"Spiritual Feminism" and Christian Hebraism: Women and the Study of Hebrew in Seventeenth Century Europe

Women's participation in the study of the "learned languages" in general, and of the "sacred tongue" in particular, has received little scholarly attention. This paper explores and analyzes the Hebraic endeavors of two seventeenth century Christian scholars: Anna Maria von Schurman of Holland and Antonia, Duchess of Wurtemberg, Germany. It situates their work within the larger context of the Christian Hebraist project, examines the situation of female scholars whose exclusion from the academy caused them to form alternative systems of intellectual exchange, and considers Hebraist attitudes towards Jewish scholars and scholarship, and speculates on the role of female Hebraists in the formation of those attitudes.