Abstract

This study grows out of the contemporary feminist reclamation of the past. It is an exploration of the woman to woman relationships that are presented in the Hebrew Bible. In the entire corpus, there are only three such relationships portrayed with any details, these being the ones between Leah and Rachel, Sarah and Hagar, and Ruth and Naomi. The examination has a twofold purpose: to probe the representations within the biblical text in order to uncover both the relationships and the women involved in them, as well as to trace the androcentrism of subsequent commentary concerning these relationships. Two groups of commentary are examined: traditional rabbinic-style commentary from the Late Antique, medieval and modern eras, and contemporary feminist commentary. Both the biblical text and the commentary are subjected to an analysis based on a methodology proposed by Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza to expose the androcentrism underlying biblical texts. A careful reading of the text leads to questions, remembrances, and proclamations. The relationships are examined both on their own and in relation to one another. What emerges is a picture of the diversity that is present in the text: these three relationships share more differences than they do similarities. Neither the traditional nor the feminist commentaries are found to be uniform in their androcentrism. There are instances in which the traditional commentaries are relatively free from this tendency; there are also instances in which the feminist commentaries are found to exhibit them, albeit in more subtle forms.