Gender and Education

Feminism has come to mean different thing for different people. For some it is fighting for equality while for some others it is fighting to demonstrate which of the gender is superior, yet some are quite happy with the status quo. The debate on gender, however, has to do, and must be, with removing inequalities which have been constructed by the society. It is not about who is able to give birth and who cannot? because nature has endowed certain differences between male and female. And these differences are about biology. And there is no point fighting about the way nature has endowed us. However, gender inequalities need to be addressed. The evil system that exploits women must be torn down. And the boundary between social construction and natural endowment must be maintained to make the debate meaningful.

Throughout the ages different societies have constructed different way of exploiting women. Aristotle, though considered as the father of biology because of his works The History of animals and The Generation of Animals, considered females as imperfect males, accidentally produced by the father’s inadequacy or by the malign influence of a moist south wind. The ancient Jews would not consider woman as a person, but a thing. A Jewish man would thank that God had made him a Gentile, a slave or a woman. The ancient Romans would marry of their daughters by 12-14 years, and in many cases girl child would be left in dung heaps to die. No wonder even if millions of men die in war male far outnumbered women due to widespread practice of female infanticide. And almost all civilizations inherited the tradition of female oppression and practice it without realizing its negative side.

The biblical idea of gender equality is a profound one. Many Christian theologians debate whether women should be allowed to preach in the church or not. However, that is never an issue in our poumai churches because we allow women to minister without any reservation. Egalitarian defends women’s ministry, and complementarian argues against it. And our churches go for egalitarian pattern. Praise the Lord! Amazingly, however, the issues we face are something which both egalitarian and complementarian would not fight about. Take domestic abuse (wife beating), both egalitarian and complementarian would not hesitate to blast those males who physically assault their wife. Or even take female infanticide, which is very common is certain parts of India though uncommon in our place probably due to absence of technological know-how, every biblically literate person would call such act as murder of babies.

What does the Bible, then, say about gender equality? In the creation account we read of man (in generic sense) i.e. it includes both male and female, being created in the image and likeness of God himself. That is to say both male and female have spiritual thirst, moral awareness, creative power, relational need etc. And we also read of God giving them the mandate to “be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it…” (Gen 1:28 NIV) and to rule over sea creatures, sky creatures and land creatures. The mandate was not given to male alone, but to both the sexes. And God united them to build a home. However, the effect of sin as seen in Genesis 3 disturbs the entire environment. And we still observe in our surrounding scores and scores of cases where the effect of sin is played out: Rape, prostitution, wife beating, dowry system, female foeticide, etc.

God’s answer to all these effect of The Fall is The Cross. Jesus bore the sins of the world on the cross and he redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for us (Gal 3:13). And this healing from the effect of the Fall or curse is extended to all Jews and Gentiles, slave and free, male and female. Christians who call themselves followers of Christ, therefore, must practice a different lifestyle. Not repeating the kind of sinful life that one used to practice before coming to Jesus. Since Christ has dealt sin on the cross the entailment requires us to go back to Genesis 1-2 to find out God’s initial design for male-female relationship. And Genesis teaches us equality of worth though different in our biology.

I consider knowing this theological truth as profoundly liberating. ‘Secular’ education definitely brings liberation to women, but without knowing the theological element the liberation will not be complete. Education of both theological as well as non-theological elements need to go hand in hand to bring out the full force of liberation. And this twin force is a desperate need for our society today.

Education nowadays has become the fourth element of our human need-- after food, shelter and clothing. According to United Nations Development Programme Human Development Index is measured on the basis of three parameters viz. Literacy Rate, Life Expectancy and Per Capita Income . According to 2001 Census Report literacy rate for India is 63.38%. And if we further break it up literacy rate for male is 75.85% and for female it is 54.16%. For Manipur it is 68.87%, and for male 77.87% and female 59.70%. And for the world according to 2002 Report it is 79.7%, and for male 85.2% and 74.2%. What we notice in the statistics is that female are more illiterate than male. Literate women are less likely to be beaten, to be sold for prostitution and raped. Empirical work in recent years has brought out very clearly how the relative respect and regard for women’s well-being is strongly influenced by such variables as women’s ability to earn an independent income, to find employment outside the home, to have ownership rights…^1. These factors, however, depend upon education of the person. An illiterate woman can never achieve of such welfare.

