Dan, I have to say that I was more than a little gobsmacked with some of your comments such as:
women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking and therefore fitness to preach and teach the whole counsel of God.
(!!!!!) but I guess I can’t really say complementarians should own up to such a reading and then be surprised when they do.
I really don’t understand how v13 & v14 get boiled down to being just about the pattern of headship or authority, as per Phil’s argument:
The issue in the woman’s being deceived and Adam’s knowing acqiuescence in sin is about abusing God’s created pattern, a pattern reinstated in Christ, rather than v.14 being about the comparative deceivability of men and women since the Fall.
That seems to be the exact opposite of what v14 says - Paul directly contrasts the deceivability of Adam and Eve in the context of the fitness to teach. I don’t know how you can read “And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner” and read it (in the complementarian sense) as about anything other than the “comparative deceivability of men and women since the Fall”.
I understand you can read v13 as being about the created order and how that reflects on patterns of authority, but I don’t understand how you can use v13 to say v14 doesn’t mean exactly what it says. If anything, the meaning of v14 in the complementarian sense frames v13 in a more first-century mind set.
I find it ironic that, when it comes to 1 Tim 2, the complementarian position seems to want to claim to be on the one hand the most ‘biblical’, and on the other still culturally acceptable by gutting v14 of it’s meaning, and so becomes neither.
As an Anglican in England myself, I’d be interested to learn what folks think is the true cause of why the women priests over here are so much more liberal than the men (which in itself is saying quite something!).
Hi Dan,
I would humbly suggest that to become a woman priest requires certain mental gymnastics in both biblical interpretation and philosophy, as well as a certain level of determination to proceed no matter what. The less authoritative the bible is to you, the easier you find it to justify your passage to the priesthood (as a woman, anyway).
Women from more evangelical circles (or at least circles where the bible is treated more seriously than as an interesting historical artifact) are probably more hesitant because having someone accuse you of being sinful is a rather good way to stop you in your tracks. I think the more seriously one takes the authority of the bible, the more likely it is that 1 Timothy 2:12 will be a real barrier to a woman seeking to serve in ministry in such a position of authority. There aren’t as many direct prohibitions on men seeking a position of authority. While a man may choose to selectively edit the requirements list in 1 Timothy 3 or Titus 1, there are no verses in the bible that wipe out a man’s ability to become a presbyter based on his gender alone - particularly not one that appeals to the order of creation in so doing!
women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking and therefore fitness to preach and teach the whole counsel of God.
women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking and therefore fitness to preach and teach the whole counsel of God.
?
No, I don’t. =)
I don’t think it’s feasible to argue the case based on generalisations about gender. If that were the case, we could generalise back with “Well, men are more likely to beat their wives, so make very bad pastoral carers - so there!” (Yes, it’s a ridiculous generalisation, but you get the point)
I certainly agree that there are differences between the genders, which should not be steamrolled over. But for me the key issue is what the bible says. I read the bible with Jeremiah 17:9 firmly in mind: the heart can be deceitful (especially when interpreting scripture), and all too easily I can read into the bible what I want to see, rather than what it actually says. I have yet to see a fully convincing argument for why 1 Tim 2:12 is completely cultural, or a good complementarian explanation of verse 15, either - and I have studied much on the topic (I have a vested interest, you see, being female - though tongue-in-cheek I can safely say I am right now, having had 2 kids)!
The issue I see with verse 13 and 14 is not that “Adam got here first, so he goes first”, but that God’s prohibition on eating the fruit of the tree was given to Adam before Eve was created. Therefore he had a God-given responsibility to ensure that it was kept. Eve ate the fruit while Adam was with her, so he completely abnegated his responsibility. Yes, Eve was deceived, but I don’t think that verse 14 is therefore a statement on the tendency of women as a gender to be deceived more than men. As in several places in Paul’s letters, his brief reference to the OT passage is an invitation for us to look at the context of the whole passage (cf 1 Cor 10:7). God chose to give Adam the responsibility. Adam stepped back from his responsibility. Eve took responsibility that was not hers. Chaos ensued.
