Now, Wrested Scriptures doesn’t attempt to convince the reader of the positive doctrines we believe; rather, it assumes the doctrines are understood and accepted, and then provides help in dealing with verses which may appear to contradict the doctrine. So, for this thought-experiment to be effective, I would ask you to attempt the following task:
- temporarily imagine that you are coming from a position of believing that Scripture does not distinguish male and female roles in the church, and then
- consider whether you would find the explanations of the verses helpful in working with someone who believed a doctrine of gender roles.
Once you have finished the thought-experiment, then step back and feel free to assess whether the result is any less compelling than is typical of our treatment of “difficult passages”. I am interested in any feedback you may have. — John Launchbury
Male and Female “Roles”
Many Christian groups hold a doctrine that God has instituted male and female “roles” within the church, whereby most of the vocal functions, especially leadership and teaching, are to be carried out exclusively by males, and only the secondary and supportive functions are allowable to females (as well as to males).Without a doubt, the majority of leadership functions in Scripture have been carried out by males, as they are still today. However, the issue at the heart of this doctrine is not about what is most common, but about what is permitted. The doctrine claims that God has designated distinct church roles based specifically on gender, and that any divergence from this is sin.
General approach
A foundational principle of non-discrimination is established by Paul in Galatians:
You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3:26-29)
Some will hold that this passage pertains only to salvation, but the context shows that the purpose of the passage is to address discrimination in the congregation against Gentile (Greek) Christians who were not circumcised (Gal. 2:11-3:5). Though Paul’s immediate purpose is to address discrimination against Gentiles, since he draws parallels between race, status and gender, any claim for distinctions between males and females can be examined to see how a similar argument would fare if it were recast as a discrimination between Jews and Gentiles, or between masters and slaves.
A second approach is to note that God is the provider of gifts and talents in the church: It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up (Eph. 4:11-13).
Right from Pentecost, we have very clear evidence that God selected both men and women to be prophets, who would all exercise vocal leadership functions thereby. As Peter says: These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy (Acts 2:14-18).
Any claim that it is a sin for women to teach or speak has to be tested against God’s explicit choice to designate both men and women as prophets. Again, the issue is not what was common in Biblical times, but whether a practice is approved or condemned by God.
As a general point, it is worth noting that masculine language is very commonly used in Biblical times when either gender can be meant. This section started with one, where Paul uses sons and then explicitly includes male and female, and Peter speaks similarly in the Acts reference (using the word men to include both men and women).
Here are two other examples (drawn from hundreds), Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him. (Rom. 4:8) If your brother is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died. (Rom. 14:15) As these passages both demonstrate, the use of masculine language is not sufficient by itself to conclude that males are intended exclusively.
1 Cor 14:34-45
These two verses in Paul’s correspondence with Corinth are often used as evidence that women are not permitted to have a speaking role within church services: Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church. (1 Cor 14:33-35)Approach
(1) These verses prove too much if taken at face value. They would require overall silence from the women, not simply abstaining from a speaking role like teaching or leading. True silence implies no singing, for example, and this is how the Catholic church interpreted it historically.In fact, Paul uses the same Greek word for speak when he says elsewhere, Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs (Eph 5:19). Furthermore, because the context is any gathering of believers, the injunction to silence ought to include silence during any congregational fellowship period, even if outside a formal service. Clearly, we need a more refined understanding.
(2) It is commonly claimed that the men and women in the church are enacting a teaching parable about the relationship between Christ and the church, and that is why women are to have no speaking role. But again this verse goes too far, for here the speaking is asking questions, which would be a perfect manifestation of church role in the parable of Christ and the church.
(3) From its foundation at Pentecost, the New Testament church had women prophets, and Corinth was no exception. Prophecy, says Paul, is for believers (14:22), and is so that the church will be built up (14:5). It was a vocal gift, and it was exercised within the church services (the injunction on women having their heads covered (1Cor. 11:5) is specifically praying and prophesying). Consequently, Paul cannot have intended 1Cor. 14:34-45 to be taken as a blanket prohibition on vocal roles by women.
