New Testament Teachings : Part 2

Woman; Man's Equal
by Thomas Webster

(Page 6 of 11)

In the passage first quoted in this chapter, Paul gives explicit directions for the manner in which women should be arrayed while speaking in the Church. Since, then, there can be no contradiction in the Word of God, and we have positive proof that women did speak in public assemblies by permission of the apostles, nothing remains but to reconcile the two texts so apparently contradictory, by ascertaining to what kind of a public assembly the apostle had reference in the text last quoted. By reference to the verses preceding this text in the fourteenth chapter of First Corinthians, it will be seen that the apostle is pointing out the impropriety and unprofitableness of speaking in unknown tongues; and of the contention and disorder that then existed at Corinth. False teachers had caused dissension and tumults in the Church; and, besides, the whole system of Christianity was violently assailed by both the Jews and the pagans. The disciples at Corinth were in the midst of a great controversy. According to Eastern ideas, it was an outrage upon propriety and decency, not only for a woman to take part by publicly asking questions, or teaching in any such disorderly assembly, but even for her to be present therein. To avoid the very appearance of evil, they were to absent themselves from these contentious meetings because it was a shame for a woman to speak or contend in such riotous assemblies. It is more than probable that Christian women had done so prior to this; and therefore Paul warns them against such improprieties; not, however, forbidding them to pray or prophesy in the Church, providing they "covered their heads." The Gospel proclaims an equal freedom to all; Paul earnestly asserting (Gal. in, 28), that "there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." Nevertheless, lest the cause of God should be hindered by women asserting their Christian liberty, by speech or action, he desired them to comply with the common usages of the society in which they lived, where those usages were not in themselves immoral or contrary to the Word of God. Kindred to I Cor. xiv, 34, 35, and referring to the same thing, is I Tim. ii, 11, 12: "Let the women learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence." For a woman to attempt any thing either in public or private that man claimed as his peculiar function, was strictly prohibited by Roman law; and Christian women, as well as men, were to be submissive to the "powers that be." Those who contend, from their rendering of these texts, that women are prohibited by them from taking part in the public worship of God, to be consistent, should also insist that they must not enter the house of God at all; because they are as strictly charged by Paul to remain at home and learn in silence from their husbands, as to refrain from speaking.

Now, if women are to be silent in the Church; that is, if they are neither to pray, speak, nor sing in public - for singing is certainly one method of conveying instruction to those who hear, and is therefore teaching them how to ascribe praise to God - if they are, upon Scriptural authority, to know nothing but what they may learn from their husbands at home, - then our whole system of civilized education with regard to women is out of place; we had better borrow a leaf from the Turks or Chinese. Girls here are sent to school, and encouraged to exert their mental energies to the utmost in acquiring knowledge. Both mothers and daughters are taken to church, and if they have tuneful voices they are expected to sing; all of which is manifestly improper and unchristian, if women are to receive all religious instruction from their "husbands at home" only, and in silence. The taking of women to church, or indeed out of the house, therefore, is exposing them to the temptation of hearing and receiving instruction from unauthorized lips; for - fearfully depraved though it may be in the sight of some - women are quite as prone as men to listen to what is told them and to remember what they hear, and - worse still - to reason out difficult problems for themselves.

And what is to be done for widows, or poor women who have never been blessed with husbands? Are they to go down to death in heathenish darkness, because the genial light of a husband's countenance has ceased to shine upon them, or, perhaps, has never done so? Must unmarried women forever continue in ignorance of the glorious Gospel of Christ, because they have no husbands to teach them? As girls, according to such a rendering, they ought not to have learned any thing; for a father's teaching - if it were proper for him to give it - and a husband's might differ widely. Besides, what is to be done for those women who are blessed with husbands incapable of teaching them; or, as is notoriously so frequently the case, who choose rather to spend their time in places of disreputable character than at their homes with their families!

Such a rendering of these texts as is frequently given, and the homilies derived therefrom, are an outrage upon common sense. They are at variance with the direct teachings of St. Paul, and contrary to what the Scriptures prove to have been his practice. Surely, none will dare to accuse the apostle of inconsistency; and yet we have his own testimony that Phoebe was a "servant of the Church at Cenchrea;" that is, she was a deaconess, having a charge at Cenchrea. Priscilla, quite as much as Aquila, was Paul's helper in "Christ Jesus," acknowledged by him as such. Priscilla was associated with Aquila in "expounding the way of God more perfectly to Apollos." (Acts xvii, 62.) Strange that the great Apollos should receive religious instruction from a woman; stranger still, if it were contrary to the will of God, that she was permitted to give it! Why was she not severely rebuked for her presumption, and put in her place, and taught to keep silence, as becometh a woman? On the contrary, creditable mention is made of the fact that she did instruct him, and that through that instruction he was made useful to the world; and all this upon the authority of inspiration, without one word of censure as to her unwomanliness. Over and over again, Paul names her in his salutations.

In Philippians iv, 3, he entreats help for certain women, counting them as fellow-laborers. "Help," says he, "those women which labored with me in the Gospel." Honorable mention, too, is made by name of Tryphena, Tryphosa, and of the beloved Persis, who "labored much in the Lord." Philip had four daughters which "did prophesy" (Acts xxi, 19); and we nowhere hear of their being forbidden to do so. If Paul, influenced as he was by the Holy Spirit, had designed to prevent women from attending religious meetings, or taking a public part therein, when there would he have allowed all this laboring and prophesying and instructing to go on? Instead of stopping it, however, he at different times commends Phoebe and her sister-laborers to the kind regards of other Churches. Let the utterances of Paul be properly and fairly interpreted, and it will be manifest that men and women are one in Christ Jesus. Decidedly, it is wrong for a woman to usurp authority over the man; and just as decidedly wrong is it for a man to usurp authority over the woman. According to history, the office of deaconess continued until between the eleventh and twelfth centuries, when, the midnight of the Dark-Ages having come, it was abolished in both the Greek and Latin Churches. Which sex usurped authority in that case?

Source: New York: Nelson And Phillips. 1873