Dawkins ignorantly attributes the ending of slavery in the west and the improvement of women's rights, to rationalistic thinking, though in fact both were brought aboutg my Christians. Certainly slavery was as the abolitionists in America and Wilberforce in particular in England were acting from their Christian principles. Dawkins thinks it's a matter of finding a verse here and there that can be used against slavery while there are others that suppo0rt slavery in the Bible, but the Christians who ended it rad the Bible as tending against slavery in its e3ntirety. As for women's rights, Jesus is known for his acceptance of women in a way none of th4e Jews of His day were, and that is the basis for mmost of the western equality movovements. The Bible accommodated the universal practice of slavery while ven in ancient Israel liberalizing laws for dealing with slaves and setting dates for them to be freed. You don't just forbid a universal practice that is a major part of the economy, that is a modern impositionj on the text. God is much wiser than that, He deals with people according to our weaknesses, and even in the New Testament Paul has to approach a slaveowner with careful appeals to his Christian belief to request theat he consider rfreeding a slave of his who is also a Christian. As for women's rights, it should be remembered that in the biblical context we learn that women were subjugated to men because of Eve's disobedience of God in e3atin gof the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. Ever since the Fall women have been subje8ugated to men and you can see that in every culture up until very recently and certainly see it in Muslim countries still. It was the influence of Christ that brought women into the modern world with rights, Christ who pay id penalty for original sin and began the process of freeing us from the effects of the Fall.