There is no doubt that education is liberating. But I think we need to further dig down why we are not able to provide education. Poverty, it seems to me, emerges as the main culprit. But why poverty? Too many children. Why too many children? Because of illiteracy. So we have here a vicious circle. Poverty results in illiteracy that results in poverty. How then do we get out of this vicious circle? We need to address the issue at various levels. God has given us a self-sufficient kind of economic infrastructure. We never experience drought nor thunderstorm that destroy our crops. The soil is so fertile that whatever is sown sprouts. But so is also the female womb. Our parents are never satisfied with two children. Two children norm, I believe, needs to be vigorously promoted in our society. Even if both the children are girls we need to learn to be satisfied. And that takes us further to the issue of preserving or rather dismantling the patriarchal system. I would not get into sociological dimension in addressing patriarchy. I hope some other contributor would take up the challenge. I would, however, like to take up one biblical passage that male chauvinists use to justify exploitation of women.

Ephesians 5:22 says, “ Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” (NIV). However, v 22 says, “ Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” And between v 21 and v 22 in NIV there is the heading “Wives and Husbands”, as if vv 22-33 forms a paragraph. The Greek Bible reads otherwise. Verses 21 to 24 come as one sentence. And the heading “Wives and husbands”,therefore, must come before v 21, i.e. between 20 to 21. The New Living Translation gets it accurately which unfortunately NIV does not. Here we read of Paul underscoring the idea of mutual submission to one another and then goes on to give further explanation. It is not only the wife who is to submit to husband, but husband also needs to submit to wife.

The issue gets further complicated when Paul uses ‘head’ (Gk. Kephale) to elaborate the nature of wife’s submission to husband. The Greek word ‘kephale’ can be translated in different ways. It can be translated either as chief/ruler or it also be translated as source/beginning. John Stott goes on to argue this way which it seems to me makes sense. “… headship must be compatible with equality. For if ‘the head of the women is men’ as ‘the head of Christ is God’, then man and woman must be equal as the Father and the Son are equal. On the other hand, headship implies some degree of leadership, which, however, is best expressed not in terms of ‘authority’ but of ‘responsibility’. The husband’s headship of his wife, therefore, is headship more of care than of control, more of responsibility than of authority. As Christ gave himself for his bride( the Chruch), in order to present her to himself radiant and blameless, so the husband gives himself for his bride, in order to create the conditions within which she may grow into the fullness of her womanhood. ²

The mark of a Christian man and woman is (not are) “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” ³ When we live a Spirit-filled Christian life there is no place for domination, but only gentleness; no place to shouting, but only self-control; no place to be angry, but only love. If man shouts and punches that may appear masculine, but if woman does that oh! she is no place in the society. But the Bible does not differentiate between man and woman in this kind of behavioral issue. Biblical values are virtues we all need to cultivate, both male and female.

(Published in Dziila)

Politics for Poumais!

The derivative of the word politics is polis which means cities, and the word ‘police’ and ‘polite’ are also derived from the same root word. Broadly speaking, politics then is the process by which people make decisions to govern the citizens of city-state. There is nothing wrong, therefore, in being in political game. To make wise decisions that in effect transforms the lives of thousands of people has to be a virtuous act. If we understand politics in such manner Christian engagement with politics is indispensable and inevitable. Politics, however, has often been narrowly understood and so it used to mean some cunning scheme devised to gain some unjustified end. It seems to me that before we venture into redeeming politics itself, we first need to redeem the definition!

As of now the political system in our society has become so dirty that it seems an impossible task making effort to get it rid of the corruption. Has it become the den of thieves and robbers? The way money power decides the outcome of election instead of the manifesto, the tall promises of the local politicians without the obligation to fulfill them, the diversion of funds meant for the construction of roads and bridges by the ministers to their personal bank accounts, bribery in appointment of different posts in different departments… The list can go on. Seeing the way the elected leaders are governing the city-state, I think, in most people the urge to clean up the system gets punctured.

