"This volume in the series Bible and Women explores the relationship of women to the Bible in the high and late Middle Ages in Europe and Byzantium. It opens up new insights into women's reception and exegesis of biblical texts in their mystical, doctrinal, and literary writings as well as through art and music. The authors examine a variety of interpretations from the Gregorian Reform (1046-1122) up to the Malleus Maleficarum (1498), including traditional exegesis that uses the Bible to legitimize the subordination of women and their exclusion from the spheres of power. Readers will encounter erudite medieval women from Heloise to Christine de Pizan, who developed a new hermeneutic both liberating and empowering. These leaders engaged biblical themes and characters to reflect on their female identity, thereby illumination both their own circumstances and convictions as well as the biblical texts."-- Page 4 of cover.