1 Timothy 2:12 uses the word authentein for authority - the only place in the NT where this is used. From my (inexpert) readings (and therefore I am happy to stand corrected), it seems that this has a sense of “usurping, grasping” authority. It has a slightly different sense to the regular use of exousia in other passages. To see it as a usurping of authority fits with the following reference to Eve. She usurped Adam’s authority and became a sinner by eating the fruit. Adam became a sinner because he sat back and did nothing, and then blamed his wife when everything went south. Now there’s an opportunity for a gender generalisation if ever I saw one… ;)
Sorry, sarcasm will get me into trouble, i know it…
women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking and therefore fitness to preach and teach the whole counsel of God.
?
Just to add to Kristen’s response, the problem with the view that Dan expressed, whether it is true or not (and there will be plenty of people with a lot to say about that!) is that it’s not what the text says. The text says that “Eve was deceived, not Adam”; it does not say, “in the same way women are more prone to be deceived than men”.
Kristen and others have already explained the significance of the deception which Eve fell into; it is the context of BOTH Genesis 3 and 1 Timothy 2 (and not just v13) which then guides us in our understanding. 1 Timothy 2:15 actually supports Kristen’s reasoning, in that it has to do with women fulfilling their God-given responsibilities (using the Greek device of synecdoche, which I’ve explained elsewhere).
Well, that’s good :) But do you accept that our attitudes toward women in western, 21st c society have, rightly, come along way from the 1st century Middle East?
But for me the key issue is what the bible says.
Sure, I think that’s the key issue for everyone here. I’m arguing the complementarian view is a weak reading of the passage, gutting it of it’s apparent meaning to conform more (though obviously not entirely) to 21st century standards.
The issue I see with verse 13 and 14 is not that “Adam got here first, so he goes first”, but that God’s prohibition on eating the fruit of the tree was given to Adam before Eve was created. Therefore he had a God-given responsibility to ensure that it was kept. Eve ate the fruit while Adam was with her, so he completely abnegated his responsibility. Yes, Eve was deceived, but I don’t think that verse 14 is therefore a statement on the tendency of women as a gender to be deceived more than men. As in several places in Paul’s letters, his brief reference to the OT passage is an invitation for us to look at the context of the whole passage (cf 1 Cor 10:7). God chose to give Adam the responsibility. Adam stepped back from his responsibility. Eve took responsibility that was not hers. Chaos ensued.
Thanks for the explanation, I can see where you’re coming from, but to me if Paul is saying the men should set up in their responsibility to teach and shouldn’t have authority over men, then the allusion to 1 Gen 3 reinforces the reading that v14 is about women being deceived, that is men should take the reigns so to speak, because when Adam didn’t the (implicitly) weaker woman was deceived. That is to say the reason given for asserting authority in men over women is that the woman - not Adam - was deceived, so don’t let the pattern repeat here. I’m really perplexed as to how this gets left out of the complementarian reading, it really is quite baffling :)
The reason I think it does get left out is our desire to impose a modern, mostly egalitarian world-view on the text, as though Paul was a man of the 21st century, not of the first. The complementarian reading seems to say ‘Both men and women did the wrong thing by abandoning their roles as per the created order, and chaos ensued’ (as per above). The blame therefore is equally spread around, and both genders are equally at fault. That’s very modern. But that’s only half the story - chaos ensues because the woman - not Adam - was deceived, and that’s the point Paul makes! The deception is highly relevant and perhaps the pressing concern in Ephesus given the false teaching around, it can’t just be explained away to make the passage more palatable to our modern views.
