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 PrintableVersion Evangelical feminism and biblical truthAn analysis of 118 disputed questionsComplementarians win the debateDISCOVERING BIBLICAL EQUALITY EVANGELICAL FEMINISM AND BIBLICAL TRUTH After what seems like a deluge of books and articles for and against either of the above perspectives on men and women in various forms of Christian ministry from a wide variety of sources, IVP (UK) has in 2005 produced two massive volumes one from each of the two distinct perspectives. The first volume is a multi-authored series of essays entitled Discovering Biblical Equality: Complementarity without hierarchy, edited by Ronald Pierce and Rebecca Groothuis. The second book from the complementarian viewpoint was written by Wayne Grudem, the most prolific author on this subject, Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth: An analysis of 118 disputed questions. The titles of these works convey clearly the intentions of the authors. This is not new territory for IVP (UK), because an earlier 1984 volume, The Role of Women, edited by Shirley Lees, appeared in the ‘When Christians Disagree’ series. On that occasion proponents of differing opinions interacted with each other in the search for common ground and elucidating points of difference. The difference in 2005 is that the two volumes here are completely separate and written entirely independently. IVP (UK) is so designated to distinguish it from IVP (USA) which appears to be an egalitarian publishing house, an approach which hopefully will not be followed by its UK counterpart. Wide rangeThe Pierce and Groothuis volume is a direct response to two earlier complentarian multi-authored works — J. Piper & W. Grudem (eds), Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (1991) and R. Saucy & J. TenElshof (eds.), Women and Men in Ministry; A Complementary Perspective (2001). Although individual authors had offered different insights in particular areas of this debate, these particular works covered a wider range of subjects, not only biblical exegesis and church history, but also insights from biology, psychology, sociology and law, followed by applications and implications for daily living. The pattern followed by Pierce and Groothuis’s work is as follows: three introductory chapters setting the stage, followed by ten chapters of biblical exegesis; a further six looking at different theological issues, followed by five addressing hermeneutical and cultural issues, with a final section of five more papers working out the practical applications of the viewpoints propounded earlier in the book. View of Scripture?It is impossible to comment in detail on all the chapters of this book, but some general points can be made on this work. First of all, the irenic spirit in which the book is written is helpful, especially to readers like this reviewer whose perspective in this debate is very different to the opinions propounded in this volume. Secondly, although some authors such as Gordon Fee, for example, largely repeat information stated in earlier volumes, others such as Kevin Giles and William Webb produce viewpoints less familiar in this debate. Fee, although a fine New Testament scholar, who has made valuable contributions on other issues, is one of the weaker contributors on this topic. The extent to which he departs from an evangelical view of Scripture is evident in his approach to 1 Corinthians 14.34-35, which he dismisses as an interpolation into the text, despite its presence in every New Testament mss. Thankfully, most egalitarian commentators do not adopt this approach with respect to issues of textual criticism. Grudem (pp. 232-247) gives a most convincing account of the challenge of these verses. There is inevitably a variety of emphases from such a long list of contributors. Howard Marshall, in his discussion of the marriage passages of Colossians and Ephesians admits that Paul teaches ‘a love-patriarchalism’ (p.194) — conceding that a straightforward reading of the text would suggest a complementarian viewpoint, but he suggests that the advances made by Paul points forward to a ‘mutual submission’ (egalitarian) position, as in the status of slaves where his teaching contains the seeds of destruction of that institution. Webb takes this principle, which he describes as a ‘Redemptive-Movement Hermeneutic’, and applies it to women, slaves and homosexuals in the light of the debates over Galatians 3.28. This is a very significant contribution, to which Grudem replies in his volume listed above, principally in pages 600-645, where he draws attention to some serious flaws in Webb’s line of reasoning, including an unintended departure from the Reformation principle of sola scriptura, by Webb’s insistence that that the New Testament revelation is not final in its ethical standards. He also moves at will between Old and New Testament passages without recognising the progressive