Nothing but Faddish Songs! A Musical Meditation

He had not been brought up in a church-going family. In fact, his life prior to conversion had been, using his own words, that of a "profligate and libertine." Indeed he was one of the most despicable kinds of folk on the planet - a slave trader! Yet he was found by God even in that blackness. He was forever grateful to the Messiah for his grace. He had a lot of growing to do in the Lord.  Some of his old evils were shed more slowly than others.  And he, like us, made excuses but change he did.

He became a non-conventional proclaimer of the Word of Christ. Because of his background he was inclined to minister to those looked down upon by proper church folk. Part of the power of he developed in preaching was directly traceable to the fact that he courageously broke with with preaching conventions of the day and spoke freely of God's power in his own life.

You know him through the rich spiritual treasure he has left western Christianity. What you probably do not know is that his music was as cutting edge, and contemporary, as was his preaching style. Against the formal 'high church' tradition of the Church of England he put the good news in simple everyday language.  He sang that message to what were considered "pop tunes" that people would sing in the local bar with intoxicated friends.

While preachers like George Whitefield left the Anglicans, John Newton stayed.  For that, he endured frequent harsh criticism from traditionalists for his preaching and musical innovations. He was the subject of denunciations for tampering with sacred worship practices and traditions and promoting irreverent worship styles.

You no doubt remember many of his irreverent tunes.  Today, ironically, they are no longer thought of as faddish or unfit for congregational worship as they were in his day.  Now they are considered the classical style for hymnody, the kind that many traditional church members find comfort in. He no longer offends as he did 250 years ago.

Newton gave us such cutting edge, and irreverent, hymns as "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken" and "How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds." Perhaps the most well known song in history comes from his pen and was considered unfit for worship in his day: "Amazing Grace!"

Sometimes we wonder if the people of God, the church, have learned anything from its history.  How different Newton may have been viewed in his own day if his contemporary critics could see into the future.  We often resist the blessings that God sends even when they show up with ribbons!  We live in a time when beautiful and moving music is being written afresh in honor of the the Triune God.  Sometimes these very writers are accused, like Newton, of tampering with our worship traditions.  But perhaps God does not simply want to hear the same Top 40 year after year.  He wants to see the creativity of his people thus he blesses us with artists who give us new songs ...

"Sing God a brand new song!
Earth and everyone in it, sing!
Sing to God - worship God! ...
(Psalm 96.1, The Message)

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First Timothy 2.8-15 & the Silencing of Women in Worship

"A learned Christian woman may expound the scriptures and urge obedience to them, to one hundred men and women at one time, as well as to one hundred, one at a time, ... and no more violate a scriptural command in one instance than the other." (Silena Holman in the Gospel Advocate, 1888)

In the past I have offered various thoughts on the theme of women in the Bible and relating that to our world today.  One text I've not addressed, and have come to believe is misused frequently is 1 Timothy 2.8-15.  I offer this study as preliminary thought even as though I have dug into it for many years. I believe that the exegesis of any text must be guided by its historical and literary context as well as its flow in the canonical story of God.  These are my presuppositions: I do not believe that whatever it is that Paul is saying in 1 Tim 2 is correcting, or contradicting, what he has said and done by example in other places. Not only that, but what he says must cohere with the whole sweep of the Story of Redemption.  I maintain that that numerous other texts are just as "plain" and "clear" as this one and just as authoritative.  So with these caveats in mind see if we can come with in "understanding distance" of the text (the phrase is Alexander Campbell's).

Approaching the Subject - What are We afraid of?

The advancement of social equality for women in the last century and half has often brought great anxiety among many western men - including God-fearing, Bible loving, conservative Christian men. In the last one hundred years women have achieved remarkable advances in education, employment, athletic, and scientific endeavors.  We have learned that women are just as smart as men and work just as hard as men. They can drive tanks, fly planes and go into space and serve as presidents of universities, CEOs of corporations, and presidents of nations.

