In The Strength of Her Witness (a set of essays published between 1990 and 2013), Elizabeth Johnson makes available a unique collection of feminist contributions to Christology, the Christian doctrine most often associated with the oppression of women. The book's title is inspired by the Gospel of John's account of Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at a well (4:4-26). Unlike the Pharisee, Nicodemus, who meets secretly with Jesus at night and departs doubting (3:1-21), the Samaritan woman meets Jesus in daylight and departs believing, thereby serving as a symbol for women who continue to give witness to Jesus Christ and his message.
Noting in her introduction that Rosemary Radford Ruether's question, “Can a male savior save women?” (in Sexism and God-Talk), is no longer the “pressing question” (xii), Johnson provides a rich variety of feminist Christological perspectives in this twenty-five-chapter, four-part book. Part 1, “The Easter Experience,” offers biblical studies’ perspectives, beginning with Sandra Schneiders’ treatment of Mary Magdalene, the disciple at the foot of the cross, who is the first to see the resurrected Jesus. Part 2, “Sweeping Overviews,” includes Dictionary of Feminist Theologies’ entries and the perspectives of two Christian scholars and one Jewish scholar. Part 3, “A Symphony of Voices,” offers twelve constructive theological essays by women from three continents, underscoring the importance of contextualizing Christology in the complex lived realities of women. Part 4, “Fresh Takes on the Body of Christ,” features different ways that women share “the identity of Jesus as the Christ” (253).
The book's selections collectively give witness to the importance of global inclusivity through interreligious and cross-cultural dialogue about Jesus and his significance. The former is evident in selections written by Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish women scholars. The latter is “mapped” by contributions not only by diverse North American women (including three African Americans) but also by women from Africa, Australia, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Latin America, and Western Europe, making “global voices of women” an apt description.
Regarding interreligious perspectives, the choice of American Jewish scholar Judith Plaskow's “Feminist Anti-Judaism and the Christian God” (86–99) is noteworthy. Plaskow argues that the “Old Testament God” of wrathful punishment, contrasted with Jesus as “the God of love,” deemed a “feminist” by many Christian women theologians, ignores how Judaism is defined today, including by Jewish feminists.
The diversity of cross-cultural perspectives of women who find themselves “in situations of intense suffering and struggle” is illustrated well by the choice of Teresia M. Hinga's “Christ and the Liberation of Women in Africa” (131–40) and Dolores Williams’ “Black Women's Surrogacy Experience and the Christian Notion of Redemption” (199–213).
Drawing attention to the roots of feminist Christology, Hinga from Kenya describes Jesus as “the voice of the voiceless [and] the power of the powerless” (137), an iconoclastic prophet who challenged the status quo and who is therefore significant for women's search for emancipation from patriarchy. African American Williams addresses emancipation by drawing attention to post–Civil War African American women who fulfilled the role of “voluntary surrogacy” in white households as caretakers of children. She challenges the theological claim that “Jesus died on the cross in the place of humans” as the “ultimate surrogate” (208), who takes on sin to redeem humanity. This, she argues, renders surrogacy “sacred,” thereby “ignoring its structure of oppression” for black women (208), while also prompting them to interpret a sociopolitical evil, the crucifixion of Jesus, as sacred.
The book closes with a call for the church to rethink the priesthood sounded by Indian scholar Astrid Lobo Gajiwala. In her “The Passion of the Womb: Women Re-living the Eucharist” (323), she reflects on women providing family meals as eucharistic bonding in “the intense moment of remembrance, thanksgiving and hope” (325) and proposes that the church has much to learn from women's “recovery of the sacred” in everyday life (332).
More examples to illustrate the value of this collection could be cited. As with any collection of essays, not all are of equal quality. The book also would have been enriched by a brief biography of each author and fuller introductions of its four sections. Even with its modest shortcomings, I strongly recommend The Strength of Her Witness as a resource for graduate courses on Christology, feminist theology, and sociopolitical theology. I anticipate that many will share my gratitude to Elizabeth Johnson for her initiative in developing this essay collection.
