Her Story in Blood

One of the most interesting questions I find in the New Testament is "Who does Jesus harvest, and how?" Within the frame of that question, the story of the woman who bled for 12 years has always been particularly fascinating for me. Here is a woman who, because of Levitical law, has lived more or less in isolation, suffering physically, socially, and financially, for 12 years. She is so unimportant that she is never named, and her story is told as an interruption to the story of Jairus, a synagogue leader. She does not dare to interrupt Jesus herself, and tries to slip away quietly, but Jesus interrupts his own errand in order to pursue her, engage her, and bless her. Somewhere in there is the gospel for all of us, and especially for women.

In writing this play, I wanted to explore this woman's many vulnerabilities, how her female biology both creates and complicates these vulnerabilities, and the realities of women today who suffer similar pains. I also wanted to explore the way that Jesus responds to her, what that might mean for her, and how his response is in contrast to common attitudes towards women. Because the bleeding woman's anonymity makes her both un-knowable and every-knowable (universal), it is possible and desirable to explore her story from multiple angles. None of the women featured in the play is "the" bleeding woman, but modern women in whose suffering the bleeding woman might find deep resonance. Similarly, because we do not experience Jesus in a vacuum or through the influence of a single person, but rather from the multiplicity of the church, I have chosen to have the actresses take turns playing Jesus, so that they can be the hands and feet of Jesus to one another onstage as we, the Church, are to one another in real life.