‘Go,ask a woman's womb’: Birth and the Maternal Body as Sources of Revelation and Wisdom in 4 Ezra

Abstract

The author of 4 Ezra makes significant and repeated use of several motifs related to birth, including barrenness, pregnancy, the womb, miscarriage, birth itself, fetuses, and lactation. These motifs have myriad pedagogical functions in the text, including imparting instruction about personal, national and cosmic matters. Most importantly, the birth of the city from Mother Zion that Ezra witnesses and the anticipated rebirth of the dead from Mother Earth experientially resolve Ezra's earlier theological concerns, which could previously not be solved rationally. Finally, based on ritual studies (Turner and Van Gennep), the article suggests that elements in the structure of episodes four to seven reveal that the author of 4 Ezra likely had familiarity with a potent rite of passage or transformation that he/she in turn expressed through imagery of birthing and death.