Most of the women involved in the nineteenth century women's movement [1] were first involved in the Abolition Movement and the Temperance Movement as dedicated Christians pursuing their agendas on explicit biblical principles. Silena Holman is a shinning example within Churches of Christ of a dedicated female follower of Christ seeking biblical justice.  She is quoted at the head of this essay [2]. Many conscientious, God-fearing, men believed Scripture forbade women work outside the home, the right to vote, and in some cases simply to be educated as a man might be.

Today the situation is both radically different and strangely the same.  Men who fear women, caricature the women's movement, or see females as sexual playgrounds remain. Without saying he falls into any of those areas, Roy Deaver is an example of one who seems to greatly misunderstand the issues involved in the wider movement  Deaver cites eight reasons why Churches of Christ must shore up its approach to women in the church.  Each of the eight is negative:

1) because feminist's are working "feverishly" to break down all gender distinctions
2) because of his opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment
3) because of his opposition to government funded day care
4) because of his opposition to bring civil rights to homosexuals
5) because of his opposition to abortion
6) because feminists are trying to destroy capitalism and its patriarchal concepts
7) because of their efforts to reform marriage
8) because of his opposition to disarmament, guaranteed annual income, etc

According to Brother Deaver the "goals of feminists and the Communists are exactly the same." [3]

LaGard Smith, another very popular writer, has shared his views on the matter of women in the church. In his book What Most Women Want (I have been privileged to hear Brother Smith lecture on the matter several times as well) he argues, like Deaver, that feminism is the cultural engine pushing the church into female ordination, deaconesses, and more participation in worship.  Smith's charges are even wider than Deaver's, laying the charge of paganism and New Ageism at the feet of those who believe that Scripture authorizes a broader view of women's role than previously held in the late 20th & early 21st century Churches of Christ [4].

In my view, these two brothers illustrate how difficult it is for us to come to the Bible  afresh, especially the polarizing "role of woman."  But we have to try to be fair to the entire canon and we must hear Paul as they would in the first century. These brothers are adamant - and so am I - about the priority of Scripture and listening to it [5]. But I believe they are as glued to a cultural worldview as anyone else. I believe their interpretation of Scripture is "plainly" culturally driven. They both fear something.  That something is, in their opinion, manifested in the women's movement. It must be opposed.

I am not a radical feminist by any means, nor do I believe that one has to be to know that women have been denigrated and that feminist thinkers have raised profound questions for us to reflect upon in the light of God's redemptive intent for creation. Thus I celebrate any and all moves that demonstrate my wife and my daughters are fully human, and as much imagers of God as any man. 

Both of these beloved soldiers of the cross (and I have great respect for both), and many other men, appeal to 1 Timothy 2.8-15 as sort of the basic passage for limiting what women are allowed to do in worship (or in work).  The Kroeger's have noted that "many evangelicals view all biblical passages about the role of and ministry of women through the lens of 1 Tim. 2:12. It becomes the key verse, the one on which all others turn" [6]. My goal is to understand the meaning of Paul's word's in their original context and ask what that means for us in our own setting today. 

The Archeology of the Ancient Text: Historical & Literary Contexts

As a missionary, Paul, entered the capital of Roman Asia, Ephesus, he could not have missed one of the largest structures in the Hellenistic world. The magnificent temple to the Goddess Artemis - one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It had columns towering to six stories and was four times the size of the Parthenon in Athens, measuring about 377 by 235 ft [7]. Artemis was the center of life in Ephesus and this is demonstrated by the fact that the city stopped work and devoted itself to the the cult for a whole month each year [8].

Ancient historian, Gregory Sterling, notes that women in the Greco-Roman world were generally devalued and restricted to home. In the area of religion, however, women tended to achieve their greatest degree of "freedom." He says that religion was the one state-sanctioned sphere where women were allowed to take leading public roles throughout the period" [9]. This freedom was especially true in the Cult of Artemis in Ephesus that was dominated by women.

