Conversion Women and Early Christianity

The Importance of Women in the Rise of Christianity

Despite the struggles of modern women in obtaining parity within many Christian denominations, women had a significant role in the development of the early Christian church and the shift from paganism to Christendom in the ancient world. According to Rodney Stark’s 1995 article, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity: The Role of Women,” women were, in fact instrumental in proselytizing the new religion. In fact, for Stark, women hold one of the keys of explaining how Christianity shifted from a rather small and obscure corner of the Roman Empire to replace classical paganism altogether.

First, because women (compared with pagan religions) had higher status and more influence in the early formulations of Christianity, they were more apt to convert to the new faith. But they did not necessarily marry Christians. In fact, the higher percentage of women in the religion and the social compulsion to marriage often meant that their husbands were non-Christians. Women thus had a great influence from behind the scenes of the family in encouraging acceptance of the new religion.

Stark finds this a far more persuasive and socially and historically supported argument than the idea that mass conversions were the reason for the success of Christianity. One problem in understanding how the Christian religion spread is the fact that so many of its adherents are sincere believers who accept wholeheartedly the accounts in the gospels of mass conversions, and view the acceptance of Christianity as part of Christ’s miracle in and of itself.

This is highly problematic, however, as it means social science and historical documentation has little to offer in understanding the history of religion. But what can be substantiated outside of the gospel narratives was the fact that the pagan Roman Emperor Valentinian specifically prohibited Christian missionaries calling upon women within their houses (Stark, 1995, p. 231). The fact that the greater status offered to women within the religion was so appealing and the fact that the Emperor saw fit to prohibit contact with women (particularly within the home women men might not be present) is telling.

Men significantly outnumbered women in the Roman Empire at the time, which was another factor. Female infanticide, given the desirability of producing a male heir, was partially responsible for this. Additionally, Stark notes, abortion in the ancient world, far from being liberating for women was often practiced in a manner that was “barbaric and deadly,” in stark contrast to modern, safe abortions (Stark, 1995, p. 232). By prohibiting both common methods of reducing the number of female births (as well as a practice that frequently killed women), Christianity increased the percentage of women in the religion for biological reasons as well, over time.

Even when women did not have positions of power themselves, Christian women who were married to influential pagan men could make their opinions felt. The Emperor Commodus, although he himself never converted, was influenced by his wife Marcia to free a man who eventually became a future pope (Stark, 1995, p.233). Stark also makes a distinction between primary and secondary Christian converts, alleging that men were often less enthusiastic secondary converts to the faith. Women were the primary converts, enthusiastically adopting the new religion. Men might go along, following a path of least resistance, but once a man became of a particular faith, then all members of the household (children, servants, and slaves) would have to follow suit.

The image of Christian conversion presented by Stark, in other words, is not that of mass public conversions, but rather of Christianity spreading household to household. Once again, this explains the desire of pagan emperors specifically anxious about proselyting to women within their homes. Stark also suggests that as the influences of the religion’s greater appeal to women as well as the greater ability to survive to adulthood increased, so did the power of women within Christian communities, as women were no longer restricted and regarded as “scare goods” or a commodity that must be restricted to give birth to later generations (Stark, 1995, p. 234).

To support this notion, Stark uses an example from pagan antiquity. In Athens, where female infanticide was practiced, women led highly circumscribed lives (despite the fact Athens is often praised as the birthplace of democracy). Sparta, although much more militaristic, only practiced infanticide if children were born with physical defects. Women owned property, moved freely, married late, and actually made up the majority of the population (due to the losses of men during wartime).

Within Christianity, many of the sexual prohibitions against polygamy, infanticide, and infidelity helped women, given that women inevitably bore the brunt of these practices within pagan societies. In other words, while women were expected to be faithful and produce legitimate heirs, pagan husbands were free to have mistresses and to demand their wives allow their infant daughters to be killed. Christians, Stark argues, were not necessarily viewed as more repressive by women, but as effectively ending the double standard that was hurtful to women. The fact Christianity frowned upon remarriage after the death of a spouse was likewise celebrated, since wealthy pagan wives received a great deal of pressure to remarry.

Without such pressure, they could enjoy their wealth themselves and also use their free time and funds to provide greater support to the church, rather than to a new family. This also explains why so many Christian women converts were of high status, in part. Not only did such women have additional leisure time for spiritual pursuits, but the ideology stressed the spiritual benefits of not entering into another marriage (which may have been unpleasant, arranged, and unwelcome to them in the first place) and instead using their status and wealth for the greater glory of God.

Women also tended to marry later within Christian society. Given that wives in Roman society had often been married off at ages we would consider today to be children—11 or 12—this is also significant (Stark, 1995, p. 236). Women who had had bad memories of this practice might not want their daughters to suffer a similar fate, or simply be sympathetic to a religion which did not view this as the norm. Even many Romans of the time considered consummating such practices to be cruel.