In Women and the Bible in Early Modern England Femke Molekamp examines “the diverse cultures of Bible-reading in which early modern women engaged, and maps their connection to forms of female writing” (6) in England between 1550 and 1670. Molekamp argues that there was a specific link between the development of these reading cultures and the “growth of original, interpretive, female religious writing” (9). She largely succeeds at this, although the work does not quite deliver the breadth it promises.
After the introduction, Molekamp begins in the first chapter with the Bible as it was read and used in the home. Focusing on the Geneva Bible, which she notes was the most influential and widely used of all the English Bibles, Molekamp examines a vast array of Bible-associated issues that related to readers. These included such Bible-reading aids as the paratexts and the marginal notations, which Molekamp identifies as one of the “most defining features” of the Geneva Bible (23). Different editions of the Geneva Bible were produced to reach various literacy and educational levels, and the paratexts and marginal notes reflected that, as well as the clear desire of the Bible's editors to control biblical interpretation. These were particularly important for women, for, as Molekamp explains, not only were women “less likely than men to be fully literate” (28) but the desire to shape women's reception of the Bible was acute since even men who supported women's Bible reading nonetheless betrayed a good deal of anxiety about women's interpretative abilities.
Yet Molekamp's further exploration of women's personal marks and insertions in their Bibles demonstrates that, while receptive to such guidance, women were quite capable of expressing “their personal theological convictions” (40) as well as noting both the application of specific Biblical texts to their individual circumstances and recording “personal life-writing” (39). Women's interactions with their Bibles extended even to the materiality of the Bible itself. Noting that early moderns “styled their Bibles to conform to their preferences” (42), Molekamp, looking in particular at the embroidery that women used to decorate their Bibles, argues that for women there was “an obvious connection to be made between reading, writing, and needlework” (45).
Having constructed a multifaceted view of domestic Scripture, in the second chapter Molekamp moves on to the various kinds of Bible-reading engaged in by women: “from active, annotative reading, to private meditative reading; linear to non-linear approaches, reading typographically, providentially, proverbially, and even prophetically” (83). She also begins to link these modes of reading to women's writing, a topic that carries over into her third chapter, on how Bible-reading created female communities in a variety of forms, arguing that “women not only participated in, but (depending on status) could organize, devotional reading at home” (85). Here Molekamp quite properly emphasizes women as mothers and mistresses of households, since in these roles women were often religious instructors; indeed, a significant number of catechisms were targeted for use by mothers and “appear to take for granted the mother's authoritative role in biblical and theological learning. Women further demonstrated this authority by contributing to the genre … as writers” (91). Yet the Bible and the “vibrant communal devotional lives” built around it facilitated women as writers beyond purely didactic material, as women “frequently drew on this cultural matrix in producing manuscripts and printed texts” (101). While in other forms of religious writing, such as collections of prayers and meditations, women still often invoked the role of mother and, in particular, alluded to the mother-daughter relationship, they yet gave voice to a greater range of religious expression and sought a greater religious influence. Molekamp demonstrates that in these as well as their other authorial forms, women's ability to anchor their writing in scripture allowed them to assert an authoritative voice.
Having dealt with the various sorts of Bible reading done by women, both alone and in groups, as well as devotional writing aimed at communities, in her fourth chapter Molekamp’ more deeply examines women's engagement in “affective, meditative reading” (120). This is perhaps the most successful and compelling section of the book, as Molekamp makes expert use of women readers/writers like Elizabeth Melville and Anne Lock to demonstrate the “critical connection … between the richly affective devotional reading experiences encouraged by and for women and the forms of religious female writing” (149). She builds in this in the final two chapters by focusing on the two parts of the Bible that feature most prominently in women's devotional reading and writing: the Psalms and the Passion. In her conclusion Molekamp recapitulates her thesis and major points; she follows it with an appendix of some poems by Anne Rhodes and a bibliography.
Molekamp describes her work as an “historicist study” (14), but it is firmly based in literary criticism, which is both its great strength and minor weakness. She does an outstanding job with the texts, offering a great deal of nuance and subtlety in her analysis. However, while those outside the field of literary criticism will find this work useful, they may also find it at times tedious. It would have been beneficial if Molekamp could have integrated her research more with historians' work on devotion. Nonetheless, this is an excellent book.
