Link affirming women's ordination. 'Short read.'

[Tigger45]

I admit I waffle on the subject. I know posting this is this forum won't typically give the opposing arguements but those discussions tend to become unproductive due to the tone of many posters. I thought it would make for an interesting discussion none the less.

Why Certain Words Are Left Out Of Our English Bibles

 

[Gregorikos]

Keith Giles is a wonderful scholar. I'm a big fan. He is exactly correct about Junia, and I wish he had said more. But then he says something referring to 1 Tim 3:11 that I think is not quite right.

However, the word here is not the usual word for “wife” in the Greek. It’s actually the word for “women”

This is only partially correct. In fact, the word here is the usual word for wife. I'm sure he didn't mean to say it quite that way. But he is absolutely correct that it is the word for "women."

The fact is, in Greek there is no word for wife or for husband. They simply used the words man and woman, and just as we refer to our spouse as "my woman" or "my man", so did Greek. So he is correct that 1 Tim 3:11 does say "women" and it is bias on the translators part to assume that it means "wives." And if they do so without a footnote it is inexcusable. (Such as NKJV)

There is another place this word for wife plays out very much in our favor. The word is used only 15 verses prior to 1 Timothy 3:11-

I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. 1 Timothy 2:12 (NIV)

The word for "woman" in 1 Timothy 2:12 is exactly the same word as 1 Timothy 3:11. Why do translators assume it means "woman" in 2:12 but "wife" only 15 verses later?

And in fact, I think we should flip the two. 1 Timothy 2:11-15 is speaking about a married couple. 1 Timothy 3:11 is speaking about the women that were deacons. (Like Phoebe in Romans 16:2)

Thus the Common English Bible:

A wife should learn quietly with complete submission. I don’t allow a wife to teach or to control her husband. Instead, she should be a quiet listener. 1 Timothy 2:11-12 (CEB)

In the same way, women who are servants in the church should be dignified and not gossip. They should be sober and faithful in everything they do. 1 Timothy 3:11 (CEB)

 

[mkgal1]

Thank you for sharing that, @Tigger45 . I felt sort of betrayed when I first learned of bias in interpretations. This is such a great article that shows just how much changes when even just one word gets left out of the interpretive text (as the one example used demonstrates).

 

[Tigger45]

Back in the early 1990’s I was a brand new born again Christian attending an ELCA congregation. They brought in a female associate pastor and it was just to much for my personal convictions at the time. Mind you I was witnessed to and mentored by a very conservative Christian. God bless his heart because he was able to help this atheistic leaning agnostic to receive the historic Jesus Christ as my Lord and the Bible as the Word of God. It wasn’t until about eight years ago that we started visiting a congregation that one of their three pastors was female. I allowed myself to tolerate it by telling myself “Well at least there is a male as senior pastor.” Of course on a worldly level a woman could be a gifted speaker, organizer and care giver but what I couldn’t dismiss is how often she was prophetic. Now I’m the more mystically minded one in our marriage but my wife who’s temperament is more grounded to earth could see it too. It’s hard for me to consider the gift of prophecy to be anything other than from God. I guess ‘Teaching an old dog new tricks.” Is a slow process because I’m still “On the fence” concerning women’s ordination but I would be open to it if it was a biblical truth.

 

[Gregorikos]

I allowed myself to tolerate it by telling myself “Well at least there is a male as senior pastor.”

@Tigger45 that is such a common belief! Many years ago I heard from someone I respected, "I believe a woman can be a pastor, just not the Senior pastor." That sounded good... even generous! "I'll allow that women can be almost anything!" That's exactly what I believed for a very long time.

I've been thinking about this a lot for the last seven years, and I think 1 Timothy 2:12 is the only verse in the Bible that can be used to support that idea. If you can think of any others please let me know.

Now first of all, there is no such thing in Scripture as a "senior pastor". And even if there were, applying 1 Tim 2:12 to church leadership doesn't fit the passage well at all.

I want to share a video if that's OK. It's Dr Cynthia Westfall speaking with Pastors Bruxy Cavey, Bec Thomson, and Karmyn Bokma of the Meeting House Church in Toronto. Westfall's exegesis of 1 Tim 2 was eye-opening for me. It starts at about 12:00 in the video (which later gets into Eph 5 and 1 Cor 11) I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

[youtube]

[/youtube]

 

[Tigger45]

@Tigger45 that is such a common belief! Many years ago I heard from someone I respected, "I believe a woman can be a pastor, just not the Senior pastor." That sounded good... even generous! "I'll allow that women can be almost anything!" That's exactly what I believed for a very long time.

