Escaping Eden brings together feminist biblical scholars to explore how aspects of social location such as gender, ethnicity and national origin, social and economic class, and cultural and religious background affect the interpretation of biblical texts.

Written in a range of modes including historical and literary criticism, cultural studies, satirical fiction, and the personal essay, the contributors challenge the presumed objectivity to which much conventional biblical scholarship still pretends, willfully blurring the disciplinary boundaries between descriptive and prescriptive readings of biblical texts.

Contributions range from a social group theory perspective on Genesis to a transgendered reading of Jeremiah, from feminist literary studies of Luke to Asian feminist Christian and U.S. womanist reappropriations of Philippians. Interrogating biblical authority, reclaiming diverse texts, and exploring translation as a feminist act, Escaping Eden expands the usual boundaries of biblical academic discourse.