1 Timothy 2:12 uses the word authentein for authority - the only place in the NT where this is used. From my (inexpert) readings (and therefore I am happy to stand corrected), it seems that this has a sense of “usurping, grasping” authority. It has a slightly different sense to the regular use of exousia in other passages. To see it as a usurping of authority fits with the following reference to Eve. She usurped Adam’s authority and became a sinner by eating the fruit. Adam became a sinner because he sat back and did nothing, and then blamed his wife when everything went south. Now there’s an opportunity for a gender generalisation if ever I saw one… ;)
Hehe.. yes, but that’s not the argument Paul makes, he’s not saying ‘Adam and Eve both did the wrong thing and became sinners’ in an equal opportunity for sin kind of way, that’s a modern, egalitarian idea. Paul says “Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.”
It seems really ironic to me that the claimed basis of the complementarian argument is on ‘it what the bible says’ when it appears (to me at least) that it leaves so much of the meaning out of the passage.
I’d rather read it for what it says and realise we (regardless of whether you take a complementarian or egalitarian view of the passage) have progressed in our understanding of women, and acknowledge that again, on both sides, we (rightly) expect far more from women today here in Sydney than for them to - unlike men - “learn in quietness and full submission” and that they “must be silent”.
The modern complementarian view has whittled this passage down to only a pale shadow of it’s original 1st c meaning, as far as I can tell. Points for hanging on to tradition I guess, but we can’t explain away what Paul says and call it good bible reading. There are of course numerous problems beyond the reading of v14 - the inconsistency with how women are (rightly) treated in roles of authority and teaching in modern society, as mentioned earlier in the thread, the inconsistency of the literal take on v14 and the vague take on surrounding passages, and the negligence of context, time and place in reading the passage in general.
Alternative views which are more biblically accurate, more intellectually honest and more consistent with how *all of us* (I hope) think about, relate to and treat women in society today are possible and desirable for all those reasons imo. They should be explored if for no other reason than their biblical accuracy, again imo.
Finally, just on Bob’s comment:
Bob Cameron - 19 July 2008 08:25 PM
Just to add to Kristen’s response, the problem with the view that Dan expressed, whether it is true or not (and there will be plenty of people with a lot to say about that!)
Um.. do you really believe that’s an open question - as to whether (to quote Dan) “women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking”? Goodness.
is that it’s not what the text says. The text says that “Eve was deceived, not Adam”; it does not say, “in the same way women are more prone to be deceived than men”.
As I argued above, to me, that’s exactly what the text says, for reasons given above.
Luke this is starting to feel like an unending rally in a tennis match.
Egalitarians and complementarians agree there are alternate readings of 1 Tim 2.11-15.
The latter discern a pattern of relations between men and women in that text and elsewhere in scripture which precludes women being in authority over men in God’s household, based on creation and / or Christology.
The former don’t.
Granted we don’t appear to be able to persuade one another on this thread, can I ask a different question?
If you cannot agree with what you see as Paul’s view - that women are comparatively more deceivable than men from the fall onwards - can you agree that his command should still be adhered to today? That is, that due to their differences, women are precluded from teaching / having authority over men?
The reason I ask is that I can’t see where your argument is going. If hypothetically I agree that the text says women are more deceivable than men today, as you believe, I’d still defer to the command. Would you?
Phil
Thanks for providing, early on in this thread, excellent summaries of some of Ward Powers’ main arguments in his book on women in the church.
Yes Paul sounds like he was deceived (because he was) ... but the issue in 1 Timothy 2.14 is that Adam was not deceived, whereas the woman was.
It’s this distinction which is cited as part of Paul’s reasoning in not permitting a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man.
Paul said he fell into transgression because he was deceived. He said Eve fell into transgression because she was deceived. Adam was not deceived. He willingly and wilfully sinned. I don’t think the point of this verse is about who was deceived and who wasn’t. It’s about the fact that sin is sin. Having sinned through being deceived doesn’t make you any better (or worse) than someone who sins through wilful disobedience.
Contrary to many people I don’t see 1 Timothy as being all about church order. The letter starts off with an instruction to Timothy that he charge “some” to stop teaching false doctrine and stop giving credence to fables etc. which only cause disputes. It finishes with a similar injunction; Timothy is to avoid the profane and idle babblings of what is falsely called knowedge (gnosis).
