Women's Day

South Africa, in contrast to other countries, celebrates the 9^th of August as Women’s Day paying homage to 20 000 women who marched to the Union Buildings on the 9^th of August 1956 to protest against the extension of the Pass laws. Among the leaders were Lilian Ngoyi, Helen Joseph, Rahima Moosa and Sophia Williams de Bruyn.

Globally, Woman’s Day has been around for over 100 years and still impacts on the advancement of woman’s rights in the economic, social, cultural and political arena. International Women’s Day is celebrated on the 8^th March. Although the date in South Africa differs from the date Women’s Day is celebrated internationally, both dates mark the resilience, conviction and perseverance of women who dared to stand for gender equality and racial discrimination.

With absolutely no gender equaliser, the Bible tells a story of a woman who found herself at a well preparing her last meal for herself and her child, before dying in the Wilderness of Shur. In this desperate state, the Angel of the Lord appeared to her. The Angel of the Lord is the visible, physical manifesting of God. He instructed her to return to her mistress, and her offspring became the Ishmaelites. Today, widely recognised as the Arab nations. Her name, the well-known female Egyptian slave of Sarah, Hagar.

After the death of Sarah, Abraham married Keturah, named in Genesis 25. While the covenant of the promise passed exclusively through Isaac, Keturah’s descendants, particularly the Midianites, played a prominent historical and cultural role later in scripture. For example, Moses married a Midianite woman, Zipporah. Keturah is mentioned in two passages of the Bible, Genesis 25:1–4 and 1 Chronicles 1:32–33.

The narrative of Abraham’s grandson Jacob, recorded in Genesis 27-29, is woven by deception, manipulation and unequalled love. Jacob married two women, Leah and Rachel. Rachel for whom he worked fourteen years, bore him his first-born son, Joseph. He was sold by his brothers in another bizarre tale of deception, and providentially became the second in command in the then, most powerful empire, Egypt. Here, Joseph married Asenath, an Egyptian noble woman who was the daughter of Potiphera, the priest of On. Other than the fact that she was Joseph’s wife, her name is mentioned when she gave birth to Joseph’s sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. 

Jacob relocated his whole family to Egypt, where they lived in the land of Goshen. Years after Joseph died, the Egyptians oppressed the Israelites, and Pharoah gave instructions to the Hebrew midwives, to kill the boys at birth. The opening narrative of Exodus, records the conduct of two Hebrew midwives. This narrative, compared to the content of the book of Exodus, which describes the ten plagues, the Exodus and the receiving of the Law on mount Sinai, fades into the background. The book of Exodus does however name these two women by name: Shiphrah and Puah.

The Exodus happened, the Israelites wandered in the wilderness for forty years, Moses died on mount Nebo and Joshua took over the rulership. The first city to conquer was Jericho, a well-fortified city in the land of Canaan. Joshua sent two men to spy out the land, and the spies were hidden by the renown Rahab, a Canaanite woman who was a prostitute and lived on the city wall.

Fast forward to the time of the judges. Samuel, was the last judge who ruled the nation of Israel around 1 070 BC. In the book named after him, there is another desperate woman. She was the wife of Elkanah. She went up with her husband to worship and sacrifice at Shiloh. Cloaked in the misery of her barrenness and mistaken for being drunk, she petitioned the Lord for a child. This was the story of Hannah.

Much lesser known is Sheerah, the daughter of the son of Beriah, who built the Lower and Upper Beth-Horon and Uzzen-Sheerah, of the wall of Jerusalem in Nehemiah’s time, 1 Chronicles 7:24. Deborah, the wife of Lappidoth, is another woman who is not well-known. She was the only female judge and prophetess, and yet important enough to be mentioned by name.

The Bible is repleted with the names and narratives of the renown and brave women who all played a role in the birth of Israel, their liberation from Egypt, the conquest, their sin and exile and the lineage from whom Christ was born. Even the women who are much lesser known, are recorded by name.

In the New Testament, the apostle John records a debate between Jesus and a woman at the well in Sychar in Samaria. The debate centred around where the people should worship. Here, Jesus gave the most profound lesson in worship.

Jerusalem was the place where God put His name. Both the first and second temple were built here. Jerusalem, the city of David, holds a central place in biblical history and prophecy. It was established as the political and spiritual capital of Israel by King David, 2 Samuel 5. The name Jerusalem יְרוּשָׁלַם according to Abarim publications, is a combination of two words, Yerush, possession or inheritance, and shalem, which means whole, complete, or peace, stemming from the word shalom. The name Jerusalem then means "Possession of Peace" or "Foundation of Peace."

From the narratives in the Bible men had to go to the Lord: Moses had to ascend mount Sinai and men were instructed to go to Jerusalem three times a year on the Feast days to worship. It is evident from these scriptures that men had to go and meet with God. But in contrast, the Lord met Hagar in the wilderness, saved the prostitute on the wall of Jericho, gave Hannah a son and comforted Mary and Martha when they were grief stricken. In contrast to men, the Lord always met women in their deep desperate states of rejection and inconsequential existence.

Maybe your circumstances correlate to that of Hagar, or Rahab or Hannah or maybe you feel that your name is not even mentioned, but this is where the narrative of the woman at the well in Sychar paints a different picture. At the well, Jesus met the Samaritan woman, a marginalised woman, the wife of five men, whose name is not mentioned in the narrative and whose identity is simply pinned on her origin. But to this woman the most significant and pivotal Bible truth was revealed. Jesus said to her: “Woman, the hour is coming that people will neither worship on this mountain nor in Jerusalem”. Her response: “I know when the Messiah is coming, He will tell us all things”. To this outcast, marginalised Samaritan women, Jesus revealed Himself as the Messiah. From her experience, it is clear that the Lord does not only reveal Himself to the well-known, the genealogical important or those named, but also to women just busy with the daily chores who are not even named.

“When He comes, He will tell us all things”. Jesus said to her, “I, Who speak to you, am He,”

- John 4:25-26.