why are powerful intelligent women often reduced to the status of whore in religion and history?

Question

The three who easily come to mind are Jezebel, Cloepatra and Mary Magdalen (who was very influential to jesus).

Love that title, Uppity women of ancient times. Looks like a must-read

Answer 1

You should read the Gospel according to Mary Magdalene; you can find a translation online pretty easily. In that text it discusses how the men don't believe her because she is a woman!

Also remember Thecla, she dressed up like Paul and preached as well. What a girl!

Anyway, Mary Magdalene has been traditionally linked with the whore with the long hair because a pope read the text wrong, and even though they are two different people, they got merged into one. Jezebel wasn't liked because she was a Pagan, and she was powerful. Cleopatra was in the same boat. Don’t forget Salome either, she was Herodias’ daughter who requested John the Baptist’s head!

A lot of this spin comes from centuries of sexism. Men were the ones with education and literacy, so they recorded history. Some used it as a way to stay in control.

I think a book you would enjoy reading is called, "Uppity Women of Ancient Times."

Answer 2

The problem with both history and religion (not to be confused with actual spiritually) are male dominated. Although Dan Brown wrote a fictional novel, I believe there is a lot of truth behind the idea that the Catholic religion (along with many other religions) have covered up and even changed stories in order to pursue their own agenda. Historically, our world (religion and otherwise) has been run by men - it seems only logical that as the story goes round the woman reduced from the hero she may be into a whore because it IS intimidating for a woman to be great in a male-dominated society.

Women are even intimidated by this because historically we were brought up understanding that male were dominate and that women should respect that. So even the women were eager to believe that a woman must have had to be a whore in order to achieve power.

Although we have come a long way. We still have a way to go. Women being powerful and independent is still outside of the "norm". Although it is OK for a while - once a women hits 30 or so, many times, she is no longer viewed as strong and independent; she's viewed as flawed (if she weren't flawed, someone would have married her by now).

Answer 3

I think the catholic church had a lot to do with vilifying Mary Magdalene. It was a very male dominated society, and the concept of women having any intelligence or power was just more than they could deal with. One pope actually labelled Mary Magdalene a prostitute, even though the bible never said she was the prostitute, that was an entirely different woman.

Answer 4

Many men are threatened by powerful intelligent women.

You can see that today with Hillary Clinton. I lived in NY state during Hillary's senate campaign. Her republican challenger ran a campaign that was nothing more than an "I hate Hillary" fest. Even republicans couldn't remember the guy's name who ran against her, because he had no positions other than that he hated Hillary.

heck, ask someone who hates Hillary WHY they hate her. (you'll find that they're 99% men, by the way, which should be a hint right there) They won't be able to come up with a coherent answer. You'll get something incoherent about socialized healthcare out of them, but they won't be able to articulate why that's bad either. Regardless, that one issue won't explain the level of HATRED that they have for her.

She's a strong, powerful, intelligent woman, and that scares the crap out of a lot men.

It's nothing new unfortunately.

Answer 5

The saying "it's a mans world" didn't come from nowhere. It's sad but true that men have never given women the due they deserve. It comes from old world religions and it's still an issue today. Very sad

Answer 6

Just think about what youve asked.....powerful and intelligent. Two things that the Church attempts to horde to itself: power and (lack of) intelligence. It is not surprising that they would orchestrate a smear campaign against these women! Just look at the recent "Inconvenient Spoof" stuff....a spoof movie placed on YouTube.com by an "average Joe"....turns out that average Joe is a company that advertises for large Corporations...and their beiggest client is Exxon...... SMEAR!!!

Answer 7

Men in power have written everything, so it's only logical that they write it in favor of their own personal favor. Women, minorities, etc. all get the short end of the stick because we didn't write the history. If my ancestors had written the history books, things would be looked at much differently.

Answer 8

No, they are not. Read your text again.

And as for that mary, it is not proven that she is prosititute, nor is she ever been at all influential. Only in myth, copied by Dan Brown.

Answer 9

no i dunno bout others but i can give u the list of all the important women who r given great status in history of mankind.

eve (pbuh)- she was the first of all mothers. when christianity said that eve was the reason for downfall of mankind it was islam that said no both adam and eve were jointly responsible (pbut). their names hav always been mentioned together around 70times in quran and in no place can u find islam pin pointing only eve(pbuh)

hazrat biwi sarah(a.s) - wife of abraham (pbuh) and mother of isaac(pbuh)

hazrat biwi hajirah (a.s) - wife of abraham(pbuh) and mother of ishmael (pbuh)

miryam (a.s)- musa's (pbuh)sister

maryam (a.s) - mother of jesus(pbuh). she is xalted and held most high as she had the guts to giv birth 2 a child wifout any male intervention. she is among the top 3 role models as she did wat god had asked her

aasiyah (a.s) - the wife of pharoah who adopted moses(pbuh) when she found him in the river

hazrat khadijah (r.a) - muhammed's (pbuh) 1st wife, the first woman of faith. she was a great scholar and gave xcellent sermons.

hazrat ayesha (r.a) - last of muhammed's (pbuh) wives and was a great scholar. she recorded all the sayings and teachings of muhammed (pbuh) and compiled it as hadith

all these women were xamples of great role models for all muslimah

muhammed (pbuh) was the man who said no to female infanticide, to women being 2nd class citizens and he gave women right 2 vote.
he was the man who first said that a divorced woman or widow could remarry. remeber hindus followed sati (burning wives alive when husbands died) and so did early christianswho would shave the womans hair when she bcame a widow.

it was he who said that women have right over her parent's, her own and her husbands property. or else in christianity women were not allowed to hold anything, no money or property for themselves.

infact there hav been times in christianity where the statemnts of women were not considered valid(esp if it is property or witness).

it was muhammed who 1st said that women should b educated. or else there were no sermons by women in christianity or any religion. the best xample being virgin mary (a.s) and mary magdalene herself

it was muhammed who 1st said that women should b educated. or else there were no sermons by women in christianity or any religion. the best xample being virgin mary (a.s) and mary magdalene herself.

Answer 10

Due to religion and history.