(4) Paul’s purpose throughout this chapter is to promote positive and constructive worship, and steer the Corinthians away from disruptive activities. God is not a God of disorder, but of peace. (1Cor. 14:33). To accomplish this, Paul prohibits speaking in tongues unless there is an interpreter: the speaker should keep silence in the church (14:28). Similarly, if a revelation comes to someone sitting down, the current speaker should become silent (14:30). So in a similar way, rather than having the women call out questions during the service, Paul enjoins them to be silent, and to ask their questions when they get home. If Corinth organized its seating in the style of traditional Jewish synagogues, in which men and women were seated in separate areas, then calling out questions would be particularly disruptive, especially as their behavior was such that he exhorts them to be submissive. So we see that these verses are continuing his theme of avoiding disorderliness and chaos. As such, they cannot be used to prohibit women from taking a constructive vocal role in church meetings.
Other points to consider (5) The words, “if they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home” reflects a cultural standard of the time. During Jesus’ youth, the Roman historian Livy published his History of Rome in which he quotes Marcus Portius Cato as saying, “Could you not each of you put the very same question to your husbands at home?” (Book 34.2).
Similarly, the use of the word disgraceful also strongly suggests a cultural standard: in Greco-Roman culture it was often deemed disgraceful for a wife to speak out in any public setting. Things are different today: in our culture it is not seen as disgraceful for a woman to talk in public.
(6) There is some evidence that these two verses may be a later addition to the text. In three Greek manuscripts and a couple of Latin witnesses, they don’t occur after verse 33, but later, after verse 40. That (and other reasons) has led some scholars to surmise that the verses were not written by Paul but originated as a kind of marginal note added by a scribe. The note was then inserted in different places of the text by various scribes—some placing the note after verse 33 and others inserting it after verse 40. As with most suggestions about late additions, it is hard to be sure one way or the other.
1 Tim 2:11-15
These verses are often understood to prohibit women from teaching, or at least from teaching men. A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety. (1Tim. 2:11-15)Two reasons for the prohibition of women teaching are commonly taken from these verses: that a male should be in authority because Adam was created first; and that a woman should not teach because women are more easily deceived as was Eve.
Approach
(1) The Greek word translated silent here should really be translated by quiet, in the sense of peace and gentleness rather than striving. The very same word occurs at the start of the passage, where it is indeed translated as quietness. Other examples of this Greek word in the New Testament make the point even more clearly: Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the bread they eat. (2Th. 3:12) When they heard this, they had no further objections and praised God, saying, “So then, God has granted even the Gentiles repentance unto life.” (Acts 11:18) Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. (1Pet. 3:4) With this clarification, we see that these verses describe the attitude in which learning should take place, and simply do not address the general question of vocal roles. As such, these verses cannot be used to establish a blanket injunction of silencing women.(2) This is the only time the Greek word translated have authority occurs in the New Testament — it is not the word which appears elsewhere for authority. The form of this word is literally self-within. The Louw & Nida Greek Dictionary translates it, to domineer. It appears that it may be describing abusive or grossly insubordinate behavior.
(3) The references to submission, to Adam and Eve, and to childbearing, all strongly suggest a marriage context. Combining this observation with the previous point, Paul may well be saying, I don’t permit a wife to teach or domineer over her husband, she must be peaceful. That is, his intent may be quite narrowly defined.
(4) Timothy was the overseer of the church at Ephesus, where the impressive temple of Artemis/Diana was located (Acts 19). According to Greek mythology, the city of Ephesus had been founded by the Amazons, famous women leaders who had slain their men-folk. Artemis herself was said to be a huntress who had engineered the death of the hunter Actaeon, who came across her when she was bathing. It was taught that she had special powers to protect women through the trauma of childbirth.
