Discussing gender roles in the post, “Are Women Called to be Pastors“ over at Complegalitarian, some commenters made fantastic points about the pink and blue lenses through which we derive our “plain” teaching that all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
Psalmist said:
I would really like someone to point in Scripture to any principle that forbids us to practice anything except that for which we are given specific, gender-specific scriptural examples. Why is it that we invoke this for women only? Life in the church would be very, very different if we did this for the male half of the species.
Light replies:
Hermaneutics in pink and blue. Many complementarians approach men’s and women’s roles something like this: to discern what roles in the church are permissible for women, we need to look at what examples there are in scripture. (This is exactly the approach used by Dan Doriani, a PCA pastor, in his book “Women and Ministry: What the Bible Teaches).”
So if you use this “pink” hermaneutic, the modern woman is limited to just those specific functions described as being performed by women in the Bible. However, I have never heard that approach being used for a man. Rather, the male or “blue” hermaneutic goes something like this: everything is open to males, unless there are specific restrictions put upon it.
Can you imagine how different things might be if we used the “pink” hermaneutic for men? Since there are no male youth pastors, directors of worship, or music ministers mentioned in the Bible, men would be prohibited from serving in that way. I think it’s time we did away with the double standard. Let’s at least be consistent in our hermaneutics.
Well said. Why is it with women, the interpretational emphasis in conservativedom is generally assumed to be one of restriction instead of one of liberty?
Towards the end of the comments, Dave W from 42 touches on this very same question, though he brings up a topic that many complimentarians say is unfair (”You can’t compare subjegated women with subjegated slaves!”). I disagree, obviously, for reasons such as the ones Dave brings out:
Scripture says a lot about slavery being ok, it is not condemned by Jesus or by Paul. Yet we do not accept slavery today and we reject it because we have learned to re-read the specific texts that support slavery in the light of wider teaching by Jesus
Scripture has far less to say about the role of women in the Church. We are limited to just a very few verses which are far from clear. Yet scripture says a great deal more about gifts poured out on all people, the need for the whole body to work together & the importance of love. In Jesus we see a man who broke many taboos and customs in the way he responded to women and their importance to his ministry.
William Wilberforce and others persuaded us of the need for a new hermeneutic regarding slavery. Many of us have experienced the joys and active presence of the Holy Spirit when we have switched to a hermeneutic that takes a wider view of the gospel when attempting to interpret these difficult texts. In doing so we have found that both scripture fits together better (eg Galatians 3:28 with letters to Timothy) and also God blesses our endeavours.
Posted by J. K. Gayle on January 15, 2008 at 3:07 am
Molly,
Thanks for highlighting some of the comments. In addition to Psalmist, Light, and Dave W, and George Orwell and William Wilberforce, there’s Jesus. Jesus who gives us the Holy Spirit. Jesus who says, “You have heard that it was said . . . , but I say to you” and “Woman, where are your accusers?” and “if you don’t understand this parables, then how will you understand any parable” and “come to me all of you who are burdened and weighted down . . .”
What a human being; what a lens!
Posted by MInTheGap on January 15, 2008 at 6:24 am
Interesting post. I believe that if we continued to look at examples from the Bible– and you included the whole Bible– you’d find that in the temple it was the males that led the musicians (Aseph, etc.) and that most of the functions from the sacrifices on down were done by males.
Now, is that illustrative? I don’t know for sure. God certainly had a reason for everything He did, and He does not change– both of these things we know for certain.
We also know that God claimed the first male child in Israel, He created man first, and Jesus was a man. Now, either all of these things are significant or they are not– that’s up for us each to decide. And how much their culture differs from our culture is also a question that would need to be resolved.
And just to throw one more thought out there that’s slightly off topic– why do we even have church buildings when most churches met in homes in the New Testament. Could we have missed the boat by adopting the whole RC tradition of having buildings?
Perhaps if we didn’t have buildings we wouldn’t have music ministers, etc. and therefore we wouldn’t even be having this discussion.
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 6:51 am
“Most” is certainly not “all.” We have women who are named, in a positive way, such as Phoebe the deacon and benefactor and emissary of Paul to Rome; Priscilla the teacher of Apollos, Junia the apostle; and a number of women whom Paul names as his “co-workers.” Now that’s just in the post-Pentecost infant church; there are other, earlier precedents for women doing the “forbidden things,” such as Mary of Bethany who took the disciple’s posture of learning at Jesus’ feet (disciples were accepted by rabbis on the basis of their ability to eventually go and do what the rabbi did–teach); the woman of Samaria who told her whole village what Jesus did for her and brought them to him; and Mary of Magdala who was sent out directly by Jesus to tell of the Resurrection, to name a few of the most notable.
My point in naming these women is to show that the “prohibitions” cannot be absolute, or these women would all have been in error. I think everyone knows this, which is what gives rise to the “pink and blue” double-standard hermeneutic that Light and I commented on. What’s really at the heart of it is viewing all of Scripture through a lens of what most Christians have traditionally been (erroneously) taught that the Bible forbids women to do. So one by one, we get “yeah, but’s” about each and every one of these women. Some will even say, “But show me a woman who was an Old Testament priest,” as though the Law’s male-only Levitical priesthood is binding on leadership qualifications in the church. The fact is, people are being terribly inconsistent and flat-out wrong in their interpretive preferences, just to preserve the status-quo of “no women leaders in the church.”
Me, I’m glad that none of my mothers in the faith, named and commended in Scripture, said “No” to God’s call to serve as God willed, no matter what their brothers might (or might not) have said. Jesus and Paul apparently saw nothing but good in their obedience, hence their commendation in Scripture.
Posted by Light M. on January 15, 2008 at 7:31 am
The “hermaneutics in pink and blue” is not my own idea, but one I gleaned from writer Christiane Carlson-Thies, who has had several articles published in CBE’s Priscilla Papers theological journal. I will quote here from her book review (Priscilla Papers, Spring 2005) of Dan Doriani’s “Women in Ministry: What the Bible Teaches.”
Exerpt quoted below has been edited for brevity. Complete article can be found at
http://www.cbeinternational.org/new/pdf_files/free_articles/women_and_ministry_print.pdf
Hermeneutics in Pink: deriving laws for women’s leadership from biblical narrative
To determine how women may minister in the churches today, Doriani advises us to consult the record of what women were allowed to do in the Bible. “By analyzing those patterns, we can discern what God ordains and what he does not” (24). …Once we see how biblical women exercised leadership and ministered to the community of faith, he claims, we will know exactly what is (and what is not) authorized for contemporary women. “In principle the scope of women’s ministry today should be as broad as it was in the apostolic era”.
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I call this approach the “hermeneutic of completedness.” The fundamental premise of this hermeneutic is that the narratives of biblical women in leadership reveal the completed scope of all that God desires from, and authorizes for, women’s leadership for all times. Because biblical women completely incarnated everything necessary for the responsible exercise of women’s authority within the community of faith, the church today needs only to model women’s ministries after the revealed biblical leadership pattern set down by our ancient sisters in the faith.
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In these chapters, then, Doriani proceeds to show what constitutes this biblical pattern. … Doriani strictly scrutinizes the revealed details of each woman’s leadership, asking how, when, and where she ministered in order to discover what exactly it is that God allows.
