it continues into the twenty-first century. Critics of religion often claim that the biblical narrative promotes female oppression, patriarchy, and silence. Even within some corners of the Christian world, biblical passages are sometimes distorted for political or ideological advancements, fueling further criticism of Christianity.

Historically, understanding women’s roles in the ancient world is challenging due to the scarcity of firsthand female testimonies and the diversity of societal norms across cultures. Ancient laws offered some protections for women; the biblical narrative differs by grounding these protections in holiness rather than in social status, property, or retribution like in nearby cultures, thereby countering the claim that the biblical narrative is one of female oppression. Many claims of oppression often do not account for historical context and cultural norms.

This article will demonstrate the biblical countercultural depiction of women, demonstrating that it not only challenges the oppressive norms of its surrounding cultures by elevating women but also serves as evidence of the historical reliability of Scripture through accounts unlikely to have been fabricated. First, I will examine the laws and societal norms of the ancient Near Eastern world and, second, the Greco-Roman world. Last, I will address controversial passages in Scripture, highlighting the elevation of women.

In the ancient Near Eastern world, the biblical portrayal of women shared similarities with surrounding cultures, but biblical laws often diverged from them. This is not to say that patriarchal structures did not exist. Most ancient societies were patriarchal, but many of the laws within ancient Israel differed significantly by providing a layer of protection for women not seen elsewhere. Biblical narratives frequently show legal protections and social roles for women atypical to the norms of the surrounding cultures. These narratives, while formed within patriarchal contexts, do not encourage the oppression of women. Rather, in comparison to neighboring cultures, biblical narratives often elevate the voices and values of women.

Laws and Societal Norms of the Ancient Near Eastern World

Many laws in the ancient Near East viewed women in relation to their male counterparts. One of the most famous ancient Near Eastern law collections is the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1753 BC). The Code includes certain protections for women but also provides broad allowances for divorce. For example, the Code states in section 138, “If a man wishes to separate from his wife who has borne him no children, he shall give her the amount of her purchase money and the dowry which she brought from her father’s house, andlet her go.” Men did not need a moral justification to divorce their wives, and since children significantly influenced social status, they could choose to divorce based on fertility issues, regardless of the woman’s wishes. Although the woman might receive monetary compensation, remaining unmarried could negatively affect her ability to manage her wealth, based on her socioeconomic position.

By contrast, biblical procedure for divorce required a charge of indecency or unfaithfulness: “When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her . . . he writes her a certificate of divorce” (Deut 24:1–4). Under biblical law, men were required to have moral reason to divorce their wives. Even further, we see in Matthew that divorce is a concession to human hardness rather than God’s divine ideal. As Jesus states in Matthew 19:8, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.” Other near Eastern laws demonstrate similar contrasts between culture and the biblical narrative. For example, the Middle Assyrian Laws included harsh punishments for women and offered little legal protection. Middle Assyrian Law (MAL) A 37 leaves the choice of divorce entirely to the discretion of the husband and requires no compensation. The law states that “she shall go forth empty.”¹

A comparison of MAL A 8 with Israelite law in Deuteronomy further demonstrates the stark difference in biblical culture versus Assyrian culture. MAL A 8 addresses the case of a woman who injures a man’s testicle, stating that “a finger of the woman shall be cut off.”² By contrast, Deuteronomy 25:11–12 prescribes the amputation of the woman’s hand. At first glance, the Assyrian law may appear more lenient, but the Assyrian system employs what Israeli law scholar Reuven Yaron describes as a “mirroring punishment,”³ an organ-for-organ retaliation. Yet MAL A 8 continues with harsher punishment, stating, “If the second testicle is affected and becomes inflamed,” the woman is subjected to torture, stating that “both the woman’s nipples are to be torn out.”⁴ This is not mere retributive symmetry but brutal torture. Further severity appears in cases of assault or rape. MAL A 50 enacts vengeance not only on the offender but on his wife: “As he has done to her, they will do to her,” further emphasizing violent retribution rather than justice. Women’s bodies thus function as instruments of male-centered retribution, reflecting the property-based nature of Assyrian legal thought.

In Middle Assyrian society, sexual laws were structured around the husband’s rights rather than the woman’s personhood. By contrast, biblical sexual laws are oriented around concepts of guilt, holiness, and moral responsibility rather than property loss.⁵ Yaron notes that the Hebrew concept of “ʿawon (‘sin, guilt’)” demonstrates that biblical law treats wrongdoing as a violation of moral and covenantal obligations rather than as property damage. Biblical law, therefore, generally functions within a framework of holiness rather than male ownership.⁶

Several case studies can help us understand the biblical view of women, one being Deborah in Judges 4. While it is true that many surrounding pagan cultures allowed women to serve as prophetesses, these women were often involved in sexualized religious rituals or limited to divination and other religious roles, not positions of legislative authority.⁷ Deborah’s role differs from the roles of women in the surrounding culture. She is not only a prophetess but also a judge and a military leader, holding roles that were both legislative and military.⁸ As theologian and apologist Paul Copan says of the Old Testament matriarchs, “These strong women stepped forward and wielded influence with the best of the men.”⁹

