Theology in the Raw - S2 Ep1012: #1012 - Paul, Gender, and the Women in Leadership Debate: Dr. Cynthia Long Westfall

Episode Date: September 29, 2022

Dr. Cynthia Long Westfall is Associate Professor of New Testament at McMaster Divinity College and is the author of the highly acclaimed book Paul and Gender, which has been hailed as one of, if not the, best biblical defenses of the egalitarian view of women in leadership. In this podcast conversation we talk about what led Cynthia to write the book and we work through a few key passages, such as Ephesians 5:21-33, 1 Corinthians 11:2-16, and 1 Timothy 2-3.  If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe to my channel!  Support Theology in the Raw through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theologyintheraw

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. My guest today is Dr. Cynthia Long-Westfall, who is Associate Professor of New Testament at McMaster Divinity College. Cynthia has a PhD from University of Surrey, Roehampton, has an MDiv from Denver Seminary, an MA from Northern Arizona University, a BA from Biola College, back when it was called Biola College. Cynthia is the author of a fairly well known scholarly book called Paul and Gender, Reclaiming the Apostles' Vision for Men and Women in Christ. It's widely considered one of the best defenses of the egalitarian position of women in church leadership. And I am just about done with the book. I tried to finish before the interview and I got really, really close, but I was excited to have Cynthia on the show. And we, yeah, we talk a lot about all those passages that you're thinking of when it comes to women

in church leadership. And she, whether you agree with her conclusion or not, you'll easily be able to appreciate how incredibly sharp she is, how knowledgeable she is, especially at the Greek language and how she has provided a very, very thoughtful argument for women in positions of leadership in the church. So please welcome to the show for the first time, the one and only Dr. Cynthia Long-Westphal.

Thank you so much for coming on the show, Cynthia. I've been looking forward to this for a long time, ever since I started to read your book 50 years ago and now have picked it back up. Thank you for this book, Paul and Gender. It's an excellent book. Why don't we start with what led you to write this book and what led you to become interested in the question of, it's often framed women in ministry. I don't, I like to say, you know, women in church leadership over men might be the more specific issue, but yeah, what led you into this conversation? Well, I was asked by my PhD supervisor to write a book on Paul and gender. And so I said, I said, yes, which I said too many times, but I said yes. And in terms of writing books, you know,

that, that, but, but he asked me to do it and I agreed to do it. And I took a good long time to do it. I had a position at that point, but it was a long time coming. How did I come to this position? I would say that that's a question. What led me down this road? And I think that any woman who has a set of gifting of, say, leadership or teaching gifts or feels called to ministry, even if they're called to a parachurch ministry, they are going to be dealing with this issue. I think that's one thing that men and people who don't have this gifting, women that don't have this gifting, don't realize that women who are walking this line, who have this calling, face a barrage of challenges and criticisms. And so all my life, since I became a Christian at 14, I was challenged in this area, even when I was complementarian. So I started out as a complementarian, but I somehow wasn't behaving properly, which was interesting. It's like I couldn't figure it out.

I'm doing everything. I tick off all the boxes. I'm in complete agreement. What am I doing wrong? And there's a lot of embedded theology that goes way beyond what people claim the scripture teaches about women in ministry and leadership that comes into play. And I was raised as an agnostic. I didn't get it. I just simply couldn't.

I would read the Bible and I would do what the Bible says. And I think I handled it fairly well from the beginning. And it seemed clear to me what the Bible taught. Then I'd get in the zone spiritually and I'd get pushback. So this kind of dissonance characterized my life. And I went into campus ministry and got involved in evangelism, but I love teaching. I didn't make anyone come and hear me. It's like whoever wants to come and hear me, you come and hear me or don't,

you know, and I'm just excited about the text. And that's been, I think, what's really characterized me as that I found myself every time there was a door open, like to go to seminary. There wasn't a door open when I graduated from Biola. I went to Biola. No doors open that I knew of. And, but when I went to the campus ministry, they made me go to seminary. And I was like, yes, I get to study Greek and Hebrew, maybe. People found this incomprehensible. And it wasn't because I wanted to

be a pastor or challenge the system. This is just the desire of my heart, you know, is, is, is the word of God and I, and the word of God really truly saved me on all levels because I grew up in a very dysfunctional home and I knew I was in trouble. And then when I became a Christian and I, and that's the thing, I mean I poured myself into the word of God and the word of God really did transform me. So I had a life worth living. So what would be better than to go deeper and deeper and deeper? And I didn't care where it led. And it was just a journey of pure love.

You know, so I just kept going. Actually, I kept going to seminary like a professional seminary student. One day I met Craig Blomberg and I was crazy over Greek by that time. And he was he was having me after I was a student. He would have me come in and sometimes, you know, team teacher, do something, do a little session about Greek. Finally, he said, you just got to get your phd and teach right and the voice of god and um yes that's what you that's what you're going to do it's a it's a bigger story than that but there was a clear calling a clear leading a clear when you're in the zone spiritually this is where you go it wasn't a a challenge to authority but as as I went through this dissonance between what I saw in the text and what I had been taught was the role of women, what was permitted and not permitted, I saw these things thrown into contradiction constantly.

And it was sometimes pure textual contradiction. And I have a very high view of scripture. So that's not going to work for me. I'm going to figure this thing out if texts are brought into contradiction. That's the kind of interesting thing is that it appears that people don't realize things are in contradiction, or they'll say it seems to be in contradiction, but it's kind of like it's all going to come together in the clouds. But no, there are some very, very serious contradictions that women who are like me really get. And that's, that's the role of experience and interpretation. I think that, you know, when you're, when you're in this place,

I think that, you know, when you're when you're in this place, the seams become visible. And to me, this is a view of interpreting scripture and such a way that not only doesn't teach what it's supposed to teach but maybe undermines other clear passages about how you're supposed to follow god with all your heart yeah how how um that you you know what is it jesus said about hating your mother father sister uh to to follow him in spite of what anyone says to you. And like, strangely, what I was taught as a woman is, oh, it's different from you. You're supposed to pay attention to all those people. That's how you'll know what Jesus is telling you what to do. And those things came into conflict.

