&S H Y A O R U RELIGION M N A G ìThis set of frank and searching essays...is impressive for the depth of its historical material H and the breadth of its humanistic vision. This fine E collection of learned yet accessible writings should be in virtually every libraóryB.oîo klist R V They say religion is a personal and private affair. But when a woman believes in a tradition, she ›has a rela O tionship to that faith beyond her sacred space. ReligiIous traditionsí historically poor treatment of women has lead C many to question why they believe. How has› their tradi E tion either embraced and enlightened, or excluded and , confined women throughout hiHsetro rVyo?i ce, Her Faith presents the personal and historical perspectives of women who not only live their faith day to day, but whHo also know their religionís history with women in general. E KATHERINE YOUNG is professor of religion at McGill R University where she co›editsA ntnhuea l Review of Women in World Religio.n sHer research centers on F South Indian religion and new scholarship on women and A religion. In addition, she is a member of the McGill Centre I for Medicine, Ethics and Law, through whic›h she recent ly published a major study of euthanaAsRiVaI.N D T SHARMA is professor of religion at McGill University iHn Montreal. Born in India, he completed his ›doctoral stud ies at Harvard University, where he studie›d under the reli gious historian Wilfred Cantwell Smith at the Center for the Study of World Religions. He has taught at the University of Sydney, Australia, as a colleague of the WESTVIEW PRESS 5500 Central Avenue Boulder, CO 80301›2977 www.westviewpress.com Her Voice, Her Faith (cid:1) Her Voice, Her Faith (cid:1) Women Speak on World Religions Arvind Sharma Katherine K. Young Editors A MEMBEROFTHEPERSEUSBOOKSGROUP All rights reserved.Printed in the United States of America.No part of this publica- tion may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,electronic or mechanical,including photocopy,recording,or any information storage and retrieval system,without permission in writing from the publisher. Copyright © 2003 by Westview Press,A Member of the Perseus Books Group Westview Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations,institutions,and other organizations.For more in- formation,please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group,11Cambridge Center,Cambridge MA 02142,or call (617) 252–5298 or (800) 255-1514,or email [email protected]. Hardcover first published in 2002 in the United States of America by Westview Press,5500 Central Avenue,Boulder,Colorado 80301–2877,and in the United Kingdom by Westview Press,12 Hid’s Copse Road,Cumnor Hill,Oxford OX2 9JJ Paperback first published in 2004 by Westview Press. Find us on the World Wide Web at www.westviewpress.com Library of Congress has catalogued the hardcover edition as follows: Her voice,her faith:women speak on world religions / Arvind Sharma,Katherine K.Young,editors. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8133-6591-0 (hardcover:alk.paper) 1.Women and religion. I.Sharma,Arvind. II.Young,Katherine K.,1944- BL458.H45 2002 200'.82—dc21 2002015755 ISBN 0-8133-4257-0 (paperback) The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48–1984. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 C o n t e n t s (cid:1) Preface by Arvind Sharma vii Introduction by Katherine K.Young 1 1 Hinduism,by Vasudha Narayanan 11 2 Buddhism,by Rita M.Gross 59 3 Confucianism,by Terry Woo 99 4 Taoism,by Eva Wong 119 5 Judaism,by Susannah Heschel 145 6 Christianity,by Mary Gerhart 169 7 Islam,by Riffat Hassan 215 8 Goddess Spirituality and Wicca,by Wendy Griffin 243 Notes 283 Bibliography 297 About the Contributors 307 Index 311 v P r e f a c e (cid:1) To appeal to one’scommon human- ity is to appeal to something profoundly moving. However profoundly moving though, it is not unambiguous, for although our common hu- manity inspires us, it also obscures one fundamental fact about human- ity—its even split into men and women.When asked to respond simply as a human being,what if someone asked—as what,as a man or a woman? Of course one can speak with a common voice but it is not the same voice.Isn’t one able to tell whether one is talking to a man or a woman by the voice alone? To appeal to one’s faith is also to appeal to something profoundly moving—but although it is profoundly moving,it too is not unambigu- ous.For although one’s faith inspires,it also obscures another fundamental fact of humanity—that there are many faiths.Of course one could talk of what these faiths have in common but they are not the same,a fact that becomes even more obvious when the faithful begin to talk to each other. Once it was possible to take men alone as the main sample of the hu- man race and the Christian faith as the prime sample of all faiths. But what could be taken as axiomatic in the imperial and rationalistic glare of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has become problematic in the discriminating dawn of the twenty-first, which reveals these samples as merely examples.To be a man is only one example of what it means to be vii viii preface a human being, and to be a Christian as only one example of what it means to be a person of faith. Her Voice,Her Faith is an attempt to unite these two new perspectives, and its various chapters are the offspring of their union. In this book women rather than men give voice to different faiths—both Christian and non-Christian—and we hope you enjoy being a part of this valuable conversation. Arvind Sharma I n t r o d u c t i o n Katherine K.Young (cid:1) Something phenomenal—Indeed, historically unprecedented—happened in the second half of the twentieth century.Women recovered their religious history and challenged negative stereotypes that had become so deeply embedded in the authority of scrip- tures and their commentaries that they seemed to be about female nature itself.The cutting-edge scholarly contributions were built upon solid knowledge of ancient languages,both scriptural and vernacular,the detec- tive’s eye for clues to the real world of women,scrutiny of male accounts for bias,and a relentless search for texts by women and about women that had been ignored,marginalized,or reinterpreted to disguise their creativity. Because much of this development occurred in the United States (or was inspired by the women’s movement there),I am tempted to call this, in the spirit of the history of American religion,“a great awakening,” adding it to other great American awakenings such as the eighteenth cen- tury’s awakening of religious piety and the nineteenth century’s religious fervor that transcended sectarian and denominational lines.In our present context, the term “awakening” has been expanded to include women’s awakening to their religious histories and practices and their awakening to the fact that now many religions are included in a new American religious movement that is challenging the idea that secularism is here to stay. In addition, the word “awakening” is apropos for our topic because it is a 1