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When he examines the judgeship of Deborah (Judges 4-5), for example, Doriani finds that the single most important detail of her leadership is that the Israelites came to her to have their disputes decided. This fact, he argues, proves that Deborah’s authority was expressed in private, rather than public, settings (pp 34-35). Deborah’s leadership is thus not defined by the authority and responsibility encompassed in her title, “judge,” nor by any of her accomplishments, such as her participation in the defeat of the Canaanite king, Jabin. Instead, the single detail concerning the Israelites coming to her is made to stand for the whole meaning of her leadership.
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From such examples Doriani derives his position that the biblical pattern that must govern women’s leadership and ministry today is this: women may lead alongside men and they may teach in private (38).
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This “hermeneutics of completedness” method of analyzing the biblical material naturally raises a question: has every detail of every leadership woman in the Bible been considered and correctly interpreted to arrive at the authorized pattern? For if God’s law for women’s leadership is fully incarnated in Scripture and is to be found in the compilation and proper interpretation of revealed details, then no detail may be left out. The revelatory significance of each detail must be considered and weighed in relation to all the others. Furthermore, the analyst must explain the principles by which he determined which of those, among the wealth of details presented in a narrative, are the details that incarnate God’s immutable laws for women’s leadership. No such explanations are offered in Dr. Doriani’s book.
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However, even if we were able to put this thorny problem aside and accept Dr. Doriani’s survey of leadership women in the Bible as completely correct in every detail, his conclusion does not follow that such a catalogue of details constitutes an “incarnation,” or full specification, of God’s expectations for women’s leadership throughout human history. Is this how the Bible works? Are the details revealed in all the biblical narratives of leaders intended to provide us with a completed picture of incarnated leadership for all times? It is clear from the rest of his book that Dr. Doriani has not even convinced himself about this.
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Hermeneutics in blue: deriving laws for men’s leadership from biblical narrative
If the “hermeneutic of completedness” is the proper tool for discerning God-ordained leadership patterns, one should be able to turn to many scholarly surveys in which the details of male judges, kings, prophets, priests, teachers, preachers, elders, and apostles are interpreted to specify laws and patterns which contemporary male leaders must follow. Of course, such studies do not exist. No serious theologian—including Dr. Doriani—applies a “hermeneutic of completedness” to biblical narratives of male leaders. Instead, like all other complementarian theologians, he draws just one simple conclusion from the entire, complex, detailed story of male leaders in Scripture: God chooses men, not women, to lead His covenant family.
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How does he derive this stark, simple conclusion about God’s preference for male leaders? It is precisely because the “hermeneutic of completedness” is not applied to his reading of the narratives of male leaders. Imagine what would happen if it were. How, for example, would the revealed biblical pattern of Davidic lineage as a necessary qualification for national civic leadership be applied today? Should membership in the tribe of Levi or the Jewish lineage of the twelve apostles influence who can lead in today’s church? As for those gentile males who attained office in the New Testament church, what authorized leadership pattern do the details of their embodied service reveal? Would today’s gentile male leaders have to pattern themselves after these men’s occupation, their level of education, their marital status? Would gentile males today be barred from every office except for those particular ones that a named gentile male clearly held in the New Testament? And what about all those new offices that we have invented that have no biblical precedent whatsoever, such as Youth Pastor, or Minister of Music, or Administrative Pastor?
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In short, the general conclusion that male leadership per se is taught in the Bible only appears to hold up because all the particular details of male leaders in the Bible have been stripped of every normative or limiting function. But consider: the only way Doriani made a general case against women’s leadership from the Bible was to take the exact opposite approach and invest particular, selected details of women’s leadership as representing the embodiment of God’s eternal laws. A clear double-standard is at work. Hermeneutics in pink and blue.
Posted by Light M. on January 15, 2008 at 7:34 am
Well, crud. The formatting didn’t come out like I expected. Everything below the link to the PDF is Carlson-Thies’s article.
Posted by Tom Neyhart on January 15, 2008 at 7:34 am
Interesting thoughts and I will have to turn it over for awhile. I would agree that the church excludes women a lot in areas where gender is not mentioned. As a Christian University graduate in 2000 I had several Bible classes and although many people would point Paul out to be strongly against women, reading his writing in depth would point out differently. For example in 1st Corinthians 14 he states that women should be silent but extensive study shows that earlier in chapter 11 he addresses how women should pray and prophecy in public demonstrating that women did have a role. His later remarks about women being silent would suggest that there was occasions that women were to be silent. One thing we know about his letter to the Corinthians was that it was written to address specific problems that had arisen in the church. Any way you want to look at it, his writing in chapter 14 about silence would contradict what he wrote in chapter 11 if it were a blanket for all women to be silent.
Posted by Light M. on January 15, 2008 at 7:53 am
Tom, good thoughts. It’s so important to remember that Paul was often just putting out fires! And we deal with fires very differently than we deal with day to day life. It’s an important distinction, all too often missed.
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 8:06 am
I would add that it’s very important to remember that it is Paul’s directive about a particular, unnamed woman, “I do not permit a woman to teach or usurp authority over a man,” that has been turned into a supposedly universal prohibition against women teaching or holding authority “over” men. Setting aside the issue of worldly vs. biblical concepts of authority, we cannot find in this singular passage a universal prohibition against women teaching or assuming godly authority relative to men in the church. It’s simply not there.
Posted by jacob on January 15, 2008 at 10:06 am
I would think that Paul would have added τινι (tini) after γυναικι (gynaiki) if he had meant a “certain woman” and not woman/women in general. The lack (in this case) or even the presence of the article (τη – dative singular) before “woman” (had he used it) is not, I think, conclusive evidence re: whether Paul was speaking of women as a class, because I think Greek usage allows either, with context determining what is meant.
Posted by Mak on January 15, 2008 at 12:31 pm
really good stuff Molly
I think that the comment “God does everything for a reason and doesn’t change” is simultaneously right and wrong – it’s not fully true across the board because much of what God did was ALLOW not APPLAUD. For example, he allowed polygamy, he didn’t applaud it.
To bring it home esp. in a global missiological perspective (which is often the lens through which I view things), I would say that God has allowed patriarchies to exist and even has appeared to bless people in the midst of them but I don’t believe he applauds them. There are many cultural situations in which I would not promote egalitarianism but it is a redeemed issue of justice that I would hope to be able to someday move toward.
I believe this is much of what we find in certain “golden calf” gender scriptures that are used by many as dogma – we find certain models and methods being tolerated by God but not promoted or applauded. So does God change? no. But how we see God and what God expects of us does change – we’re supposed to be moving toward his perfect justice, redemptive work on the earth, mercy, love etc….not away from it. And frankly, “secular” society has done a better job of that in America in many areas of gender than the “church” has.
Posted by molleth on January 15, 2008 at 4:09 pm
Mak,
I am pretty much on the same page. I think we err by assuming “rule for all time,” and I think we are susceptable to that error because we have so removed the Scriptures from their physical cultural real-time-real-lives context. We’ve “spiritualized” them so much that we are blind to what is right in front of us, much as the Pharisees in Jesus day had the Scriptures viewed in such a specific paradigm that they missed the Good News right in front of them—the Good News that the very Scriptures they put on their foreheads proclaimed.