As Christians, I would argue, that instead of distancing oneself from the political system we need to actively engage in it. We need to engage as citizens of the land, and some even as political leaders. Jesus ministry to transform the society is a political engagement. If we understand Jesus as showing concern only for immaterial entity of human being, and not for the transformation of the peoples-societies-nations (or rather socio-economic-political world) we are not knowing well the Jesus of the Bible. Politicians who cheat, steal, take bribe, and lie need to confronted. In the Bible we read Nathan confronting David, John the Baptist challenging Herod Antipas, Paul appealing to Caesar etc. Even today we can ask our political leaders of their accountability.

Politics is essential for our lives, and Christians must do politics. But what kind of development must it bring? Justice and common good. Justice for all and common good served is the holistic development as followers of Christ we need to pray and work for in our political involvement. Just politicians in a liberal democratic system can do so much to build society, but that is also equally true for its citizens because ultimately every five year every political leader must return to the people to seek their mandate. Church, academic settings, politics – all have tremendous potential to build or destroy people and society. It will not be fair to pit them against one another. To be able to take these different strands and flourish is a hard work, but that is key to progress.

In democratic system can we include even animals and trees in our voter list? Can an elected leader show concern only for those villages who voted for him? Is it wise for entire village to vote for a candidate because she is from the same village? Is the MLA representative of even those villages who did not vote for him? How should we educate the voters about the importance of manifesto? How do we decide which candidates can represent us well in the assembly and speak out for our rights? I think these are some hard questions which particularly students of Political Science should seriously think through, and write and speak out about.

Finally, key to good politics is media. Public moods is best voiced by the newspaper. The newspaper can also express the failures and achievement of the politicians and in effect inform the public of the things happenings. Politicians are much more accountable when there is such a medium like newspaper which can inform the public, and also much more progressive when they are informed of the moods of the public. Sometime back I heard of a newspaper being launched in Senapati. Sad to learn that it shut down because many readers were not willing to pay the bill. We have miles to go before we can day dream!

(Published in Dziila)

Evil Eye

Kids nowadays grow up reading fantasies like Harry Potter, Chronicles of Narnia and Lord of the Rings. And that is the way our worldviews and thought patterns are subtly shaped. But I am sure the little older generations who grew up in the village would have grown up listening to the legendary stories of heroes and heroines like Pou, Proupuzhee, Rohne and others. And many of us take pride in the lesson derived from such folk tales… that we are the descendents of such brave heroes and even today we must maintain our honour and dignity. But there are other stories of one’s own generations and even from other villages that our parents taught us and ultimately influenced the way we live our lives.

One such story that has penetrated our cultural subconscious is the story of evil eyes. The story of ‘hraomai’, if I am allowed to use a Poula. The story is that the power of the evil eyes is passed to the children and spouse, and even to next generation and the next and the next… They can see through human heart, and with a verbal poison they can decapitate even buffaloes and the heroes of the village. They are beautiful and they are rich, so goes the story, and they are intelligent. The story would name people who had ‘victimized’ and been ‘victimized’. And the story lives on demonizing families and clans of the these people.

Stories are powerful tools in communicating and preserving truth and falsehood. No wonder each civilization has produced profound story tellers. Throughout human history we read of story tellers. Homer, Ved Vyasa, Milton, Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, Camus and scores of others. Luke whom Paul referred to as the beloved physician was a powerful story teller too. Luke weaved into his story the story of Israel and Jesus’ birth, death and resurrection and the birth of the Church. If Luke was a 21^st century story writer I am sure he would have used “…” to close his volume II, the book of Acts, because we people living in 21^st century, and all to come, are also the member of the characters yet to appear on stage. But Luke’s story is a sub-plot within the Story that God is writing.

In the story that Lukes narrates to his reader Theophilus, we read of characters like Mary and Zechariah evoking a sense of God rescuing His people from oppression and injustice, a divine promise of liberation. When Jesus came to Nazareth He declared that he was bringing liberation for the people (ch 4). Luke then picked certain teachings and actions of Jesus to communicate the theological idea that God’s kingdom is already here. And in the story that Luke narrates he used healing, feeding, reconciliation, forgiveness etc as signs of God’s kingdom come.

