Brave: Women of the Bible and Their Stories of Grief, Mercy, Folly, Joy, Sex, and Redemption

by Alice Connor

Overview

Women are essential to the biblical story--they lead communities, bear life, and testify to God's power and presence. Some of their names we know, others we've only heard, and others, tragically, go unnamed.

Following the success of her beloved book Fierce, pastor and provocateur Alice Connor introduces us to a whole new group of women from the Bible, including Rachel, Leah, Miriam, Esther, and Lydia. Connor invites us to see them not as players in a man's story--as victims or tempters--nor as solely morality archetypes who teach women to be better wives and mothers, but as brave foremothers of the faith. Skillfully drawn by the author, these women's stories are messy, challenging, and beautiful. When we read their stories, we can see not only their particular, formidable lives but also our own.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781506463971
Publisher:	Augsburg Fortress, Publishers
Publication date:	11/16/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	180
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Alice Connor is an Episcopal priest and college chaplain. She is the author of Fierce: Women of the Bible and Their Stories of Violence, Mercy, Bravery, Wisdom, Sex, and Salvation and How to Human: An Incomplete Manual for Living in a Messed-Up World. Alice is a certified enneagram teacher and a stellar pie-maker. She lives for challenging conversations and has a high tolerance for awkwardness. She lives in Cincinnati with her husband, two kids, a dog, and no cats.

Table of Contents

Introduction: How Could She Possibly? xi

1 God Is Not a Man: I'm Every Woman; It's All in Me 1

2 Sarah: Have It All, Lose It All, You Ready for More Yet? 11

3 Rachel and Leah (and Bilhah and Zilpah) 23

4 Miriam: To the World We Dream about and the One We Live in Now 35

5 Delilah: We Don't Need Another Hero 47

6 The Levite's Concubine: It Gets Better. Eventually 59

7 Hannah: I Put My Thing Down, Flip It, and Reverse It 71

8 Michal and Jonathan: I Have Vague and Messy Positive Feelings toward You 83

9 The Queen of Sheba: More Than Meets the Eye 97

10 Jezebel: No More Evil Than the Next Guy 107

11 Huldah and the Three Wise Women 119

12 Vashti and Esther: Fierce-Ass Women 131

13 Judith: Antifa before It Was Cool 143

14 Foreign and Bleeding Women: Time to Pick My Heart Up off the Floor 153

15 Lesser-Known Moms: How to Parent with Body, Heart, and Mind 165

Acknowledgments 175

Appendix A The Biblical Stories Themselves and Whereto Find Them 177

Appendix B Homework (a.k.a. Ideas for Further Reading) 181

Notes 187

Editorial Reviews

"Alice Connor's retelling of the biblical story—fanfiction, as she calls it—is half stand-up comedy, half soul-piercing truth. She spins the ancient tale in startlingly fresh ways, bringing the women of Scripture to life in a way that is both authentically relatable and unapologetically feminist. With each chapter I felt the anticipation of reading a brand-new story, even when it was an account I'd heard a thousand times." —Kyndall Rae Rothaus, author of Thy Queendom Come

"Alice Connor is so friendly, funny, and adept at making biblical scholarship accessible. Reading it felt more like taking a long walk with a wise woman than undertaking some gnarly challenge to overturn centuries of male-centric commentary. And yet she gracefully does some immensely valuable overturning. Connor writes as a pastor with a clear heart for those longing for a spark of freedom to become more fully themselves." —Debbie Blue, author of Consider the Women: A Provocative Guide to Three Matriarchs of the Bible, Consider the Birds, and Sensual Orthodoxy

"Brainy, hilarious, and unapologetic, the book is every bit as courageous as the biblical women Alice Connor brings to life. Don't read it unless you're willing to reevaluate what you think you know about the Bible and gender." —Jana Riess, author of Flunking Sainthood and The Twible

"Some studies of biblical women gloss over contextual and interpersonal challenges and inconsistencies, leaving us with sappy platitudes and surface conclusions. Connor takes us deeper into the stories and their contexts. With her candid and conversational style, she reveals dimensions and aspects of women we malign, misunderstand, marginalize, silence, or ignore in our preaching and teaching. In the end, Connor shows us women who mirror who and what we are—sometimes flawed, misguided, ill-advised; yet also wise, clever, creative, subversive, and, you know, brave!" —Rev. Barbara J. Essex, author of Bad Girls of the Bible: Exploring Women of Questionable Virtue

"A consistently surprising and almost gleefully subversive reexamination of the very human side of our most sacred stories. Alice Connor's explorations of these tales and those who inhabit them ask us to question all the familiar elements we have taken for granted for so long, and to shine a much overdue light on perspectives we may have never considered. In the end, we emerge better from the experience." —Matt Kish, illustrator of Moby-Dick in Pictures

From the Publisher