Not a lot of respect for men

ChubbyCherub said:

Well, it is unfortunate to me that a man is put in the position of leadership but still falls for the tactics of women regardless of the reasons or justifications they may give i.e. wants to make a woman happy at the expense of himself. How can he lead women in spiritual matters if his earthly happiness is forever tied to how his woman feels or the things she does knowing that they are not Christ focused? It seems silly and I just can't reconcile it! It would be like the blind leading the blind and it just doesn't make sense to me. There are times I wish I had an armchair for Jesus to sit in so He and I could have a 1:1 chat about all the mysteries of the bible!

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When I look into what the bible says about relationships, I view it as what is the perfect standard? I mean, we aren't ever going to be perfect, but understanding the standard would be key because it helps you pick out who is a terrible leader, vs someone you would want to follow.

The standard is Christ.

He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked. - 1 John 2:6

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So essentially, how Christ-like is that man? What are his fruits? Is he leading by serving just as Christ did? Is he leading by example? Is he guiding you to be in a stronger relationship with Christ? Is he correcting when necessary, uplifting when needed and putting others first above himself?

Now with all those questions in mind, re-read what I quoted from you from your last reply. Doesn't fit does it?

ChubbyCherub said:

Thank you very much.

They have not addressed Paul's comments re: Ephesus rather his at Corinth. They stated that Paul is not suggesting that women need to be quiet, submit or not have leadership or ministry roles in church but that it was contextual for the time and place Paul was instructing in Corinth.

Specifically, women in Corinth were leaders/owners of brothels and were used to positions of power within society and at home as they were the financial heads of the families. As a result, they were raucous at church which Paul felt was distracting and didn't allow for people to hear the message that was intended, hence, a set of societal rules laid out to assist a very specific situation.

They stated that Paul's words are misrepresented and misinterpreted because the verses are read out of context instead of read as a whole. I read the bible and didn't see where the information re: woman's job roles, financial status etc came from so was put into a position where I had to instruct the family to just 'trust' what was being taught at church. But, they are very educated and so this was not sufficient for them hence the quest for further information.

Regarding Pauls letter to Timothy re: Ephesus, I have not yet addressed this with my church given that we now see that Paul says the same about Ephesus and there is not an explanation regarding why the women, or exactly how the women, were behaving in whatever way initiated Pauls comments. I might possibly ask them but I have asked them so many things already and, much like this forum, I have to allow people to keep up with all the questions I fire off!

Many thanks!

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Thanks for sharing that bit of information. Essentially, your pastors/ministers are correct, even if I might say there are additional nuances that could be added to what they've already said. So, they're giving you some substantive inter-textual, cultural information, all of which is relevant to how we should be reading and drawing inferences from the written text. We can't expect everything that is relevant to our understanding of a letter or book of the Bible to be contained, and only contained, within that very letter or book.

So, taking this one step at at time, I think the first order of protocol for reading any document in the Bible, such as the 1st letter to Timothy, is for us to ask essential questions pertaining to its setting. Answers to these questions may or may not be reflected or addressed in the writing itself, or they may or may not be referred to extensively even if reflected or addressed.

The first hermeneutical question we have to ask is: who is Paul writing to, and where is this person located? What is the general social/cultural background of that place in which this addressee is working and what sort of challenges might this pose?

ChubbyCherub said:

Thank you very much.

They have not addressed Paul's comments re: Ephesus rather his at Corinth. They stated that Paul is not suggesting that women need to be quiet, submit or not have leadership or ministry roles in church but that it was contextual for the time and place Paul was instructing in Corinth.

Specifically, women in Corinth were leaders/owners of brothels and were used to positions of power within society and at home as they were the financial heads of the families. As a result, they were raucous at church which Paul felt was distracting and didn't allow for people to hear the message that was intended, hence, a set of societal rules laid out to assist a very specific situation.

They stated that Paul's words are misrepresented and misinterpreted because the verses are read out of context instead of read as a whole. I read the bible and didn't see where the information re: woman's job roles, financial status etc came from so was put into a position where I had to instruct the family to just 'trust' what was being taught at church. But, they are very educated and so this was not sufficient for them hence the quest for further information.

Regarding Pauls letter to Timothy re: Ephesus, I have not yet addressed this with my church given that we now see that Paul says the same about Ephesus and there is not an explanation regarding why the women, or exactly how the women, were behaving in whatever way initiated Pauls comments. I might possibly ask them but I have asked them so many things already and, much like this forum, I have to allow people to keep up with all the questions I fire off!

