1Tim 2:13
Beginning at 1 Timothy 2:13 we have a biblical rationale provided for this current ruling that amounts to something of a midrash on portions of Genesis 2:7—3:12. It can be seen as an illustrative paradigm (in this case a negative one) after the fact that provides an “inartificial proof” or further clinching warrant for the imperatives just given. In order for us to understand the use of the story of Adam and Eve here, certain factors not directly mentioned here are crucial. In the first place, according to Genesis 2:16-17, only Adam received the initial prohibition to avoid eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Nothing whatsoever is said about God instructing Eve at this juncture; indeed, she had not even been created yet. One is left to assume that it was Adam who told Eve about the prohibition, and apparently he did not do a very clear or good job of it.
1Tim 2:14
This leads to the next point: as 1 Timothy 2:13 indicates, Adam was first in creation, but as 1 Timothy 2:14 stresses, Eve was deceived and was the first in the fall. In fact, the text says that while Adam was not “deceived” (epatethe), Eve was “truly deceived” (exapatetheisa). Indeed, so deceived is she said to be that she “happened” or “entered into a state of transgression.” This theme of Eve’s deception is found also in 2 Corinthians 11:3 (cf. Sir 23:24), where Paul is suggesting that it could happen to any of the Corinthians, male or female. It is unlikely that Paul thought that falling prey to deception was an inherent flaw in women to which men were not subject. Notice that in Romans 3:12-20 Paul is quite ready to blame Adam for the fall. It is likely, as Jouette Bassler suggests, that there is a link here with the false teachers, who are viewed as deceivers (1 Tim 4:1; 2 Tim 3:13; cf. Tit 1:10), and women in Ephesus who are being deceived (2 Tim 3:5-7).
I suggest that the reason why Paul mentions that Adam was formed first, before he speaks about Eve, is to remind the audience of the context of the story in Genesis 2. That story is quite clear that Adam alone was formed and was present for God’s original instructions about what was prohibited. Eve was not there for proper divine instruction, and thus she was more susceptible to deception. Nothing is said here about the woman being more susceptible by nature to deception, unlike what we find in, for instance, Philo (QG 1.23.46).
The verb “truly deceived” here is an important one, and it seems to refer to what happens when one is misled about something one has been taught, or even when one is subject to being misled because one has not been properly taught in the first place. Notice that in the Genesis 3 story Eve tells the serpent that she is not even to touch the fruit—something that God never told Adam. But where did she get this idea? Surely we are to think that it either came from Adam or she made it up.
1Tim 2:15
The question then becomes, What is the connection between 1 Timothy 2:13-14 and 1 Timothy 2:15? Here, much depends on the translation. One could argue that it should be rendered “but she will be kept safe through childbearing,” seeing here a promise of a reversal of the curse on Eve of pain and danger in childbearing, if one is a good Christian woman. Unfortunately, the translation “be kept safe” is unlikely here. Our author uses an entirely different word for the idea of being kept safe (see 2 Tim 3:11; 4:18).
More weight should rather be given to the presence in the Greek text of the definite article “the” before the word “childbearing” (tes teknogonias). One must ask, “Which particular childbearing is meant?” especially since the verb is in the singular (“she will be saved”), and surely the answer is “Jesus, born of woman, born under the law” (as Gal 4:4 puts it). In other words, the curse on woman incurred in Eve is reversed through Mary. Human fallenness came through a woman, and so did human salvation. This was the view of many of the church fathers about this verse, not least because they recognized that the Pastorals elsewhere had strongly insisted that salvation was by grace through faith, not by producing offspring while maintaining a highly moral lifestyle! For example, we can point already in the early second century to Justin Martyr (Dial. 100) in support of a messianic reading of 1 Timothy 2:13, and more remotely we can also compare Ignatius, Ephesians 19.
