Nobody's Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament Nobody's Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament Paperback Audible Audiobook Kindle Audio CD

Interview with Sandra L. Glahn, author of 'Nobody's Mother'

What led to your interest in researching and writing about Artemis and the context of Paul's letters?

As a Bible teacher experiencing infertility and pregnancy loss, I read Paul's statement that "she will be saved through childbearing" (1 Tim 2:15 NRSV) and was told it meant women (including me) needed to redirect teaching gifts away from the church and toward our own children-which I lacked. In making this statement about childbearing, was Paul laying out a universal truth rooted in creation order, or was he drawing on the Genesis creation story to correct a local one in Ephesus, where Timothy the recipient of his words-resided? The answer lies in understanding the spiritual and cultural context, part of which Acts 19 provides. The goddess Artemis had a stranglehold on Ephesus at the time of the earliest Christians. So, who was Artemis of the Ephesians at the time of Paul and Timothy? The answer is essential to determining a biblical anthropology of woman: Who is woman and what did God make her to do?

What do you hope your book contributes to the field of New Testament studies?

• Corrects falsehood relating to biblical anthropology and ecclesiology about woman
• Provides social and spiritual context for 1 Timothy (with ramifications for other pastoral epistles)
• Lays to rest the myth that Artemis was a nurturing mother goddess or bringer of some sort of feminine principle
• Establishes the identity of the Ephesian Artemis described in Acts 19

Chapters include