Many thanks!

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Keeping in mind the basic questions I prompted in my post above, apply these to the following video where New Testament scholar, Michael Bird, discusses the cultural meaning (and challenge ) of Artemis of the Ephesians in the city of Ephesus during the 1st century with Dr. Sandra Glahn. The content of the video encapsulates her book, Nobody's Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament (InterVarsity Press, 2023).

As you watch and listen to the discussion (and yes, I know, it's about 30 minutes---my apologies, but it'll be helpful for you) then think about how what they discuss may affect your evaluation of Paul's direction given to Timothy as he worked in his ministry and dealt with certain troublesome women in Ephesus.

2PhiloVoid said:

Women in general don't have to shut-up. Keep in mind that there are multiple (and often ignored or unnoticed) historical and cultural context in which Timothy was enmeshed in the city of Ephesus, and Paul was directing Timothy how to deal with uppity Ephesian women who thought they should displace men in leadership, even within the Church.

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This has nothing to do with "uppity" women and everything to do with the goddess Artemis. Women in ancient Ephesus had more prominent and influential roles compared to many other Greco-Roman cities, primarily due to the city's focus on the goddess Artemis. Women held high positions as priestesses in the powerful cult of Artemis, and some even held the influential civil office of prytanis. So in essence, Paul was pushing back on this cult rather than keeping women barefoot and pregnant.

Maria Billingsley said:

This has nothing to do with "uppity" women and everything to do with the videos Artemis. Women in ancient Ephesus had more prominent and influential roles compared to many other Greco-Roman cities, primarily due to the city's focus on the goddess Artemis. Women held high positions as priestesses in the powerful cult of Artemis, and some even held the influential civil office of prytanis. So in essence, Paul was pushing back on this cult rather than keeping women barefoot and pregnant.

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EXACTLY!! .... you've nicely restated the overall point I'm gradually building here. Thanks for contributing!

ChubbyCherub said:

Paul said that widows, specifically under the age of 60 years old, were prone to gossip, idleness etc. They needed to be steered towards marriage and not pushed onto the churches as a needless burden. They needed to have children as a way to redeem their fall thanks to Eve causing Adam to sin.

1 Timothy 2:11-15

11 A woman[a] should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man;[b] she must be quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women[c] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

Paul fails to note that Adam was not deceived but weak enough to go along with deception. How then can men be viewed as leaders or heads of household? Why should they teach when they can't learn? Men were responsible for the death of Jesus. Men were leaders, kings and rulers who brought their people to war and sin.

Men still believe that their vote matters. They still believe in medicine. They still listen to women who gossip and are led by uneducated women. A quote, "Happy wife, happy life," springs to mind.

Men seem to have lost their authority as 'head' straight out of the gate. Was Paul speaking from a place of wishful thinking?

I have serious doubts about men leading anything because they seem weak willed and weak minded.

Don't get me wrong. I wish this weren't the case. I read the bible and see that this shouldn't be the case. But what should be isn't reality so why are we supposed to pretend something is real that, time and time again, has been proved wrong or, at the very least, flawed?

If we are all sinners and we are all saved by grace, why do we women have to shut up and give birth to correct the error of Eve in addition to the sins of Adam?

Am I missing something here?

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Many biblical scholars and commentators do argue that the restrictions Paul wrote in 1 Timothy were specific to the cultural and religious context of Ephesus, where Timothy was ministering.
Ephesus was dominated by the cult of Artemis (a powerful goddess), whose worship included female priestesses and a belief system that sometimes elevated the woman over the man (as she was born first in their myth).
Blessings

ChubbyCherub said:

Thank you very much.

They have not addressed Paul's comments re: Ephesus rather his at Corinth. They stated that Paul is not suggesting that women need to be quiet, submit or not have leadership or ministry roles in church but that it was contextual for the time and place Paul was instructing in Corinth.

Specifically, women in Corinth were leaders/owners of brothels and were used to positions of power within society and at home as they were the financial heads of the families. As a result, they were raucous at church which Paul felt was distracting and didn't allow for people to hear the message that was intended, hence, a set of societal rules laid out to assist a very specific situation.

They stated that Paul's words are misrepresented and misinterpreted because the verses are read out of context instead of read as a whole. I read the bible and didn't see where the information re: woman's job roles, financial status etc came from so was put into a position where I had to instruct the family to just 'trust' what was being taught at church. But, they are very educated and so this was not sufficient for them hence the quest for further information.