And so my whole adult, well, I wouldn't even say adult life, even pre-adult life, uh adult well i wouldn't even say adult life even pre-adult life what has been working through the dissonance and working through the contradictions i wouldn't i wouldn't come down off the line you're on for the longest time i think that that's a noble place to be so you yeah so i mean when you said you're a grew-up comment complementarian, did you just assume that view? Or did you go through a period where you were studying, studying, studying, and you were like exegetically convinced of complementarian reading of scripture? I was. And I wasn't raised – well, I should say I was raised complementarian. I was raised in the 1950s post-war gender roles.

I was supposed to be a Victorian woman and an ornament to society. Well, I still can chat, but that's another story. So I'm curious. I ultimately want to get to like what I appreciate your recommendation to move slowly because there's, you know, as I'm finding out, and you know, I kind of knew this ahead of time, but now as I dig in, there's's a lot of complications i just looked up how many studies have been done on kephale the meaning of head and it's like this person says it's authority source it's both it's neither and it's like here's 15 really in-depth studies that i feel like i have to wade through and do word searches and that's just on the one word and then you know oftentimes and you know there's there's just a lot of uh stuff that i i don't feel like i'm in a place where i can just trust

this scholar that scholar because i two scholars i trust say the opposite thing so i'm like i need to dig underneath um what was it for you that back to the question you asked oh yeah in the beginning having said it came from a broken place and a dysfunctional home and became a Christian, I was the ideal disciple in a sense. It says, tell me what I'm supposed to do and I'll do it. I mean, this is all about obedience. I'm not even trusting my instinct. That was a dangerous place to be, actually, to say you don't trust your instinct. But it was like, I'm going to be formed by the Word of God and by faithful teaching. And so I was in a fundamentalist circles that were very friendly with John MacArthur and his whole teaching. So there was there was no other view. Also, even at the time we're talking, say, when I started at Biola, it was 1971. And there weren't significant – yeah, now everyone knows how old I am. I'm not going to ask, but I want to, but I won't.

Because you don't look like you went to Biola. I turned 69 like in a month. But I don't feel like it. And so there we are. But I do feel like I'm from the 50s and 60s. I definitely am from the 60s. Maybe that'll settle a lot. But yeah, there wasn't another view that was really significantly out there at that time. And we're talking about even the feminist movement was just kind of getting underway. So it was really later that even the first whispers of

evangelical feminism came out and then later egalitarianism. And so that all developed while I was going to seminary, but after I'd gone to Bible school. So there was just no question about what was right. I was just trying really hard to live with it. Okay. Okay. Yeah. But, but to, uh, about taking your time, I think some people might be okay to work with intuition, but I think, I think people that the kind of person I think that you are, you take your time. Mm hmm. Yeah. You're completely right about the complexity of the issue. And sadly, it's at this level that I think that the conversation will move over at more of an academic level, because we're talking

about things like word studies in the Greek, you know, and how are they used during the first century and this kind of thing. Can you take us down your exegetical journey? I'm curious about your first kind of like aha moment where you were working through a passage and like, oh, that doesn't say what I thought it said or like, oh, you know, yeah. Did you have one of those or a few of those? I think Grimke said, oh, if I only could learn the Greek, then I would really discover some amazing things. And when I first learned the Greek, I thought, you know, she wasn't right. And now I would say, no, she was right.

But the frames that are placed on the text are so very powerful. And you don't even realize what you're importing into the text to interpret the text. The big breakthrough came with Ephesians 5. And now we're not talking about women in leadership, but we're talking about the issues of women and men and authority. And what that was is that I realized that all the Bibles that I had read broke up a sentence and started a new topic. And so that I started and the more I studied that this thing kept breaking, this this passage kept breaking for me, the more I studied for studied it, the more it looked really, really interesting. But the first breakthrough was to realize that wives submit yourselves to your own husbands was right in the middle of a

sentence. And that the sentence started with Ephesians 518. And it doesn't really end until pretty much until the instructions to women are done. And then the next thing that was a major breakthrough is that it doesn't even say women submit to your husbands. It says women to your husbands. And it's like, oh, and especially the more I got into actually the study of discourse analysis, which has nothing to do with a study of women in the Bible. has nothing to do with a study of women in the Bible. It had to do with how it was handling Hebrews and how I read Hebrews. Totally different thing. But reading it from a discourse analysis understanding is that, you know what?

You respect the grammar. Yeah. Respect the grammar. What's being done here? And that's your starting point. And just just even going there you just all of a sudden strip away all kinds of presuppositions that have been imported into the text and so that was the first one to go so can you yeah can you unpack that just a little more for somebody who might be not totally familiar with the issue so in ephesians 5 22 most translations like mine here says wives

submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. But that sentence doesn't begin, like you said, it begins in 518. But then 521 has a, is it a participle? Submitting to one another in the fear of Christ. And then the Greek would say, wives, to your own husband. It isn't like the verbal, there is a verbal sense carried over into 22, right? It's not like it's wrong to say, or is it wrong? What's the best translation of 522? Not the most woodenly literal, but like what's Paul saying in that verse? Well, in the common English Bible,

we said, I want in the common English Bible, I wanted to actually take all of the household code that goes down through 6-9, and I wanted to indent it with bullet points to show that the whole thing was about submitting to one another. code. And the fact that it takes place right in the middle of a sentence means this is being embedded in what's the understanding is filled with the spirit. And so it says be filled with the spirit. And then it has a whole string of participles, you know, singing, psalming, making music, giving thanks, submitting to one another, for example, right, to husbands, for example, children to parents. But it says the thing is, it's like what it's saying, submitting to one another, wives to husbands, husbands to wives. And so what I've come to understand that is to say, one of the things you're going to ask as a first century person in a house church, you're going to say, submit to one another and go, I'm sorry, but how am I going to submit to my slave here? I mean, there's a non sequitur here.