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Jacob,
Er… *guilty shuffling* I know nuthin’ ’bout all that stuff, having dropped out of my Greek class because the teacher sucked… HARHARHAR…No, actually, YOU WERE GREAT. It was the fact that learning Greek actually required EFFORT, which at that time, I wasn’t interested in putting in. I still have my books, though and remember some letters…Uh, does that count for anything? *grins*
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Psalmist,
I think that the directive against women teaching should be weighed against the mentioned women in the NT who were very much teaching/leading (seemingly with Paul’s full approval). There is MUCH in the Timothy passage that is obscure…the “saved in childbirth” bit, etc. Learning more about the culture REALLY opens up the passage, I think (at least it did for me), like how the people Paul was writing to were comign from a religion that had them appealing to an idol to save them in childbirth (a very risky business back then), and a certain version of that religion taught that women were superior since they were made first, etc…
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Is Paul saying that MEN are superior in 1 Timothy (with the whole created order passage), or is he simply correcting an imbalance, correcting a false teaching? For example, when I correct a “greasy grace” imbalance from someone preaching that we can do whatever we want because God’s grace is free and deep and wide, am I then promoting Law? NO. But if you take my words out of context, it probably will look like I am.
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In the same way, Paul went out of his way in other passages to say that NO GENDER is superior to the other. Yet if we take 1 Timothy out of context, particularly out of the cultural context with the background of the “female superiority cuz girls came first” cult, we can make Paul seemingly say that *men* are superior. That doesn’t mean that’s what he actually taught, though.
…But YOU know all that. I’m just rambling.
It proves nothing, in that sense, in that we know that death is not God’s *ideal* will for mankind, and yet it is what it is. I think of male rule in the same way. Gen. 3:16 has God telling us it will be that way now that the human race Fell from the ideal. So of course, in the OT, we will see male rule—-the Law never promised to take away the curse.
Women are no longer “in” because they’re represented by a male—they’re in because they are covenant bearers in their own right.
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Light,
Absolutely! Paul was NOT writing “the rule book for how the church should look.” He was answering letters. We only have his side of the letter…and our modern assumption that the NT epistles are written in the same way that a coffee maker instruction booklet is.
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Tom,
Exactly . (I’ve read some interesting stuff on the 1 Cor. 14 section on women’s silence, btw, with some very strong arguments for those verses being added at a later date, in that they are a very weird “fit” in the chapter, don’t seem to match Paul’s writing style, and seem to directly contradict his words in chapter 11. But I dunno.)…
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MininGap,
In Gen. 3:16 we were told that males would rule. So the fact that they then seem to rule a lot shouldn’t be terribly surprising. We were promised death, too. So the fact that most everybody dies in the Bible is also not terribly surprising.
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One fascinating distinction between the Old Covenant and the New is that the Old Covenant embraced male rule fully. The sign of belonging to the Old was the circumision—-a wholly male sign if there ever was one. Females “got in” to the covenant through being represented by males, you know?
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But the New Covenant “replacement” for circumcision was a gender-free sign. Baptism is not gender specific. Baptisism is not for males only, but for ALL, Jews, Greeks, males, females, slaves and free.
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I like your ramble on the church building thing…that’s one of my spare thoughts rolling ’round my noggin too.
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J.K.,
AMEN and AMEN!
Posted by jacob on January 15, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Do the words “Among Ten Thousand” ring a bell or send a chill down your spine?
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News at 10:00.
Posted by molleth on January 15, 2008 at 6:24 pm
YOU ARE SUCH a BRAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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*throws moose-poop laced snowball*
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Jacob, the fact remains that this is not a universal prohibition for “women”; Paul was saying, “I am not now permitting A WOMAN to teach or usurp authority over A MAN.” We really can’t get around that, at least not convincingly.
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Very, very good stuff about context, Molly. We simply don’t have a “No woman, anytime, anywhere, for any reason, are ever permitted to teach men or have any authority to leade men” prohibition. We can’t read the fragment in context and come to any such conclusion. And you’re correct about there being numerous difficult issues to deal with in interpreting the passage. We could just assume that “have authority over” is a comprehensive translation, but it’s not. Paul deliberately used a rare word that has much stronger, more negative connotations that that. He did NOT use the word that would have meant “have authority.” No accident, I’m certain. And the context, of course, is in providing the precedent for women to learn, not to prohibit them from ever teaching men what they were to learn.
Posted by jacob on January 15, 2008 at 7:04 pm
1 Timothy 1:12 is what Daniel B. Wallace calls a “Debatable Example.” See his Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, p. 525. Wallace argues that the term γυναικι (gynaiki) “a woman” is “a generic object,” and he discusses generic nouns (with the absence of the article) on p. 253, and on this he references A. T. Robertson, A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, p. 757. Wallace lists on p. 525 four reasons why the verb (”permit”) is likely a gnomic present (i.e., a general, timeless fact), rather than a descriptive present (”I do not presently permit…”).
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 7:11 pm
I understand that, Jacob. Context, however, pretty clearly precludes our deriving from this passage a universal prohibition against women teaching men or holding authoritative leadership in the church. And we also need to recognize that Paul shifted from plural to singular. Again, I don’t think that’s accidental.
I can understand that if we approach the passage expecting to find the status quo in it, we’ll probably find it even if it’s not there. That’s how the whole “women aren’t permitted to teach or have authority in the church” paradigm developed, after all, despite the obvious scriptural examples of women teaching and leading with godly authority.
Posted by jacob on January 15, 2008 at 7:26 pm
In his discussion of 1 Timothy 3:2 on p. 229, Wallace writes: “(2) the context of 1 Tim 2:8-3:16 involves an interchange of singular and plural generic nouns, suggesting strongly that the singular is used as a generic noun.” I.e., he seems to be saying (including 1 Timothy 2:12 in the discussion) that the shifting between singular and plural supports the idea that these nouns are generic – i.e., men/husbands and women/wives as a class. Which feeds back into his argument that the verb “permit” is a gnomic present.
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Or so it seems per my reading of Wallace.
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Perhaps the lengthiest recent treatment of the passage is Women in the Church by Andreas J. Köstenberger and Thomas R. Schreiner, Editors, 2005 (Second Edition). They argue for the traditional understanding, IIRC.
Posted by Psalmist on January 15, 2008 at 7:39 pm
I’m well aware that they do, Jacob. No surprise there. They wrote precisely for that purpose, after all. I still say they have to have discounted the full context. You don’t set up precedent for unlearned women to receive sound teaching, only to forbid them to use that teaching except (possibly) to teach other women. There’s simply no prohibition, either in the passage in question or elsewhere in Scripture, for women to be forbidden to teach men or to exercise authoritative leadership in the church. We could go back and forth about just how significant Paul’s shift from plural to singular is, but he’s simply not making a universal prohibition here, no matter how we might want to slice and dice it.
Posted by jacob on January 15, 2008 at 7:50 pm
I think your statement is too dogmatic, because I think the passage can indeed be interpreted that way, and that is how the church has largely interpreted it historically, is it not?
I’m not saying the church has been right, but I am saying that I don’t think one can say that Paul is NOT making a universal prohibition here when he very well might be, based on the grammar and the context.
Posted by Atlantic on January 15, 2008 at 8:38 pm
I hesistate to poke my head up in a discussion of Greek grammar, but a few points:
1. I trust that St John Chrysostom knew NT Greek extremely well
, and in his treatment of this passage, he didn’t find it necessary to make any argument that the woman must be a singular particular woman; he takes it for granted that it refers to women in general.
2. My Greek is awful, but I do speak a modern language that has the same feature of no indefinite article, which might give me a better feeling for the essence of that grammatical feature in actual use. Translated into that language, that text (with a singular noun and no article) sounds general to me.
