ContradictionsReading order 376Bible context 3 min read
Who is the most blessed woman?
Mary, Jael, and Judith receive exceptional praise, but Mary's greeting does not explicitly rank her first. The strongest competing superlatives concern Jael and Judith.
- Textual conflict
- Weak tension
- The alleged conflict needs substantial assumptions, such as treating an omission as a denial or figurative language as literal.
- Importance
- Supporting
- A supporting event, teaching, or biographical claim.
Jael and Judith receive competing praise superlatives, but the speeches do not define one permanent ranking and Mary is only blessed among women.
An editorial assessment of the quoted passages. Importance describes the stakes; it does not increase certainty. Reading order weighs both.
Gabriel calls Mary blessed among women
And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth, To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
Luke 1:26-28
Translation / edition: King James Version (KJV)
Read the full chapter:Luke 1
Jael is praised as blessed above women
Blessed above women shall Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite be, blessed shall she be above women in the tent. He asked water, and she gave him milk; she brought forth butter in a lordly dish. She put her hand to the nail, and her right hand to the workmen’s hammer; and with the hammer she smote Sisera, she smote off his head, when she had pierced and stricken through his temples. At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down: at her feet he bowed, he fell: where he bowed, there he fell down dead.