And so he breaks this out, breaks out these three authority relationships. And then, OK, this is how it's going to work with you. But he spends the most time talking about men. And what's interesting about that is that he almost does nothing to women. He doesn't even do you understand most English readers will not understand there is not a single command given to women. That's not how the text reads. But there's not an imperative, not the case for men. So women is he's like, he's like, almost avoiding using a command. Why? I think it's because generally, everyone understands what a woman's role is supposed to be. But then he turns it all on to his head, he starts giving commands to men. And what he says the

strangest thing to men. And I rarely have seen complementarians, if never, have seen complementarians really explain what it means that Jesus is the model and he's giving baths and washing clothes and ironing and doing spot removal. Doing domestic chores. Like in your book, you talked about how shocking it would have been to describe the men, the husband's role in terms of domestic household chores. He's really turning the stereotypes on their head in this passage, right? One time I was teaching a class in Greek and we were going through this passage and a man who had been a missionary to Afghanistan and Pakistan said said they would hate this passage but i really

started pointing out what it told them to do because i mean in those cultures to this day the kinds of things that he's he's giving us a model and then telling men to nurture and feed like you do your own body right those are those are counter stereotypical models and so what he's really what i would understand he's doing here is saying okay submit to one another let me use women as my primary model of what it means to submit this is how you treat one another another person when you're submitting to her and what's so funny about it, that the passage is funny, because I mean, in the end, the men are wearing a dress. He's the head and she's the body. So who has the genitals now? Right? She's a man. I mean, she's the body, right? She's like your body. So and so he's he

sat there and turned everything on its head. And what I think is funny, I think it's hilarious. He ends, actually, with a henna clause. And check this one out and see what you think about it, where it says, however, each of you. And it's funny. Look at this in the Greek, because he really piles it on. He's kind of each of you men. You, yes, you.

I'm talking to you. It's very emphatic. Love your wives. And it's followed by a Hina so that she may respect or fear her husband. And so they say, hey, that's an imperatival Hina. So they translate it as a command. And I'm going, what do you mean an imperatival hina. So they translate it as a command. And I'm going, what do you mean an imperatival hina? Check out the imperatival hinas.

I would say that's a sexist category. Is that a thing, an imperatival hina? Is it? Not in my grammar. I mean, you'll find it in grammars. But, you know, it's to actually say, obviously, women are being commanded here. And I'm saying, you know what? He's making a real point of not commanding women here. And he's actually talking

about making this about reciprocity. These kinds of things get totally submerged in our translations. This is why it's wonderful to study the Greek. I mean, not just to sift through these passages, although these passages have a huge payoff, you know, in Greek, but to, but just in general. So just, just so my audience knows, they may not know this, like Cynthia, I mean, you're, you're obviously a biblical scholar, but you're primarily, I mean, you're a fundamental Greek scholar, like that, that's your your you probably read greek faster than i can read english um so so i mean any new testament scholar has to know greek but some are like they really specialize in how the language works that that's your primary love area right isn't it i mean discourse analysis of of the biblical text in the greek yeah that's that's um where i did my phd and that just contained that that has

very much influenced the linguistics applied to greek discourse analysis and how that works yes that was absolutely um integral in writing polygender gender. It changed everything, right? When I saw it was said and took, you know, I did my PhD on the structure of the book of Hebrews, which I'm still trying to convince everyone of. And I'm just, I guess I have nothing if I don't have, you know, convictions. That's so funny. So let me, as I, and I'm still kind of marinating on your book and, you know, you read a book of this length and depth, it's hard to keep it all in your mind. And I'm taking copious notes on everything. Judy Bolf say the same thing with 1 Corinthians 11 that Paul seems to be really navigating this sensitive tension of maintaining

this counter-cultural Christian perspective and yet not pushing it too far. So he often maintains kind of the shell, the husk of what a Greco-Roman household might look like, what the church might look like, um, how to behave in society. So he's using the same kind of symbols, but he seems to

be kind of like subtly subverting those symbols. And this is, I mean, anybody who studies Ephesians five knows that like, this is a popular, these household codes from Aristotle all the way to his era. I mean, this, this is a common way to talk about the household. And Paul even maintains, wives submit to your husbands, husband. But he completely subverts what submission is, subverts what being the head is. And like Aristotle would not like this. He would be pretty offended. Even though Paul's kind of like, oh, yeah, house.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Structure the house. Yeah, yeah. Wives Yeah. Yeah. Structure the house. Yeah. Yeah. Wives. Yeah. Is that, um, and, and, and I want to get the first Corinthians, first Corinthians 11 because there's some weird statements. It's like, whoa, are you a misogynist or are you a feminist? Like, is that, how would you describe that? That kind of dance that Paul seems to be playing and is that even an accurate

way of describing it? Well, and this is where, uh, I, post-colonial interpretation really has shed some light on this is to say that Paul was a minority, a besieged minority in the Roman Empire. And so it's really the situation of Jews, whether they're in the diaspora or they were in what the Romans would call Palestine, in Judea, he was working as a minority within a dominant and very oppressive empire. And when you are in that situation, you learn how to subvert, how to take actually symbols of the dominant culture and subvert them for the purposes of what you're trying to accomplish. And Paul makes no secret, say in Romans 12, one and two, that we're not supposed to conform to the world but we're supposed to be transformed he also makes no secret that he is combating the sexual wars of the day

he is not buying into the gender the gender stereotypes of of the time and people say people seem to think oh he bought the sexual stereotypes but not the sexuality but the two go together hand in hand um in in terms of yeah what is a person and authority what's the pattern of familial is entitled to and um you know the the right of life and death and control over the body of the people in his household. So there were limitations, of course, but there were a lot of places that there were not boundaries at all. You said that he takes the symbols of the empire and subverts them. Off the top of your head, do you know somebody who's written on that?

I see a lot of people kind of like what you're saying. I know a lot of scholars who would probably agree with that. But has somebody really unpacked that on an in-depth level, how he does it? I think the place that that's being done is in post-colonial, best is in post-colonial studies where people are finding and in some of the Paul and Empire studies or Jesus and Empire studies. Richard Horsley, maybe he, well, people like that, but,

but, uh, yeah, but that, and, and I would say handle with care when we read these things, we don't, we don't buy what everyone says,

but you, this, you know, how this is done, I think is gold is to say that people, that, that people will even use the etiquette of the culture and subvert it into an insult. That's an inside joke, you know, these kinds of things.