Moreover, as the religious movement of Gnosticism developed, Eve became conflated with Artemis, as shown by the following creation myth: After the day of rest, Sophia sent Zoe her daughter, who is called Eve, as an instructor so that she should raise up Adam, who had no soul in him, so that those whom he would beget should become vessels of the light. When Eve saw her co-likeness lying flat, she showed pity upon him and said, “Adam, live! Rise up upon the earth.” Straightaway her word became a deed. For when Adam had risen up, he immediately opened his eyes. When he saw her, he said “You will be called ‘the mother of the living,’ because you are the one who has given me life.” (Nag Hammadi Codex, II, Tractate 5, On The Origin of The World, 115.85-116.86).
It seems likely that Paul is addressing the early stage of this heresy head-on. He has already instructed Timothy about those who teach false doctrines and devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies (1Tim. 1:34). and later he says, Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge (gnosis), which some have professed and in so doing have wandered from the faith (1Tim. 6:20-21).
Now he addresses this false doctrine head-on: Eve, he says, was not the originator, and neither was she perfect: after all, she was the one deceived. Having addressed the core of the false doctrine, he then draws the implication that the Ephesian women should not rely on Artemis for safekeeping through childbirth, but rather should maintain their faith and trust in Christ who has true power.
(5) Some argue that women cannot be trusted to teach because Eve was deceived. However, elsewhere Paul also uses the deception of Eve as a warning to the whole Corinthian church, male and female, providing us with firm evidence that he does not consider this a gender issue:
I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. (2 Cor 11) In fact, the situation is quite the reverse.
Luke tells us that Paul’s close friends Pricilla and Aquila together taught the gospel to Apollos (Acts 18:26). Paul himself encourages Timothy to keep faith because he could trust the teachings of his mother and grandmother (2Tim. 1:5, 3:13), and elsewhere he explicitly exhorts older women to teach what is good (Tit. 2:3). All these demonstrate his confidence in women’s ability to teach correctly.
1 Tim 3:2
From this verse, some conclude that a church overseer must be male. Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, (1Tim. 3:2).Approach
(1) Background: Paul seems to have appointed a number of elders, or overseers, in each of the churches he established. Prior to his arrest, he speaks to the Ephesian leaders as a group: From Miletus, Paul sent to Ephesus for the elders of the church… “Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.” (Acts 20:17,28) Now, about five years later, Paul writes to Timothy in Ephesus about the practical qualifications for making appointments to this same group of overseers.(2) Amongst these qualification is being the husband of but one wife. In the Greek the literal phrase is, a onewoman man. What is Paul’s purpose in this qualification? Does he mean to exclude someone who is unmarried? What about someone who is widowed? What if a widower had remarried? Most likely, Paul’s intends to require that an overseer be faithful in marriage. Indeed, the feminine version of the phrase is (literally, a one-man woman) is translated explicitly in this way: No widow may be put on the list of widows unless she is over sixty, has been faithful to her husband (1Tim. 5:9)
(3) A little later in the same chapter, Paul goes on to describe deacons, or church servants, and he uses exactly the same idiomatic phrase (a one-woman man) in their requirements: A deacon must be the husband of but one wife and must manage his children and his household well. (1Tim. 3:12) Yet women were certainly deacons. About five years previously Paul had written in very positive terms about Phoebe, a deacon of the church at Cenchrea (Rom. 16:1), and fifty years later, Pliny the governor of nearby Bithynia writes to the emperor Trajan about two Christian deaconesses whom he tortures for information (Letters 10.96-97).
In the case of deacons, then, we have to conclude that Paul follows standard practice and uses a masculine form of language simply as representative, and with no intent to exclude a feminine equivalent. Given that exactly the same form of language is used for overseers, it also cannot be used as evidence that Paul was prohibiting women from carrying out this function. Note that none of the other qualifications have any gender restriction.
