FLAKES: Odd wives of the Bible

My fellow Nyeri women are famous for being tough and for asserting their conjugal rights, but if you think Nyeri wives are quite something, you haven’t met the Bible wives.

Take Mrs Eve Adams. She was disturbed by her husband’s landscaping business and his reluctance to exploit certain business assets for religious reasons. However, she made the mistake of choosing a snake as a business consultant.

The consultant advised her that a diet of fruit salad was the answer to her marital and business challenges. The advice led to eviction and insolvency and the rest, as they say, is history.

Next, meet Mrs Naamah Noah. Her comments on her husband’s prolonged woodwork project and his subsequent attempts to accommodate an informal zoo were not considered suitable for inclusion in a religious book.

Moreover, no sooner had her family survived the worst El Niño ever, than her husband managed to plant a vineyard and subsequently curse his cheeky, youngest son while suffering from the world’s first hangover.

Let’s move on to Mrs Sarah Abrahams who, for the most part, remained very gracious despite severe provocation from her husband. Her husband dislocated her from a settled life of luxury in the world’s leading city to spend the rest of her life camping.

Her husband’s other annoying habits included introducing her as his sister when it suited him and not only inviting impromptu guests to the camp, but also setting the menu.

THREATENED TO KILL HIM

At one time he took her precious teenager on a hiking trip and threatened to kill him! In the face of all this it is astonishing that Mrs Abrahams is only recorded to have laughed sarcastically on one occasion and to have sacked just one house help.

The actions of Mrs Jael Heber are even more inexplicable. In keeping with her husband’s alliance with King Sisera, she provided the king with food and shelter as he fled from the battlefield.

However, it is hard to understand why she hammered a tent peg through the poor fellow’s temple as soon as he collapsed into an exhausted slumber! It goes to show that it is advisable to establish whether your best friend’s wife really likes you before you make yourself too comfortable in their home!

The Bible has little to say about Mrs Judith Esau. However, she distinguishes herself by not only surviving as a co-wife but also by pioneering the tradition of a strained relationship between a woman and her mother-in-law.

On the other hand, Mrs Asenath Joseph never got a chance to meet her mother-in-law, but this daughter of a priest willingly married a former jailbird! However, she was vindicated when he became prime minister of Egypt.

On to Mrs Michal David who fell violently in love with her handsome and accomplished husband to the extent of siding with him against her father, Saul. However, just a few years later she was sneering at his breakdancing display and publicly making some cutting remarks about his lack of dress sense. Her love for prestige was at odds with her husband’s simplicity and they ended up living apart.

Subsequently, her estranged husband noticed Mrs Bathsheba Uriah, a lady who would have done well to invest in some opaque curtains for her bathroom. Mrs Uriah soon became Mrs David, and by a twist of fate, that is why we have a tradition of Christianity in our neighbour, Ethiopia, thanks to her son Solomon. However, despite this good twist in the Bathsheba tale, I insist you should keep your bath time private!

Lastly, the queen of biblical wives has to be Mrs Jezebel Ahab, better known as Queen Jezebel. Her bad temper probably arose from her decision to feed 400 priests of Baal at her dinner table each evening.

When wimpish Ahab would not eat his dinner (I thought she would celebrate at having one less mouth to feed) she had poor Naboth killed and grabbed the land that Ahab wanted!

Celebrate the women in your life this Saturday.