There is, however, a problem with a purely messianic reading of 1 Timothy 2:15: gyne here in the singular ought to mean the same thing as it does in 1 Timothy 2:11, where it is a generic term for “woman.” It seems unlikely that Paul is saying that Mary in particular was saved through the childbearing of Jesus, so that the focus is on her being the type of which Eve is the antitype. Rather, I suggest that although the subject in 1 Timothy 2:15 surely is women in general (which would include Jesus’ mother), “the childbearing” is indeed a reference to a particular birth, that of Jesus. The point is that it was through woman that the fall came, and through woman redemption came as well. In support of this we note first that the following verb, “if they continue/remain,” is in the third person plural. Second, this coming into the world is alluded to at 1 Timothy 1:15 in the first trustworthy saying in this letter, which states emphatically that Jesus came to save sinners. Our own text here has made emphatic that Eve was indeed the first and paradigmatic sinner. Thus women, the daughters of Eve, who is said to “have happened into transgression” in this very text, are indeed saved through his coming, dying and rising again. It is highly unlikely that this text is about women being saved by producing progeny.
Of what relevance is all this to the discussion of women learning rather than teaching? Eve is an example of someone who could be deceived by a false teacher (in her case a serpent), precisely because she had not been properly instructed in the first place. This, I submit, speaks directly to the problem in Ephesus, where we have some high-status, well-to-do women, likely with some education, who are trying to assume the mantle of teaching before they have learned the apostolic message properly, and in all likelihood after they have already been misled by the false teachers. This view makes sense not only in light of the context of false teaching, but also in light of what else is said about women in this letter and in 2 Timothy, which includes the following: (1) 2 Timothy 4:19 refers to a ministry couple, Priscilla and Aquila, who apparently are once more in Ephesus, a place where previously they were known to have taught, indeed to have taught a church leader named Apollos (Acts 18:26). This reference becomes all the more pertinent if in fact Luke wrote this letter on Paul’s behalf. There had been at least one woman who had taught and taught well in Ephesus with Paul’s approval. Priscilla was someone who had been properly trained, presumably in Corinth, by the apostle himself and then left in Ephesus to help start some house churches there. (2) We are told of widows who pray night and day to God (1 Tim 3:5). Clearly Paul has no problems with women praying or even with their praying out loud in worship (as 1 Timothy 2:9 suggests), and indeed 1 Timothy 5:9-10 even suggests that already there were older widows in the church who appear to have served various ministerial functions. (3) In addition to this, in all likelihood 1 Timothy 3:11 speaks of deaconesses, and although there is a concern about how they speak (not with malice), they are not banned from speaking or teaching. (4) In Titus 2:3 Paul has already told older women to teach what is good to younger women.
The issue, then, in 1 Timothy cannot be teaching per se, or women teaching per se. Nor in light of the example of Priscilla can the matter be women teaching men. The issue, rather, is untrained and unauthorized women, who need to be learning, seeking to teach and indeed to domineer men. This situation Paul may see as a violation of the creation order, but even more to the point, he sees it as an abuse or an unauthorized use of power, power and authority that perhaps because these were high-status women (and especially if the meeting was being held in their own home), they assumed they already had. These are the women whom Paul is currently not allowing to teach, but neither does he rule out, if they did indeed learn and submit to the teaching, that they might one day be authorized to do so.
The passage concludes in 1 Timothy 2:15b with the affirmation that women, like men, must persevere in the faith, working out their salvation with fear and trembling, as Paul suggests in Philippians 2. Here this thought is expressed by reminding them that Jesus’ first coming will indeed save them at the eschaton, provided they continue to persevere in faith, love and holiness in the interim. Once again final salvation (note the future tense of “will be saved”) is linked closely with the behavior of Christians here and now as they stand between having been saved and still living in the hope of eternal life in the future. Paul, in 1 Timothy 5:3-16 and 2 Timothy 3:5-9, will have to continue to correct women in Ephesus, so we must think that this was a problem that did not readily go away. I will say more about this in due course.
Letters and Homilies for Hellenized Christians, Vol 1. A socio-Rhetorical Commentary on Titus, 1-2 Timothy and 1-3 John, Ben Witherington III (2006) pages 228-232