In his story 5:12-16, Luke tells of a man being of his leprosy. Jesus healed skin disease. In 5:17-26, Luke tells of paralytic being forgiven and healed. Jesus forgave and healed bone defect. In 8:40-56, Lukes tells of healing a bleeding woman, and a girl being raised from the dead. Jesus healed sickness related to blood, and He is, in fact, in able to reverse the human body mechanism. Every degenerated DNA comes to live as he spoke. In 10: 37-45, the tormenting evil spirit is driven out of a boy. Jesus has authority over evil spirit. The evil spirit cannot torment Jesus’ children. These events are historical events that Luke used to weave into his story to tell that God’s kingdom is come. The events that Luke used are not fantasy. Finally then , we read of Luke using another historical event to give a punchline, the death and resurrection of Jesus. Luke was here driving home the lesson that Jesus bore the sin and evil of the whole world upon himself as the climactic part of his project, and his Father vindicated him by raising him from the dead on the third day. And this is not fantasy again, but an event that happened in time and space, in history. However, on the 40^th day Jesus moved into another dimension, to use our phrase, and on the 50^th day after resurrection the Spirit came upon those who believed in Jesus as Lord and Savior. This is the birthday of the Church! God is now not far away, so to speak, just believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior and He will come and live in your heart. That’s a promise He gives to all those who believe in son his Jesus as Lord and Savior.

The story of healing that Luke tells is so different from the story that we tell to demonise and oppress the families and clans of the ‘evil eyes’. Luke tells the story of healing and reconciliation based on factual events, and we tell the story of division and hatred based upon pagan hearsay. ‘Evil eyes’ do not have victims, rather they are our victims. We are the oppressors. Through our stories we victimized, ostracized and demonize them. They cry out to God because society considers them to be unclean, and people in the society do not want to marry them. Luke would have been broken if he hears the story we tell today. Because he believed Jesus healed and still heals, mended and mend gaps, destroyed and destroy barriers.

I believe there are people whom the evil spirits use. Black magic, witchcraft, voodoo etc. are real. But even these practitioners get healed when they believed in Jesus as Lord and Savior. Because evil spirit cannot possess and use a person who has believed in Jesus as his or her Lord and Savior. The Holy Spirit comes to live in the life of every believer. (Rom 8:23; Eph 1: 14; 2Co 1:22) However, the story we tell about ‘evil eyes’ is little different. Among the story teller there is confusion whether it’s because of evil spirit or because of DNA. If it’s because of evil spirit there is a possibility of people being used to harm others, but the evil spirit cannot be transferred to other people through marriage or childbearing. Transferring of evil spirit to children or spouse is utter nonsense. But if it’s because of DNA (or blood as commonly understood) there is no medical proof to support that words can kill. Medical science has mapped the DNA code of human being and there is no evidence of such kind. We are not mutants. (For those who have seen the movie series X-Men). The entire story is based on pagan myth. There is no empirical evidence to proof that it is not myth.

There are times when people have openly called names. And I wonder what psychological trauma a person would go through when victimized and abused based on unchristian and intellectually stupid story. As Christians we should not let such story shape our conduct, but teach and live to remove all barriers being erected on the basis of caste, class, clans, colour etc. There is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all and is in all ( Col 3:11). As Christians we are new creation, the old is gone. (2Co 5:17) In our pagan society cases of evil spirit using people might have been there. But it just does not make sense in light of Christ giving us new life. If we have problem it only exposes our biblical illiteracy and intellectual poverty.

Many will say, “I have no problem, it’s the society”. Well, you and I make the society. If not you, who will change the society. Do not let society dictate you, look to Jesus and follow his path. We sang as kids, “though no joins me, still I will follow”. I think we need to sing all the more aloud now.

Planting a Mango Tree

Buy one kilo of Mango. Eat the flesh to make oneself healthy. Take the seeds and clean them well. Dry them. Then keep the seeds in a cup till roots begin to be formed. In the meantime you may need to change water every alternate day for some two-three weeks, which is normally the time for roots to be formed. Then plant the seeds in a park that still has space. If possible water them till their roots become strong. But let them be planted in such park where cows will not enter. Cows have eaten such young mango trees in the park before. Cows love mango leaves.