3. The Catholic position on this passage is that it is indeed a general prohibition on women…but where “teach” and “hold authority” are defined very narrowly, meaning to teach and hold spiritual authority in the very strongest and definitive sense, ie only the way a priest and especially a bishop do. It hasn’t stopped the Church from declaring three female Doctors of the Church (literally, “teachers of the Church”, of which there have been only a few dozen in 2000 years) , for example, nor from women being able to hold teaching and authoritative positions over men generally speaking.
4. “You don’t set up precedent for unlearned women to receive sound teaching, only to forbid them to use that teaching except (possibly) to teach other women.” I have to admit I find this a deeply weird argument. It seems to imply that there is no purpose or use to sound doctrine except to pass it on. Surely you can’t mean that?
Posted by Atlantic on January 15, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Sorry – for “didn’t find it necessary to make any argument that the woman must be a singular particular woman”
read
“didn’t find it necessary to make any argument against a possible reading that the woman was a singular particular woman”
Posted by Suzanne on January 15, 2008 at 9:40 pm
On 1 Timothy 2:12, I think it needs to seriously be considered that no one has shown that the verb authentein means “to exercise/have authority over.” In fact, that is why Kostenberger and others have tried so hard to prove that it must mean that only because it is associated with “teach.” However, we do have exactly one contemporary citation, here,
BGU 1208 (27 BCE): “I exercised authority (Καμου αυθεντηκοτος) over him, and he consented toprovide for Catalytis the Boatman on terms of full fare, within the hour.”
Well that is Baldwin’s translation. Other people translate it as “I forced/compelled/made him” pay up.
That is it. The more recent uses suggest everything from “dominate,” “to to take over power from someone else.” So, in fact, if you want to quote Wallace, please, also be careful to quote the verse in its original meaning.
I do not permit a woman to teach or compel a man. It has no relationship whatsoever with any concept of authority in the scriptures positive or otherwise.
Posted by Suzanne on January 15, 2008 at 9:50 pm
Since we all like Chrysostom, here is a quote from him,
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Do not therefore, because your wife is subject to you, act the despot;(αυθεντεω) nor because your husband loves you, be thou puffed up. Let neither the husband’s love elate the wife, nor the wife’s subjection puff up the husband. For this cause has He subjected her to you, that she may be loved the more. For this cause He has made you to be loved, O wife, that you may easily bear your subjection. Fear not in being a subject; for subjection to one that loves you has no hardship. Fear not in loving, for you have her yielding. In no other way then could a bond have been. You have then thine authority of necessity, proceeding from nature; maintain also the bond that proceeds from love, for this allows the weaker to be endurable.
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Please note that authentein is used to mean “act the despot” and is specifically forbidden for the the husband over the wife. Why then are we surprised that Paul forbids the wife to act the despot over the husband.
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This has nothing whatsoever to do with women holding proper positions in church.
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I don’t necessarily believe in Chysostom’s views on subjection but he seems to have believed, from the whole quote. that the desire of the husband and the obedience of the wife were reciprocal and equal forms of submission. I find his views quite attractive although they do not protect the wife whose husbands eyes have wandered elsewhere.
Posted by Suzanne on January 15, 2008 at 9:57 pm
Sorry about all the verbiage, but here is the alternate transaltion for Catalytis.
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BGU 1208 (first century B.C.): “I had my way with him [authenteō ] and he agreed to provide Calalytis the boatman with the full payment within the hour.”
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As you can see there is more than one way to translate this. It may seem hard to believe but this is the only use of this word contemporary with the NT. It has been translated as “dominare” up until the 16th century when it was “usurp authority” and finally became “have authority.” The trajectory of scripture translataion!
Posted by molleth on January 15, 2008 at 11:44 pm
I’m enjoying sitting back and reading this with a cup of tea (wishing I had something chocolate, though)…
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 4:21 am
My comments from Wallace were mostly re: whether or not “a certain” woman was in the author’s mind (the claim that was being made) or if he meant “woman/women” in general, and whether or not it was a descriptive present (”I do not presently permit”) (again, the claim that was being made) or a gnomic present (”I do not permit”). I wasn’t really focusing on the meaning of authentein.
As for being “careful to quote the verse in its original meaning,” that is what we are trying to determine or discuss or debate in these last few comments, isn’t it? I.e., what is the original meaning of the quote, and to whom does it apply?
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 5:13 am
Atlantic, what we have is a case of Paul setting out the means by which a woman (which women? How many? Apparently in Ephesus, not everywhere; not repeated in the Canon for any other churches–not needed?) is to be permitted to receive FORMAL teaching. The rubrics are spelled out. Both Paul and Timothy were sons of the Covenant, after all. And no rabbi worth his salt permitted disciples who had neither intention nor ability to in turn become formal teachers. Those taught to teach, teach. However, they don’t get to grasp for authority and teach BEFORE they have learned. It seems rather obvious to me that there was at least one woman at Ephesus who was attempting to teach before she had received adequate teaching herself. Hence this corrective.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 6:08 am
Then there is of course the problem that the Greek words can mean both “man” and “husband,” and both “woman” and “wife.” Paul (or the author of 1 Timothy – but that’s another issue, isn’t it?) uses anthrôpos in 2:1,4,5(2x), but then switches to anêr in 2:8,12. The problem is compounded by the fact that the example/basis he gives of Adam and Eve could be viewed as “husband” and “wife,” and not “man” and a “woman.” In the succeeding discussion of bishops and deacons, he mentions them being the husband(s) of one wife. And 3:11 could be deacons’ wives, not female deaconesses. If so, then the gynaikes in 2:9 might be wives, too, and not women (which means the gyne/gynaiki in 2:11-12 might also be “wife” and not “woman”).
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I think.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 6:13 am
Typo correction to last sentence in paragraph: “If so, then the gynaikas in 2:9 might be wives, too, and not women (which means the gynê/gynaiki in 2:11-12 might also be “wife” and not “woman”).”
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 6:23 am
And that brings us back to Molly’s post, I think. How restrictively are we interpreting passages about women, relative to how restrictively we interpret passages about men? Why be as narrow as possible in what’s permitted for women, when we’re so permissive for men (i.e., unmarried men, childless men, older men whose children are no longer at home, etc. being considered fit for office, but ignoring Phoebe in order to claim that the Bible doesn’t even permit female deacons, for example).
Posted by tiffany on January 16, 2008 at 9:23 am
Jacob- I really appreciate the time you have taken to talk about and explain the Greek. I think you have show that words/phrases like “clearly”, “obviously”, “no-whatsoever”, “the fact remains” don’t seem to have a place in a discussion about this particular verse. I think it would be more productive (and intellectually honest) to say “here are the possible Greek meanings” “here is the context of the chapter” “here is the context of the book” “here is the context of the Word” and because of these reasons I believe this passage to be indicating XYZ.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for absolutes, but from peoples comments it seems like they have their minds completely made up about the meaning and so when someone suggests it could be saying something else we get the response of “clearly though it is teaching XYZ, and so your comments don’t change that fact”.
Both “sides” do this this in conversations all over the blogosphere, not trying to single anyone out. But I will say that if the egalitarians that are commenting would like those of us who are not to truly consider their arguments and not read with “a pink and blue hermaneutic” (which is a valid point) then it would be good to extend that same grace to others.