The church that Timothy was put in charge of lived and breathed the atmosphere of that great pagan temple and its goddess. Just as the church in Corinth was affected by its surroundings, and churches in the South imbibed its environment, so the Ephesian church could not escape the toxins of the flamboyant and uninhibited worship of Artemis. The worship of Artemis was dominated by virgins dedicated to the goddess and castrated males. Kenneth Baily wonders, "what possibility would any male religious leadership have had for a sense of dignity and self-respect? What kind of female attitudes would have prevailed in such a city ... Castration being the ultimate violence against the male, would not anti-male sexism in various forms have been inevitable" [10].

These few historical stones dug up already shed considerable light on both the depiction of Timothy in the epistle and the relation of 2.8-15 to the rest of the letter.  For example such a hostile environment could explain why Paul has to urge Timothy to stay at his post (1.3) and to "fight the good fight" (1.18 & 6.12) and to not let anyone look down upon him (4.12). Timothy, as we read the letter itself, seems to be a man just hanging on simply hoping Paul would return (3.14-15 & 4.13).  Timothy is urged to resist false teaching and ungodly behavior within the congregation (1.3-7, 19-20; 4.1-3, 7, 11-13; 5.20-22; 6.3-5, 20-21). This heavy emphasis, in such a small letter, reveals a church situation that is quite serious since some have already shipwrecked their faith (1.19) while others have missed the mark (6.21).  Timothy's position seems to be in double jeopardy since the false teachers themselves seem to be among the elders of the church itself [11]. It is clear from any reading of the text as a whole that Paul has deep concerns for his younger padawan learner (for the Star Wars people) in this unfriendly urban pagan center of the Roman Empire.

The concern of Paul for Timothy helps explain the "all business" [12] nature of the letter to his son in the faith.  It even lacks the usual greeting (but it does have charin, in 1.12 which perhaps functions as a thanksgiving but that is not certain [13]) and the typical Pauline concluding "greeting." It is clear from the content of 1.3-7 that Paul is seriously concerned with Timothy's handling of the false teachers and their gangrenous teaching. However the unhealthy teachers are finding a receptive field among some ignorant (of the basic truths of the faith??) women who go from house church to house church spreading misinformation (5.13) [14]. 

Paul's Correctives in 2.8-15

The wider concerns of the letter surface within this section of First Timothy especially in regard to certain women and the teaching being done. The larger unit of thought, 2.1-15, deals with appropriate decorum within the assembly.  It is generally recognized that Paul's admonitions in this paragraph (vv. 8-15) are within instructions regarding the worship in the Gathering, especially prayer [15]. Everett Ferguson has argued convincingly that the Pauline phrase en panti topo in 2.8 is a technical designation to refer to the assembly of worship or place of prayer. In Christian usage the phrase becomes a short hand way of referring to the Lord's Table [16].

Paul's initial instructions, at first glance, seemed aimed at the male population of the Ephesian church. He tells them not quarrel or dispute; rather they are to offer up their hands in prayer to God in unity and without anger or disputing (v.8). This instruction anticipates Paul's concern elsewhere in the letter about un-Christian attitudes prevailing in the house churches, especially among the false teachers (cf. 6.3-5).

But it is a less than careful reading to assume that Paul is speaking about only of men praying [17],  for Paul assumes that women will be, or are presently, praying in the assembly of the Ephesian church. Consider Paul's use of hosautos in v.9. The word is usually translated “likewise” or “in a similar manner” and is commonly used to refer to an idea which is already in the context of the passage.  In other words, it can refer, in its usual form, to an idea already mentioned previously which is to be repeated in what follows.  As France has commented, "the reference to women's dress and demeanor is not changing to a new subject, but turning from how men should pray to how women for their part are to pray" [18]. Paul simply assumes the privilege of prayer to both men and women in the assembly just as he did at Corinth (1 Cor 11.4-5).  This is a good and possible way to understand the Greek, for v.9 has no verb.  F. F. Bruce has also suggested this line of reasoning in his Answers to Questions that when hosautos has its full force the text can read: when men pray, the hands they lift up should be holy hands:  When women pray, their attitude and demeanor should be chaste. He cites Chrysostom's Homily on Timothy as support that women were praying in Ephesus and this understanding of the verse. 

