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Women In Ministry - Part 2
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Answer From Scripture - 2
Before we move on the 1 Timothy I would like to go back to 1 Corinthians for a minute. Specifically I would like to look at 1 Corinthians 11:3 "But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of a woman, and God is the head of Christ." (NASB95) This verse would seem to say that men are the head over women just because of their gender. But that interpretation is blatantly untrue. I am the head of my wife because I am her husband. But you are not her head. Neither am I the head of your wife. This verse only makes sense
if you translate it as referring to husbands and wives. In fact I found that 4 English translations translated the passage that way, the Disciples Literal New Testament, the English Standard Version, the original Revised Standard Version and Young's Literal Translation. The interpretation of verse 3 to apply to all men being over all women has been responsible for much injustice and inequality.
But now let's move on to 1 Timothy 2:11-12 "A woman must quietly receive instruction with entire submissiveness. But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet." (NASB95) Here again we are faced with the issue of whether this is talking to all women or to wives. I would argue that the words used in Greek are referring to husbands and wives. But others would differ with that interpretation. So is there any other evidence in scripture that may help us here?
(Before we go on I would like to draw your attention to the fact that this passage starts with the wish that all men would pray in every place. The point being that here we are not talking about a church meeting but a life style. That becomes important later on in our discussion.)
Now let us look at Acts 18:26 "And he began to speak out boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately." Here we have a case where people who had been traveling with Paul found a man, Apollos, teaching about Jesus but somehow not speaking the whole message. So Priscilla and Aquila took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. Notice here that a woman was part of explaining things to a man. Also notice that the woman's name occurs before her husbands. Outside of once in Luke where Mary is mentioned before Joseph, I know of no other place where a wife's name is given before her husband's.
Now either Priscilla, with her husband's approval, was going against Paul's teaching or the the word woman in 1 Timothy 2:12 is best translated "wife" and man is best translated "husband." I think that in light of all the evidence it is clear that 1 Timothy 2:11-12 is not talking about all women and all men but about husbands and wives.
Now I have heard the response that 1 Timothy is talking about women in a church setting while the passage about Priscilla and Aquila refers to a private meeting with Apollos which would allow Priscilla to function as she did. I believe that reading both passages you will find that neither passage has the context of being just in a church meeting.
Tradition aside, the Bible clearly teaches that a wife is in submission to her husband and is to listen to him. But it does not say that a woman is in submission to every man and must listen to all of them, no matter what foolishness they spout, without seeking to correct their errors. Either Priscilla was in error when she corrected Apollos or our understanding of the role of men and women in the church is in error.
Scripturally, I believe I can say that the verses that have been used for so long to prevent women from ministering in the roles of pastors and deacons and teachers are verses that, translated properly, address issues between husbands and wives and not men in general or women in general.
MEET JIM
Hello and welcome to my blog. I am writing here about the things that concern me, and, though most of my topics will be about Jesus and the Christian life, I do not write as a theologian or an expert but as one who bumbles and stumbles through life the best he can with probably more failures than successes. I hope you at least enjoy what you read.
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Answer From Scripture - 1
For the purposes of this blog I am using the word "ministry" to include all the ministries of the Christian Church, including the ministries of pastor, deacon and any other position coming from the gifting of the Holy Spirit, It is, of course, obvious that women are already involved in many of the ministries of the church, such as child care, teaching children, being secretaries and other functions depending on the denomination. And for most mainline denominations this question has already been answered by the inclusion of women in positions of denominational leadership. But, for many conservative, evangelical denominations and groups, women are still excluded from any position that involves ordination or leadership.
I will deal with this matter in five sections: the answer from scripture (2 parts), the answer of what the early church practiced, as recorded in the Bible, the answer of what the early church fathers wrote, the answer of archeology and what I am calling the answer from slavery. In this first part we will deal with the first part of the answer of scripture.
The Answer Of Scripture -- Part One
For serious biblical Christians, all of our decisions about faith and practice, including the issue of women in ministry, come from the scriptures. And I think I can fairly say that the biggest impediment to women being included in the full ministry of the church has been the historical interpretation of the scriptures of the New Testament, especially the passages found in 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 (which I will deal with here) and 1 Timothy 2:11-14 (which I will deal with in the next blog).
Read in almost any modern English translation, those verses seem to answer the question in the negative, once and for all and to leave no wiggle room for doubt. They appear to be so clear that my denomination, based on these verses, has removed churches from our fellowship, including the largest church in the denomination, for ordaining women.