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 9:46 am
Tiffany, nothing that Jacob has said warrants transforming the 1 Tim. fragment into an absolute prohibition against women teaching and exercising authority in the church. Too much else in the Scriptures contradicts such a reading. My mind was indeed made up that the traditional misreading was correct, until I was forced to study this and many other “proof” passages in-depth. It was study, in context and (reluctantly) without my pre-determined “women can’t teach men or have authority” conclusion blinders on, that convinced me I was wrong.
So I stand by my observation that there is no such prohibition in Scripture. Yes, there are proof-texts that continue to be used to force such prohibitions into church policies, but Scripture gives us no such prohibition. I’m not ashamed of stating that as fact.
You will notice that I did provide context for the fragment in question, which begins with the telling “Let a woman learn.”
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 9:49 am
Just chalk it up to my using the “blue” hermeneutic for women as well as for men. That’s what happens when I don’t just accept the most restrictive possible reading, just because it would restrict only women and not men.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 9:55 am
Since nowhere in 1 Timothy does the author say that his comments about behavior are only for goings-on in “the church” (i.e., are women only supposed to dress modestly in church, but can dress like floozies in the marketplace? are older men only allowed to be rebuked/appealed-to in the context of a church setting? do the rich only have to set their minds on spiritual things when they are in church?), and since he grounds his argument in the creation account when he brings Adam and Eve’s formation into the picture, which would tend to universalize the teaching to all men and women everywhere (assuming it’s “man” and “woman” he is talking about, and not simply about Adam and Eve being husband and wife), I wonder about the implications of the traditional teaching for, e.g., women being bosses of men in the workplace. *impish grin*
Posted by paisley3 on January 16, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Hi! Are the pink and blue sort of like the Blue and Red states? Sorry. Couldn’t resist…I’m not keeping up with the discussion very well…just too swamped with the FlipTHATHouse project going on under my own roof…
Keep the faith.
Posted by Atlantic on January 16, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Psalmist, could you explain how you are getting from women “receive FORMAL teaching” to “become formal teachers”? And it might help to define what you mean by “formal teaching” and “formal teacher” here.
Posted by molleth on January 16, 2008 at 1:38 pm
I hear what Psalmist is saying. It’s kind of hard to explain in words, but it’s applicable particularly for women who have the gift of teaching, preaching, leading, and/or pastoring. For those women, they will always have to sit in Sunday School classes as learners, even if the male teaching is boring the crap out of them, even if they could teach the same class with one hand tied behind their back and blindfolded to boot, even if they have a legitimate gift for teaching and a passion for communicating God’s truth, even if… For those women, they will always have to be in the audience, period, quietly “learning” (or faking that they are).
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This is hard to explain because it makes it *seem* like these women really only want the limelight, but that’s not the case. I think that only those males with a gift of teaching/preaching/leading/pastoring would be able to understand what I’m even saying, because MAYBE they might be able to identify with how difficult it would be for THEM if someone said they were not allowed to have a pulpit, a lecturn, an audience or any other vehicle for expressing their gift beyond a second grade sunday school classroom.
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In a round about way, I think that’s one of the points Psalmist is bringing out. Men get to be students so that some of them can “grow up” to be teachers themselves. But women, simply because of gender, never get to “grow up.” They must remain always in student position.
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(This will not be a problem for all those who do not have the gift of teaching/preaching/leading/pastoring. But for those who do, it is unbelievably hard, not to mention the additional weight of being told that the “gifts” you think you have aren’t from God, because God doesn’t want women to do those things).
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Also, and I think Psalmist means this as well, this is NOT to say that the position of student is bad. I think we ALL are students, life-long students of Christ. So this has nothing to do with that. It’s simply talking about those women who have been given the gift of teacher/preacher/leader/pastor and who must keep it stuffed down somewhere deep, because there is no acceptable outlet for it beyond a 2nd grade classroom.
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Before someone jumps on me for eschewing the 2nd grade classroom, know that I’m not saying that’s “lame,” either. I’m just saying that not all of us are called to children’s work. We don’t knock the pastor because he feels more called to the pulpit than he does to the 2nd graders, do we? But for those of us who are women, we are not allowed to say that we’d prefer a pulpit over a 2nd grade room.
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For women to say that, we’re told we’re being proud/haughty and/or that we obviously have an issue about wanting to be in the spotlight. Again, the pink and blue standards. It’s totally acceptable for a man to say he’s called to preach. We say, “Praise the Lord!” to the young man going off to seminary. But if a woman says that…something is wrong with her.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Sheri Klouda was, I think, in 2nd-year Hebrew at The Criswell College when I took my one year of Hebrew there. I remember that she had a reputation for her academic performance (as well as being a nice person to talk to), and that she was caring for a sick or disabled spouse. As you can read in the link, her gender got her in the cross-hairs at SWBTS. You can google for her name and find lots of posts about this incident, like this one re: her subsequent lawsuit.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Sheri Klouda was a Hebrew student at The Criswell College when I took my one year of Hebrew there. As you can read at the link, her gender got her in the crosshairs at SWBTS. You can read more about it by Googling for her name, including her subsequent lawsuit against the seminary. I remember her being a nice person with a reputation as a great student, and as a wife and mother who was caring for a disabled(?) spouse.
Posted by tiffany on January 16, 2008 at 3:31 pm
Going back to your original post/quotes….
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I think there is a fundamental problem when we try to discuss women having the gift of preaching/teaching/pastoring in the same context as discussing “wives submit to your husbands”.
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It’s not that they don’t overlap, they do. But I think one could come to the conclusion rather safely that women are given the gift of teaching, while still believing they are to submit to their own husbands. I think it weakens both positions (egal and comp) greatly to always interlink them.
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Which is what I think this post does, by first talking about women in the church, and then to go on to compare the submission of wives to husbands as the same (or related to culturally) as slaves to masters.
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I can see the valid critique of a pink and blue hermaneutic when it comes to official roles in the church, but when it comes to roles within marriage the standard used by complimentarians is really the same for both genders- basically: the instructions given aren’t simply based on culture or for that culture only, and so it is imperative on both the husband and wife to follow them. What you are saying here is that comps say to women you are only allowed to do what the Bible specifically gives example of, and men you are allowed to do everything except what you are told not too. It is very different. Even if you disagree about wives submitting to their husbands, it isn’t the same (claimed) flaw of reasoning.
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On a related note….
I think discussing a particular verse of scripture like this is great. It does however bring up an important question- must one have an understanding of the original language and culture in order to understand completely and apply scripture? Must one have an understanding of the group the Epistle was originally written to? Does the person who knows the original language and culture automatically have more authority in these matters? What do you do when two (or three or 10) prominent scholars disagree on the original language? How do you determine to trust people who have written(either via blog or book) who say “I studied the language and culture and this is what it means”? Maybe a topic for another day, but one I don’t think that can be gotten away from as soon as we pull out any source (language, culture, etc) to help us delve deeper into the passage.
Posted by molleth on January 16, 2008 at 5:01 pm
Atlantic,
A friend sent me this thought on the Catholic position of male leadership in the home…I found it VERY interesting, particularly the second half!
http://www.catholicculture.org/library/view.cfm?recnum=6387
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Tiffany,
You said,
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This is a good point. Hm. I usually think of the two as completely connected (aka, male rule or no male rule). Maybe I should reconsider that presupposition.
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You also said,
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I’d say this is a presupposition on the part of the complementarian (particularly considering that submitted wives was the name of the game in those cultures, just as obedient slaves were).
