Sermons

The Eshet Chayil Doesn’t Belong in a Box

Abundant God,
Be in our midst as we break open your word.
Challenge us in new ways.
Draw us closer to you.

Amen.

I’ve got some bad news, and I’ve got good news. The bad news is that this sermon would last six months if it were up to me. That’s how much time I think we would need to learn basic Hebrew. But the good news is that I only have about twelve minutes. So you’re off the hook for basic Hebrew, but that means I will do my best to preach about the Eshet Chayil, the Women of Valor, in English. Okay, with a little bit of Hebrew thrown in.

Eshet Chayil is the name given for the woman described in our reading from Proverbs today, Chapter 31, verses 10 through 31. Proverbs is what we call a book of Wisdom because its genre cannot be described any other way. Most of its contents are bite-sized aphorisms like “Iron sharpens iron, and one person sharpens another.” But at the very end of the book comes this beautiful poem, an ode to a woman. In a patriarchal society where women were considered property, here is a beautiful, lovingly constructed poem with a strong woman as its focus.

Some of the poetic value is lost in English, which is why I wish we could be reading the Hebrew text together. This is what is called an abecedarian acrostic poem. Abecedarian is my favorite word that I learned while writing this sermon and if you think it sounds like ABCD, then you’re right. To help demonstrate, the prayer I began this sermon with takes the same form. Each line starts with a subsequent letter of the alphabet. “Abundant God, Be in our midst as we break open your word. Challenge us in new ways. Draw us closer to you.” ABCD.

The poem in Proverbs is structured with 22 verses, each verse beginning with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet, one verse for every letter. It’s thought that this style of poetry was meant to show completeness. We might say something like, “Here’s everything you need to know about this reading, from A to Z.” This poem is everything the author thinks you need to know about the woman of valor, Alef to Tav. Like in English, the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet makes a “b” sound. With that in mind, listen to the second verse of the poem:

Batach bah lev ba’lah v’shalal lo yechsar.

Even to our English ears, we can hear the alliteration, batach bah lev ba’lah. I’m sorry but honestly, how cool is that? Very few things get me more excited than ancient Hebrew poetry!

Now that we’ve looked at the literary form of the text, let’s look at its content. The text describes the woman of Proverbs 31, the eshet chayil. Eshet is the word for woman or wife. And chayil is a word that means strength or valor. In other parts of the Bible, it is most often used to describe military might. Although it appears 241 times in the Hebrew scriptures, only one other time is it used to describe a woman. Throughout history of English translations of the Bible, this phrase has often been translated as “a capable wife” or “a good wife.” But that is an awful translation that does not get at the true meaning of the word! The New Revised Standard Version (updated edition) which we read today translates the phrase as “woman of strength” but I prefer “woman of valor.”

So what do we know about the woman of valor? She seems to be the perfect matriarch. Her husband trusts her. She’s the ideal manager of the household, spinning fiber and sewing clothes, instructing the servants. She provides food for her family. Her children adore her. Quite honestly, it all seems like a bit much. And it can be easy for us to read our own 20th century concept of June Cleaver, the perfect housewife, onto this text. In many Christian communities, this text is not read as an ode to a 7th century BCE idealized matriarch, but rather a yardstick to measure 21st century women against. If you don’t want to marry or have children, if you are “too much,” or you’re just “a lot” (as I have occasionally been told that I am) then this text is used against you. You’re failing the test of being a Proverbs 31 woman. This has done immeasurable harm to women and girls, who deserve to have the image of God in themselves affirmed. Just as we try to put the eshet chayil in a box, to confine her to being one thing, we put women in a box. In our patriarchal culture, this serves as a form of control. This year, an election year where
the full citizenship of unmarried, childless women like myself has come into question, recognizing the harmful ways that texts like this have been used is especially important.

One woman who grew up in a culture that weaponized this text is the popular Millennial Christian writer Rachel Held Evans. Very sadly, Held Evans died in 2019 but her work continues to be circulated and nurture many of us. In her book, A Year of Biblical Womanhood, Held Evans writes that she was taught that Proverbs 31 was “God’s ideal for women,” that this feminine archetype was “venerated, idealized, and glorified to the level of demigoddess.” In the course of her exploration of so-called biblical womanhood, Held Evans consults a Jewish friend about this same text. In Judaism, this text is often read at women’s
funerals, and it is traditionally recited to women as families enter into the Shabbat rituals in the home. The Jewish woman explains to Held Evans that in her culture, this term eshet chayil, woman of valor, is used as a verbal affirmation for women, rather than a measuring stick.

Aced your MCAT? Eshet Chayil!

Took the dog to the vet for its annual checkup? Eshet Chayil!

Held Evans is so taken with this way of affirming the women of valor whom she sees all around her that it becomes her own rallying cry for women to take back this term. In fact, a book which she inscribed to my mother reads, “For Trish, you are truly a woman of valor.”

And so, as women have so often done, Held Evans refuses to be put into the box of the “Proverbs 31,” and instead frees her from the box entirely. She affirms the many ways that women are living into valor and strength in the world. Yes, that includes
as wives, mothers, and matriarchs. But also as Olympians, executives, and many other roles that our ancestors could only imagine. And when you look back at the text itself, it paints a much more complex woman than it may initially seem. “She considers a field and buys it, … She girds herself with strength, and makes her arms strong, She perceives that her merchandise is profitable.” None of these are the feminine qualities or roles you would expect to find in this list. And beauty, which is often counted as among the most important of feminine qualities, is discounted completely in favor of fear of the Lord. The eshet chayil is not just one thing.

There’s one last point I want to make about this text. As I mentioned, the poem to the woman of valor concludes the book of Proverbs. And its language and imagery hearken back to another woman figure who is introduced at the beginning of the book, God’s Wisdom personified as a woman. Both characters are described as “more precious than jewels.” Both women are called or praised at the city gates. Scholars believe that these and other similarities show that the woman of valor is in fact Woman Wisdom again, two descriptions of the same figure bookending the book of Proverbs. In this interpretation, the qualities of the woman of valor take on a universality. Her diligence, steadfastness, commitment to those around her, and concern for the poor are the same qualities of the Holy One who cares for us and loves us. Just as Luke describes Jesus as a mother hen watching over her brood, so here we have another image of the feminine face of God. Poetry can give us new ways to see the everyday. When we baptize, we say we receive the new Christian into the “household of God.” Here we have a metaphor of what that household would look like.

My friends, whether you approach this text with suspicion, tenderness, or hurt, I hope that I have given you a new entry point to understand the eshet chayil. I’d like to conclude with words of Rachel Held Evans, the author I mentioned earlier. She writes,

“Among the women praised in Scripture are warriors, widows, slaves, sister wives, apostles, teachers, concubines, queens, foreigners, prostitutes, prophets, mothers, and martyrs. What makes these women’s stories leap from the page is not the fact that they all conform to some kind of universal ideal, but that regardless of the culture or context in which they found themselves, they lived their lives with valor.”

May we all do the same.

1 Rachel Held Evans, A Year of Biblical Womanhood, p.74