So, yeah, so the understanding of particularly scholars that have come out of that people have been formally colonized by the UK, for instance, have contributed. This is what it's like to live with a dominant power like that. And I will tell you that even though I said the UK was fairly brutal, I don't think it held a candle to what the Roman Empire was and the way it's treated peoples that it subjected, especially with the Jews, because the Jews were always resisting. In many, many ways, they were certainly a part of the culture, part of the Greco-Roman culture, but they were resistant to so many things that they were considered. I like to say it was like a powder keg that was giving off sparks. It blew in 67, which was not long after these things were written,

not long at all. So would you, just as, let's sum up Ephesians 5 then, except we got other passages we got to get to. Would you say that Paul is maintaining that wives submit to husbands, husbands submit to wives, but he's redefining what submission is. And then his command to love your wife almost becomes, I don't want to say practical submission, but I mean, there is a, so there is a

mutuality built into the passage. I just, I just struggle with in the New Testament, husbands are never commanded to submit to their wives. Like that term is never used there. Parents aren't commanded to submit to your children, masters, slaves. But you do see the relationship still one of reciprocity. How would you navigate that tension? Well, here's the deal. And this is the thing that I think people don't acknowledge or understand. a thing that I think people don't acknowledge or understand, that they take these passages as Paul making comments on society as a whole. And what he was really doing is he wasn't challenging the authority structures. I wouldn't consider the household was under the authority of the church.

The household was under the jurisdiction of the Greco-roman empire and that was one of the things that they said that was one of the building blocks of their hierarchy it's the most basic foundational things then go things go wrong in the home you have you have you know uh defied the empire you have to write down to sexual positions you know yeah yeah it was it was very serious business. And so he's giving instructions on how you navigate your faith and following Christ within these social relationships that he had no control over. He did not have power within the Roman Empire to change the culture. He wasn't doing culture wars. He was talking about how we behave as people of faith when we walk in these roles. And so that's a huge distinction. And so he, yeah, he's not, he's not saying I'm changing the culture. He's saying, here's where

the culture is. And therefore I just told you to mutually submit so how is it going to look uh like how's that going to look like in these authority relationships and what he says to men is quite subversive to where you say yeah that's how men mutually submit or um slaves and masters uh you know in terms of of it's it's the one who has the power that makes the bigger adjustment in these commands, as it should well be, because within the culture, no question that women are

supposed to submit, children are supposed to submit, and above all, slaves are supposed to submit. And if he were telling slaves not to submit, that would undermine Christianity as a whole. It probably would not have lasted. But instead of saying, yes, you guys submit. In fact, you're doing it right. In fact, you're my role models. You're my heroes. And now people in

authority, you observe their behavior and you model that. I'm not taking you out of authority. If he did, there'd be trouble. But within that relationship, you can still have the mind and the action of Christ. I've never thought of it like this precise. It's just kind of coming together now as a possible way to understand this, that the mutual submission description in 521, then, you know, that sets up everything. Then he goes into three different sets of relationships, wives, husbands, children, parents, slaves, masters. Would you say that he's still using the familiar terminology to the Greco-Roman environment, but as he describes these three sets of relationships, the content of the description is almost subtly describing mutual submission

without using the term submit. Like he's not saying, master, submit to your slaves, but the way he just reorients the relationship, he kind of is getting at that without using the language. He's trying to use the same language that isn't going to offend

the Greco-Roman structures, but he's still gutting them from the inside out. Is that? Yeah. Well, he's already said mutually submit. And I don't look at this and find this any more disturbing than I find Philippians 2. I think this is exactly what Philippians 2 is telling us to do. Or what Jesus said, if you want to be first, you make yourself a slave of all in Matthew 25. This has been said over and over and over again. But how does it, but this is the thing is how do these teachings, how does Jesus' teaching, or Paul's saying, I make myself a slave to all that I by all means when some, how does this work out within these authority relationships within the culture? And that's what, that's what he's doing with these household

codes is he's helping them navigate the culture. Um, and so that's to say, uh, when we go from culture to culture, I think if we are following Paul's model, we respect the culture and we work within the culture. But we're bringing something totally different in terms of our faith and its implications. So the whole – I mean women in leadership, however you want to frame it, there is a strong missional emphasis here. Like for instance, if you're a missionary in Saudi Arabia, it might hinder your mission if you had like half your elder team is all women and everything. Like there might be some cultural sensitivities while you're still trying to slowly establish a more maybe biblical mutuality within a structure that is still maintaining the semblance of the broader culture. Otherwise, your missional impact wouldn't be there. Would that be an accurate analogy? I wouldn't necessarily suggest that the church's structure should mirror the authority structure.

I would say when you're within society, but church is something different. And that's where we could look at transformation. And so that's what I would say when Galatians 3.23, which is not, you know, as you would gather, not the central verse, not my silver bullet. As someone said, I said, no, I've never said that. But when it says there's no Jew nor Greek, no, I got to get Jew nor Greek. It's not Jew nor Gentile. It's Jew nor Greek, no slave or free, no male and female. That's talking about within the church.

That's not like the Magna Carta for all society. He's talking about, he says, when you come through, if you would allow me to say the doors of the church, that's where our identity and our ways of relating change. And so the church is his jurisdiction. But yeah, what you do, that you still might have, well, you have all kinds of relationships in terms of husband, wife, children, and parents, and slaves and free. I mean, some of, you know, both parties might not be there. Right, right.

And often they weren't. And so all those things is way more complex than people think of. And then people automatically read Paul and then they jump to what is he saying about, you know, whether we run for office or something like that. Just keep it where it's supposed to be to read it properly. Don't take it out of context and apply it to, you know, can't mean now what it didn't mean then. That's a great expression, right? That is a great expression. Let's talk, I think my favorite section of the book is your stuff on 1 Corinthians 11. That sounds bad. Not that the book is your stuff on 1 Corinthians 11.

That sounds bad. Not that the other, I didn't like it. It's just that was like most like eye-opening to me. So for those who aren't familiar, we don't need to read the whole passage, but 1 Corinthians 11, 2 to 16, where this passage, I mean, not only do you have the issue of head coverings or bales or whatever, or long hair, however you want to understand this. But you have some statements that some seem outrageous that man was not created for woman, but woman for man. And then what's the one about the image? Oh yeah. Yeah. A man in fact should not cover his head because he is God's image and glory, but woman is man's glory.