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*shrugs* I mean, it COULD be an eternal command, yes, but I think there’s also a valid argument for it being a cultural one.
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On “must one have an understanding of orginal language and/or culture…?” Yes and no. I think we don’t have to, but in the same way that we read Shakespeare with a LOT more understanding when we learn more about the background, I think it’s fair to say that the same is true about the Bible.
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God speaks to us through…His Son (Heb. 1:1-3). And He breathed His words to us through the Spirit…and we collected those words and call them the Bible.
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Most of us can all readily attest: words in that book have changed our lives… How, I’m not exactly sure, but I wager it has a LOT to do with the fact that the Spirit opened the eyes of our heart while we were reading and we “saw” Jesus in those words.
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So, one the one hand, NO, we do not need a cultural commentary and 12 years of Greek classes under our belt.
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On the other hand, if we’re going to start using the Bible like a textbook, then we better be real darn sure we know what it is we’re reading so that we apply the “rules” rightly. If we had a little more study under our belt, first off we’d know right away that we can’t use the Bible like a textbook! LOL…
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Secondly, we’d be a lot less apt to misapply and miscomprehend the words. (Though we’d still all see things differently—-of that I have no doubt). But we’d be able to understand the story behind the story.
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The reader, if he has no clue of leprosy, will never grasp the significance of Christ *touching* the leper when He healed him. The reader, if he has no clue of cultural context, will never grasp the significance of Christ approving of Mary sitting at His feet instead of being in the kitchen. The reader, if he has no access to Greek teachers or books, will never know that Scripture is being twisted and misapplied by his Bible college teacher, and therefore will believe things that he thinks are “proved” in the Scripture yet actually aren’t there at all! And the list goes on…
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I guess I’m trying to say I think the answer is both/and in this situation. The Bible is both simple, and it is also complex. We are enriched when we learn about culture and original languages, as long as we never forget that the real intent of Scripture is not to rightly understand doctrine, but rather to open our eyes to see Jesus.
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“You search the Scriptures thinking that in them you will find life, but they are that which testify of Me…”
Posted by pauseforamoment on January 16, 2008 at 5:32 pm
“But I think one could come to the conclusion rather safely that women are given the gift of teaching, while still believing they are to submit to their own husbands. I think it weakens both positions (egal and comp) greatly to always interlink them.”
Yes, this is completely my view. I believe in submission to one’s husband (and to all the governing authorities Jesus talks about), but I also firmly believe women are called to do all the things men are called to. In our church, women are free to teach and preach and prophesy and pray etc etc (within, of course, the structure and order of the church and what is happening at the time), but we still follow the concept of submission. I have to say, though, that if I, say, am leading our homegroup that week, my husband submits to me and my authority at that time. He will ask me what I would like him to do. I offer him the same submission when he is doing it. We are on the same team, just loving and honouring one another (which is a way of submitting!).
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Just as a side note, we had a prayer meeting at church last night, and we were all mucking around as we do at the start, and our pastor called out, “Women! Be quiet! Women have to be silent!” It was funny at the time because it is SO different to how we operate as group!
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I believe that many of the passages on silence etc are culturally based, but some things seem irrefutable, such as a wife submitting to a husband. How that looks, though, is highly open to interpretation. I suspect this is where the patriachal camp has it wrong. Something very beautiful and honouring has become a bondage, which of course looks ugly. In our marriage, and in the marriages around us, there is truly hardly any where there is a dominance or a superiority thing happening. None of it is legalistic, rather it is a sweet and honouring thing.
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Now, if I am ever going to go for a swim at the beach, I better leave right now!!!
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Valerie
Posted by molleth on January 16, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Valerie,
Your thoughts and opinions and wise words are always welcome here, but you are NOT ALLOWED to talk about going to beaches whilst SOME of us are freezing our scrawny butts off in sub-zero temperatures.
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The Queen Hath Spoken.
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Harumph.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Well, in a sense the question was partly answered before you stated it, and indeed by/b> you stating it, because if there wasn’t at least someone, or several someones, who had “an understanding of the original language and culture,” you would not have your English translation of the Scriptures for you to read and ask your question about the need to have “an understanding of the original language and culture”!
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But even if one doesn’t have the Scriptures, or the full understanding of them, I think a lot of our faith comes down to two simple rules:
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1. No one gets away with anything. Nada. Zip. Per the immortal (or confusing) words of INLAND EMPIRE, “Actions have consequences.” If not in this life, there will be comeuppance/recompense/vindication in the next.
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2. Always treat others the way you would want them to treat you.
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So, you see, it’s all rather simple. The devil, of course, is in the details.
Posted by jacob on January 16, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Formatting snafu. Try again:
Well, in a sense the question was partly answered before you stated it, and indeed by you stating it, because if there wasn’t at least someone, or several someones, who had “an understanding of the original language and culture,” you would not have your English translation of the Scriptures for you to read and ask your question about the need to have “an understanding of the original language and culture”!
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But even if one doesn’t have the Scriptures, or the full understanding of them, I think a lot of our faith comes down to two simple rules:
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1. No one gets away with anything. Nada. Zip. Per the immortal (or confusing) words of INLAND EMPIRE, “Actions have consequences.” If not in this life, there will be comeuppance/recompense/vindication in the next.
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2. Always treat others the way you would want them to treat you.
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So, you see, it’s all rather simple. The devil, of course, is in the details.
Posted by Tiffany on January 16, 2008 at 6:05 pm
Molly,
don’t have time to respond to everything, but when I said that
I wasn’t so much trying to discuss it, but rather point out that it is a different sort of argument being used by comps in this instance verses the pink/blue argument that was talked about early. Which is why I didn’t think lumping the two subjects together was a good idea. On one hand it is being said that there is a pink/blue hermeneutic being applied for church roles and that they are ignoring cultural implication for marriage roles. It is two different charges of inaccuracy and should be dealt with separately I think.
Posted by Suzanne on January 16, 2008 at 6:24 pm
I would say that a good understanding of what it means to “love your next one as yourself” is better than 10 years of Greek.
Posted by pauseforamoment on January 16, 2008 at 6:48 pm
LOL! And it was bee-yoo-ti-fool! Hot, though. I only lasted forty minutes or so. 39 today, and you can stop being envious because I’ve got to go and get dolled up for a wedding. Fancy being dressed up when it is 39 outside and (likely) the church has no airconditiong? I’d rather be here in my wet bathers and with the a/c.
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Check this out. This is close to where I just was. http://www.dpi.wa.gov.au/imarine/coastaldata/1735.asp
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And now, back to discussing men and women.
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 8:30 pm
Atlantic, re: “formal” teaching and learning: Both Paul and Timothy were Jews. (And lest anyone rebuke me for not mentioning that Timothy’s father was a Gentile, we should remember that a Jewish mother’s child is automatically counted a Jew, and both his mother and grandmother saw that he received instruction in his faith.) Unlike that Greek argumentative didactic methods, Jews (including Jewish followers of the Way, like Paul and Timothy) who studied with a teacher had certain rubrics (formalized practices) that controlled their behavior. We see instances in the Gospels where Jesus taught his disciples apart from the crowds; the Twelve were his formal disciples, and certain others (including Mary of Bethany) also learned from him as their rabbi, but the crowds who heard his preaching were not considered his disciples; they did not follow him formally to be trained to do as he did. (Remember how he promised that the Twelve would do even greater deeds than he did?)
