Eva Etzioni-Halevy is professor
emeritus of political sociology at Bar-Ilan Univeristy, Israel, now
turned into a biblical novelist.
A child Holocaust survivor, she was
born in Vienna, Austria. She managed to escape as a small child with
her parents in 1939 and spent World War II in Italy, partly in an
Italian concentration camp and partly in hiding. She moved to what
was then Palestine in 1945.
She also spent time in the United
States and Australia before returning to Israel and taking up her
position at Bar-Ilan. Eva lives in Tel-Aviv with her husband; she has
three grown children.
To find out more about Eva follow the
following link: http://www.women-in-the-bible.com
What did the women of the Bible look like? Did they cover
their hair? Did they cover their faces with veils?
In many
works of art they appear excessively modest, which conforms to the
conception of the artists rather than to historical reality.
In
truth, the only hint on women's apparel in the Bible itself comes
from the story of Rebecca in Genesis. There the Scripture says that
when she met Isaac, she "covered herself with a veil,"
which may be taken to mean that she did not wear a veil
regularly.
If you check out my
website: www.women-in-the-bible.com you will see an
alternative version of what biblical women looked like.
As
with all women, what biblical women wore was connected not only to
modesty, but had a variety of symbolic meanings. According to the
Bible, the color symbolizing wealth and elegance was scarlet. This
was also the color that symbolized sin. This raises an interesting
question: How were the two connected?
White, on the
other hand symbolized purity, as it still does in the west
today.
Another question that may be of interest is
this: How did the women of the Bible care for their
cleanliness?
We know that cleanliness was of great
importance in biblical times, as washing of feet and of the entire
body appears many times in the Scripture, and also had
religious/ritual significance.
The washing of a woman
in particular is mentioned in the case of Ruth, who is prodded
by her mother-in-law Naomi to wash and anoint herself before she goes
out into the field to lie at Boaz's feet at night. It also appears
with respect to Bathsheba who, in the course of washing herself on
the roof, was spotted by King David and eventually became his
wife.
But what did the women wash themselves
with?
In the Torah, The Five Boks of Moses, washing
with water only is mentioned. In the book of Jeremiah, there is a
mention of washing with soap. So during the centuries that elapsed
between the writing of the first and the second, soap must have come
into existence and usage. This certainly shows welcome progress with
respect to cleanliness in the course of biblical times!