Women Erased by Bible Translators

Matthew 7:9-11

Are there any of you mortals ^{[invisible women]} whom if their children ^{[invisible women]} ask bread will they ^{[invisible women]} give them ^{[invisible women]} stones? Or if they ^{[invisible women]} ask fish will they ^{[invisible women]} give them ^{[invisible women]} serpents? If you then being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

Comments: ^{Matthew 7:9-11} In most translations of this passage, women and girls are rendered invisible seven times in just two verses (verses 9-10). Extrapolate these numbers across the entirety of scripture and the number of times Bible translators erase women is astronomical.

Jesus never erased women.

That transgression lies squarely at the feet of gender biased Bible scholars.

In verse eleven, translators give the correct context for the passage, which is Jesus speaking to parents about their children. Jesus was not speaking exclusively to fathers about sons, but how many times have we read this passage and only seen men and boys in it?

Yes, we may intellectually understand that humanity in general is described here, but in our mind’s eyes what do we see? The honest answer is that we visualize only fathers and sons. Mothers and daughters are completely wiped out from this passage, … until we come to verse eleven.

The days are long gone when the argument that the word “men” is understood to mean all humanity. The days are long gone when the argument that the word “sons” encompasses daughters as well. They do not and never did.

Women and girls have ever been deliberately erased from the pages of the Bible by gender biased translators, who continue the practice to this day. Throughout the ages, this practice has leeched into scholastic writings, the writings of civil law, and into virtually all literature, rendering women invisible, and by extrapolation, … unimportant.

The wonder is, that the practice isn’t changing much today, and there is little to no outcry against it, especially among scholars who largely remain silent. Shame on them.

Jocelyn Andersen is the author of several non-fiction books, including, Woman this is WAR: Gender, Slavery, and the Evangelical Caste System.

Note from the editor: I read my Bible every day, always picking up today where I left off yesterday. This is what I call my “on-track” Bible reading. I have been doing this for over 44 years. The posts in this column are usually notes on whatever passage I happen to be reading on any particular day. If you are not presently doing the same, I invite you to join me, beginning with where I’m at. How much you read on a daily basis isn’t important. It only matters that you read, feeding your spirit with a prayerful daily dose of the Word of God.

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Read more about this commentary HERE.