Paul's concern over female decorum in v.9 suits the context we have described in ancient Ephesus. Keener points out that beauty was packaged in antiquity just as it is today [19]. These women addressed by Paul are clearly from the elite wealthy class whose appearance is grounded in their domineering attitudes we expect from the Cult of Artemis[20]. Alvera Mickelsen sees the connection between Paul's concern with clothing and jewelry and Artemis.  She writes:

"In Ephesus with its huge temple to the goddess Artemis were hundreds of sacred priestesses who probably also served as sacred prostitutes. There were also hundreds of hetaerae, the most educated of Greek women who were the extramarital sexual partners of upper-class Greek men. Possibly some of these women had been converted and were wearing their suggestive and expensive clothing to church. Since hetaerae were often respected teachers of men in Greece (many are named in Greek literature), they would be more likely to become teachers after they became part of the church." [21]

These women, instead of being ostentatious (uppity! in a bad way) should adorn themselves with good works as they enter prayer ... that are fitting for all servants of Christ.

Moving into verse 11 Paul uses the first imperative of this paragraph, manthaneto. Paul does not merely tell women to be quiet but commands them to learn! It was not a conclusion that women would naturally become learners in the first century as Sterling reminds us that women were routinely left out of the education process [22]. Paul, however, wants the female disciples at Ephesus to be learners and students (it should be recalled that in 2 Tim 2.2, Timothy himself became a learner in order to be a teacher!). She is not to be arrogant but "silent" (NRSV). Hesuchia does not mean, as we are sometimes told in church, the absence of verbal communication or that ladies cannot contribute to the learning (or do announcements!).  Rather, Paul is emphasizing the attitude of the learner - remember the historical setting - she should have a spirit of learning [23].  These freshly converted women are not to come in and assume control, but rather they are commanded to become students (disciples) and learners first.The recent Kingdom New Testament captures quite well Paul's aim here: "They [women] must study undisturbed, in full submission to God (1 Tim 2.11).

Paul's oft quoted statement in v.12, "I permit not a woman ..." probably does not mean what the KJV says at all. Paul uses a present indicative verb epitrepo which many scholars render "I am not allowing ..."[24]  This rendering shows the concern Paul has for the historical and social reality of the Ephesian church in the shadow of Artemis. Paul uses a rare Greek verb (used only here in the entire New Testament), authentein, to describe what the women are not to be doing. Lots of ink has been spread on this word. Paul's typical word for "authority" is proistemi, which he uses several times in the letter (3.4-5, 12 & 5.17) or exousia. These other words are readily available to Paul but he did not use either in reference to these women or this situation.

As noted already, there has been considerable controversy over the actual meaning of the rare word authenteo in 1 Tim 2. The Kroeger's have argued at length against the background of the mystery religions and early Gnosticism that the term meant actual or representational murder [25]. This view could make sense in the context of the life of the church. But Carroll Osburn has challenged some of the Kroeger's thesis, suggesting that the while the term does sometimes mean "murder" it more often in Koine Greek has the connotation to "domineer."[26]  It cannot legitimately be argued that Paul is simply restricting women from exercising authority.  The word is a violent word and is used in violent contexts whether we understand it to be "murder" in some sense or gross "domination." Again Paul does not use this word in any other place nor does any other NT writer. It is an extraordinary word called for by extraordinary circumstances. Paul is rejecting unhealthy assertiveness on the part of certain women that would be incompatible with men too (cf. Eph 5.21 & 1 Cor 11.11-12).  France has suggested translating the verse as "I do not allow these ignorant women to batter the men. They are to stop shouting and calm down." [27]

