Judaisim:
Sacred text - Orthodox Jewish men include the following in their daily prayers: ‘Blessed art thou o Lord our god that i was noy born a slave.’ ‘Blessed art thou o Lord our God that I was not born a woman.’
Worship - Women's participation is restricted - Jewish women can't read from the scriptures. Women sit on balconies

Christianity
Sacred text - In the bible the new testament mentions the following: ‘Wives be subject to your husbands, as the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife's Christ is the head of the church.’ In christianity, Eve was created from the rib of adam. Virgin mary was a virgin. Mary Magdalene is seen as a sinful woman by some christians.
Worship - women were the property of men, ‘to obey’

Criticism
Sacred text - “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female for you are all one in Christ Jesus “

Hinduism - sacred text - In all religions except Hinduism all the gods are males. Goddesses are important in Hinduism (Lakshmi, Kali, Parvati) although very few female priests exist in Hinduism

Islam
Worshipping - Women’s roles are minimal in services. Religious taboo over menstruation – women can’t touch the Quran if they are menstruating (impure). But nor can men if they are unclean (eg. just after sex)
Laws and customs - In some cultures, the female may not divorce her husband. Stoning for adultery (BUT : cultural or Islam ? )

The study of the decline of the goddess depicts female god figures across Europe and asia. Armstrong argues that male aggression exhibited through the invasion of societies, more male dominated cultures from the northern hemisphere/middle east, meant that male gods grew in importance. Therefore the goddesses seemed less important or inferior to the male gods.
Monotheism meant the belief in one god, rather than many (polytheism), which enforced people to have adopted the same male god.

Argue that the return to fundamentalism is a response to women’s choice and freedom and wanting to return to patriarchal control e.g. the Taliban ; recent events in Iran to a woman flouting strict hijab rules

She says that religion itself is a patriarchal myth. Although she is originally a catholic she argues that the Christian story eliminated other ‘Goddess’ religions. She argues that Christianity is rooted in male ‘sado-rituals’ with it’s ‘torture cross symbolism’, and that it embodies women-hating.

Argues that the Torah (Old Testament) was written and interpreted by men and incorporates all their traditional biases against women. Women are identified with body, instinct, nature, sin, childbearing and domesticity (hence conservative views, promoting traditional beliefs)

-Veiling may not patriarchal as interpreted by western opinion - as Watson says, it may be liberating, protecting and offer cultural identity

-Women may not turn to religion more due to greater suffering (‘social opium’) but rather because religion reflects women’s expressive characteristics (functionalist response)

-Women may be prominent in some religions (Hinduism) and not always associated in a passive/expressive way eg. Kali as a goddess of power and destruction

-According to postmodernists, feminists over-generalise patriarchy : some women believe in the traditions of a religion ; some religious organisations have a more prominent role for women

-Semiotic analysis of religious texts can be selectively used - either way

-Is it the religion itself that is patriarchal or the culture within which it is based (and the subsequent interpretation of religion)?