Eve: The Unbearable Flaming Fire

This anthology on Eve brings together an international group of scholars to discuss how this biblical character has been interpreted and commented upon by students of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. In an age wherein the history of women is being reassessed, it is quite natural that western women especially turn their thoughts to one of the paradigmatic female figures in our culture. This broad treatment of Eve covers a wide range of thoughts about her role as mother of our race, victim, stooge, wife, companion, independent thinker, curious life form, and helper . The reader learns of the poetry inspired by her being, music that plays a similar role, and how graphic artists and historians of literature have turned their thought to her place at the very beginning of biblical history. A venerated figure by many modern feminists and a totally denigrated figure by those who blame her for original sin and the like, no reader will leave the pages of this anthology indifferent to the first woman, nor fail to understand her role in three great religious traditions that have come to predominate in the west.