Bible women, Quaker women

Dartmouth pastor-scholar draws parallels in new class

By Bill McNamara, Standard-Times correspondent

Since Jacob Taylor's break-through moment in time, women have marched to the forefront of activity in the Society of Friends, their nobility recognized for more than one of appearance or form.

Tim Seid, present-day Quaker and pastor of Smith Neck Friends Meeting in Dartmouth, looks at the role of women in "patterns of faith" and says: "It doesn't take a scholar to figure out that women have always been integrally involved in their religious communities. If we look for it, we can find examples of women in the Bible who went beyond the conventions of their day and who have been overlooked in a male-dominated reading of the Scriptures."

In quest of a ready way to enhance our appreciation of that insight -- now this might conceivably take a scholar, which Pastor Seid is -- the Smith Neck Quaker struck on the drawing of parallels between biblical women and Quaker women of recent times.

Today, Pastor Seid (say "side") brings his findings to the classroom, teaching a South Coast Learning Network course on The Bible and Women, focusing on women who fulfilled the role of prophetess and comparing them with Quaker women in similar roles, women who "worked toward religious freedom and the good of humankind."

Take, for example, Priscilla of New Testament times whose hospitality and learning St. Paul not only recognized but heralded in his letters to far-flung disciples. He not only visited her and her husband, Aquila, in Rome and Corinth; he stayed with them and worked with them in matters of their young church and in matters occupational for they, like Paul, were tentmakers.

In a letter to the Romans (16:1-5), Paul asks his friends to give a warm welcome to deaconess Phoebe, to "receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the holy ones, and help her in whatever she may need from you, for she has been a benefactor to many and to me as well." (Who says St. Paul looks down on women?) And then he goes into his litany of greetings. At the top of the list is Priscilla.

"Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my co-workers in Christ Jesus, who risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I am grateful but also all the churches of the Gentiles; greet also the church at their house," for the early Christians met in leaders' homes for their services of prayer and worship.

Priscilla's name comes up in other books and letters, too, including Acts and Corinthians. These writings record activities that took place in or about year 50 A.D.

For corresponding activities taking place in Western historical times, Pastor Seid chooses the wife/husband team of Sybil and Eli Jones whose mid-19th-century faith journeys take them to Canada, Europe and Africa. She is the minister, he the companion. They need help with child care during extended absences. Being Quakers and Mainers, they have connections in this region. Some of the five kids get to know the Friends Boarding School in Providence during parental mission jaunts. (The Joneses were no strangers to the Friends of Dartmouth, either.)

Too bad St. Paul wasn't around to commend or greet the Quaker wayfarers from Maine and Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania. But the husbands of the lady-missionaries often took up the pen to encourage their spouses and to put them in the Friends' new-world testament. Here, for example, are a few lines from a Philip Price letter to Rachel abroad:

"Although thy company thee knows would be very desirable at home (in Pennsylvania), I hope thou wilt be favoured to be easy about us until thy mind is at full liberty to return with peace ... Having set thy mind to the work it will not do to look back, otherwise thou wilt lose the reward which I believe those are favoured to experience who are faithfully given up to it in true sincerity of heart." (1852)

A former Baptist, Pastor Seid and his family are now six-sevenths Quaker. Abby, the eldest of five daughters, was attending classes at Eastern College, a Baptist institution near Philadelphia, when the rest of the family formally enrolled here in the Society of Friends. They've been at Smith Neck for three years, having come from Rhode Island where Mr. Seid was studying at Brown University.

When the young scholar in early Christianity finally received his doctorate in religious studies from Brown -- oh, cruel irony -- he found himself suddenly situated where he couldn't flaunt his new honorary title of doctor: he was the pastor of a Quaker meetinghouse; Quakers eschew titles.

The other title he had to drop was that of Baptist, though he will never relinquish the title of son of a distinguished Baptist minister, the guiding influence of the younger Seid's life. His switch from Baptist to Quaker came -- triggering that cruel irony -- by way of a help-wanted ad in the Providence Journal. A Friends meeting in Dartmouth was looking for a part-time pastor. He applied and the moving trucks came, one to cart away his old titles, the other to haul family belongings to the SouthCoast for a new life in a new setting and a different community of faith.

A native of Michigan, Tim Seid developed twin interests in -- and a certain warring tension between -- pastoral and scholarly pursuits. They endure today, as reflected in his meetinghouse responsibilities versus his appointment as Visiting Scholar at Brown and his new teaching role at SCLN.

Though in his own family, women have assumed what appear to be quiet, supportive stations in life, they are more influential than one might suppose. It is true of his mother, he says, as it is of his wife who accompanies him on visits to Friends' homes where she leads the way in discourse, regaling their hosts with interesting stories.

"I listen, and come in at the end with my little amen," the pastor recounts.

Their four younger daughters attend public schools in Dartmouth, which the Seids hold in high regard -- Heidi in middle school, Emily, Lauren and Tabitha at Cushman.

Pastor Seid says he was encouraged to teach at SCLN by the Rev. John Douhan, former executive minister of the Inter-Church Council, and by veteran teacher Pam Cole, who herself is teaching a SCLN course on a literary approach to the Bible.

The Quaker's Bible and Women class meets 7-9 p.m. every Wednesday at the Inter-Church Council offices on County Street, New Bedford. Eight students are currently enrolled.

In the fall semester, the Learning Network enrolled a record high of 1,139 students in its widely scattered programs. Sandria Parsons, co-director with Bartley Nourse, observes that the winter term "features courses that foretell a new, 21st- century learning model that will reinvent the way communities deliver education to citizens of all ages."

SCLN headquarters recently moved to 5 Dover St. in the heart of the New Bedford historic district. For more information, call (508) 997-9792.

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