Her Image Of Salvation

Corrington examines the image of the savior and the experience of salvation, two concepts that are inextricably entwined. The author asserts that Christianity set aside female images of salvation by emphasizing the maleness of Jesus. She draws on solid knowledge of Jewish and classical Greek sources to show that the image of God could be seen as both male and female.

This series brings to a wide audience important new discoveries concerning relationships of women and men in the Bible, ancient Israel, early Judaism, and early Christianity. The books explore the role of gender within the biblical tradition and document its continuing influence on subsequent life and thought. The books emphasize literary and historical methods as well as anthropological, archaeological, and linguistic approaches to biblical characters, gendered imagery, and the history of biblical interpretation. The books are based on thorough scholarship and can be read with pleasure by all serious readers.

Library Journal

Corrington's (religious studies, Rhodes Coll.) powerfully presented study of female soteriological models and early Christianity provides superior analysis. Corrington seeks to prove that female savior figures like Mary, the Egyptian Isis, and Sophia/Wisdom ``embrace the opposites, in whom virgin and mother, human and divine, spirit and flesh, savior and saved meet.'' Certainly, she argues, these models don't necessarily require a male to fulfill their redemptive function. As fleshed out by its early, formative practitioners, however, Christianity proclaimed that only a male could meet the salvific directive. Corrington stays the course well, avoiding angry feminist barbs and clearly illustrating how early Christian theology helped solidify our conceptions of male savior figures. The heavily footnoted text is academic in tone, and those conversant with the debate surrounding Christian history and gender issues will reap interesting fruit from this work. Recommended for large religious and women's studies collections.-- Sandra Collins, SLIS, Univ. of Pittsburgh