Women of Bible Lands is an anthology of biblical and early stories about Jewish, Christian, and Muslim women from the nineteenth century B.C.E. to the ninth centuryC.E. Ancient words and journeys strengthen modern readers for a challenging pilgrimage from the head to the heart as they travel in spirit through the Holy Land to Greece, Turkey, and North Africa. Kirk's book, which is the first guide book to biblical sites associated with women, not only fills a void, but does so in an inspirational and imaginative way.
Part One: Reclaiming Women's Stories and Journeys discusses the types of women that have been remembered in the Christian tradition and examines the scarcity of women's writings and the possibilities of women's oral tradition within the Bible and other early sources. Chapters in Part One are: Shards and Stories," *'As a Mother Hen Gathers Her Brood Under Her Wings, '- *The Pilgrimage to the Womb of Compassion, - *Seeking the True Cross, Seeking the True Helena, - *Ascetic Life, an Inner Journey; Pala and Egeria, Their Outer and Inner Journeys, - and *Guides for Reading. -
Part Two: Stories, Sites, and Maps includes introductions to the sites, maps, information about or by women or female images of God, and selections from the Bible or an early Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Coptic, Syriac, or Arabic text. Chapters in Part Two are: *The Old City of Jerusalem, - *Other Sites in Jerusalem, - *Sites in Israel and Palestine, - *Sinai, Egypt, and Tunisia, - *Iran, Iraq, Jordan, - *Lebanon and Syria, - *Greece and the Mediterranean Islands, - and *Turkey. -
Martha Ann Kirk, CCVI, ThD, is professor of religious studies at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas, and a recent recipient of the Texas Pax Christi 2005 award. She led several study tours to the Holy Land and was a research scholar at Tantur Ecumenical Institute, Jerusalem. Kirk has written entries for Worship Music published by Liturgical Press and is the author of *Liturgical Drama, - published in the Collegeville Catholic Reference Library on CD-ROM and The New Dictionary of Sacramental Worship by Liturgical Press.
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