Herstory Rewritten: The Women They Tried to Erase

Sanctuary Dispatch | Friday Reflections from the Wild Path

The Soft Rebellion

What if the Bible told us the gospel of Mary Magdalene alongside Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?

What if Lilith had remained Adam’s equal in the garden instead of being cast out as a demon for refusing to submit?

How different would our stories be?

How different would we be?

Lilith: From Sovereign to Monster

The oldest tellings place Lilith in Eden — not as a temptress, not as a serpent, but as Adam’s first partner. She was not molded from his rib, but formed from the same earth, the same breath of life.

When Adam demanded her obedience, Lilith refused. She claimed her equality. She left the garden rather than live beneath him.

That should have been the story of a woman choosing sovereignty over subservience.

But somewhere in the long corridors of history, her defiance was recast as wickedness. She was turned into a demon, said to prey upon men in their sleep, to seduce, to destroy… and eat babies.

This is how you make sure no woman ever wants to follow her example: you turn her into the embodiment of terror.

But imagine if her story had been honored as one of courage. How many generations of women might have walked away from what diminished them instead of shrinking themselves to fit?

Mary Magdalene: From Disciple to “Fallen Woman”

In the gospels that remain, Mary Magdalene is one of the few disciples named again and again. She traveled with Jesus. She supported his ministry. She stood at the foot of the cross when most of the men had fled. And in the earliest resurrection accounts, she is the one who first sees him alive — she is the one he entrusts to carry the message.

But later, Pope Gregory the Great merged her identity with that of an unnamed “sinful woman” in Luke’s gospel, cementing her in public imagination as a prostitute redeemed by Jesus. Her leadership, her teachings, her role as “apostle to the apostles” faded behind the stained-glass image of the penitent whore.

Imagine if her gospel — discovered in the sands of Egypt in 1896 — had been canonized. Imagine if girls grew up learning that a woman’s voice was central to the birth of Christianity. How different would faith look? How different would leadership look?

The Power of the Rewrite

These were not accidents of history. They were deliberate edits.

Because a woman who stands beside a man as his equal is a threat to every system built on keeping her below him.

And a woman who speaks with divine authority disrupts the hierarchy that says only certain voices are worthy of being heard.

But these stories aren’t gone.

They live in whispers and fragments, in gospels unearthed from the sand, in the myths that refuse to die.

And they live in us.

Every time we choose truth over compliance, every time we refuse to disappear, we are writing them back in.

This week, speak their names. Tell their stories. Let the erased women stand beside you again.

Because reclaiming what was stolen isn’t just history work — it’s rebellion.

It’s looking at the systems that decided which voices were worthy and saying, we refuse to obey those edits.

It’s writing the truth back in, not just on the page, but in the way we live, lead, and choose.

This is the heart of the Soft Rebellion — standing quietly but firmly against what was designed to erase us, and building a future that remembers.

Are you ready?

Sanctuary Dispatch

Friday Reflections from the Wild Path

This is where the personal meets the political, and care becomes a form of resistance.

Each dispatch is part of The Soft Rebellion—a movement rooted in clear seeing, collective care, and the courage to act.

These reflections rise from the ground we stand on, and ripple through The Soft Rebellion: Local Chapter in Metro Northwest Massachusetts.

✨ Learn more and apply to join the local chapter:

www.spreadingthecheer.com/softrebellion