Laws and Societal Norms of the Greco-Roman World

Shifting to the New Testament, the Greco-Roman world, William Bowes writes that one of the reasons early Christians were targeted was because of the “inclusivity they showed toward the overlooked and marginalized.”¹⁰ During the lifetime of Jesus, culture was not monolithic in its sentiment toward women, but Hellenism largely influenced people to believe the Aristotelian idea that femaleness was defective and maleness benign.¹¹ While it is true that women in manyancient cultures faced significant limitations, the degree to which agency was permitted varied widely by social status and cultural norms. In several surrounding cultures, women served in religious roles, such as priestesses, yet holding political office remainedrare.¹² Even within the Roman world, the role of women was codified into law, where women were viewed as belonging primarily to the domestic sphere.¹³ A well-known saying attributed to the Greek philosopher Thales expresses theprevailing sentiment: “There are three attributes for which I am grateful to Fortune: that I was born, first, human and notanimal; second, man and not woman; and third, Greek and not barbarian.”¹⁴ Roman law scholar Eva Cantarella states that within the Roman world, killing infants was tolerated and female infants in particular were targeted.¹⁵ Further, historical figures in the second-century such as the philosopher Celsus frequently mocked Christianity for elevating and welcoming women, comparing females to slaves and complaining that people considered “ignorant” by Greco-Roman society were deemed “worthy” of God.¹⁶

Contrary to the attitudes of the surrounding culture, the biblical narrative regarding women was largely protective, as seen in the Old Testament. Regarding divorce and adultery, Roman law treated women and men caught in the act of adultery differently. If a man had sex outside of marriage, it was not considered adultery unless the woman with whom he had an affair was another free man’s wife.¹⁷ For women who committed adultery, it was considered a criminal offense punishable by divorce or monetary loss, and the woman was never allowed to enter into a marriage again.¹⁸ Comparing the Roman law with the biblical law, Leviticus 20:10 holds both the man and woman, regardless of social status or gender, to the same consequence for adultery: the death penalty. Further, a more radical biblical narrative of adultery is Jesus’s response to the woman at the well in John 4.

When Jesus spoke with the woman at the well, he transcended culture by breaking both cultural and social norms. There was a longstanding history of animosity between Jews and Samaritans, even more so between men and women, and even more so between a rabbi and a woman, who were not to speak alone together. A God who desired to oppress women would not have made an intentional effort to speak with the woman society deemed an outcast. On a different occasion, Jesus not only speaks with an adulteress but defends her, saying in John 8:7, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” A God or biblical narrative desiring to reinforce the oppression of women or reflect the surrounding culture would not have challenged these social norms, nor would it have benefited from doing so.

As previously mentioned, the surrounding cultural laws of the ancient world were rooted in male authority, monetary loss, property, and social order. In contrast, biblical laws were grounded in holiness and morality. This is reflected when Jesus says in Matthew 5:27–28, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Notice that Jesus’s language is not targeted at women. Instead, he directly challenges the attitudes of men in society and the root of the sin. This again demonstrates a countercultural approach, one that does not show evidence of the oppression of women but rather calls all people to holiness.

Notes

1. Reuven Yaron, “The Middle Assyrian Laws and the Bible,” Biblica 61, no. 4 (1980): 554.
2. Yaron, “Middle Assyrian Laws,” 552.
3. Yaron, “Middle Assyrian Laws,” 552.
4. Yaron, “Middle Assyrian Laws,” 552.
5. Yaron, “Middle Assyrian Laws,” 554.
6. Yaron, “Middle Assyrian Laws,” 551.
7. Carol L. Meyers, “The Roots of Restriction: Women in Early Israel,” The Biblical Archaeologist 41, no. 3 (1978): 91–103.
8. Tommy Wasserman, “The Woman at the Well as a Witness in John Revisited,” The Journal of Theological Studies 73, no. 2 (2022): 535–88.
9. Paul Copan, Is God a Moral Monster?: Making Sense of the Old Testament God (Baker Books, 2011), 104.
10. William B. Bowes, “A Religion of ‘Women and Children’?: A Christian Woman’s Place in the Greco-Roman World Before AD 300,” Priscilla Papers 35, no. 4 (2021): 14–19.
11. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14.
12. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14.
13. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14.
14. Thales, as quoted in Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, 1.33.
15. Eva Cantarella, as quoted in Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14–19.
16. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 15.
17. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14.
18. Bowes, “Religion of ‘Women and Children,’” 14.

©Noelle Fitchett. All Rights Reserved.

RESOURCES

• Subscribe To The Heidelblog!
• Download the HeidelApp on Apple App Store or Google Play
• Browse the Heidelshop!
• The Heidelblog Resource Page
• Heidelmedia Resources
• The Ecumenical Creeds
• The Reformed Confessions
• The Heidelberg Catechism
• The Heidelberg Catechism: A Historical, Theological, & Pastoral Commentary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2025)
• Recovering the Reformed Confession (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2008)
• Why I Am A Christian
• What Must A Christian Believe?
• Heidelblog Contributors
• Support Heidelmedia: use the donate button or send a check to

Heidelberg Reformation Association
1637 E. Valley Parkway #391
Escondido CA 92027
USA
The HRA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization

Post authored by:

• Noelle Fitchett

  

  Noelle Fitchett is a student at Westminster Seminary California pursuing a dual MA in Biblical Studies and Theological Studies. She is a marketing associate at Sola Media and a California native.

  More by Noelle Fitchett ›