Of course parts of the letter are about how to choose overseers (a position it appears that “anyone” may desire) and deacons, what to do about widows and how to respond to people who are straying - perhaps by being involved in false teaching. But it is completely reasonable to view these and other instructions in the letter as aimed at correcting circumstances that led to false teaching becoming a problem at Ephesus and at dealing, as Christ would, with the people involved in it. That the advice about choosing overseers etc. is useful for churches everywhere does not necessarily mean that all parts of the letter are relevant to all churches everywhere and at every time.
I was going to try and labour over writing something reasonably accurate about the role proto-gnosticism and the worship of Artermis might have played in creating the situation that 1 Timothy addresses but this site that I discovered a couple of days ago provides a better presentation of those issues than I can.
The repeated emphasis on male “authority” by those who assume that 1 Timothy 2:12-15 is about church order, rather than being a correction of a particular kind of false teaching, needs to be looked at in the light of what Jesus said about how those among His followers who desire to be leaders should behave.
Jesus called them to Himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.
43 “Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. (Mark 10:42-43 )
When this thread started I would probably have called myself a complementarian with one or two niggling doubts. When we married I even promised, though it was optional, to obey my husband. But quite frankly, having read the sort of legalistic, oppressive, tortuous, claptrap that complementarians can come out with, I’ve come to think that they, particularly the most extreme of them, need to conduct a thorough check of their eyes for logs and their hearts for deceit.
I’ve enjoyed the interaction on the thread so far, and on it Jason H actually persuaded me that Powers’ limitation of 1 Tim 2.11-15 to refer exclusively to husbands and wives did not stand upon closer scrutiny.
There are extremes on both sides of the debate, but neither side benefits if those extreme (or just poorly expressed?) views become the basis for rejection of the opposing view as a whole. Neither side has a monopoly on tortuous claptrap!
I had a look at the site you linked to in your previous post. Referring to reconstructions of the historical context is useful as part of exegesis, but I think it’s better first to circle out from the text to other relevant texts (e.g. the rest of Timothy, 1 Cor 11 & 14, Eph 5, 1 Peter 3, Gen 1-3 etc) to see how scripture interprets scripture. Only later should historical reconstructions come into play, and then only if necessary.
For my own part I’m not persuaded that there are enough indications within 1 Timothy of errant females teaching heresy in the first place to warrant the move to that link’s elaborate reconstruction. I can expand on this more if you like.
My concern with the link you supplied is that the writer seemed happy to rely on Witherington when it suited, but to ignore his scholarship when it didn’t suit the reconstruction. This seemed not arbitrary but agenda-driven. I’d steer away from making this kind of reconstruction a decisive factor for interpretation of scripture.
I don’t follow what you mean in this para:
Paul said he fell into transgression because he was deceived. He said Eve fell into transgression because she was deceived. Adam was not deceived. He willingly and wilfully sinned. I don’t think the point of this verse is about who was deceived and who wasn’t. It’s about the fact that sin is sin. Having sinned through being deceived doesn’t make you any better (or worse) than someone who sins through wilful disobedience.
If the distinction between the woman being deceived and Adam not being deceived is just about sin being sin, why does Paul refer to it when discussing men and women and teaching and authority?
Just to add to Kristen’s response, the problem with the view that Dan expressed, whether it is true or not (and there will be plenty of people with a lot to say about that!)
Um.. do you really believe that’s an open question - as to whether (to quote Dan) “women as a class are inherently more spiritually suggestible, and therefore corruptible, in their thinking”? Goodness.
is that it’s not what the text says. The text says that “Eve was deceived, not Adam”; it does not say, “in the same way women are more prone to be deceived than men”.
As I argued above, to me, that’s exactly what the text says, for reasons given above.
