Daughters of Miriam: Women Prophets in Ancient Israel by Wilda C. Gafney

Daughters of Miriam: Women Prophets in Ancient Israel Reviews

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  Carmen Imes

  This book is remarkable for the ways that Gafney points to so many influential women hiding in plain sight! She's a careful reader of the biblical text and a careful analyst of the surrounding cultures. At times she concludes in favor of a reading that is only a possibility rather than a certainty, but her positions are never unwarranted.
  
  I am grateful for her stimulating work that is systematically recovering the voices of women in the Bible.
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  Biel

  I'm here to support the (Black) women of color in Biblical scholarship!!! Dr. Gafney is an amazing woman with a lot of important insight in Biblical academia. I feel like this book didn't offer any particularly new or "surprising" information, however, that doesn't discredit or diminish the incredible work offered and displayed in this book. Each chapter clearly outlines concrete information that I think would serve as a great starting point for any sort of research regarding prophecy in the Hebrew Bible. I also appreciate the academic "drag" written at the beginning of the book ;)
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  David

  Excellent work of scholarship that is quite eye-opening regarding the prevalence and power of female prophets in ancient Israel. I guess saying it is “eye-opening” simply reveals my own masculine bias.
  
  This book is detailed; I imagine there are similar books, probably by Gafney herself, that are more accessible for popular-level readers. That said, pastors and teachers and students would do well to read more scholars like Gafney.
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  Tristan Sherwin

  *Daughters Of Miriam: Women Prophets in Ancient Israel* is a study that I would highly recommend. Not only does it provide a review of the Hebrew scriptures (and other Ancient Near Eastern texts) to outline the functions/roles of prophets, but, as the title suggests, it highlights the central role that women played within this tradition. A role that has often been downplayed or disregarded in biblical studies.
  
  Gafney convincingly demonstrates that the female prophetic voice was not an “exception” to the norm, nor a second choice (in the absence of a male voice), but that women prophets were normative within the ANE, and also prominent and actively present within each era of Israel’s history.
  
  Although this work has plenty of in-depth surveys of the ancient languages/terminology and cultures, Gafney has kept this accessible and summarises her key points well. So the beautiful insights here are not out of reach to a lay-person (like myself). However, if you do feel a little out-of-your depth with this study, may I suggest that it’s not because of how the work has been presented, but possibly down to being introduced to new concepts/new language. If that is the case, stick with it—it’s worth it!
  
  Overall, this is an important and excellent resource from Dr Wilda C Gafney; one that I can foresee myself returning to again for reference and reflection.
  
  —Tristan Sherwin, author of *Love: Expressed*
  
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  Rev. Linda

  A suggested text for a Spring 2018 Brite Divinity course - the detail obtained from Dr. Gafney's research is amazing in this book - this book will be a valuable reference resource on my book shelves for future study of the Hebrew Bible -- From the publisher: There are untold numbers of female prophets hiding in the masculine grammar and androcentric focus of the Hebrew scriptures. There were women-prophets in the communities around biblical Israel, existing for hundreds of years and even a thousand years before the Israelite and Judean prophets recorded their messages. The rabbinic and Christian fathers analyzed and found more women in the scriptures who function as prophets than the biblical authors identify. All of these female prophets have an intimate connection with the God of Israel; they express that connection by singing, dancing, drumming, speaking with and for God, waging war, performing miracles, exercising statecraft, and giving birth. Each of them is a daughter of Miriam, the mother of all women-prophets. Women prophets gave a powerful voice to Yahwist faith at the formative moments in ancient Israel s development, and were expected in biblical visions of the future. Now they come to the foreground as Wilda Gafney explores prophetic practices in ancient Israel, its near eastern environment, and early and rabbinic Judaism as well.
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  Angélique (Angel)

  3.5 Stars. It took me months to finish this book not because it was bad but because it was way over my head. This book is full of fascinating insight into the concept of prophecy in the Hebrew Bible and ancient Near East; however, it is definitely intended for individuals with training in advanced Biblical scholarship and a solid understanding of Biblical Hebrew. As a previous reviewer noted, it is repetitive at points, but some of that repetition was helpful for me as someone mostly out of her element. All that being said, I think reading this book has expanded the way I think about prophecy in the Bible and more broadly, Biblical translation.
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  Peter

  Too technical for me
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  Robin Tobin (On the back porch reading)

  audiobook... wow....
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  Faiqa Mansab

  Poorly researched.
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  Sarah

  Gafney takes an innovative and disciplined approach to her topic, female prophets in the Hebrew Bible. (While she works to reconstruct the historical realities of ancient Israelite prophecy and does some interesting comparative work with cuneiform sources, all her sources are textual). Her approach is primarily philological and grammatical: she makes the important point that masculine plurals in Biblical Hebrew often mask mixed-gender groups, and works from specific female prophets first to reconstruct categories of prophetic activity women may have practiced and then to recover female figures who may have practiced prophecy without being named "prophets" in the text. A key and under-highlighted contribution of the book is her definition of prophecy: anything described in the text with verbal or nominal forms of the root for "prophet/prophesy," n-b-'. This is a refreshingly simple and unbiased approach to seemingly interminable scholarly debates about what constitutes "true" biblical prophecy.
  
  While I disagree with some of her claims (for example, that there was widespread support for Nehemiah's temple rebuilding project, or that "keeper of the wardrobe" more likely describes a domestic servant than high-ranking court official), the book is a fine example of the deployment of traditional philological methods in service of ground-breaking interpretations. Much of the book is accessible to a lay reader, and the rest to anyone with basic proficiency in biblical Hebrew. I'd strongly recommend it to researchers working on prophecy or gender, and also to feminist or womanist students looking for models for their own work. (It is a revised version of the author's Duke dissertation.)
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  Lauren

  Good content, but repetitive.