1. Image of God: Ruling / Child bearing
Because the dividing difference between men and women is believed to be ruling and childbearing, the only role available for women in patriarchy is that of a wife and mother. Complementarism continues Luther’s tradition of assigning motherhood as the only vocation available for women, as seen in Knight’s essay The Family and the Church [in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood].
God relates the effect of the
curse respectively to that portion of His creation mandate (as already
established in Genesis 1 and 2) that most particularly applies to the woman on
the one hand and to the man on the other hand. God has said to them: ”Be
fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over… every
living thing that moves on the earth. (Genesis 1.28) Now he relates the curse
to that aspect of the creation mandate that is the particular responsibility of
the woman and of the man and in so doing indicates the particular role that He
has determined each is to fulfill. … In short, God speaks about what is unique
to her as a woman, namely, being a mother and a wife… Then he delineates what
is the main calling for man, namely, the responsibility of breadwinner and
provider for his wife and family.[1]
Knight
finds the roles by dividing Genesis 1:28 into two categories and assigning
“being fruitful” to the woman and “ruling” to the man, which puts the woman on
par with the animals for they were told to be fruitful, but not to rule due to
their lack of reason (Gen. 1:21-22).[2]
Patriarchy denies women are human, wherefore when it's ideology is imposed on the Bible, women cease being humans in our theology.
2. Leadership: Leader / Servant
"Servant leadership" claims to make all men servants, but because the servant leader serves by leading, the concept makes the man the leader and the woman the servant. In Matthew 20 Jesus refuted the concept of servant leadership when he told the disciples that they ought to seek to become servants instead of rulers who exercise authority over others.
Jesus called them together and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave- just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Matt 20:24-28, NIV).A slave does not exercise authority over those whom he serves. The only role of a slave is to serve. If a man exercises authority over his wife, he is no longer a servant, he is a ruler.
Instead of serving by leading, we should seek to lead by serving, for we should all serve another through love.
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. The entire law is summed up in a single command: "Love your neighbor as yourself." If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other (Gal 5:13-15 NIV).
3. Submission: Command / Submit
Just as with leadership, submission is divided into those who command and those who submit.
Complementarians acknowledge that Ephesians 5:21 must mean mutual submission because of the word allelon (“one another”), but because they give hypotasso the meaning “yield to authority,” Piper and Grudem [in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood] must create a mutual submission which is experienced in different ways.
But even
if Paul means complete reciprocity (wives submit to husbands and husbands
submit to wives), this does not mean that husbands and wives should submit to
each other in the same way. The key
is to remember that the relationship between Christ and the church is the
pattern for the relationship between husband and wife. Are Christ mutually
submitted? They aren’t if submission means that Christ yields to the authority
of the church. But they are if submission means that Christ submitted himself
to suffering and death for the good of the church. That, however, is not how
the church submits to Christ. The church submits to Christ by affirming His
authority and following his lead. So mutual submission does not mean submitting
to each other in the same way. Therefore,
mutual submission does not compromise Christ’s headship over the church and it
should not compromise the headship of a godly husband. [1]
Since
hypotasso does not mean “yield to
authority,” Piper and Grudem’s argument is invalid, but there is also another fallacy
in their argument: the church shows her devotion to Christ by willingly
sacrificing themselves, whether through life or death, due to their love for Christ (Phil 1:20), which is the
devotion and love Christ showed to the church when He willingly died to make
the church holy and blameless (Eph. 1:4; 5:27). When we give hypotasso the meaning “co-operation,” we get
a one flesh unity of a head and body in which mutual submission is leads love and respect (Eph. 5:21, 33).[2]
Yet, complementarians point to the fact that the Bible tells wives
to submit and husbands to love as evidence that Ephesians 5:21 cannot teach
mutual submission (hypotassomenoi
allelois).[3] Although it is true that the Bible
doesn’t explicitly tell wives to love (agape)
their husbands,[4] the New
Testament tells believers to love each other (agapate alleleous).[5]Since the husband is also a brother, a wife should love her husband just as he
loves her, for the instructions given to the married cannot conflict with the
rest of the Bible. Hence, if a wife must love her husband, a husband must submit to his wife, especially since it it is explicitly mentioned in Ephesians 5:21.
4. Teaching: Teacher / Student
Because of 1 Timothy 2, teaching is divided into male teachers and female students.
The medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas wrote in the 13th century:
The apostle says: “Let women keep silence in the
churches,” and “I suffer not a woman to teach.” Now this pertains especially to
the grace of the word. Therefore the grace of the word is not becoming to
women. … First and chiefly, on account of the condition attaching to the female
sex, whereby women should be subject to man, as appears from Genesis 3:16. Now teaching and persuading publicly
in the church belong not to subjects but to prelates (although men who are
subjects may do these things if they be so commissioned, because their
subjection is not a result of their natural sex, as it is with women, but of
some thing supervening by accident). Secondly, lest men’s minds be enticed to
lust, for it is written (Sirach 9.11): “Her conversation burneth as fire.”
Thirdly, because as a rule women are not perfected in wisdom, so as to be fit
to be intrusted with public teaching.”[1]
We find the same idea repeated in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.
Also George W. Knight
III recognizes that 1 Cor 11:3-16 allows women to pray and to prophesy in his
essay The Family and the Church, but
he views 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 as a prohibition for women to teach in a church
setting.
The
context of 1 Corinthians 14 is speech. (Laleo
is used twenty-four times in chapter 14.) In verses 1-25 Paul explains why the
Corinthians should desire to prophesy rather than to speak in tongues; in
verses 26-40 he explains the proper way of prophesying and speaking in tongues.
