The Perfect Woman, or Something Else Proverbs 31:10-31 September 20, 2009

A friend of mine is the living embodiment of superwoman. She cleans every room in the house a couple of times a week, has a huge vegetable garden, works in a nursing home, cooks fantastic meals every day, does handcrafts, and is the church secretary. If asked, I would bet she will say it is her Christian duty as a wife to do all those things - and the outside jobs are so she can enjoy her passion of cruising.

Well, I remember being like that - trying to keep up with four kids, clean the house from top to bottom, freeze and preserve veggies for the winter, make jam, do handcrafts - and hold down a job at the same time. That was what a good and capable wife did, right? The perfect woman. In fact, a lot of women of my generation and since - have bought into the notion that they have to do all those things to be a good wife. If they want to do something else, they would be criticised. In fact, statistics show that even today, in most households, women do the major share of the work as well as working outside the home.

James Hopkins writes: “In the church of my youth.....Proverbs 31:10-31 was the passage of choice on Mother’s Day. ‘A mother’s work is hard.’ we were told as our pastor interpreted the scripture. ‘Those of you who are godly mothers deserve our praise.’ ran the sermon. ‘Those of you who were raised, those of us who are being raised, by mothers who labor long and hard on our behalf need to thank God and thank those women.’ This was all fine and good. The problem was that the same church was against women in the pulpit, women in public places of power, women who rejected the traditional roles of wife and mother; they were subservient members of the community. Any mention of equal rights for women was put down. A message which has been taken from this passage is that for a woman to live up to God’s expectation of her, she has to be a ever-resting, always striving overachiever who always puts herself last.

This particular passage from Proverbs has been trotted out since time immemorial as an example of what a good wife should be. The problem is, when we try to read scripture through the lenses of our own era, the danger of misinterpreting is high. To read any scripture solely through the eyes of our own time is as much an error as it is to take scripture as literal.

Well, you all know I am not interested in interpreting the Bible literally - that’s a grave mistake and doesn’t help us to learn. And it’s too easy because it requires no real though.

So let’s take a slightly closer look. First, this is in fact a poem, something we would not know because we don’t read Hebrew. It is an acrostic poem arranged in alphabetical order; the first letter of each line is a letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Put together with earlier passages about wisdom, it becomes clear that this is more than a human woman. It is about Woman Wisdom - and the husband of the passage is a kind of stand-in for the followers. The poem portrays the benefits to anyone who chooses to become wise. The passage opens with the question “A strong woman, who can find?” As well as commenting on the warrior-like qualities of Wisdom, it notes that life with Wisdom begins with a search. Wisdom has to be sought out, is not easily acquired, but when attained is “more precious than jewels”. Life with Wisdom is a life of devotion and trust, and brings benefits to the household of Wisdom.

The poem moves back and forth between the life of a wife and mother and the personification of the virtues which display wisdom. So rather than being about a perfect woman and wife, it is about the personification of wisdom. It is about the universal values that sustain humanity. Integrity in personal relationships; opening our hands to the poor; doing what is there to be done, but doing it with a sense of humour; looking out for those around us.

Perhaps we can also take these qualities and use them as a tool for our own self -assessment - not in the sense of comparing ourselves to other individuals, or to other congregations, but just looking clearly at ourselves. Do we value trust and integrity, compassion and wisdom, gentleness and strength of character. In fact, this passage is about reverence for God, and how we live our lives in that reverence. It is about the wisdom that comes from understanding God, the awe of God.

Sources:
1. Rev. David Shearman, Owen Sound, ON.
2. Rev. James Hopkins, Lakeshore Avenue Baptist Church, Oakland CA.