Luke
1) My use of a conditional sentence (i.e., “whether it’s true or not") doesn’t say anything as to the likelihood of the principal statement being true (or about my own views on the matter). But is it an open question? Well, Dan isn’t the only person I’ve heard argue that way, or similarly, so I guess it is, whether you like it or not!
2) It seems to me that the reason you understand the text as saying that women are inherently more likely to be deceived than men is because you either don’t understand the concept of Adam and Eve’s federal headship, or you reject it. Could you fill us in on your thoughts in this regard?
G’day all, I’ve been away a week (on conference) and am interested to see how this thread keeps moving. Let me add a bit of a reply to Janice in particular:
Janice said:
I was going to try and labour over writing something reasonably accurate about the role proto-gnosticism and the worship of Artermis might have played in creating the situation that 1 Timothy addresses but this site that I discovered a couple of days ago provides a better presentation of those issues than I can.
I had a look at the site you mention and some of the things mentioned there. (It makes a number of similar arguments to the article referred to by Chris Albany.)
I note that both the web page and the article put a lot of weight on the argument by Catherine & Richard Kroeger in I Suffer Not A Woman (Baker, 1992). This is not surprising given that it is a major peice of work making a number of significant claims about religion in Ephesus in the first century. They essentially paint Ephesus as an exotically feminist social-religious culture. They are therefore able to argue that
Such a pagan element, based on sex hostility and reversal of gender roles, may well have found a place in the cult practice among the dissidents in the congregation at Ephesus . . . If this is the case, the condemnation (i.e., 1 Tim 2:12) is not directed against women participating in leadership but rather against a monopoly on religious power by women.” (p. 93)
Hence, they argue, Paul’s prohibition is only against Ephesian women, since they were infected by an anomalous cultural outlook.
The biggest problem with this argument is that their premise about the ‘exotic feminist culture’ in Ephesus has now been disproved. Perhaps the strongest rebuff is the article by S.M. Baugh, “A Foreign World: Ephesus in the First Century” in Women in the Church, edited by Kostenberger, Schreiner & Baldwin (Baker, 1995). This seems to be accepted by Philip Towner in his recent NICNT commentary The Letters to Timothy and Titus (Eerdmans, 2006), who says:
S.M. Baugh has recently debunked one of the more popular scenarios that posited a uniquely Ephesian feminist movement, grounded in a feminist principle, surrounding the Ephesian Artemis cult.” (p. 195).
The web page you referred to makes mention of this debunking, yet continues to use the argument??
The reason I labour this point is that the argument is used almost indiscriminately by ‘egalitarians’ to clinch their claim for the localised application of the passage (for example in the article by Kenneth Bailey cited by Chris Albany). To continue to base one’s understanding of the passage on an argument that has been ‘debunked’ seems to me to be building on sand!?!
I haven’t read Baugh though I have read about his work. As I understand it what he’s debunked is something the Kroegers didn’t assert.
This author wrote a review of a review by Baugh of the Kroegers’ book.
[Baugh] cites a quote to characterize their position, saying “that the Ephesian women were radical feminists and trying to dominate men.” I didn’t remember this emphasis in Kroeger and Kroeger, and then checked the citation, and found it’s from a different book and author. Then he answers this position, saying “Up to this point, no one has established historically that there was, in fact, a feminist culture in first century Ephesus.” But ... [t]hey only claimed that it extolled fertility and motherhood, like many other patriarchal cultures. Therefore, all his lengthy following argument appears to be aimed, not at Kroeger and Kroeger, but at the straw man he has created. The overall effect was to make me very suspicious.
In a similar vein, he argues against what he says is Kroeger and Kroeger’s attempt to substantiate “matriarchy” at ancient Ephesus.” But again, ... [t]hey said the maternal was extolled in fertility/earth-mother cults, not that Ephesus was actually a matriarchy! Obviously, the city government was a typical patriarchal, all-male government. By thus falsely characterizing an opponent’s argument, the author loses credibility. He even cites a passage in Kroeger and Kroeger that says Ephesus was not a matriarchy, so what’s the point? He goes on for paragraphs showing that Ephesus was run by men, all to no purpose. I was amazed that he implied the Kroegers may have actually thought this great ancient city government was run by women. Such a conclusion would require incredible ignorance, and I never believed they were making any such outrageous claim.