Rabbis/teachers gathered disciples in order to train them to be teachers themselves. They were to learn in submission; “a student is not greater than his teacher.” They were to be still (quiet, silent) and receive instruction at their rabbi’s feet. This is what Mary of Bethany was doing. You didn’t presume to sit at a rabbi’s feet if he had not accepted you as his disciple. It’s no wonder Martha was so upset with Mary. She wasn’t simply neglecting kitchen duty, she was showing herself to be an actual discple of Jesus — and Jesus approved!
So…what to do in Ephesus, where false teaching was being circulated and at least one woman was apparently presuming to the place of a teacher without having been taught properly? Start with the basics. “Let a woman learn…”, but how? “In the proper way: quiet, submissive to the teacher. She’s not to usurp the teacher’s rightful place or presume to be something she’s not qualified (yet) to be. For now, I’m not going to permit her to teach and mind that she does not arrogantly grasp for authority she hasn’t earned.”
An entire house church would have received regular exposition of the Scriptures, and if the next few generations’ records are any indication of the first two generations’ practices, all new believers would have received a period of instruction in the faith before being allowed full participation in the community. I think it is likely that it’s either this initial intensive indoctrination, or else a separate more advanced course of instruction upon recognition of gifts for teaching, that Paul was speaking of. The gathered community would not have been so formally structured, given the variety of activities that are recorded as happening (not dedicated to teaching alone, as Paul describes). Teachers, we read elsewhere, are held to a higher standard, and rightly so. Part of that standard would of course be a stringent education so that they were qualified to teach in the first place.
Posted by Psalmist on January 16, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Molly, thanks for interpreting for me. (grin) You got it all exactly right, in terms of where I am coming from on this issue.
As far as the critique of not separating (more completely) discussion of women in marriage from discussion of women in church leadership, part of the problem is that arguments against one almost invariably are “proved” with arguments against the other. Since passages that specifically mention women are a relatively small subset of the totality of Scripture, it’s as though they all get yanked out of context, mixed together, and that pink hermeneutic gets applied, as though that passage proof-text patchwork constitutes an exclusive list of what’s permissible for women. For example, women get told that their sole calling in life is to be wives, mothers, and homemakers, and then that gets used to “prove” that women can’t be church leaders because they’d be neglecting their families and homes. (Meanwhile, we single and childless women just scratch our heads…) And it’s Scripture that “proves” all these things, because since women are told to be “keepers at home” (actually, it’s rulers –”despots — of the home) and the older women are told to teach the younger women to care for their families, and young widows are told they should marry, well, there it is. That’s all they CAN do, right? (Unless they make tents as Priscilla did, or have a lucrative trade in expensive textiles as Lydia did, or follow Jesus around and support him financially as a number of women did, or get sent to Rome as an emissary as Phoebe was, etc.)
That’s not to say that there’s ANYTHING the matter with marrying, bearing children, and being primarily responsible for the family’s home. But using the Bible to say those are a woman’s only legitimate callings is terribly wrong. And I don’t think I have to give examples of people, men AND women, who are doing exactly that (and making serious money off it, to boot.)
Anyway, that’s one example of how I see the pink hermeneutic being used to tell godly women they’re not allowed to obey God’s calling. I suspect that there are a lot of young women today who will find that God doesn’t stop calling them and, when they shut off the pink-hermeneutic noise enough to really listen, they’ll have a life-changing decision to make. Probably not most women; most men AND women aren’t called by God to radically buck the ecclesiastical tide they happen to be swimming in at the moment. But some are. Plenty of men shove the calling aside for a season or two, as well. But God is nothing if not persistent; I have found that “no” is generally not accepted as the “final answer.”
Posted by Leigh Ann on January 17, 2008 at 5:52 pm
“Can you imagine how different things might be if we used the “pink” hermaneutic for men? Since there are no male youth pastors, directors of worship, or music ministers mentioned in the Bible, men would be prohibited from serving in that way. I think it’s time we did away with the double standard. Let’s at least be consistent in our hermaneutics.”
This is off topic, but those have a strict view of the regulative principle would say that there should not be youth pastors, directors of worship or music ministers that we see today (because there were some involved in music worship in the temple)–this would be my view. So be encouraged that there are those out there that apply this “hermaneutic” to both sexes. No one is being left out
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Posted by Atlantic on January 18, 2008 at 11:04 am
Psalmist, I think you’re conflating different types of teaching and students.
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“Rabbis/teachers gathered disciples”
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Usually, the students chose them. This is one place where Our Lord differed from the traditions of the time – as He did in many ways. Parallels with Jewish tradition can be illuminating and even valuable as supporting evidence, but it’s dangerous to rely on them too much.
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“in order to train them to be teachers themselves.”
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Certainly this was a major part of their calling, but it is extremely likely that most rabbis had many students at many levels of ‘intensity’. Remember, Jewish men all have the obligation to study Torah, and studying alone simply wasn’t an option.
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“They were to learn in submission; ‘a student is not greater than his teacher.’ They were to be still (quiet, silent) and receive instruction at their rabbi’s feet.”
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They were not to be still, quiet or silent as a general rule. Students were encouraged to ask question and even debate (respectfully!) with their rabbi. Students were often paired for verbal debates. Furthermore, Torah study is traditionally done out loud; there are cautionary traditional tales of students who forget everything because they have studied silently.
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Assuming that we are interpreting that “learn” here refers to any typical range of learning by a Torah student (which I don’t believe, incidentally), the admonition to learning in silence would then be utterly at odds to normative methods of Torah study.
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This is what Mary of Bethany was doing. You didn’t presume to sit at a rabbi’s feet if he had not accepted you as his disciple.
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It was the custom for hosts to sit the feet of a rabbi-guest as well, without being disciples.
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“An entire house church would have received regular exposition of the Scriptures, and if the next few generations’ records are any indication of the first two generations’ practices, all new believers would have received a period of instruction in the faith before being allowed full participation in the community.”
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And still do, I should hope!
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“I think it is likely that it’s either this initial intensive indoctrination, or else a separate more advanced course of instruction upon recognition of gifts for teaching, that Paul was speaking of.”
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And presumably the initial intensive indoctrination received by all, both women and men, was not with the intent of making every one of them a formal teacher.
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The gathered community would not have been so formally structured, given the variety of activities that are recorded as happening (not dedicated to teaching alone, as Paul describes).
They can have a nice long discussion of Genesis and Proverb 31 together.
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Interestingly, the way that the Catholic Church interprets this passage means that the most common occurrence of males-only teaching is precisely to the gathered community.
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I should reiterate here, I think, that while I’m all in favour of traditional sex-roles being more widely-accepted in society, I think the hyper-patriarchalists are going way, way overboard.
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Personally, I wonder what would happen if we put together in one room a Christian hyper-patriarchalist who believes in women only ever being called to be “keepers at home”, with the sort of Jewish ultra-Orthodox who believes in sending women to work in the world to be the main support of their (large) family while he sits and learns.
Posted by molleth on January 18, 2008 at 12:17 pm
Atlantic, that last paragraph is HILARIOUS!!!
Posted by Psalmist on January 18, 2008 at 12:39 pm
Atlantic, it’s POSSIBLE I’m conflating different thing. However, I believe it’s very probable that I’m correct about this.
First of all, yes, many times it was the students made the overture to rabbis, but rabbis always ultimately determined who was allowed to learn from them and who was rejected.
