Women Leaders Or Not?

Whether women should be able to be a leader in the church has been something of controversy over a long period of time. After much consideration and research I will post both sides of the argument as this is a huge debate.

My final opinion will be drawn at the end.

1 Timothy 2:12-15 it is hard passage to draw a conclusion on because it is hard to understand what exactly Paul is trying to communicate. There are a number of interpretations and because of the difficulty in understanding the passage I find it very hard to be as dogmatic as the traditionalist are in their interpretation. After further investigation in the passage I find myself agreeing with Ronald Pierce who says that he “experienced a significant change of mind (344)” when he completed his study on the text. The traditionalist or conservative say that with absolute certainty we know what Paul is telling us in the text. But how can we be so certain with such an obscure passage? This new perspective will investigate both sides of the argument excluding and permitting women to teach in the public worship setting. We begin with the exclusion.

From the text itself it is easy to deduce what Paul meant when he referred to the creation account. Women are to play the role of the learner and not the teacher. This is the problem in Ephesus and is why Paul returns to the first instance of when a woman tried to teach a man (Trentham 34). According to Trentham and others like Moo, Mcgee, and Greene it is perfectly clear that what Paul is trying to communicate is a subordination of the sexes. Man is superior to woman. The reason for this instruction from Paul was to show that Adam was formed first and then Eve which shows man as being dominant over woman (Liddon 18). This is what God had intended by creating man first and then woman. The woman is to be subordinate to the man because he not only came first, but because she was created from him.

Therefore, when it comes to the public assembly as Paul is referring to in 1 Timothy it is the man who is to teach not the woman. She is to remain subordinate to him because of her mistake in trying to teach man from the beginning and leading him into sin. Greene says that it is the man’s job to lead in public prayer and speak and the woman is to sit in silence and accept the doctrine being taught. The office of a teacher was that of an authoritative office. These teachers are exercising their God-given authority to proclaim the truth of the gospel message (Acts 13:1; Eph 4:1). But this public proclamation was denied to women (Kent 113). Women are forbidden to teach in any public gathering and are to learn in quiet submission. 1 Cor. 14:34, 35 clearly states that women are not allowed to speak in a public setting. They are to learn from their husband in the home if they wish to learn anything (Greene 95).

The man has a God-given authority to lead and the woman is not to try and take that away from him. It may sound like these are harsh words but they are actually very comforting. They refer to letting a woman be a woman. Let her be what she was created to be. Don’t let her try to be something she is not. Don’t let her dwell in a place that she should not. “Let a fish not live on land. Let a bird not dwell under water. Let not a woman yearn to exercise authority over a man by lecturing in public worship.” For her own sake and the sake of the congregation let not a woman mingle with that which is forbidden (Hendricksen 108). Why let women try to be or do something that they were not created for? It would be like trying to glue something together with Vaseline. They are completely incompatible. The comfort in these terms is being used in a way in which she will be fruitful.

Women find their satisfaction and joy in life when they devote themselves to what they were created for. So what were they created for? They were created to be housewives and give birth and raise children. When God leads a woman to be a housewife she will find no greater joy than fulfilling the work she was called to especially not endeavoring to become a leader within the church (Trentham 35). Tradition has it that aside from the charge in Deut. 31:12 for women to learn, they were not allowed to study the Torah. The reason behind this was that women were viewed to not be as intellectually capable of learning and they were not expected to be able to learn because they were to be a housewife. Rabbi Hisda interprets the book of Turubin from the Talmud as saying “This teaches that the Holy one, blessed be He, built Eve in the shape of a storehouse (Spencer 217).” As a framer makes a storehouse narrow at the top and wide at the bottom, so also did God do with Eve. He made the womb of a woman wide so as to be the storehouse of the embryo. The woman is so clearly described as a housewife that even her body was built in such a way as to make that possible. Because of this it was natural to see that it is the job of the man to study and learn and not the woman (Ibid 218).

However, this does not completely eliminate women from all teaching and learning in every aspect. If there were no godly women in the churches then most churches would be forced to close their doors. Obviously the woman plays a very important role in the rearing of their children and it would be travesty to say they could not teach their children. In this context these verses refer to a woman usurping their authority over men (Greene 93). No where does it say that a woman is not allowed to teach Sunday school or a small group Bible study. Nor does this forbid women in the mission fields so long as they are not the representative authority figure. Women are fully capable of teaching as long as they are not the ultimate authority figure. Paul gives two reasons why. Man was created first and the chronological implications of this are clear. The other is in the fact that it was Eve who was deceived not Adam (Kent 114-115). There are several places one can turn and see that God uses a woman to teach and they are commanded to teach certain people. Acts 18:22 shows a husband and wife in private correcting Apollos in his false teaching (Greene 100). It was not just the man but also the woman who was participating in the correcting. But this was not in a public worship setting. It was in the privacy of the home. That is the integral point of the passage in Timothy. It is dealing with the corporate public worship setting not the privacy of the home or a small group setting.

Every woman has the right to be in the mission field, teach Sunday school, small group Bible studies as long as they are not taking the authority of the man in charge and going over his head. The woman has certain liberties but they are in no capacity to demand the right to fill an office of authority. There are no grounds for a woman to say they have scriptural support for taking a role in leadership in the public worship. No where does it even allude to this in the Bible (Greene 94-95). “No woman has the right to stand up in the public assembly and argue with the pastor, the deacons, or those who are in the seat of authority (Ibid).” She is to sit in quiet submission learning; not trying to take man’s God-given authority. This is the God ordained and instituted hierarchal chain of command.

But is that the true meaning of this text? Is it really so clear in its meaning? Can you boldly say that this is absolutely the meaning Paul intended when he wrote this letter? This is one of the toughest passages to interpret and yet so many say that “it simply means this.” I beg to differ. I don’t see this as being a simple passage to interpret. It is one of the hardest if not the hardest aside from eschatological prophecy. There are several other alternatives to understanding this passage and the danger of following one of those interpretations is being categorized as a complementarian or an egalitarian. The complementarian says that in the eyes of God women are equal to men and hold just as much importance in the family as in the church. The egalitarian says that women are equal to men in all aspects regardless of redemptive status (Enns 624). I consider myself a fundamentalist but with new insight on a very difficult passage to interpret.

The otherside will be posted later. I will also post the bibliography at the end of the second post for both arguments.