That seems to flat out contradict the rest of the Bible, Genesis 127, among other passages. So we're going to act like, yeah, okay, now this is what we think. And I would actually think it's the way that's being read and in part the way it's been a little bit you know tweaked in the translations to me now i just see this as a um first of all i would say yeah don't read this in a way that contradicts scripture read in a way that it doesn't contradict scripture i mean we can read the passage unless you just want to all mishandle genesis and we're going to go with it but can we read this in a way that's totally and completely consistent with a with a decent understanding of genesis and you know what you do see in uh genesis 2 that man was not good without women without women you know it went

through the whole creation everything was good then man's well then we're in yeah Then man's, well, then we're in, yeah, in man's created with now to woman, and it's not good. And there's a lot said about Adam naming the animals, but I think they're missing the point. It's not about his authority. Adam is beginning to see that he is needy. He brings all the animals and he's like, oh, a mate everyone has a partner where's mine and so he actually came to understand he was lacking he was needy and so woman is created and when he sees her he's like bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. And, you know, it's really exciting. It's a really exciting thing. She met his need.

And she's an easer. As God says, I'm going to give you an easer. Elsewhere in scripture, easer is kind of like a patron who's helping someone in need. And really said, yeah, if you could read it this way, you know, woman didn't need man. Man needed woman. Yeah, yeah, if you could read it this way, you know, woman didn't need man, man needed woman. That's the point of the whole passage. And why would you read it otherwise? And actually this, if you read it this way, this helps you understand how the passage seems to kind of logically fall apart. Cause he says, Hey, I'm not saying women's independent of man. And you're going, I just thought you said that she was,

you know, created to be a, to be a slave. And then she was not even in God's image. And then, and then you say, Hey, but women's not independent.

And you're going, obviously. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you look at, I mean, 11 verse seven and compare it to 11,

11 to 12, I mean, two verses later, these seem like they're written by different authors. So that should... It seems like it switches arguments. So the number one would be that women didn't need man. Man was needy and she filled his need. That puts her in a preaching client relationship. That puts her in a position of strength. Right. Yeah. client relationship, that puts her in a position of strength, where she's the one who meets the need. And she has the power and ability to meet needs. I mean, for instance, he might have done

on his own, he might have tried to subdue the world, but he wasn't going to fill it. And the other thing is, is that really man was not necessary at all. God could have created woman and then she could have started having children like, you know, I mean, like Jesus, right? He didn't need a man for Jesus. He could have just simply started with a woman. And instead, because she's got all the equipment to do that between him and him and her. So man needed woman. woman didn't need man. Man is created in the image of God, image and glory. He's the image and glory of God.

Woman is the glory of the glory. We know from Genesis that she is also in the image of God. Now we're saying she's got something else. So 11's not, so 11.7, again, man's created in God's image of glory. Woman is man's glory. He's not saying women don't bear God's image. If you just read the English text, just that one verse, you would think, oh, man bears God's image, women don't, but that's not what he's... Well, we're reading this as a criticism of women, and Paul is putting women in their place that you're going to read it that way. And I'm saying, wait a minute, I think you've missed it. This is not what's going on.

And we don't know what the context was, but I would suggest that he is saying something positive about women. And he's not saying they're not in the image of God. He's saying they're not only in the image of God. they're also the glory of man, the glory of the glory. And the only other place that that occurs is in the Apocrypha, where there's an argument about what's the most powerful thing on earth. And one of the guys and one guy says, I know, it's woman. It's woman. And one of the guys and one guy says, I know it's woman. It's it's woman. And one of the things he says, she's the glory of man. And that's to say she's more powerful than man in that context. That's the only place where I can find a comparable.

Interesting. OK, so so woman is man's glory is not a demeaning term. It's actually the opposite. It's actually elevating her. It's the best of what what is right. It's the best. Right. The glory of the glory. And so if best right the glory of the glory and so if

you're the glory of the glory that's something um but and the way i understand this is in the context of what the culture is and in many places continues to be actually this kind of understanding is quite pervasive beyond the beyond the mediterranean world at that time, even to the present, is that a woman's hair is her glory. Right, right. And so now how does that work out in the culture? And so in Africa, when a woman, and this is according to a Nigerian student of mine, he never saw his mother's hair, but she kept it covered. But when there was a village event, she would come out to new glory. And so I mean, she would come out with her hair and it was amazing. And so that's something where yeah, is is part of your public expression. Okay. And in the Mediterranean world, they were saying, Okay, you know, women ought to be covering that up. And that ought to

be something that's between her and her husband. And so even to the current day, you know, you take off a woman's veil, it's like ripping off her shirt or something. It's, it's, this is a, an issue of honor, and also modesty, but honors a very big, so, so covering, covering your hair is covering your could get that when i would read this initially i was trying to read it it's like if your hair is your glory it goes your hair is to women as women is to man and i would like and i was just trying to figure out the logic of it why if the hair is your glory do you cover it it's like well when you're in worship tone it down don't be in competition with the glory of god i mean and that's to say that um

women in these cultures and in many cultures are thought to be uh dangerous right right fatal attraction is it a veil or head covering here is that that's a big dispute, right? Or like, what is the... It doesn't matter. There were various different styles and methods of covering. Tertullian actually discusses this. And so even to this day, I sat in a room with, I don't know, seven women who covered their head. Not one of them had had the same head covering. They each one of them had a different style because they were from different parts of the Muslim world. In some cases, you know, the covering might be minimal. In other cases, you know, it might be a full on covering, veiling. But what you do is you say any of the covering is is what what you would call technically veiling. Any of the covering is what you would call technically veiling.

And it's related to, for instance, confining women to a harem. That's behind the veil. It's all associated with what's going on there. And when you come out of your, I don't want to say private because that's taken differently, Come out of your home. You can be uncovered in your home. You come out, you cover your hair. Your stuff on the first century context of this was fascinating. And let me see if I could recall it. In the first century, veiling signified some kind of social status. Is that correct?