Moreover, Paul considered prophesying, which both men and women participated
in, equivalent to teaching, for he wrote, “But one who prophesies speaks [laleo] to men for edification [oikodome] and exhortation [paraklesis] and consolation… For you can
all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all may be exhorted [parakaleo]” (Cor 14:3, 31, NAS). The
purpose of their gathering together, the psalms, teachings, tongues,
revelations and interpretations, was edification (oikodome, v. 26). Therefore prophesy was not distinguished from
teaching as to its purpose. In addition, exhortation (paraklesis) is equivalent to declaring divine truths - such as the
gospel, as seen in Acts 13:15-52, Hebrews 13:22, and 1 Thessalonians 2:2-3 -
and people are expected to learn as a result. Since prophesying is a form of
teaching, it is impossible that Paul excluded women from teaching, and
consequently, the evaluation of prophesy.
This is seen
in Paul's treatment of the gifts in 1 Corinthians 11-14, where women are
excluded only from speaking in church (1 Corinthians 14:34-5) where
congregational "teaching" is involved (1 Corinthians 14:26; notice
that the items listed in verse 26 correspond with the subjects dealt with in
verses 27 and 35 [with only the first item, "a psalm," not dealt with
in these verses] and in particular notice that "teaching" [NASB] in
verse 26 is the one-word description for the "speaking" Paul will
deal with when it comes to women in verses 34-35). These women are recognized
as properly participating in praying and prophesying, for example, but are only
asked not to throw off the cultural sign of their submission when they do so (1
Corinthians 11:1-6).[1]
Knight
does not explain how the "one-word description" of
"teaching" can be "speaking" (laleo) in 1 Corinthians 14:34, considering the word is connected to
both tongues and prophecy three times in verses 27-29. Neither does he have a
reason why women should learn (manthano)
at home when the purpose of prophecy is that all may learn (manthano) at church (v. 31).
5. Church: Pastor / Laity
Leading in the church is reserved for men, but as a result, just as with the image of God, women are removed from the church because the ministries that are reserved for men can be done by all.
Weinrich [in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood] observes correctly that it was during the patristic and medieval periods that “patterns of conduct and ecclesial behavior were developed and solidified,” and that the fathers of the Reformation adopted the medieval practice of excluding women from the clergy “without question.”[1]
Martin Luther (d.1547) consistently maintained a
priesthood of all believers (especially on the basis of 1 Peter 2:9). This
common priesthood possesses the right and power to exercise all “priestly
offices” (teach, preach, baptize, administer the Eucharist, bind and loose sin,
pray for others, sacrifice, judge doctrine and spirits). Yet, Luther habitually
combines 1 Corinthians 14:34 with Genesis 3:16 to assert that women are
excluded from the public exercise of the common priesthood. In view of the
“ordinance and creation of God” that women are subject to their husbands, Paul
forbade women “to preach in the congregation where men are present who are
skilled in speaking, so that respect and discipline may be maintained.”
However, if no man is present to preach, then “it would be necessary for the
woman to preach.” For Luther, the apostolic prohibition of 1 Corinthians 14:34
was determinative.[2]
But
if Genesis 3:16 does not describe what should be, why did Luther connect the
verse with 1 Corinthians 14:34 to affirm that women were excluded from the common
priesthood? Because he followed tradition
and not all traditions follow the Bible.
Luther’s
exclusion of women has it’s origin in a tradition begun by Tertullian (145-220).
Karen Jo Torjesen describes Tertullian’s vision of the church as an essentially
Roman institution.
Tertullian’s description
of the Christian community dramatically marks the transition of the model of
the church from the household or private association to the body politic. With
him the church became a legal body (corpus
or societas, the term the Romans used
for the body politic) unified by a common law (lex fidei, “the law of faith”) and a common discipline (disciplina, Christian morality). For
Tertullian the church, like Roman society, united a diversity of ethic groups
into one body under the rule of one law… Tertullian conceived the society of
the church as analogous to Roman society, divided into distinct classes or
ranks, which were distinguished from one another in terms of honor and
authority.[3]
Only those who were full members of the political
body could possess ius docendi (the legal right to teach) and ius baptizandi (legal right to baptize).
Women could not be full members and therefore they were excluded from the
clergy. But Tertullian excluded women also from the laity, for although the
laity could perform the legal functions in the absence of the clergy, women
could not.
“It is not permitted to a woman to speak in the church; but
neither (is it permitted her) to teach, nor to baptize, nor to offer, nor to
claim to herself a lot in any manly function, not to say (in any) sacerdotal
office.”[4]
Weinrich considers Tertullian “a representative voice” of the universal
church of the second century,[5]
but he cannot do so without excluding women from the church altogether.
In conclusion, when we try to give men authority the Bible doesn't give or recognize, we end up making the woman an inferior creature who is relegated to a life resembling the animals. Such is the goal of patriarchy, but it cannot be the goal of the church.
It's time to bring back biblical equality.
[1] Piper and Grudem, 347.
[2] Ortlund disagrees with Knight, ”Further, Moses
doubtless intends to imply the equality of the sexes, for both the male and
female display the glory of God’s image with equal brilliance: “… in the image
of God he created him; male and female he created them.” This is consistent
with God’s intention, stated in verse 26, that both sexes should rule. “…and
let them rule…” (Piper and Grudem,
97).
[1] Piper and Grudem, 62-63.
[2] “Marriage ought to allow for the growth of authentic
love between man and woman. This love should evolve as a mixture of greater
humanness between the partners (you could also call this friendship), sexual
intercourse, and the procreation of the other human beings. This deep and
meaningful love is devoted to the welfare of the other.” (L. Richard Lessor, Love and Marriage and Trading Stamps
[Argus Communications, 1971], 10).
[3] Piper and Grudem, 199.
[4] In Titus 2:4 Paul uses philoandros and philoteknos. Not
agape.
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