I will concede that there were various “levels” of learning and ability. However, no Jew was at the time of Christ was required to study with an itinerant rabbi. Most rabbis were associated with the teaching of a local synagogue and most disciples (learners from rabbis, if you will) did “the minimum required” with such rabbis. While itinerant rabbis were not uncommon, they were not who taught the average Jew.
I think you need to be pushed a little on your description of an argumentative mode of teaching. That was the Greek norm, not the Jewish. While the disciples may have been encouraged to argue amongst themselves, and rabbis were quite commonly pitted against one another (that’s how we got Talmud, after all), disciples most emphatically did NOT argue against their teachers. When the rabbi taught, the disciples were still. Yes, respectful questions were permitted, which is something very different than the premature teaching or grasping for authority that Paul is forbidding the unnamed woman to do.
As far as learning at the feet of a guest rabbi, yes, that was common. It was extraordinary in the case of Mary of Bethany, however, because as a woman she dared to that formal place of learning and because Jesus defended her for choosing that place. Guest or “regular,” rabbis would normally have followed the custom of preferring not to teach at all, than to have a woman learn Torah. Jesus definitively rejected that norm, and Paul similarly provided a place at the teacher’s feet for the unnamed woman at Ephesus.
I think the historical evidence shows that providing a formal place of learning for the woman of Ephesus, points toward a process separate from/in addition to the initial instruction of new Christians. First of all, there WAS at least one woman already teaching at Ephesus, or else Paul’s corrective wouldn’t have been required in the first place. She would already have received some sort of instruction already, or else she wouldn’t have had the ear of the community. Secondly, there is no evidence that women were being excluded from that initial instruction, so the corrective would for that reason also have been unnecessary.
Current and historical Catholic practice doesn’t bear much resemblance to the scriptural descriptions we have of first-century teaching and church order, so I don’t see a lot of point in relying on it to inform what that first-century church looks like. And another point is, WHICH first-century church? We see very different things described scripturally in Ephesus, Corinth, and Rome, for example. That’s yet another reason why I find it unconvincing to turn Paul’s temporary (”I am not now permitting”) corrective at Ephesus into a universal restrictive against any woman ever teaching men or exercising godly leadership in the church.
Posted by Atlantic on January 18, 2008 at 4:37 pm
“First of all, yes, many times it was the students made the overture to rabbis, but rabbis always ultimately determined who was allowed to learn from them and who was rejected.”
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Yes, of course, but that’s still very different from Jesus going about saying, “Right then, you.”
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“I will concede that there were various “levels” of learning and ability. However, no Jew was at the time of Christ was required to study with an itinerant rabbi. Most rabbis were associated with the teaching of a local synagogue and most disciples (learners from rabbis, if you will) did “the minimum required” with such rabbis. While itinerant rabbis were not uncommon, they were not who taught the average Jew.”
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Again, of course, But why should we assume that the norm for itinerant rabbis applies to the situation at Ephesus? Furthermore, itinerant rabbis would also sometimes teach at local houses of study and synagogues in their travels (as Our Lord did).
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“I think you need to be pushed a little on your description of an argumentative mode of teaching. That was the Greek norm, not the Jewish. While the disciples may have been encouraged to argue amongst themselves, and rabbis were quite commonly pitted against one another (that’s how we got Talmud, after all), disciples most emphatically did NOT argue against their teachers. When the rabbi taught, the disciples were still. Yes, respectful questions were permitted,”
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Perhaps ‘debate’ is too strong a word, certainly if you take it to mean Greek-style dialectic. However, respectful questions, including those that queried apparent inconsistencies in the rabbi’s views or behaviour, were not only permitted, they were strongly encouraged.
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That still makes at least three main methods of Torah-study (questions to the rabbi, debate between Torah-partners, and out-loud reading and recitation) in which silence was not any sort of an option.
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“As far as learning at the feet of a guest rabbi, yes, that was common. It was extraordinary in the case of Mary of Bethany, however, because as a woman she dared to that formal place of learning and because Jesus defended her for choosing that place. Guest or “regular,” rabbis would normally have followed the custom of preferring not to teach at all, than to have a woman learn Torah. Jesus definitively rejected that norm”
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Yes, of course, but probably what we are seeing here is the extension of norms for learning. It doesn’t prove that Mary was being prepared to be a teacher in some formal sense.
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Your original comment on this matter equated “receiving sound teaching” with “being prepared to be a teacher” and cited contemporary Jewish practices as evidence. Aside from the question of how much weight should be given to Jewish practices, I have given several examples of how most Jewish men of the time would be receiving teaching without themselves being prepared to teach (including at a rabbi’s feet or from an itinerant rabbi), which I think solidly disproves your assertion.
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“I think the historical evidence shows that providing a formal place of learning for the woman of Ephesus, points toward a process separate from/in addition to the initial instruction of new Christians. First of all, there WAS at least one woman already teaching at Ephesus, or else Paul’s corrective wouldn’t have been required in the first place. She would already have received some sort of instruction already, or else she wouldn’t have had the ear of the community. Secondly, there is no evidence that women were being excluded from that initial instruction, so the corrective would for that reason also have been unnecessary.”
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As I see it, a particular exchange started over 1 Timothy 11-12, which many see as a statement applying to all women, but which you interpret as pertaining to a particular woman in Ephesus. Jacob challenged this, saying that it could be read either way. To support your view, you took the position that the context must be considered, and cited your view of this context, “You don’t set up precedent for unlearned women to receive sound teaching, only to forbid them to use that teaching except (possibly) to teach other women.”
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That is precisely the statement I questioned when I joined the conversation in this post, and our entire discussion is subsequent to that point.
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Now, in support for your view of the context – which you brought up to support your interpretation of 1 Timothy 11-12 – you are asking me to accept your interpretation of 1 Timothy 11-12 as a given. It’s circular reasoning, and I cannot accept it.
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And incidentally, where silence is concerned, I can speculate on one reason why Paul might be applying a corrective of a different sort. Jewish women today, when they do attend a synagogue, are not still under the same duty a man has to pray and to learn. They may pray and listen, but they also habitually talk and socialize amongst themselves. I’ve always wondered if the same was true then, and perhaps Paul was simply trying to make sure they were paying attention, or at least trying to get some quiet.
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“Current and historical Catholic practice doesn’t bear much resemblance to the scriptural descriptions we have of first-century teaching and church order”
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Neither does a mustard seed much resemble a tree.
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“so I don’t see a lot of point in relying on it to inform what that first-century church looks like.”
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In this case, I wasn’t bringing it up as evidence. I just thought it was interesting.
Posted by Psalmist on January 18, 2008 at 9:16 pm
Atlantic, remember that Jesus said, “Follow me.”
I see a very distinct precedent being laid in 1 Tim. 2 for a woman (at least one) to receive formal teaching solidly in the Jewish tradition, in which when the teacher is teaching, the disciple is still (quiet, respectful, submissive–NOT necessarily not-a-sound silent). You seem not to recognize that precedent there. So be it.
You also seem not to accept that when a properly taught woman has been given the gift of teaching, there is ample scriptural precedent for that person, given soundness of character and maturity, to teach in the community of believers at the call of the Holy Spirit. Again, so be it.
I won’t trouble you further about this, since neither of us is Paul, Timothy, the unnamed woman of Ephesus, or a member of the Ephesian community, which pretty obviously had need of qualified teachers. For now, I take comfort that God always provides for each community those gifted teachers and leaders that they need, provided the community does not refuse to consider them simply because they’re women–or men.