ABSTRACT
Introduction The two quotations that introduce this chapter are taken from stories about women with impairments and their encounters with Jesus. The first story, which is told in similar versions in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, is about a woman who had a gynaecological condition resulting in continual bleeding for twelve years. The other is about Mary Magdalene, Jesus’ close associate and helper, who apparently had seven demons and was healed by Jesus. Christianity has often been called a religion of healing, and in early Christian narratives, we meet disabled and sick characters mostly in stories about the healing miracles by Jesus and the apostles. This article will look at such early Christian narratives from the perspective of gender.