Secondly, [Baugh] seems to omit information in order to create a false impression. For instance, he goes to considerable effort to show that the cult of Artemis was not a fertility-related cult because Artemis was a virgin and goddess of the hunt. But I have read in a number of sources that Artemis was also considered goddess of motherhood. Even Baugh admits in his related book that she was the “helper in childbirth.” He claims there is “deafening silence regarding her connection to fertility, but then cites an epigraph from the period saying she is “the midwife of birth and the grower of mortals,” and “the giver of fruit.” (!) In a word, Baugh seems to stand alone in his judgment here.
His best criticism was probably on the grammar of 1 Tim. 2:12. ... Although this part of their argument is not crucial to their thesis ...
Even as Baugh warns his readers that Mrs. Kroeger is leader of an “evangelical feminist organization,” we should also consider that many fundamentalist men and “true reformed” thinkers have a strong bias against female leadership in general, as my observations above suggest. Another author in Women in the Church argues without embarrassment that women are simply more easily deceived than are men, and are weaker than men, which explains why they should not be in leadership. ... The issue of gender roles remains a particularly emotional issue for many men, as well as women. I think the extremes on both sides are highly suspicious in the way they argue their cases.
This author reviewed Baugh’s chapter in the book edited by Kostenberger.
Baugh does argue convincingly that Ephesus was not a bastion of women’s rights at this time. But he nowhere even considers, much less refutes, the idea that a small group of philosophers (like Gnostics) might have been teaching the equality of women, contrary to the rest of society. And he himself goes too far in suggesting in several places that there was no rise in the social status of women during the Imperial period. For example, he notes that women had better legal status during that time, but refuses to correlate legal and social status. That is an obvious blunder, since legal status is simply an aspect of social status. Baugh likewise downplays the importance of the leadership of women in religion. But religious status, too, is an aspect of social status, especially before the Enlightenment privatization of religion. In traditional societies, religion and society were much more unified. Baugh seems to read back an American separation between church and state into the first century (42-45). ... But the worst example is Baugh’s suggestion that women were not really oppressed in Greco-Roman society. He writes, “There is no evidence of Ephesian denigration of women per se” even though in philosophy, literature, and law—in every area of life in the Greco-Roman world—women in general were oppressed and considered inferior. He goes on to object to using the word “confinement” concerning women’s roles in the Roman Empire, since women had authority in domestic affairs. Perhaps, he writes, “They may not have held public office or taught, not because it was forbidden by domineering men, but because they did not care to. They had their own spheres of influence”. Not only does Baugh commit gross anachronism by reading his own Victorian “sphere” theory of gender roles into the first century, he really shows the patriarchal nature of his bias in this passage. However, other than showing the patriarchal prejudice of this book, his chapter does not affect a contingent reading of 1 Timothy 2. Our interpretation does not, and should not, depend upon Ephesus being an ancient center for women’s rights.
Having read those I find it hard to see Baugh’s work refuting Ephesian feminism as particularly relevant to anything much.
I can’t remember exactly what Jason H wrote - only that at the time I read it I didn’t find it hugely convincing. When I find that comment again, and have thought things over again and got my thoughts in order, I will respond to you.
Janice, thanks for those quotes & links, very interesting!
Phil Gale - 21 July 2008 06:53 PM
If you cannot agree with what you see as Paul’s view - that women are comparatively more deceivable than men from the fall onwards - can you agree that his command should still be adhered to today?
I should clarify that the view I was arguing for is not my personal view of 1 Tim 2:14, it’s the view I believe complementarians should hold if they’re going to be consistent with how they read the passage, ie as a universal, timeless command. I tried to qualify it as the ‘complementarian reading’ throughout but apologies if that wasn’t clear.
