Renaissance misogyny, biblical feminism, and Helisenne de Crenne's Epistres familieres et invectives

Renaissance Quarterly, Summer, 1997 by Jerry C. Nash

Since woman, like man, was derived from and created by God, without the privileging of one sex over the other or any hierarchy established between the two sexes (Genesis 1), there can be no difference between the power allotted to man and that allotted to woman, nor any disparity between the accomplishments which both are capable of achieving. With this understanding and view of creation surely in mind - which amounts to a denial of any male sovereignty or superiority over women - Crenne rejects outright any ontologically fixed relationships between the sexes, and especially dispels the concept of woman as a purely sexual and thus inferior being. Biblically oriented and indebted as she is, there can be little doubt that Crenne knew the passage in Genesis 2. Like all other early modern feminist writers, however, she does not challenge it directly, for that would have been tantamount to attacking God's word. Crenne simply responds to the passage by ignoring it, which is a feminist statement in itself. Besides, her problem was with a certain class of men, not with God. For Crenne, the sexual dimorphism promoted by misogynists and used to denigrate women by stressing their different (i.e., inferior) nature has no real foundation, biblical or other. For her, it is not ordained by God, nature, or reason. It is socially derived and socially prescribed, and especially by certain misogynist advocates of Christian ideology - like Helisenne's husband - who prefer to opt for the other story of creation found in Genesis 2.(17)

The fact that Crenne reads, understands, and applies Scripture from a different perspective and that her sympathies lie with the first story of creation in Genesis can be seen in her feminist argument in the Epistres that women have always been involved in and accomplished "virile" works from the beginning of time. And what makes Crenne's feminism specifically "biblical" and distinguishable from other early modern feminist rhetorical practices is the degree to which she is forever turning to and appropriating the Bible in order to "authorize" her feminist ideology and narratives, especially her use of the meaning of creation in Genesis 1 as the justification for her kind of "equality" feminism. Indeed, what better way to discredit and debunk the misogynist principle with its biblical mandate for female inferiority and subordination than by documenting the successes of its object of scorn and ridicule in the biblical achievements of woman. One of Crenne's best accounts of women "exerceant oeuvres viriles" ("exercising manly tasks"), in addition to those portrayed in Epistre invective 3, is to be found in Epistre invective 4, which is her "commemoration des splendides [excellens] & gentilz esperitz, d'aulcunes dames illustres" (K iiii: "commemoration of famous women with brilliant and refined minds"), a rich testimony to the powers of women in the ethical, cultural, and public domain. This testimony also shows, just as we saw in Epistre invective 3, her panegyrical propensity to argue and to promote woman primarily through anecdote and example. Helisenne is specifically reacting to, rejecting, and reversing the misogynist view of Elenot, to whom Epistre invective 4 is addressed and who had prescribed "le filler" ("spinning") as the only activity in which women can and should excel (K [v.sup.v]). This letter is the one singled out for praise by Francois de Billon in 1555 in his Le Fort inexpugnable de l'honneur du sexe Femenin. He comments quite approvingly on the way Crenne debunks "Woman's detractors" and the misogynist "Principles" of Elenot in particular: "Bien pourroit on dire pourrant, qu'en vn passage de son Liure touchant les Angoisses amoureuses, elle donne vne facheuse touche a tout detracteur de Femme, quand en vne Lettre qu'elle enuoya a un certain Elenot (qui maintenoit fort & ferme les Femmes ne se deuoir mesler que de filer) elle renuerse aussi plaisamment ses ironiques Raisons" (35v-36).