RT Article
T1 J. Ellice Hopkins: The Construction of a Recent Spiritual Feminist Foremother
JF Feminist theology
VO 5
IS 13
SP 73
OP 95
A1 Raphael, Melissa 1960-
LA English
PB Sage
YR 1996
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1776890590
AB This article retrieves the contribution of a nineteenth-century proto-feminist activist for the history of the womanspirit movement. But that is not its primary purpose. Above all, the article asks a methodological question: namely, how post-Christian spiritual feminists might claim recent foremothers when most women of spirit have, until the early 1970s, been inspired by Christian patriarchal theology. I argue that Hopkins's direct action can be read as exemplifying female sacrality in action. Her 'rescue' of sexually abused women has, I conclude, a mythical and sacerdotal element that both subverts and transcends its patriarchal context.
DO 10.1177/096673509600001305