Ever so often, a religious term gets thrown into the popular discourse that leaves some heads spinning in newsrooms.
A recent example is a few Southern Baptist pastors calling Vice President Kamala Harris a “Jezebel,” as attested to TheLily.com, a feminist newsletter published by the Washington Post. The headline: “Southern Baptist leaders called Kamala Harris a ‘Jezebel.’ That’s not just insulting, it’s dangerous, experts say.”
In this case, we are not talking about “leaders” of the Southern Baptist Convention. The attacks came from a few pastors.
Before I dissect this opinion piece, I need to mention that “Jezebel” or “Jezebel spirit” is a term used quite frequently in Pentecostal-charismatic discourse. Now, here is the key material from this essay:
Two days after Vice President Harris was sworn in as the nation’s first female vice president, Tom Buck let it out.
“I can’t imagine any truly God-fearing Israelite who would’ve wanted their daughters to view Jezebel as an inspirational role model because she was a woman in power,” tweeted Buck, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Lindale, Tex…
Despite criticism, including from fellow pastors, Buck doubled down in a follow-up tweet the next day.
Criticism didn’t just come from “fellow pastors.”
SBC president J.D. Greer weighed in on Twitter, chastising Buck. That’s a significant response from the nation’s largest Protestant flock.
“For those torn up over my tweet, I stand by it 100%,” Buck wrote. “My problem is her godless character. She not only is the most radical pro-abortion VP ever, but also most radical LGBT advocate.”
Buck wasn’t the only Southern Baptist preacher to refer to Harris as a Jezebel, a biblical character who has become shorthand for an amoral, wantonly sexual woman. Weeks earlier, before the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, Steve Swofford, head of the First Baptist Church of Rockwall near Dallas, made a similar statement. Delivering a videotaped sermon, Swofford called Biden “cognitively dysfunctional.”
“What if something happens to [Biden] and Jezebel has to take over?” Swofford asked in the sermon. “Jezebel Harris, isn’t that her name?”
The rest of the article does explain the history of the biblical Jezebel, but leaves out vast swatches of her history, such as her habit of executing righteous prophets.