I think this is a very simple task. But if all of us do that global warming may slow down. Those who have been driving a car and polluting the air have a stronger obligation to do this. This may be as useful as putting off lights when not in use, if not more... hmmm!

Women and ministry 3

For the Christians Easter Sunday is extremely important. Christianity stands or fall with Easter Sunday. Because if Jesus is not risen from the dead, Christians may as well identify with what Paul says: eat and drink for tomorrow we die. To undermine Jesus Christ and in effect Christianity critics have tried to explain away the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

The Bible says that through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, God has begun his new creation. God is not yet done with it, but it will ultimately be complete. The Bible also says that those who believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and God are new creation. God’s work of new creation has begun in their life. In Colossians 3 and Galatians 2 Paul underscores that those who are in Christ are then to follow to a new set of ethical norm. The old relationship between Jews and non-Jews, rich and poor, male and female etc are re-evaluated in the light the this new world order i.e the new creation.

God in his creation made both male and female in his own image and likeness. This ‘image and likeness’ does not mean that we humans are like God’s statue; rather it means that we bear attributes that resemble God. Being image bearer of God, both male and female are given the mandate to take care of the world and live in it. Our ancestors somehow failed to honour God’s wish, and therefore the beginning of all wars, hatred, hunger etc.

It was God’s purpose that we human be made ‘healthy’ again—in term of our relationship with God, with ourselves, with nature etc. and that includes the repair of relationship between male and female. The dead and resurrection of Jesus is that through which the ‘healthy’ relationships begin once again, never ever to rupture again.

Is it not because of seeing through this lens that early Christians were open for women’s participation in the ministry? It is high time the reality of the dawn of new creation is visible in our individual life and our ministries.

Save Palestinian Christians from extinction!

It is not uncommon to find Christians being faulted for the Crusades launched between 1095-1272. Thousands of Muslims and Jews were killed during the period. The worst hit, however, were the Christian themselves. It all started when Pope Urban II urged the kings and leaders of Christian Europe in 1095 to bring back the Holy Land from the Turks. One of the most important rallying point of the Pope's call was to aid the Eastern Christian suffering under the infidels i.e the Muslims. Little did they know that they would end up destroying the Eastern Christians beyond almost possible repair.

As the Crusaders arrived at Jerusalem the Muslims who treated the Christians with suspicion put them out of the city. The Crusaders who could not differentiate between Arab Christians and Arab Muslims ended up slaughtering them. Villagers who were Christians were also killed due to mistaken identity. The Pope also ordered Constantinople, the seat of the Eastern church, to be sacked to pay Crusades debt. This move dealt a crushing blow to the Byzantibe Empire which have been resisting the Turkish sweep into Europe. In all this ultimately it is the Christians weakening the Christians thereby allowing the Muslims to take over.

Isn't there a similar feature between Christian Zionism and Crusades? Proponents of both movements have the intention to be faithful Christians. But the effect of both efforts is similar.There are thousands of Palestinian Christians in Jerusalem. And when Christian Zionists gave unconditional support to the display of Israel's military might upon Palestinians, it leads to the reduction in the number of (Palestinian ) Christians in the land where the church was born. Many Christians believe that when all Jews return to Israel, Jesus will return. Such policy of bringing Jews from elsewhere has negative effect on those Palestinians: Christians and Muslims, because this involves taking land and livelihood from one group to give to the other. Christian Zionism, I believe, is mistaken because land belongs to God, and there is no tribe or tongue that has absolute ownership over land. The earth is the Lord's and everything in it, and we must share and live together. Because of faulty eschatological reading of the Bible many Christians ended up supporting Israel at the expense of the Palestinian, and that is a sad affair. Since the God of the Bible who has revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ is a God of justice, I cannot support the elevation of Israel to such status that undermines the existence of the Palestinians. With more and more Palestinian Christians being killed with the help of Christians in the West, and more of them migrating each year Christians will very soon extinct from the land from where it all began.

NB: I find the works of Stephen Sizer ( a pastor and a supporter of UCCF) and Chaukat Moucarry ( formerly worked with IFES ) quite helpful.