Like a married citizen woman would veil, but like a slave woman wouldn't or something like that. And Paul just wants to level the playing field and just say, everybody should veil because certain women were finding freedom and then not veiling or something. And he's like, that's just, it's, can you, you wrote it, you explain it better than I would. I'm taking the position that uh i i believe i would take had i had been there and the women wanted to veil uh that the contention was who got to veil or whether women should veil at all so remember this is taking think about what i just said this is taking place in a house church where everybody's calling themselves brothers and sisters. It's a fictive family. And so, I mean, I could, and we get a reading on the Corinthians,

you say, oh, why don't you take off your veil, you know? And I would say, in your dreams. But we're brothers and sisters. We're at home. Paul! Tell her! Didn't it signify sexual availability, too, if you were unveiled? It did, yes. And so, I mean, there's so many problems with the idea of, that's what the veil meant, and freed women and prostitutes and slaves.

They were not allowed to veil because they were considered not virgins. They were not honorable, obviously. Their idea is like any of these women had been defiled and had sex outside of the proper honorable situation. So honorable matrons veil, but all these other people did not bail and they had no legal protection at least as far as the roman empire roman law was concerned and so they could they could sexually assault an unveiled woman and she couldn't prosecute her but but if she were veiled and she was supposed to be veiled she could could prosecute them. Yeah. So it was, it wasn't like, um, yeah, when we say sexual availability, it was, it was, there was no protection. That's more of the way to say it, that there was no protection. And, um, if I were in that church,

I wouldn't want to wear a veil, especially given some of the volatile stuff they said was going on there. And then Paul's saying, everybody, all women, all women veil. And I love it because that means that all women are new creatures in Christ and everybody's honorable. Interesting. And the translation of verse 10, I didn't realize it until I looked at your book and then look at the Greek. My translation says, this is why a woman should have a symbol of authority on her head. That's not what the Greek says. The word symbol of is not there, right? It's she should have authority over her head.

Is that, or how would you translate that verse? And why do we translate it with symbol? Do you want me to do it in a vernacular? It's to say women should make the call on this. Okay. Which is to say this would support what I said is that the women wanted to veil they didn't want to go to church to be sexual objects and this kind of thing you're I'm I'm a I'm a first generation convert right I'm I'm the first one of my family to become a Christian and I wanted to

and and for them to act like a person you know know, coming out of a culture like that would actually want to flaunt is kind of incredulous to me. I think true converts, especially women, are going to want to veil in this situation. And this is what I think the text is indicating, that the women actually want to be honorable in the worship service. in the worship service. And he's coming behind them. And not only coming behind them, but actually indicating that they're full participants in terms of praying and prophesying. And prophesying was very authoritative. All you have to do is read 1 Corinthians 14 to know that people prophesied and they drove, you know, some, some guy comes in and they drive him to his knees. He falls on his face because of what, because they confront him. Yeah. And this is, yeah, we want you doing it. You just got to cover your head when you do it.

This is where, yeah, I don't, you know, there's different forms of complementarianism, egalitarianism, if we even want to use those terms. But it does, I mean, you clearly have women prophets, women prophesying. To me, at the very least, the complementarian view that to me would be most credible is one that has male only elders, but women teaching and preaching because you have clearly women prophesying. because you have clearly women prophesying. So you almost have to say prophecy isn't like actually teaching or it's not authoritative or it's not, it's not akin to teaching the Bible or something. It's not,

you know, I heard one person say, I probably won't name their name, but you know, well, it's, it's kind of a word from the Lord, but it's not like a prepared,

you're not preparing a message, which I'm like, where do you, where do you, Hey, where do you get that too? Isn't direct word from the Lord more authoritative than you studying commentaries? So I don't know that, that, that seems,

I don't know how I'm still open. I'm still, you know, want to listen to that. But like the Breshears, Gary Breshears, Craig, Craig Blomberg, their, their kind of view of, I see a lot of exegetical credibility there. And I don't know if you want to go into like first timothy three you know uh the the qualification for overseer is a one woman man and that's i just talked to gary in fact the podcast might release next in this one but he's like right there you have to be a man you have to be married i said so jesus can be an elder he's like yeah jesus couldn't be an elder he's's not qualified. He's not married. Nor Paul, nor Timothy.

Right, right, right. Yeah. Yeah. And he's, he's very like, yeah, it says you have to be a husband and one wife. So. Yeah. Gary and I actually, at his invitation, yeah, we, we talked together, actually to Evan Wickham's church. I know. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We, we, we both, he called me in and said, you should hear what Sidney has to say. And, you know, he, he presented his view and I will say just again, we both, he called me in and said, you should hear what Sidney has to say. And, you know, he presented his view. And I will say just, again, understand Greek, understand how idioms work, and understand how grammatical gender works in Greek.

And then this passage is not gender specific. It's using idioms and it's using the masculine as the default gender. and it's using the masculine as the default gender. First of all, it says it's a trustworthy saying. Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task. That's whoever. This is one of the things that I talked about constantly, having things thrown into contradiction in that that says whoever.

There's a lot of passages that say whoever that these restrictions on women override. And it was just like it starts out with this general thing. That's me. If I desire to be an overseer, I have not done the big sin. I am not guilty of arrogance, not if men are not. I am not guilty of arrogance, not if men are not. And then it goes into using just masculine terminology as the Greek does. The Greek does use masculine pronouns here? Or is it like verse one, my translation says, if one aspires to be an overseer, he desires a noble work.

Is that a good? Yeah. I mean, this is one of the things is that translations will put in masculine pronouns that aren't there. I'm talking about the passage as a whole. We're looking at either if you're talking about the masculine singular, the masculine plural, that in general instructions, that's understood to be inclusive. The one woman man is an idiom. that's understood to be inclusive. The one woman man is an idiom. It's a set idiom that can be used for women. It's something that stands for faithfulness and would not exclude someone who's not married. That's how idioms work. Do we have evidence of one woman man being used to apply to women? Because in 1 Timothy 5, Paul uses a wife of one husband. So he does flip it around there, right? I forget where that is.