I’m more sympathetic to Paul’s comment being either allegory and/or time & location specific, so I don’t believe it’s a command for today. What I was trying to point out was that neither, it seems, do most complementarians, as they gut the passage of it’s meaning and don’t take earlier passages as literally either. It seems ironic that appeals to being the most ‘biblical’ seem to be based on both a weak and inconsistent reading of the passage.
That is, that due to their differences, women are precluded from teaching / having authority over men?
Ah, there’s that key word of “difference” again. I’m still not sure what this difference actually is in the complementarian sense - order in creation I understand but it seems to have no tangible, pragmatic aspect relevant to the situation, given v14 appears to mean the opposite of what it actually says in the complementarian reading.
The reason I ask is that I can’t see where your argument is going. If hypothetically I agree that the text says women are more deceivable than men today, as you believe, I’d still defer to the command. Would you?
Phil
My argument was (however feebly) trying to demonstrate the complementarian reading is unsustainable if only because complementarians don’t actually read the text for what it says, in their own paradigm.
As for the hypothetical, well it’s kind of absurd, it’s like asking if hypothetically the bible said the sky was red, but everyone else said it was blue and it certainly looked blue to you, would you believe on principle it was red?
Or, perhaps more realistically, if the bible appears to express, at best, ambivalence towards slavery, then is that the view we should hold? Church history would (thankfully) suggest not…
On women’s roles, I think the ironic thing again in this debate is that, in Western society, both complementarian and egalitarian sides *both* (generally speaking) hold views that are far, far more egalitarian than anything Paul or anyone in the first century would have imagined. Can you imagine putting yourself in Paul’s shoes (or, err, sandals) in the 1st c and, writing timeless prescriptions for gender roles for society two millennia later? And if Paul had this incredible foresight, why didn’t he write likewise on slavery and race relations, for instance? Would have saved us a lot of grief.
--
Bob Cameron - 22 July 2008 03:46 PM
1) My use of a conditional sentence (i.e., “whether it’s true or not") doesn’t say anything as to the likelihood of the principal statement being true (or about my own views on the matter). But is it an open question? Well, Dan isn’t the only person I’ve heard argue that way, or similarly, so I guess it is, whether you like it or not!
Well, with respect, it does indeed lend credence to the possibility of it being true, which reflects on your own position. For instance, I couldn’t say “As to whether black people (or Tasmanians) are inherently less intelligent than whites, it’s very much an open question” without serious questions being raised about my views on such a question, because that question is, for all right thinking people, very much closed!
It’s true that some people may argue that black people (or those pesky Tasmanians) are inherently less intelligent, whether I like it or not. However, I don’t think ignorances makes the question open.
2) It seems to me that the reason you understand the text as saying that women are inherently more likely to be deceived than men is because you either don’t understand the concept of Adam and Eve’s federal headship, or you reject it. Could you fill us in on your thoughts in this regard?
I do understand it, I feel ambivalent toward it, and I think it’s irrelevant to the actual passage, and that it’s a mistake to import the idea from elsewhere and use it to supplant what I see as the fairly clear meaning of Paul’s argument (in the complementarian sense), especially all the while arguing for the most ‘biblical’ reading! They are my thoughts in a nutshell :)
My main objection to importing this theology into 1 Tim 2:13-14 is it’s not historically what some church fathers held (they quite plainly believed women were inferior, and didn’t mince their words about it either!), it makes the passage more palatable to modern sensibilities which certainly didn’t exist in 1st c, it seems like a fairly weak reading of the passage (gutting v14 of meaning), it doesn’t make much sense contextually, and it’s inconsistent with what complementarians claim.
Therefore I believe the modern complementarian view on this passage as expressed in Sydney is neither historically orthodox, nor particularly ‘biblical’, nor consistent with social norms complementarians hold, and instead suits modern, post-feminist sensibilities, all the while still claiming the conservative high ground!
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