Patriarchy

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Patriarchy

Although patriarchy has been the norm in most religions for most of recorded history, it has become a highly contentious term in contemporary American religion. Patriarchy (father rule) refers more generally to male authority within any social structure—family, country, religion—and has historically been associated with reduced power and freedom for women (e.g., dress codes, restriction of mobility outside the home, control of sexual activity, prohibition from voting or holding political office, exclusion from education and various occupations). While contemporary American society has—legally, at least—virtually abolished patriarchy, religion has long served to legitimate it and is the last remaining institution to claim that patriarchy should be maintained. Theoretical debates over patriarchy, therefore, have important practical implications.

First, scholars disagree over what exactly is meant by religious patriarchy and the impact it has on gender roles. Some traditions are patriarchal in their official structure but allow women considerable power within the home. Robert Orsi has described nineteenth-century Italian-American Catholicism as a public patriarchy, private matriarchy, and similar characterizations have been made of Judaism. Conservative Protestants officially promote male authority, but women have founded and led popular movements, particularly in early Pentecostalism and in healing ministries. In short, we need to distinguish between public (official) and private (domestic) elite and popular religion.

Second, there is considerable debate as to patriarchy's origins. One theory holds that religious patriarchy is tied to economics. Settled agricultural societies where women make an equal or greater contribution to the food supply than men often have female-centered creation myths and include women in public rituals, while the reverse is true in nomadic societies that depend primarily on hunting or herding of animals. Patriarchal religion became universal because the latter type of society developed weapons and techniques of warfare to overpower the former.

Another theory ties the rise of patriarchal religion to reproduction. Before man understood the reproductive process, woman's ability to give birth must have seemed magical. Patriarchal religion emerged either as a means to counter woman's power (e.g., menstruation taboos) or as a result of man's eventual recognition that reproduction requires his input and that to claim offspring as "his" he needed to control women's sexual activity.

Both these theories imply that patriarchy may have been preceded by a society in which men did not rule. Some contemporary feminists have argued for the existence of a universal matriarchal religion that was suppressed by more patriarchal traditions (e.g., Judaism in the Middle East or the Vedic tradition in India), but the evidence is controversial. Much of the argument turns on whether archaeological findings of female figurines should be interpreted as goddesses, and whether societies who worship goddesses actually give women any authority.

Finally, and most important, there is the debate over religious patriarchy's future. Within American religious history, patriarchy was until recently accepted as normative, since it was clearly legitimated by Scripture. Until about the middle of the nineteenth century, God's curse that Eve must bear the pain of childbirth and that her husband "shall rule over you" was taken quite literally by most Jews and Christians to mean that women's primary role was raising children and that men should lead in church, at home, and in society at large. Patriarchal religion also dovetailed nicely with existing social and economic arrangements, as the newly independent nation and its emerging industrial economy benefited from keeping married women at home, raising children.

As the nineteenth century drew to a close, however, several factors combined to challenge the notion that patriarchy was God's will. One was a broader awareness of scientific theories, including evolution and biblical criticism, which led people to question the literal truth of the Bible. Another was the unintended consequence of the cult of domesticity (the notion that the home is a moral haven from the corrupt world of business and politics), which led women to become increasingly involved in church activities and later in moral reform movements such as temperance. Such involvement in turn motivated women to question their exclusion from religious and political leadership. Feminists began to challenge the notion that patriarchy is God-given and sought for new interpretations of Scripture that gave women greater equality.

Churches and synagogues were slow to respond. So-called mainline Protestant churches such as Congregationalists, Presbyterians, and Methodists were the first to officially abolish patriarchy by permitting the ordination of women in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Reform Jews followed suit in 1972 and Conservative Jews in 1985. Yet, as studies of women clergy have shown, such symbolic moves do not necessarily mean the actual structure of American religion is no longer patriarchal. Most churches and synagogues that permit women's ordination do not actually employ female pastors, and Roman Catholics, Orthodox Jews, and the majority of conservative Protestant churches still refuse to ordain women.

Because feminist criticism undermines the very foundations of conservative religion (scriptural inerrancy for Evangelicals, magisterial authority for Catholics, and halakah for Orthodox Jews), defending patriarchy has become a kind of identity badge or symbolic boundary that conservatives use to distinguish themselves from liberals. Yet unlike the nineteenth century, patriarchal religion is at odds with contemporary social and economic trends, inducing conservatives to claim that patriarchy isn't really sexist and actually empowers women.

A similar dilemma is faced by Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims, whose numbers in the United States have significantly increased since immigration laws changed in 1965. These religions are historically every bit as patriarchal as traditional Christianity or Judaism, and many immigrants come from countries where feminism has yet to make a significant impact. In attempting to retain the younger generation and in seeking new converts, these religions have had to either modify their patriarchal structure (e.g., Zen) or develop an apologetic for it (e.g., Islam).

Feminists for their part are divided over how to respond to the persistence of patriarchal religion. While most continue to push for reform, more radical feminists assert that biblical imagery and language are inherently patriarchal and must therefore be rejected altogether. These women are often drawn to new religions, especially Neopaganism, that provide an alternative to patriarchy.

Bibliography

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