But on a subject of this magnitude we need to look at the entirety of the New Testament, not just a couple of small portions, and we need to be sure that the passages we do use are correctly translated. It is my belief that neither one of these things has happened in the discussion of this subject.
(This discussion is going to be long. I am sorry but I do not wish to just glance over this matter. So please have patience and perseverance. If you get bored just push on through.)
Some facts to consider:
First it obvious from the New Testament that our view of marriage is not the same as the modern day understanding of that state. The New Testament clearly sees men as having headship over their wives in marriage. This may be very unpalatable to our modern way of doing things but that is the Biblical view.
Second you should know that there is no word for "wife" in the Greek of the New Testament. There is only the word "gune" which means either woman or wife depending on the context. There are two words for man used in the New Testament, "anthropos" which means men in general and "aner" which can mean man or husband. For example in
I Corinthians 7:2 "But because of immoralities, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman is to have her own husband." In this passage the same word "aner" is translated "man" and "husband." The one word "gune" is translated "woman" and "wife."
Third since one of the main passages used to prevent women from leadership and ministry is found in 1 Corinthians, let us take a look at what that book has to say about women. Look at 1 Corinthians 11:5. In his discussion of head covering, Paul plainly states that the women will will be praying and prophesying. Now look at 1 Corinthians 14:23-25 23 Therefore if the whole church assembles together and all speak in tongues, and ungifted men or unbelievers enter, will they not say that you are mad? 24 But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an ungifted man enters, he is convicted by all, he is called to account by all; 25 the secrets of his heart are disclosed; and so he will fall on his face and worship God, declaring that God is certainly among you.
Notice the parts I have underlined. This passage talks about the "whole church" and that "all" may speak in tongues and/or prophesy. I can see no way that women are excluded from this activity.
Next look at 1 Corinthians 14:31, "For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all may be exhorted." Now I admit that this can be possibly construed to mean only male prophets. But the word "all" is used 3 times in this passage. If the first use of this word refers only to men, then the next two uses of the word would refer to the same group. That would mean that the men are prophesying to only the men and thus the women and the children might as well have stayed home. No, all can prophesy, all can learn and all can be exhorted, men and women.
Fourth we go to the problem passage. Look at verses 34-35 in chapter 14 and you will find one of the disqualifying passages that have been used to prevent women from ministering in the church. I Corinthians 14:34-35 "34The women are to keep silent in the churches; for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the Law also says. 35 If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is improper for a woman to speak in church."
To me this brings up two questions. First, how does this passage, which does violence to the rest of the book of 1 Corinthians, fit with the other passages we have looked at in that book that plainly state that women can pray and prophesy even in the church meetings? Second, what about the single women and widows who have no husband to go and ask that they may learn? What do they do?
To find the answer to all of this we should start with 14:33, "for God is not a God of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints." At the end of his discussion about prophesy, Paul brings up the issue of order in the church. Then he makes his statement about women keeping silent. But if you translate verse 34 as "The wives are to keep silent in
the churches," which is a legitimate translation, it becomes obvious from verse 35 that the command is directed to wives, and in light of the entirety of 1 Corinthians as well as the previous verse could it be that Paul's order was aimed at wives causing a disturbance by questioning issues and even their own husbands in front of the church? (That would be a problem today and even more so in the time when this letter was written.) So if Paul is talking to wives then why not translate it that way?
It is my contention that Paul's statement in verse 34 was aimed at wives who had questions about some issue and that to prevent confusion in the meetings of the church he commanded them by silent and ask their questions of their husbands at home. Again I am not sure where this leaves the unmarried and the widows but I think their questions would have much less tendency to cause confusion in the church.
Finally I would like to observe that most churches, even in my denomination, do not observe the command of 1 Corinthians 14:34 in the same way that they interpret it. I no of no churches, except for some Mennonite and Amish groups where all women are silent all of the time in the church meetings. Women sing in choirs, sing specials, lead children's choirs where they must speak, make announcements, give testimonies, and a myriad of other things that require them to do more than keep silent. In fact, when my denomination decided to make a fresh translation of the Bible, women were included among the scholars. The first several chapters of the book of Psalms were translated almost entirely by a woman, yet that woman could not pastor or be a deacon in any of our churches. I think the current state of affairs has more to do with power and ego that the will of the Holy Spirit.
That is what I take away from 1 Corinthians. Next we will look at 1Timothy.