Paul emphasizes that these women are to keep a quiet and peaceful demeanor (the idea of not fighting or arguing is pronounced in the Pastorals).  His use of hesuchia at the end of v.12 does not mean the woman cannot speak ... as we have seen, they are praying.  But rather they are to assume a humble and peaceful demeanor.  This is the third time, in fact, that Paul has used this term in this section of 1 Timothy.  Why is it that when we read at the beginning of the present chapter that we are to pray for kings "so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life" (2.2) that no one assumes Paul is commanding the disciples to a life of silence!? But it is the exact same term in both vv 11 and 12! The word does not forbid speaking and in fact has little if anything to do with it.

What is Going on?  Creation or Fall? 

In this section, I am far more tentative than in my previous exposition. This is where I am as of today.  It is assumed by many writers, such as Deaver and Smith, that Paul, since he mentions Eve, grounds his teaching in "creation" or God's original design [28]. I am not convinced of this.  R. T. France has suggested that Paul is not working with a creation principle at all but a "fall principle" [29]. Paul does not have Genesis 1 in mind but the unit of Genesis 2 and 3 in these verses. Paul seems to be illustrating from this well known text what happened when another misinformed woman made a dreadful decision by listening to a "false teacher" resulting in drastic consequences.  Eve was created as Adam's complement or completer (not his handmaiden).  See my What did God Say? Gen 2.1b & Man's 'Helper' But she acted in ignorance (not a put down of her) and listened to the Serpent [30]. So in some way the Ephesian women are asserting their independence in the face of men and being deceived by false teachers. As France put it "in such a situation they must be denied the right to teach" [31]. The issue is a heart problem not a gender problem.

Paul's illustration from the Fall narrative can arguably be used to show the occasional nature of his instruction to the Ephesian church rather than some universal principle. In Romans 5.12ff Paul argues the exact opposite as he does here on the origin of Sin within creation. In that context it is Adam, not Eve, who is the progenitor of sin and death in the world.  Adam was chosen precisely because he was a man in that context and thus representative of all who went into sin - males and females [32].

Paul's Correction and the Story of Redemption

Richard Lints notes that it "is easy enough to affirm that any given passage of Scripture means what it says. But it can be a good deal more difficult to determine exactly what a text is saying" [33]. Scripture is not as simplistic as it is sometimes affirmed to be. Our present text and context bristles with questions and we sweep them under the rug hiding difficulties because they are not burning issues with us.  Lints is correct but one way to help understand texts is within the canonical horizon that each text in as part of the Story of Redemption.  I will try to be brief, but 1 Timothy does not exist by itself but as part of the canon.  It is clear that whatever correction that Paul makes, it does not restrict women from praying in the assembly of the church. They are doing that both here and in 1 Corinthians 11.4-5. Nor does this passage, even within the context of the Ephesian church, prohibit women deacons. It is clear from 3.11 that Paul refers to a group of women in the same category as male deacons[34].See my Voices on Female Deacons in the Stone-Campbell Movement.

It is clear that a number of women in the history of redemption have been called by the Lord God to have functional authority over his people.  Miriam (Micah 6.4) was equal with Moses and Aaron.  Deborah was a judge and a prophet over "all Israel" (Judges 4.4) and the author of Scripture (Judges 5).  Here authority is clearly over both male and female Israelites [35]. Huldah exercised great authority in the days of Josiah by the Lord's direction.  When Hilkiah was instructed to "inquire of the Lord" one wonders why he and Shaphan did not seek out the prophet Jeremiah instead of this woman prophet (2 Kings 22.14-20 & 2 Chronicles 34.22-33).  Indeed Huldah is credited with being the catalyst for Josiah's reform and the first person to declare a writing to be Scripture. See my Huldah Who? The Forgotten Ministry of a Female Prophet. Esther wrote with "full authority" from God to direct the worship of Israel at Purim (Esther 9.29, 32). There are many more portions of the canonical horizon of 1 Timothy 2.12 that is simply dismissed without a second thought by many restorationists.  I do not feel at ease in Zion following that pattern if disregard for the Scripture.