Regarding Pauls letter to Timothy re: Ephesus, I have not yet addressed this with my church given that we now see that Paul says the same about Ephesus and there is not an explanation regarding why the women, or exactly how the women, were behaving in whatever way initiated Pauls comments. I might possibly ask them but I have asked them so many things already and, much like this forum, I have to allow people to keep up with all the questions I fire off!

Many thanks!

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The pattern in Paul's letters is that the trigger/reason to write about a certain subject may be a concerning situation in that specific church/fellowship, but the instructions for Christian conduct are universal, unless explicitly stated otherwise.

E.g. in 1 Corinthians 5 Paul discusses a serious case of immorality occurring in that church; how to deal with such a case and how to uphold standards of holiness is universal. In the TNK/OT God gave varying instructions to the Israelites on how to deal with the nations to Joshua, but how to behave once they conquered and inherited the land was universal.

So the reason why Paul addresses head-covering in 1st Corinthians is likely because an issue with that had arisen (possibly women removing their head-covering), yet the instruction on how to pray/prophesy would be expected to be universal. This pattern can be noticed in e.g. 1 Corinthians 14:34–35: the background/trigger is expected to be a local issue at that time, but Paul highlights the alignment of his instruction with Torah (=the Law) as universal guideline.

E.g. when some masters treated their slaves badly this could have been a reason to admonish the masters to the treat their slaves well, but it's nonsensical to suggest the instruction for proper conduct for a master or slave is ONLY for that local church with that issue.

Yet since the 1960's with the rise of Feminism and consequently the push for egalitarian theology (removing remnants of Patriarchy) we see exactly that. Unique exceptional alleged circumstances in the addressed churches are presented to argue that Paul's instructions on marriage, women in churches or even homosexuality are ONLY applicable to the local unique situation; basically neutralising their universal applicability. There are a few problems with this approach:

• Paul's text itself does not give any clues that the instructions for model behaviour are local-only
• it ignores the fact Paul gives general theological arguments that are time/culture independent (this includes the Torah reference, but also creation order, deception order, etc.)
• it doesn't work for 1 Peter as this is not addressed to a particular church - yet its message is identical to Paul's on the issue of marriage/women's role
• the very fact the entire Christian church throughout history had a fairly unanimous view, but all of a sudden under influence of (secular) Feminism since the 1960's the rising pressure for 're-interpretation' to make the Bible compatible with 20-21 st century Western values should be a red flag.

To make practised homosexuality acceptable in churches nowadays a similar argument is applied: in those days there were no committed loving relationships between men, so Paul's prohibitions (fully in line with Torah) of course ONLY would apply to non-committed casual relationships/hook-ups, so Paul certainly would approve of those committed loving homosexual relationships today. This approach conveniently makes an assumption not present in the text itself in a desperate effort to neutralise the principle already present in Torah.

Suffice to say I find these approaches highly speculative and dependent on conjecture - wishful thinking to suit a particular (new) agenda.

You mention 'women in Corinth were leaders/owners of brothels and were used to positions of power within society and at home as they were the financial heads of the families.' ... I would submit that is highly unlikely to be true for that church as a substantial part of the Corinthian church were Jews who practised their religion as such previously (you can find clues for that in the text of 1 Corinthians).

Yes, Yeshua was revolutionary in that He encourages women to follow Him, to listen to His teaching (Mary), to speak privately with a woman (the woman at the well in Samaria) - and Paul presumes women are praying and prophesying - the Holy Spirit is poured out on all; yet it's not a cultural conformist move by Yeshua to ONLY appoint males as the 12 - that's intentional.

E.g. great effort is made by egalitarians to try to argue that in 1 Timothy 2:12 Paul doesn't really mean women shouldn't have 'authority' over men, but only 'should not usurp/seize authority from men'. I.e. so supposedly when a bishop/elder gives that authority to a woman she is completely fine wielding authority over men. But this overlooks the very first part of that verse that also says a woman should not teach a man; and the verse before that were Paul instructs Timothy a woman should learn 'in subjection', and the verse after that (v 13) where a universal creation order argument is used, and the fact Timonthy's task was to set-up/organise several churches and v. 8 clearly has a universal nature ... Egalitarian reading makes a complete mess of this section.

The Bible in both TNK/OT and NT is Patriarchal, but divine love takes the sting and strive out of that - as it does for master/slave relationships or those between parents and children.

Be blessed sister - and welcome to correct me in case you detect an error in my thinking !