Women, in New Testament times and in the eyes of Jehovah, the merciful God, a personal will. If a woman made a vow to Jehovah, and her father forbade her, her vow did not stand. The married woman had to have her vow approved by her husband, or it did not have any value. This means that the woman was not spiritually free, for the vow was made to Jehovah. This is in Num. 30:1-16.
The law of Jehovah reduced women to an object to be used, that is, the owner of that object, the father or the husband, did to the woman whatever he wished. A woman might love her husband, but, if he found anything displeasing in her, sent her away with a certificate of divorce (Deut. 24:1-4). The problem was never her virginity, because the woman had to marry a virgin, or she would be stoned to death (Deut. 22:13-21).
As the woman was an object, a father, used his daughter as a prize for the boldness of a friend of his. When Caleb conquered the land of the Anakim, he challenged his soldiers saying: “The one who attacks Kiriath-sepher and captures it, I will give him Acash my daughter as wife”. Caleb did not even ask her whether she had any sympathy for any other man, but she had to accept her father’s determination, even if the winner was a gorilla. Otniel captured Kiriath-sepher, and won Achsah as wife (Josh. 15:13-17).
Women had such little value in the eyes of God Jehovah, that Amnon, David’s first-born, inflamed with desird for his sister Tamar, violated her, and the bible tells us that After he had done this, he hated her so much that he threw her out the door (2 Sam. 13:1-7). David knew about this and overlooked it, because women did not have any value. After two years had passed, Absalom took vengeance on his brother, killing him (2 Sam. 13:21-29).
Jacob loved Rachel and paid for her with seven years of work in his uncle’s house—Laban, her father. On the wedding night, when morning came, he noticed that he had lain with Leah, and not with Rachel. Laban said to him: “It is not practice in our place, to marry off the younger before the first-born. I will give you Rachel and Leah for fourteen years of work”.
Leah was currency for her father’s deal, because women did not have any value, and married without any need of love for her husband (Gen. 29:18-27). When Lot entertained two angels and the Sodomites pleaded to have them, to have relations with them, Lot told them: “Now behold, I have two daughters who have had relations with no man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof” (Gen. 19:1-8). Women were used for business or as means of protection. Lot, because of the angels, handed his daughters to the men of the city! Something similar happened to a certain Levite who went wandering about with his concubine. Going through the land of Benjamin, as it was already late, they sat in the open square. An old man saw them and invited them to spend the night at his house. A band of worthless Benjamites surrounded the house and demanded that the old man gave them the Levite so they could abuse him. The old man said to them: “Here is my virgin daughter and his concubine. Please let me bring them out that you may ravish them and do to them whatever you wish. But do not commit such an act of folly against this man”. The Levite’s concubine was brought out and was abused all night, and she died by dawn. All these facts prove that women did not have any value during the period of the law of Jehovah. They were objects of desire, slaves for work, and objects of barter (Judges 19). Salomon had a thousand women; three hundred of which were concubines, that is, women to satisfy men’s carnal desire (1 Kings 11:3).
Abraham loved Sarah, his wife. However, to protect his life, handed her to Pharaoh as lover or concubine. Pharaoh dealt kindly with Abraham for the sake of Sarah, so that Abraham got rich (Gen. 12:11-16). The intimacy between Abraham and Jehovah was such that Jehovah called called him friend (Is. 41:8). If a woman had any value in the eyes of Jehovah, he would have protected Sarah from prostitution. The truth is that, all kinds of violence possible, in the spiritual, moral or physical fields, were forced upon women. Women were despised, humiliated, trampled over and violated under the sight of the God Jehovah, who was holy, merciful and perfect.
A stubborn and rebellious son was brought to the elders to be publicly stoned (Deut. 21:18-21). If anyone gathered wood on a Sabbath, they were also stoned, and everything by the command of Jehovah (Num. 15:32-36). If anyone worshipped an idol, they were stoned and killed (Deut. 13:6-10). Jehovah was a demanding God, inflexible and severe in matters of less value that the human soul; and he put women in an inferior position, servile and humiliating as we have already said.
In all the nations around Israel, women were diminished in relation men; and Jehovah, being God, used the same unjust measure in relation to women.
Jesus Christ came to this world and brought women to an equality in marriage, freeing the woman from the yoke of slavery (Matt. 19:3-9). Pastors, elders, and deacons, should only be allowed to perform their functions if they were married to an only woman. David had seventeen. If Jehovah were one with Jesus, he would have done what Jesus did fifteen hundred years ago.
If Jesus were on earth in the times of Jehovah, Jesus would have acted as the Father acts. Jehovah did not do it, because he has nothing of Jesus or the Father, who are not discriminating. Jesus said: “I andthe Father are one” (John 10:30). Neither Jesus nor the Father could agree with the barbarities Jehovah used to do to women.
By Pastor Olavo Silveira Pereira