Redefining Christology: Women and Jesus’ Identity

Abstract

The article examines women's role in Christological reflections through a dialogical engagement between Martha of Bethany (John 11:17-27) and the Ghanaian theologian Mercy Amba Oduyoye. Employing the Communicative Perspective to African Biblical Hermeneutic, the study offers a narrative-critical exegesis demonstrating the Christological value of Martha's dialogue with Jesus. Notably, it is to a woman — not to Peter or the Twelve — that Jesus reveals himself as "the resurrection and the life," and it is a woman who responds with one of the most notable confessions of faith in the Fourth Gospel. The article then analyses Oduyoye's understanding of Jesus as liberator and affirmer of women's full humanity. By bringing Martha and Mercy into dialogue, the study reveals structural parallels: both encounter Christ from marginalisation, both bring lived experience, both arrive at profound Christological insight, and both become catalysts for others' faith. The article argues that Martha's paradigm of theological agency finds contemporary expression in Oduyoye's work, with implications for a more inclusive ecclesiology.