declares that the badness of men is better than the goodness of women.[215] In Leviticus[216] we read that the period of purification customary after the birth of a child is to be twice as long in the case of a female as in a male.  The inferiority of women was strongly felt; and this conception would be doubly operative on men of humble station who never travelled, who had received little education, and whose ideas were naturally bounded by the horizon of their native localities.  We are to remember also that the East is the home of asceticism, a conviction alien to the Western mind.  There is no parallel in Western Europe to St. Simeon Stylites.

We would, therefore, expect to find in the teachings of the Apostles an expression of Jewish, i.e., Eastern ideals on the subject of women; and we do so find them.  Following the express commands of Christ, they exhorted to sexual purity and reiterated his injunctions on the matter of divorce.  They went much farther and began to legislate on more minute details.  Paul allows second marriages to women[217]; but thinks it better for a widow to remain as she is.[218] It is better to marry than to burn; yet would he prefer that men and women should remain in celibacy.[219] The power of the father to arrange a marriage for his daughter was, under Roman law, limited by her consent; but the words of Paul make it clear that it was now to be a Christian precept that a father could determine on his own responsibility whether his daughter should remain a virgin.[220] Wives are to be in subjection to their husbands, and “let the wife see that she fear her husband."[221] Woman is the weaker vessel[222]; she is to be silent in church; if she desires to learn anything, she should ask her husband at home.[223] Furthermore:  “I permit not a woman to teach, nor to have dominion over a man, but to be in quietness.  For Adam was first formed, then Eve; and Adam was not beguiled, but the woman being beguiled hath fallen into transgression; but she shall be saved through childbearing, if they continue in faith and love and sanctification with sobriety."[224] The apparel of women also evoked legislation from the Apostles.  Women were to pray with their heads veiled “for the man is not of the woman, but the woman for the man."[225] Jewels, precious metal, and costly garments were unbecoming the modest woman.[226]

In this early stage of Christianity we may already distinguish three conceptions that were quite foreign to the Roman jurist:  I. The inferiority and weakness of women was evident from the time of Eve and it was an act of God that punished all womankind for Eve’s transgression.  Woman had been man’s evil genius.  II.  She was to be submissive to father or husband and not bring her will in opposition to theirs.  III.  She must not be prominent in public, she must consider her conduct and apparel minutely, and she was exhorted to remain a virgin, as being thus in a more exalted position.  At the same time insistence was placed on the fact that a virgin, wife, and widow must be given due honour and respect, must be provided for, and allowed her share in taking part in those interests of the community which were considered her sphere.