Religion, Women, and Literature: Women of Spirit in Christianity, Islam, and Other Religious Traditions

This course lifts up from a neglected history those women mystics and visionaries within the Christian and Islamics as well as other world religious traditions whose lives raise questions of what it meant to be a woman of spirit in a thoroughly patriarchal system. It examines briefly the patriarchal context that failed to suppress these women’s spirit and dynamism. The course will look at issues of gender consciousness, dualism vs. integration of soul and body, self-denigration vs. self-affirmation. To what extent do these women transcend their socially constructed identities in reclaiming repressed and persecuted elements of female religious power to become models of spiritual empowerment? To what extent is this possible for women of spirit today? The course will employ as much as possible methods of connected knowing, connecting course readings and discussion to our own experiences and stories. It will seek connections to women within our own religious traditions who embody new possibilities for the place and power of women within religious communities.