Alfred Brittain

It is a bit strange reading this book now; for modern readers it seems very strange and not very scientific.
Brittain describes the role of women in early Christianity. According to him, Christianity affords women a greater measure of equality, but this sounds rather strange because women were far from equal to men at the time when the book was written.
For the first chapters Brittain's main source is the Bible, which he takes as a true account of the life and times of Jesus; though the Bible can give us some information on those times, I don't think any scientist these days would use it as a source in such a way. For later ages he does also use other sources, and it is very interesting to read his study.
However he is also very biased and clearly protestant. He considers Christianity in general a great good for all of mankind and especially for women. He fulminates against the preaching of celibacy that is seen in Catholic faith and also mentions a number of other Catholic practices in a derogatory manner.
All in all it does give some idea of how women are described in the Bible and the roles they played in the early centuries AD, but for current readers the obvious bias of the scientist writing it is strange, and means that we have to be critical when reading this work.… (plus d'informations)