In the New Testament there is manifold evidence from Paul's own writings that women were hardly silent and unseen. Phoebe was a deacon and patron of the church in the Corinthian suburb known as Cenchrea (Romans 16.1-2, NRSV, TNIV, etc). Paul identifies no less than ten women in Romans 16, designating many with the same terminology as he does men, that of "co-workers." He even calls one woman, Junia, an apostle (Romans 16.7). That Paul could call a woman an apostle has startled so many men that in the medieval period they even contrived to make this woman into a man.  There is no evidence in any Greek manuscript or version for the supposed masculine (Junias) prior to the thirteenth century A.D. [36]. Women were praying and prophesying in the church of Corinth (1 Cor 11.4-5, as well as Ephesus).  This New Testament evidence, of which more could be added, should provide some clues to interpreting 1 Timothy 2.12 but it is usually disregarded as "postscript theology" [37] or denigrated  as "non-didactic" evidence ... or just plain ignored all together.

The Ancient Text and Us

I believe that most uses of 1 Timothy 2 are illegitimate wresting of Scripture.  Failures in both exegesis and hermeneutical approach mar typical use of the text. It is not a trump card against female participation in the assembly of the church. It is clear that Paul does not want women (or men!) to domineer other Christians. Paul's chastisement of the Corinthians for their table etiquette reveals that fallen social stratification of the world has no place in the kingdom of God. He does want them to learn (ironically the Hebrews Preacher wants his hearers to learn too so they could be teachers! He does not suggest that only women should be) he does want their life to be representative of the "quiet and peaceful life" he urges for all Christians in (again using the same term) in v.2.

But in our current applications of this text we are so inconsistent.  Churches of Christ frequently say that Paul does not let women teach men, lead singing, wait on the table, pray or even make announcements. And praying is explicitly stated by the apostle Paul as something women were and can do in the assembly.  On the other hand "we" have no difficulty in letting women write authoritative books and articles, write the songs we sing, teach men in colleges, teach in Sunday schools (as long as they are unbaptized!) and even evangelize in a non-Western context [38]. So we are either inconsistent at best or deceptive at worst with the text. Deaver may be a case in point when he writes,

"The divine restriction - in force in the Old Testament times and in force in the New Testament times - simply that the woman is not at any time, in any place, in any way, or in any circumstance to place herself (or allow herself to be placed in a position which would necessarily (inherently) involve her having dominion over a man."

This is so because, according to Deaver, by God's design women are in "subordination or subjection" to men. I do not see how Deaver's words not only forbid a woman from being a deacon, teacher, song leader but also a police officer, principal in a public school or allow women to be anything other than a housewife!![39]  I cannot disagree more strongly with Deaver! The ministry of women in the Bible - I've already mentioned them by name - was real.  They really did lead God's people. That is the simplest and most straightforward reading of Deborah, Esther, Huldah and others. Why is it legitimate hermeneutical procedure to act as if these texts in the inspired word are simply not there?

It seems to me a legitimate application of Paul's correction in Ephesus recognizes is particularity ... that is it squares with its context(s).  Fee notes the remarkable similarity between the instructions to women in 2.8-15 and 5.11-15.

"Rather than displaying the 'good works' of the older widows, which includes child rearing (5.10), they have apparently 'given themselves to pleasure' (v.6) have grown wanton against Christ in their desire to remarry (v.12 apparently outside the faith). Furthermore, they have become busybodies, going from house church to house church talking foolishness and speaking things they should not (v.13; the false teachings? cf. the description of the false teachers in 1.6-7). As such they have already gone astray after Satan (v.15). Paul's solution here is for them to remarry (vis-a-vis the false teachers; cf. 4.3) and bear children, so as not to give the enemy cause to reproach the gospel. The concern and solution in 2:9-15 are nearly identical." [40]

It is clear, given the situation in Ephesus, that Paul is dealing with a major problem in that congregation and deals with it in an appropriate pastoral manner. It is clear, to me anyway at this time, that Paul is not making a general rule but dealing with the specific church issue that was rooted in the shadows of Artemis ... a situation that seems to be getting the best of Timothy.  Nor is it apparent that Paul is appealing to a creational value but instead illustrates what happens when men and women do not live together in a mutually supportive relationship.

