Book Note I Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus: Women in Q

Sara Parks, Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus: Women in Q (Lanham: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2019)

 [Please note: the author of this review completed the index for Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus on a freelance basis. The author did not perform any research or editing for the book.]

In this compelling monograph, Sara Parks combines two scholarly interests that have not been brought together before: studies of Q, a hypothetical source that explains the material shared by the Gospel of Matthew and Luke, and studies of the historical Jesus’ relationship to women. Parks argues that Q uses a unique literary device, which she terms “parallel gender pairs” (e.g., the Parable of the Lost Sheep and the Parable of the Lost Coin; she also refers to them as “gendered pairs”), to treat male and female listeners with a certain kind of equality. Although this literary device does not appear in any extant Hellenistic or early Jewish literature, Parks finds echoes of it in some of the texts that follow Q. Others have taken note of the gendered pairs, especially as they occur in the later gospel of Luke (e.g., Turid Seim, Alicia Batten, Kathleen Corley, Amy-Jill Levine, Luise Schottroff), but disagree about the implications of these sayings for women. The key argument of Parks is that, through these parallel gender pairs, Q intentionally delivers the same teaching to men and women, but not in a way that disrupts gendered social expectations. In this, she skillfully avoids feminist supersessionism—a tendency to claim that Jesus initiated Christianity in ways that promoted the equality of women over and against an oppressive and patriarchal Judaism. 

Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus includes seven chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the interest in the parallel gender pairs, the scholarly debates about their implications for women, and the ways that the project employs historical-critical and feminist methods. Introductory material continues into Chapter 2, where Parks outlines the issues that have been central to the study of Q, including the process by which “Q became a text” (29). Here, Parks offers key assertions about the social context of Q, including its Galilean provenance, its interest in Jesus’ teachings along with its lack of interest in his biography, and its rural, agrarian, Jewish demographic (31). This chapter may be of particular interest to those who question what Jesus might have said to and about women, but who may not be familiar with the nuances of Q scholarship.

 In Chapter 3, Parks contends that there are substantial differences between the context of the parallel gender pairs in Q and the texts of the New Testament. Parks reviews and engages the scholarship about the gender pairs in the early Jesus movement, and ultimately concludes that the picture for women is complicated: “Q treats women equally in certain specific ways and not in every way” (66, emphasis original). The gender pairs do signal an intentional inclusion of women in the Jesus movement, but they do not necessarily overturn gendered divisions of labor or traditional social roles.

 In Chapter 4, Parks divides the parallel gender pairs into two major categories: binary sets of parables and briefer binary phrases.

Parks offers nuance to this taxonomy, however, by differentiating three possible ways that the texts indicate gender: gender implied, gender overt, or gender overt and implied. Gender implied refers to paired sayings in which the gender of the protagonists is not indicated directly but is implied indirectly by other elements usually associated with gender, such as tasks traditionally performed by men or women. Gender overt pairs make direct references to the gender of the protagonists.

 Chapter 5 asks another question: “Were There Gendered Parable Pairs before Jesus?”. According to Parks, the answer is “no.” After examining the Hebrew Bible, Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, and various Greek texts, Parks argues that parallel gender pairs represent a rhetorical innovation that originated with Jesus. Despite several “close calls,” these comparisons indicate that “the poetic synonymous parallelism in Hebrew literature, the double injunction in the pseudepigraphon Joseph and Aseneth that cannot be dated prior to Q, or the posited wordplay of the scribes, do not provide convincing origins for Q’s gendered pairing” (122).

Chapter 6 moves forward in time by examining later texts such as the undisputed letters of Paul, the canonical gospels, the book of Acts, and texts from beyond the Jesus movement including De Vita Contemplativa, Joseph and Aseneth, and That Women Too Should Study Philosophy. Although the gender pairs represent a rhetorical innovation made by Jesus, Parks’ comparative readings of these texts demonstrate that the pairs did not appear ex nihilo; other texts from within the 1st century Jewish and Roman context are discussing and debating ways that women might be considered equal.

 The final chapter notes that Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus is the first book-length work in English that studies the parallel gender pairs. Parks argues that this innovative rhetorical technique “should play a much greater role in our investigations into where women and gender fit” within the early Jesus movement (151). Several of these pairs have been attributed to Luke based on the view that this gospel was more inclusive of women, but Parks’ work shows that some of the pairs more likely originated in Q, raising important questions about why the gendered pairs were diminished as Christianity persisted.

 Throughout this book, Parks offers a nuanced analysis of the parallel gender pairs in Q. By demonstrating the uniqueness of these gender paired sayings, Parks draws thoughtful conclusions about their function within the broader context of Q. The pairs demonstrate that men and women are equal with regard to their spiritual inclusion and eschatological agency, even as socially gendered roles are maintained. Parks’ work clarifies long-standing questions about what these sayings might mean for women in the Jesus movement, and provides an important contribution to the study of Q and the study of Jesus’ treatment of women.

Hilary Floyd is a PhD student at Drew University in the area of Bible and Cultures. Her work focuses on the New Testament and early Christianity, especially the parables and the relationship between economic context and interpretation.