Over and over again, Rabbi Leila Gal Berner spoke of two Biblical women that set a context for a vast amount of human history and current strife. The riveting image of Sarah and Hagar was amazing to contemplate. Inextricably linked in history, a barren wife and her handmaiden became the ignored matriarchs of two monumental world religions, Sarah's Judaism and Hagar's Islam. The questions of their relationship permeate to important questions facing the world today through the on-going conflict between members of their faiths. How did Sarah reach out to Hagar in times of desperation? Did she make unreasonable demands on an already battered woman, or was there a working equality between the two?

Was Hagar discarded by the Jewish matriarch when her immediate role of surrogacy was fulfilled? What was the relationship between these strong women? These questions directly related to the Palestinian/ Israeli conflict, and they must be asked. How can Jews searching for peace reach out to Palestinian Muslim women? Why have Jews discarded their human equals among Palestinian Muslims? If these women were able to peacefully co-exist in a deep love of the higher power, produced families that became the focal point of their religions, why have these families that live so near each other live with such a rift of conflict between them? If we actually examine the relationship of these two women and how their families have played out through history, we can come to a better understanding of these local concerns that have developed into a global crisis.

This shows us all the role of women in the dialogues on religion. To examine our common histories we find that women have played critical roles in the formation of current social structures, even if much work has been made to erase these efforts from our common knowledge. Sarah and Hagar, as matriarchs, are the ancestral founders of the three main monotheistic religions. These faiths have not only been incredibly important to the development of individual humans, but also human history. When we restore this power to women, we can better form our religious response to these global crisises. Again, the Rabbi spoke of women who are doing exactly this. An organization called Women in Black is comprised of women who find common histories, maintaining a presence of peace in Palestine. Their common histories are deeply personal through the loss of children to the devastating violence between the two communities. But the common history extends so much deeper. Even if implicitly, these women are accessing their religious histories, reclaiming them from a violent past based in androcentrism and patriarchy, and reliving their possibilities. This is a singular example of the need for women to be in these dialogues. More voices will bring forth the redemptive truths that lie deeply within all world religions, and the voice that we should work hardest for is that of women.