In the final analysis, it is no more valid to use 1 Timothy 2.8-15 to teach the subjection of women any more than to use 1 Timothy 6.1 to teach the validity of slavery in our world.  Any hermeneutic that legitimates chattel slavery is wrong but there were plenty that have done so in the past.

First Timothy 2 prohibits the ungodly domineering - even chauvinistic - attitudes that run roughshod over other people.  It excludes certain unlearned (about the basics of the faith) women from being teachers and commands them to be learners. Paul has the same directives for men too.

These are my thoughts ... as of now. I do not claim any infallibility for them.  

Notes:

1] See Rebecca Merrill Groothuis' Women Caught in the Conflict: The Culture War between Traditionalism and Feminism (Baker 1994) for an excellent historical overview of the roots of the Women's Movement in Scripture.  See also Anna M. Speicher, The Religious World of Antislavery Women: Spirituality in the Lives of Five Abolitionist Lecturers (Syracuse University Press 2000) and Julie Roy Jeffrey The Great Silent Army of Abolitionism: Ordinary Women in the Antislavery Movement (University of North Carolina Press 1998).

2] See C. Leonard Allen, "Silena Moore Holman (1850-1915), Voice of the 'New Woman' among Churches of Christ," Discipliana 56 (1996): 3-11

3] Roy Deaver, The Role of Women (Biblical Notes, n.d.), p. 3

4] F. LaGard Smith, What Most Women Want (Harvest House 1992), pp. 123-136.

5] Many who oppose a wider role of women's roles within the church charge carte blanch that those who differ with them as rejecting the authority of Scripture.  R. T. France notes "both sides find it hard to accept that the opposing conclusions might in fact have been honestly reached by people of equal integrity and equal commitment to the authority of Scipture." Women in the Church's Ministry: A Test Case for Biblical Interpretation (Eerdmans 1995), p. 11.

6] Richard C. Kroeger & Catherine C. Kroeger, I Suffer Not a Woman: Rethinking 1 Timothy 2:11-15 in Light of Ancient Evidence (Baker 1992), p. 12.

7] John McRay, Archaeology and the New Testament (Baker 1991), p. 256.

8] Richard E. Oster, "The Ephesian Artemis as an Opponent of Early Christianity," Jahrbuch fur Antike und Christentum 19 (Aschendorff 1976), 24-44.  Professor Oster has greatly expanded this research in a more comprehensive essay, "Ephesus as a Religious Center under the Principate, I. Paganism before Constantine," Aufstieg und Niedergang der romischen Welt, II. 18.3 Ed. H. Temporini and W. Haasa (de Gryter 1990): 1661-1728

9] Gregory E. Sterling, "Women in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds (323 BCE-138 CE)," in Ed. Carroll D. Osburn, Essays on Women in Earliest Christianity, vol 1 (College Press 1995), p. 85.

10] Bailey quoted in R. T. France, Women in the Church's Ministry, pp. 58-59

11] This makes sense in light of Paul's prophecy in Acts 20.25-32. See also Gordon D. Fee's defense of this position in his commentary, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus (Hendrickson 1988), 7ff.

12] Gordon Fee, Gospel & Spirit: Issues in New Testament Hermeneutics (Hendrickson 1991), p.56

13] Thomas C. Greer, Jr. "Admonitions to Women in 1 Tim. 2:8-15," in Ed. Carroll D. Osburn, Essays on Women in Earliest Christianity vol 1, p. 283.

