Should women teach? Another view

In a second article on the issue of women preaching in the local church, Andrew Bartlett responds to Tom Schreiner (en March 2020)

Kat spoke up in class at seminary. A male student shouted: ‘Just stop!’ He saw her participation as a danger. ‘I have one question for you,’ he said. ‘Why are you even here?’

That was in Texas. But similar things can happen in England. The main title for Tom Schreiner’s article in March en was ‘Should women teach?’ This question provokes strong reactions. Some answer: ‘No, not in the assembled church; see 1 Timothy 2:12.’ Others regard the question as out of place in the 21st century: ‘Why not? If they have learned, and are gifted, they can teach.’ Tom’s article highlights the ‘fresh urgency’ with which the question is being asked. He urges: ‘We should be open to re-examining the Scriptures.’ That is what I have tried to do in my book Men and Women in Christ: fresh light from the biblical texts. Let me tell you the story.

Trying to be non-partisan

During the last 50 years I have been in churches of different persuasions, where women were either allowed or not allowed to teach or lead or pastor. I have long been aware that this is a topic on which there is disagreement among Christians who seek to be faithful to Scripture. Recently, finding myself in an FIEC (complementarian) church, I thought it was time to try to understand more fully why each side holds the position that it does. This coincided with a change in my professional work as a lawyer. After about 40 years as a barrister, arguing the case for one side, I was doing more judicial work, partly in the UK and partly as an international arbitrator. Judging a dispute impartially requires a different mindset from advocating for one side. When adjudicating, I have no prior commitment to a particular result but am required to go wherever the evidence and reasoned arguments lead. I thought: why not try to apply the same dispassionate approach to the evangelical debate about men and women, and see where it leads?

Context, context, context

When people disagree about the meaning of what has been written, the original author’s intent often becomes clearer when we look at the real-life context and the whole flow of the author’s reasoning. Everyone knows this in theory. But resolving legal disputes provides great opportunities for seeing how it works in practice. I often have the experience of interacting with the people who wrote the letters which are being interpreted, and who therefore correct my misunderstandings. Time after time this provides sobering practical lessons in seeing how radically context can affect the meaning of what is written, and also how important it is to attend to the precise details of the words used if we are to understand correctly. I tried to apply those lessons to reading letters written by Peter and Paul.

Twists and turns

When I started writing, I was unsure where I would end up. From previous knowledge of the debate, I thought I might arrive at a fully egalitarian position on marriage. As regards women’s ministry, I thought I might find reasonably strong and finely balanced arguments on both sides, meaning that any conclusion on that issue could only be tentative. It turned out I was wrong on both points. After many twists and turns, I ended up with a view of marriage in which Christian husbands and wives do not have identical responsibilities (this is a ‘complementarian’ view, though it does not see husbands as being in authority over their wives). But I found no clear scriptural justification for restrictions on women’s ministry.

Some milestones

Here are some of the things that I found along the way. These are just headlines, as there isn’t room to show the reasoning.

1. The traditional majority view for most of church history was that women were inherently inferior and unfit for leadership. The viewpoints commonly labelled as ‘complementarian’ and ‘egalitarian’ are both innovative. They both reject the traditional majority view.

2. 1 Corinthians 7 is the longest passage on marriage in the New Testament. But it is too often neglected in the discussion. Although Paul is innocent of today’s Western cultural distaste for hierarchies, his Christ-centred perspective on marriage involves the equal status of men and women.

3. Genesis 2 teaches a definite differentiation of men and women. But the interpretation that it also teaches male authority over women is not derived from any clear statement in the text. It is built on uncertain implications.

4. Galatians 3:28 (‘not male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus’) is an important general statement, but egalitarians sometimes squeeze out of it more than is really there.

5. Paul starts Ephesians 5:24 with the word ‘But’. Most translators of the Bible into English have believed either that the husband is placed in authority over his wife, or at least that that was Paul’s view. So they translate Ephesians 5:24 to fit that view instead of translating what Paul actually writes. Interpreters who think that a Christian husband has unilateral authority over his wife do not have a good explanation for Paul’s choice of word.

6. Peter’s Christ-centred view of marriage (1 Peter 2-3) is substantially the same as Paul’s.

7. Commentators do not need to throw up their hands in despair over 1 Corinthians 11:2-16. If we attend closely to Paul’s thread of reasoning and translate appropriately, we find that he is making a continuous, logical and connected argument. It has nothing to do with veiling of women.

8. No one has found a satisfactory explanation for how 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 (women’s silence) fits the context in Paul’s letter. I was surprised to learn that there is a solid basis in the manuscript evidence for the view that these two verses were not in Paul’s original text.

9. Both sides struggle to explain Paul’s reasoning in 1 Timothy 2:11-15. This is partly because it is generally misread as being specifically about assembled worship. But that is not Paul’s focus (see vv.10,15).

10. The interpretation which reads 2:12 as a general restriction on women’s ministry floats free from the context of 1:1 to 2:8. This prior context suggests Paul is apprehensive that a woman might teach a man falsely, not that she might teach authoritative truth to men. He uses the Adam and Eve story as an illustration of false teaching, not as an appeal to a creation principle that men must be in charge.

11. Paul uses an unusual word (authenteō) in 2:12. The translation ‘exercise authority over’ is not supported by historical evidence of usage. There is no clear example of the word being used with this meaning at any time before Paul or in the 1st, 2nd or 3rd century AD. Those who think that Paul is here maintaining men’s authority over women in the church have difficulty in explaining his choice of this unusual word. In context it means ‘overpower’.

12. Spiritual gifts are for men and women alike (Acts 2:17-18). Junia (Romans 16:7) was an outstanding apostle, in the sense of a pioneer missionary. The qualifications for elders in 1 Timothy 3:1-7 are written with both men and women in mind.

Unity of spirit

I emphasise in the book that God’s mandate of unity among Christian believers (John 17:11, 20-23; 1 Cor. 1:10-11; 3:17; Eph. 4:3-4) is binding on all who take part in this debate over interpretations. When we have differing opinions on secondary matters, we are required to receive one another as Christ has received us (Rom. 15:7). As we re-examine the Scriptures together, may the discussion be taken forward with grace and peace and unity of spirit. If you’re interested to know more, you can find reviews of my book on amazon. co.uk, amazon.com, amazon.ca, Goodreads, and IVP’s website.