Oh, that's in the qualifications to be on the list. Right. Verse 5-9, she has been a wife of one husband. So he does know how to say it. I probably would confront that too and say we still got this idiom that it's about being faithful. I would certainly consider that as an alternative there as opposed to saying a woman who's been widowed and remarried could not be a part, then her husband died, couldn't be a part of that verse. I find that i'm skeptical of that reading okay i really am um especially since if a woman were barren and she and yet she was married and

widowed more than once that she would not be a part of this group and she has no relatives to take care of her i'm skeptical but this is a set phrase where a set idiom and just like within when proverbs and how uh the septuagint proverbs is translated in the septuagint it looks like it's all about men um and some people make that argument but really it the way the greeks would read that is you have a proverb in the masculine whether it's masculine singular masculine plural and it's understood to apply to women as well and so there's nothing you know the only thing that gives you pause to say is this is this not gender specific is that it turns to address women as a group and they say and so some people say well that's the the wives of elders or deacons or the wives of deacons, I think, in the context.

Or is this a group of women deacons? And what I would suggest is that women are just getting specific instructions here because the different genders. Let's zero in on women and give them some more specific instructions about how they're going to be relating in these roles. Okay. But there's nothing in here that, no activities in here that women wouldn't do in the general qualifications. Well, but of course a commentarian would say because of 1 Timothy 2, the able to teach would be ruled out because Paul said, not allowed to teach. I know you got lots of thoughts on that.

Not allowed to teach, yes. But it could be well that one may not be at that point in time, since things were kind of in an uproar in the women's culture at that point. since things were kind of in an uproar in the women's culture at that, at that point that what, but I would probably go according to individuals at that time, rather than a general instruction that there might be a, an individual who's, who's well qualified,

even though he's doing, but this now we're getting into how would you read that? But it sounds like he's well, number one, do we want to go there? Yeah, let's go. We have to cover. We can't have this conversation without covering 1 Timothy 2.

So I know there's a lot going on there. Is Timothy 2 really about a worship service? I just read that this morning in your book. Keep going. Well, I always knew it was because that's what my subheading said. That these are instructions for worship, instructions on worship. And usually taken, this is in a worship service. But immediately that kind of falls apart.

So why do you think it's a worship service? Well, there's instructions on prayer. And then it says, I want men everywhere, everywhere. That's in every place to pray, lifting holy hands with anger or disputing. And they say, it's a worship service. And I'm saying, no, it's not. There's no signal that this is a worship service. And you can if you want to take it. Did you think Paul wrote it?

Do you think he didn't write it? I really don't care. But I do think. no, I do care. But what I mean is for this argument, I would say let's put it in a Pauline context. At the very least, whoever wrote this understood Paul's writings well. And Paul's theology of prayer was everywhere at all times. It was never limited to a certain place, or it was on the river in your prayer closet, you know, everywhere. And at all times without ceasing. And that's what I would read these discussions on prayer by no means, and it specifically does not limit it to a place such as a house church,

or a once a week, this is what you, once a week you pray without anger or disputing. And what's being missed is that before Paul addresses women, he's hitting what's gone wrong with the men. And he's going to return to that later on the epistle. But the idea of anger and disputing is a big topic later on. And so the men, he's not saying men get to pray and women stay silent. What he's saying is, I want men to stop being angry and fighting and arguing, like I'm going to talk about later because we'll get to that. Okay. But let me talk to the women. And it's always a problem for saying this isn't a worship service to look at, say, get the women, get a general command. And it's about dressing.

And most of us are taking the position. This is confronting luxurious clothes as opposed to modesty. I think instructions on modesty are going to go too, but I have to agree. It looks like an emphasis that the idea of display of ostentatious clothing and hairstyles and stuff is a thing. And if you think that women were veiling, if this isn't a worship service, why isn't it talking about them wearing a veil? women were veiling. If this isn't a worship service, why isn't it talking about them wearing a veil? So wait real quick, the worship. So what about like three in three 15 when it kind of sums up,

I'm writing these things to you so that you know how to act in God's household, which is the church of the living God. So someone could say that that's kind of the overarching purpose of the letter. So everything is under that kind of rubric of here's how you're supposed to act in God's church. Is that where people get that this is a worship service? As if we went over the qualifications for elders, are we really talking about a worship

service there at any point? So it's, yeah. Okay. So it's not necessarily specific instructions for the gathering you're saying, but if you're a Christian, then you're part of God's household. So it's more of a general, like, here's a new family you belong to. Here's a new way of living, not here's instructions for the Sunday morning service. Yes, exactly. And I think you're going to be hard put to say that's what happened in chapter three. And I'm saying that it doesn't

fit the evidence in chapter two, that women should be dressing in the way he's describing everywhere. And they should be adorning themselves with good work at all times and all places, not just on Sunday morning. These are all times and all place commands. And then it goes in verse 11, it goes to the singular. And everybody says, oh, don't pay attention to the singular. Don't pay attention to the man behind the curtain. And it's like, no, you do. You do pay attention to the grammar. And what does it tell you? And I'm suggesting that when it says a woman should learn a woman singular should learn in quietness and submission. What you have there within that culture is a signal for a woman being homeschooled by her husband or her father.

And this is a one-on-one teaching situation. That's how women learn. Because I'll tell you what, Timothy was not going to be looked well upon if he tried to get wives or young women together in a little teaching group. That would not be appropriate at that time. If things are going wrong in the women's culture, how do you get at it? As Timothy, how does Timothy get at it and says, okay, instruct faithful men who are able to instruct other faithful people

in this case. And he's trying to correct the women's culture through instruction in the home. And that's where, that's why, you know, when you get childbirth and marriage passage and everything that should throw everyone off, they're trying to hold it together, but it doesn't hold together well. But if you've got a household context and a relationship between a wife and her husband, then the whole thing holds together very well. And that's the only direct command is that women should learn. He wants women to learn. And what I would suggest is you go back to 1 Timothy 1. He talks about the things that are going wrong specifically and says, okay, I wrote you, you know, I'm writing you about, you know, the false teaching and everything that's going on.

