Biblical-era women were property bound to male kin and taboo-burdened
Evidence
A decade after McDowell’s book appeared, Josh Harris helped transform the purity message into something cool for the younger set. Harris was the son of pioneering Christian homeschoolers—his parents helped establish the Christian homeschooling movement, and his father’s 1988 book, The Christian Home School, was a Christian Booksellers Association bestseller. Harris got his start as a teenager publishing a magazine for fellow homeschoolers, and in 1997, at age twenty-one, he published his magnum opus, I Kissed Dating Goodbye. Influenced by the writings of Elisabeth Elliot, Harris introduced a generation of young Christians to “biblical courtship,” the idea that fathers were charged with ensuring their daughters’ purity until their wedding day, at which point they handed unsullied daughters over to husbands who assumed the burden of protection, provision, and supervision. The book became the bible of the purity movement, selling more than one million copies. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 392 (
#exemplifies, via linked claim)
Like the Greek epikleros, woman is the instrument and not the bearer through which the domain is transmitted; that does not emancipate her; in a way she is absorbed by the fief, she is part of the real property. The domain is no longer the family’s thing as it was for Roman gens: it is the lord’s property, and the woman also belongs to the lord. He is the one who chooses a spouse for her; when she has children, she gives them to him rather than to her husband: they will be vassals who will defend his property. She is therefore a slave of the domain and of its master through the “protection” of a husband who was imposed on her: few periods of history seem harsher for woman’s lot. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207 (
#corroborates, via linked claim)
Once woman is dethroned by the advent of private property, her fate is linked to it for centuries: in large part, her history is intertwined with the history of inheritance. The fundamental importance of this institution becomes clear if we keep in mind that the owner alienated his existence in property; it was more important to him than life itself; it goes beyond the strict limits of a mortal lifetime, it lives on after the body is gone, an earthly and tangible incarnation of the immortal soul; but this continued survival can occur only if property remains in the owner’s hands: it can remain his after death only if it belongs to individuals who are extensions of himself and recognized, who are his own. Cultivating paternal lands and worshipping the father’s spirit are one and the same obligation for the heir: to ensure the survival of ancestors on earth and in the underworld. Man will not, therefore, agree to share his property or his children with woman. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 182 (
#expands, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: The advent of private property converted woman from sacred being into owned property — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 167; The incest taboo exists so women can circulate as instruments of exchange between clans — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 176; In feudalism woman functioned as property transmitting land to men — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207 (+10 more)
Broader Connections
- Biblical courtship assigned fathers authority over daughters’ sexuality until marriage
#exemplifies(0.88) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 392 - In feudalism woman functioned as property transmitting land to men
#corroborates(0.82) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207 - The institution of inheritance causally produced woman’s subordination to man’s property
#expands(0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 182 - Christian doctrine institutionalized women’s subordination despite early egalitarian impulses
#corroborates(0.72) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 204 - Patriarchal religions purify woman of her stained nature through male-defined submission
#expands(0.72) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 170 - Early evangelical gender doctrine framed male domination and female self-denial as God’s design.
#corroborates(0.70) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 151