I've been thinking about this a lot for the last seven years, and I think 1 Timothy 2:12 is the only verse in the Bible that can be used to support that idea. If you can think of any others please let me know.

Now first of all, there is no such thing in Scripture as a "senior pastor". And even if there were, applying 1 Tim 2:12 to church leadership doesn't fit the passage well at all.

I want to share a video if that's OK. It's Dr Cynthia Westfall speaking with Pastors Bruxy Cavey, Bec Thomson, and Karmyn Bokma of the Meeting House Church in Toronto. Westfall's exegesis of 1 Tim 2 was eye-opening for me. It starts at about 12:00 in the video (which later gets into Eph 5 and 1 Cor 11) I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

[youtube]

[/youtube]

Thanks I also just watched a video by NT Wright using the same arguements for women’s ordination.

 

[bekkilyn]

Thank you for sharing that, @Tigger45 . I felt sort of betrayed when I first learned of bias in interpretations. This is such a great article that shows just how much changes when even just one word gets left out of the interpretive text (as the one example used demonstrates).

That feeling of betrayal is so true. We often grow up thinking that the people who translate the bible are doing so without any external social or political motivations...that they are just plainly translating from one language to another and have the expertise to be able to determine how to translate the meanings of words that are not in both languages without intentional bias.

And then to come to find out later that it's not true and that no translation can be trusted when it comes to certain topics such as women, and then you begin to wonder just what else is intentionally mistranslated for some agenda.

I still feel betrayed in some sense because the harmful effects still continue to harm and deceive.

Unrelated Note: How come we can't "like" posts anymore?

 

[mkgal1]

That feeling of betrayal is so true. We often grow up thinking that the people who translate the bible are doing so without any external social or political motivations...that they are just plainly translating from one language to another and have the expertise to be able to determine how to translate the meanings of words that are not in both languages without intentional bias.

And then to come to find out later that it's not true and that no translation can be trusted when it comes to certain topics such as women, and then you begin to wonder just what else is intentionally mistranslated for some agenda.

I still feel betrayed in some sense because the harmful effects still continue to harm and deceive.

Unrelated Note: How come we can't "like" posts anymore?

Exactly!

Hmmmm .... that's new (where we can't "rate" posts anymore. "Gift" seems to have taken that place).

 

[bekkilyn]

Exactly!

Hmmmm .... that's new (where we can't "rate" posts anymore. "Gift" seems to have taken that place).

"Gift" has always been there along with the ratings.

 

[mkgal1]

"Gift" has always been there along with the ratings

I guess I was never looking for it....the "gift" option - so I just never even noticed it there.

 

[Tigger45]

The ratings function seems to be just a glitch. In some forums it’s still functional.

 

[Dave-W]

Thank you for sharing that, @Tigger45 . I felt sort of betrayed when I first learned of bias in interpretations. This is such a great article that shows just how much changes when even just one word gets left out of the interpretive text (as the one example used demonstrates).

And it is reason we believe the inerrant inspiration exists only in the original autographs; not in any later translations.

 

[Dave-W]

We often grow up thinking that the people who translate the bible are doing so without any external social or political motivations...that they are just plainly translating from one language to another and have the expertise to be able to determine how to translate the meanings of words that are not in both languages without intentional bias.

Translation can be such a very complex process. Human bias is bound to creep in at every point. In order to accurately understand what is being said one must be immersed in not only the original language of the author but the mindset and cultural understanding/backdrop of the original audience.

While that is difficult enough with Greek of 2000 years ago, at least it is in the same language family as our own: Indo-European. The problem only gets worse going from a Semitic language of 3500 years ago. (Pentateuch) Much of the ancient Hebrew writings are in the form of poetry, and has poetic and sometimes prophetic imagery to deal with. Add to that the fact that Hebrew has at least 4 different levels of meaning (common to all Semitic languages**) that Indo-European languages cannot handle at all.


**. The Arabic of the Koran has 7 layers of meaning for each word and sentence.