And that's what I left you there to correct. And I would say the whole thing is addressing the false teaching. And we can look elsewhere in the letter and see other things that talk about things that have gone wrong in the women's culture. We talked about the instructions on widows and them dressing luxuriously. Another thing is that he wants them to, if they're not going to be true to their vows and not behave appropriately, then he wants them to get married and what? Have children. He also addresses a concern about forsaking the marriage bed, you know, and these things have something to do with childbirth. Things are going wrong in the women's culture. He's addressing, this is a strategy for addressing them. He wants them homeschooled. When you say homeschooled, I mean, in that culture, women, unless you're like

a really high status woman, I mean, you wouldn't have had nearly the same education, public education as a man. Is that true? Absolutely true. You have a rare exception. Usually it would be the daughter of the teacher or daughter of a philosopher might take part in classes. But by and large, whatever women learned, they learned in the home. That was how women were educated in whatever way they were educated. People have tried to make the case that, you know how women were educated in whatever way they were educated people I've tried to make the case that you know women were literate But I mean maybe the literacy like you have in Afghanistan, you know, which is not beyond second grade education And so and to be to catch up to be brought up to speed

You know you need to be taught and he's placing the responsibility on the household. And then he's saying, but this is what I'm not permitting. And again, is this for all churches all time? Or is this for right now? pretty, if you think this is Pauline, Paul's clear. Am I saying this or is the Lord saying this? Is this what we're doing here now? Are we doing it in all the churches? He never says we're doing it in all the churches. He never said that this is a general command. This is what I'm doing right now. He doesn't say right now, but you could put that in and it would be perfectly at home within this whole, these are instructions that are geared to deal with this, these false teachings, you know, the myths that are circulating on you, the old wives tales. And so he says, now this is where it gets hairy. And I'm not sure how much I want to get into the hairy parts. But he says to teach, I'm not permitting, nor to exercise authority over a man, a woman, I'm not permitting a woman again authority over a man, a woman.

I'm not permitting a woman. Again, we're still in the singular. And if you're talking about women teaching the church, that's weird grammar. But if you're talking about a wife and a husband in that home situation, which I would say we're in, we're okay. We're good. This is a husband and wife. When he says to teach, that could be a moratorium on teaching, but this still could, since we're in the home, I'd say, you know, I'm not, not one, I'm not a permitting right now the women to take the teaching role in this situation.

And then when he said to authentic, did I say exercise authority? I shouldn't have said that because I think that's a translation. First of all, that would be, everyone tries to reduce that word to its semantic domain. You understand semantic domains, right? And so they say they're saying basically it belongs to the semantic domain of authority. So we could translate that as authority. Well, you know, that's wrong in the first place. This is a nuanced word. It's a hapax agamina that only occurs once in the New Testament.

What does it mean? How is it used? And I would say that instead of an authority word, this is a power word. It's a power word that has to do with force. And that force can be up to lethal force. Often it is lethal force. But, you know, it's like I've done a study of all the occurrences of this word. And every time it's done to another person, it forces them to do something they don't want to do.

It has it is never used for ministry to another person. Not once. Not once. What did I say? It can't mean now what it didn't mean then. This does not mean to be a senior pastor. This is this this has been used in cases where murder exists. Sometimes it's just forcing someone. Sometimes it's executing them. This could be rebellion. The reason it can't be authority is that sometimes it's an authority and sometimes it's not. And if it is an authority,

who it's their business to do this, then yay, we're all good. What about Kastenberger's argument that if I remember correctly, whenever you see this, she's two, like two terms paired with this kind of construction, they're either both positive or both negative.

They can't, one can't be positive and the other negative and since teaching is didascale or whatever it's just a normal word for teaching therefore authority here should also be positive well the thing false teaching is not positive and and um i think he's he's uh thinking that the t he doesn't trust the women's culture and what's coming out of it right now. So contextually, this would be this. He's saying there's a lot of myths and old wives tales floating around here and we want to nail them down. So I would contextually, we're talking about dealing with false teaching, among other things, and problematic practices.

And so authentane sometimes is positive okay so i yes uh sometimes it's positive sometimes it's negative so those who say it's always negative are wrong so let me tell you they say god does it and say yes and we're glad he does it i think i mean he does it to sodom and gomorrah it was destroyed and he does it, I think. I mean, he does it to Sodom and Gomorrah. It was destroyed. And he does it to the wicked and they perish. And so you can say that we're supposed to give that a positive appraisal. But I don't want to be the wicked.

I don't want to be in Sodom and Gomorrah. I don't want that to happen to me. So, yes, this is the case where it was killed. He killed and destroyed. The way I put it, too, is that so a lot of times if it doesn't have a personal object, it can also be positive. And so there's there's a thing where there's a letter to a bishop where he says, I want you to come in there and just authentane this matter. It reminds me of like a foot bugging. You're going to dominate this thing. Yeah, clean house. You know, and I like to say about it is that we want to eradicate illiteracy,

but illiterate's not so much. Did you say that in the book? I think you said that in the book. I might have. If I didn't, I said it elsewhere. It's my favorite line. Eradicate illiteracy, but we don't want to authenticate. We want to authenticate illiteracy, but not authenticate illiterate people. Yeah, that's right. Right. So this is really a good, I think, a good illustration of what the word does. Okay.

what the word does. Okay. And a lot, but you know, if you, if you have ultimate authority, if you're Caesar or you're a high ruler, you kind of have the right to do this, but it, you know, that's pretty much where the line is. The rest of the people who are not doing this over a thing per se, but are doing it to other people are inappropriate, inappropriate use of force. And so what would that mean with a woman? Well, it could mean that there it is. We don't know what the, what the context is, but if she was withholding sex in order to get around Genesis three, Paul would not be amused. And I could see you using that word for something like that. And there is evidence that women were avoiding sex in order to have children, but not have children.

Not have children, yeah. Cynthia, I've taken you over the hour a lot. You've given me so much to think about. And it's so fun to be able to like, yeah, it's just so fun. Like literally this morning, I'm reading your book and now I'm talking to the author and it's, wish I could do that with every book I read. So thank you so much for giving us so much to think about and really appreciate you and your ministry. And maybe one of these days we'll be able to meet up in person. Oh, I hope so. I appreciate you and your work here.

Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciate it. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.