nature of revelation between the testaments, and that the weight placed on Old Testament ethical passages is stronger than they can bear under the New Covenant in Christ (Grudem, p.610). This critique of Webb’s position is extremely convincing, if the reader’s doctrine of Scripture is that of traditional evangelicalism. Grudem also responds to the issues raised by the work of Kevin Giles in pp. 425-427 of Evangelical Feminism, noting that the Australian scholar appears to concede that the evidence for the belief in the ‘eternal subordination of the Son’ can be found in the New Testament and does not reply to it focussing on a reading of historical evidence in which ‘the tradition [of the church] should prescribe the correct reading’ (Giles, The Trinity and Subordinationism, pp.9-10). Giles, although an Anglican, appears to adopt a form of reasoning commonly associated with traditional Roman Catholicism, subordinating Scripture to Church tradition — an approach unlikely to be followed by evangelical Christians. Brilliant GrudemGrudem’s book follows a similar pattern to Discovering Biblical Equality in the layout of chapters, following his opening section on a ‘Biblical Vision for Manhood and Womanhood’. The lengthy section of biblical exegesis is helpfully broken down into small sections which make them easy to follow. Then there is a section addressing issues of biblical interpretation raised by evangelical feminists, followed by the significance of some major theological issues like the doctrine of the Trinity which are affected by this debate; a few chapters on church history and experience, a response to claims that ‘complementarianism is harmful’ and an extremely valuable chapter on theological trends in the egalitarian movement. There are also some significant appendices with important issues covered at greater length than would have been possible in the main text. In summary, anyone other than serious scholars wanting to have an up-to-date guide on the state of the debate on this subject need go no further than these two books. There is inevitably a variety of perspectives expressed in a book with over 20 contributors as in Discovering Biblical Equality, with varying degrees of persuasiveness, in contrast to the consistency and clarity of Evangelical Feminism. Remarkable thoroughnessThe depth and thoroughness of Grudem’s scholarship in this field is truly remarkable and this is probably as near as one could get to a definitive complementarian presentation. In terms of biblical exegesis there appears to this reviewer no doubt that Grudem has comprehensively answered egalitarian critics and, what is more important, as further primary research has been done in the last few years, the perspective he represents increasingly strengthened. The key issue now in this debate, and the pointer to the future of discussions on these matters, is revealed in chapter 13 of Grudem’s work entitled ‘Is Evangelical Feminism the New Path to Liberalism?’ Although there are many current egalitarians who hold evangelical views of Scripture, it does appear that the direction in which that movement is going is decisively outside evangelical approaches to the Scriptures, and IVP (USA not UK) and Baker Book House are the publishers supporting this change of direction in the debate. The Pierce and Groothuis title is commended as an accurate presentation of the current state of egalitarian thinking, but the Grudem work is commended as a convincing rebuttal of the arguments presented by egalitarians which should be on every pastor’s bookshelf. The Rev. Dr. Brian Talbot, Update in October 2005 issue of EN:Since the above, we have learned that IVP (USA) has withdrawn Discoverinng Biblical Equality from circulation. It is a multi-authored work, and the reason for its withdrawal was that it has been found that the author of one of the chapters, Judy Brown, is serving a prison sentence for attempting to murder a pastor so that she could continue a lesbian affair with his wife. Brown was sentenced in 2004 to 30 years (with eight to serve) for the attempted murder of Assembly of God minister Ted Smart. More details can be found on the website Gender-News.com. EN contacted IVP (UK), who was circulatinng the book in this country. A spokesperson for IVP said: 'IVP learned in April that one of the contributors to its recently published title Discovering Biblical Equality had been convicted of a serious criminal offence, and imprisoned. We believe that IVP should not publish the writings of those guilty of serious sin or convicted of crime, without a suitable period of rehabilitation and clear evidence of repentance. We therefore decided to cease distribution of this title. IVP (USA), the originating publisher, has since released a new edition of the book without this contributor's article, and we have just published it in the UK.' JEB© Evangelicals Now - September 2005 |
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