Women of the Old Testament: 50 Devotional Messages for Women's Groups

by Abraham Kuyper

This classic by Dr. A. Kuyper gives us 50 graphic character sketches that radiate scriptural insight. Each character study is based on a specific passage of Scripture.

Genres: Theology, Devotional

192 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1964

About the author

Abraham Kuyper was a Dutch politician, journalist, statesman and theologian. He founded the Anti-Revolutionary Party and was prime minister of the Netherlands between 1901 and 1905.

Reviews

[Alexis Neal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another quality entry from Kuyper. Occasionally he embellishes fact with what appears to be his own vision of what was going on behind the scenes, which can be frustrating. But in many cases, he presents these biblical characters in new (to me, anyway) and insightful ways. Not everything he intuits about every character is based in incontrovertible fact, but the lessons are largely sound (even if the passages in question don't necessarily illustrate those lessons).

Worth reading, and easy to digest (each section is about 3-4 pages in length, and the sections are discrete, so it's a great daily devotional).

[Courtney Kane]

Kuyper has said some not very nice things about women, so I do find it interesting that he has written enough magazine articles for two books worth of commentary on the women in the Bible. Not only that, but women apparently read them in church groups as devotionals. I still am filled with a healthy dose of trepidation and would worry that the translator has watered down the text, as was done in the abridged version of 'Near Unto God'. I believe all three are Zondervan.

[Wilma · Rating 1 out of 5]

Too archaic, and too patriarchal for my liking.

[Kara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Much of the below review seems a bit harshly worded to me now, though the sense of it remains true. I feel there is a lot of good insight in this book, thought admittedly at times it seems the author takes some liberties, and has a view of women which I don't completely disagree or agree with - sometimes I feel he's spot on, others, not so much. Worth the good stuff, don't get too hung up on the less good. It does a good job, too (usually) of pointing out how God used those who were far from perfect to carry out his plan, which underlines so well that we can still be used today, no matter our past.

Original thoughts:
May 9, 2017 (will update as appropriate, or at the end)

I've barely started this but it is easy to tell that this book was written in 1934, and by a man of that time. There are some good insights and ways of thinking about these women so far mentioned that are thought provoking and interesting - but there are equally comments that clearly leave a degrading tang in the back of the mind. Women and their thoughts and reactions are generalized to the most timid, afraid, intimated, and yet attention seeking beings. There are also comments made for which I can find no grounding in scripture about the details that are presented as truth.

{For example, Ada and Zillah "decided together" to be two wives to one man, Lamech - while this clearly is true as they both were his wives, at the same time, and bore him children, there is no more than one sentence explaining the fact. Where does it say they decided together to do this? For all we know their parents had a hand in the decision. Or not... it doesn't say - which is the point here. Also, the comment is made that the daughter of Zillah had a "tempting lure of feminine charm [which] induces man to humiliate himself still more before woman." The only thing in the Bible about Naamah is literally that she was Zillah's daughter (by Lamech) and that she is the sister of Tubal-Cain. This is not using feminine charm to humiliate man. I'm not saying it isn't possible that she did do that, but it isn't in the text. Nothing I could find - granted it was a quick search - revealed any confirmed additional knowledge of these women outside these verses, though admittedly there were some "theories."}

This is definitely be one to read with scripture firmly in mind (and in sight) and a mind that is keenly up to paying attention and determining what is truth and what is gross conjecture.

[Betzy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay for lazy reading!