Latayne Scott is our guest today.
She wrote a book called A Conspiracy of Breath.
Today, she will share the story behind her story.
In a richly-textured, controversial and provocative literary work, award-winning author Latayne C. Scott examines: What would it have been like to be a woman, a Gentile, and someone onto whom the Holy Breath moved – to produce what became the mysterious Epistle to the Hebrews in the Bible?
Learn more and purchase a copy.
What inspired you to write this book?
When I was a new Christian, I was very aware of what I didn’t know about the Bible. I had been a Mormon all my young life, so I knew I needed guidance in reading, and I used The Daily Study Bible with its commentary by William Barclay to help me understand some of the cultural issues behind the stories.
One thing that intrigued me was his assertion, based on the research of others, that the Epistle to the Hebrews might have been written by a woman. I did some of my own research and learned that in the ancient world, that may not have been an unusual thing.
- For instance, one of the most famous speeches of ancient Rome, the Funeral Oration of Pericles, was reportedly written by his lover, a woman named Aspasia.
- And one of the greatest translators of the Odyssey, Samuel Butler said it had to have been written by a woman because it was so different from the warlike, man-centered
- Some scholars think that the unabashed feminine viewpoint of many parts of the Bible’s semi-erotic love poem, The Song of Solomon, may have been written by a woman.
I found that even ancient writers puzzled over who wrote Hebrews. Origen (3rd century A. D.) said, “Only God knows the truth as to who actually wrote the epistle.”
Many modern scholars think it was written by a classically-educated patrician Roman woman of the New Testament named Priscilla. When I began researching this subject (not because I’m a feminist, because I am not; but I was intrigued by the idea), I learned that Priscilla is unique among all women of the Bible in that over half the times she is mentioned along with her husband Aquila, her name comes first. That’s very unusual in any ancient document.
She must have been a very unusual woman.
What would it be like, I began to wonder, to receive the “Breath” of the Holy Spirit and have Him move upon you to produce Scripture? And what if His scribe was a woman who lived in the midst of religious persecution by the Romans, and racial prejudice from the Jews, and a world in upheaval?
One day I saw clearly in my mind a scene, of a woman walking behind a cart. In the cart were body parts, and she had just come from a massacre in a Roman arena. As I explored what this might mean, I discovered from a book called The Bone Gatherers that women did such things in early Christianity.
In what should have been the most-favored generation of all time (to live around the time Jesus did), why did early Christians almost always die violent deaths?
Was that woman Priscilla, I wondered? How might she have ended up that way? If she did write the Book of Hebrews, what might that have been like?
And that’s how I began to write A Conspiracy of Breath.
Sounds fascinating! Thanks for sharing your inspiration to write this story!
Latayne C. Scott, Ph.D., is the award-winning author over two dozen books, the latest of which is a novel based on the premise that Priscilla did indeed write the Epistle to the Hebrews: A Conspiracy of Breath (TSU Press, 2017.) If Priscilla did write Hebrews and Scott has “ghost written” her autobiography, it would be of the best-selling woman writer of all history, with over 5 billion copies of the Bible in print.
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Latyane is giving away a copy of A Conspiracy of Breath. Follow the directions below to enter.
Thank you, Liz, for honoring this book. May God bless you!
Yes, it’s quite possible that Priscilla is the author of Hebrews.
I think so, too. Thank you for your comment!
Wow, this thought never even crossed my mind before. I remember hearing the story about Priscilla and Aquila, but never considered that she might have authored the book of Hebrews.
I guess I’d just assumed Paul wrote it until I did further research. But it is different in style and content than any other New Testament book.
I think it is possible Priscilla wrote this. Women have been overlooked for so long. Looking forward to reading your book
I guess I’d just assumed Paul wrote it until I did further research. But it is different in style and content than any other New Testament book.
No, I believe Paul wrote it.
I think most people would assume that too. Have you read any books (like Ruth Hoppin’s Priscilla’s Letter) that take an opposite view?