14] The NIV & NRSV read "gossips" for pluaroi but it more than likely has the meaning of "nonsense" or "foolishness" here. The widows seem to be involved in unlearned discourse which was received from the false teachers.

15] Craig S. Keener, Paul, Wives & Women: Marriage and Women's Ministry in the Letters of Paul (Hendrickson 1992), 102-103.

16] Everett Ferguson, "Topos in 1 Timothy 2.8," Restoration Quarterly 33 (1991), 65-73.

17] As do Ferguson, ibid, p. 73 and Deaver, Role of Women, p. 17.

18] France, Women's Ministry in the NT, p. 62. See also Keener, Paul, Women & Wives, p. 103 and Greer, Admonitions to Women in 1 Tim. 2:8-15," p. 290.

19] Keener, Paul, Women & Wives, p. 104

20] Alan Padgett, "Wealthy Women at Ephesus: 1 Timothy 2:8-15 in Social Context," Interpretation 41 (1987): 19-31. Padgett also demonstrates that Paul mirrors many of the moralists of his day in his critique.

21] Quoted in Stanley J. Grenz, Women in the Church: A Biblical Theology of Women in the Ministry (IVP 1995), p. 126.

22] Sterling, Women in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds," pp. 55-57

23] Murry J. Harris, "Quiet, Rest, Silence, Sound, Voice, Noise," New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Ed. Colin Brown (Zondervan 1978), Vol 3, p.111-112. LaGard Smith in What Most Women Want recognizes this term is not the same as in 1 Cor 14.34 but then states they essentially mean the same anyway. He says "it has a similar meaning--to hold one's peace." He then states quietness in this context "is an attitude regarding one's relative position in a hierarchy of spiritual authority" (pp. 251-252). It seems to me that Smith has simply assumed his conclusion for neither "quietness" means what he says nor does the context refer to recognizing one's place in a "hierarchy" of authority." If anything Paul is attacking an attitude of hierarchy.

24] See Gordon Fee, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus, p. 72.  Greer suggests the same rendering, "Admonitions to Women in 1 Tim 2:8-15," p. 292

25] Kroeger's I Suffer Not a Woman, pp. 185-188. Catherine Kroeger's view has evolved from understanding the term with an erotic connotation to the view just mentioned.

26] Carroll Osburn, "Authenteo (1 Timothy 2:12)," Restoration Quarterly 25 (1982): 1-12.

27] France, Women in the Church's Ministry, p. 66.

28] Deaver, Role of Women, p. 17-18 and Smith, What Most Women Want, pp. 253-254.

29] France, Women in the Church's Ministry, p. 67

30] See also the analysis of Genesis 1-3 by Rick Marrs, "In the Beginning: Male and Female in Gen 1-3," in Essays on Women in Earliest Christianity vol 2 (College Press 1995), 1-36.

31] ibid, 68

32] Gordon Fee, Gospel & Spirit, pp. 61-62.

33] Richard Lints, The Fabric of Theology: A Prolegomenon to Evangelical Theology (Eerdmans 1993), p. 295.

34] Barry Blackburn, among many others, has demonstrated that "The Identity of the Women in 1 Tim 3.11" was female deacons, cf Essays on Women in Earliest Christianity, vol 1, pp. 303-319

35] Deborah (and Huldah) is clearly a thorn in the flesh for authors like LaGard Smith. As he reads it, Deborah was uncomfortable with her role and was actually in a covert operation to renew male leadership, in his words, "in the story of Deborah, the message is clear: Great shame attached itself to the men of Israel for failing to assume their responsibility as leaders and protectors," What Most Women Want, p. 116. I confess to having missed that clear message in the Deborah narrative. The shame, if present in the story, is no greater than any other portion of Judges. One gets a better appreciation of the ministry of Deborah in Charme Robarts, "Deborah: Judge, Prophetess, Military Leader, and Mother in Israel," in Essays on Women in Earliest Christianity, vol 2, pp. 69-86

36] Peter Lampe, "The Roman Christians of Romans 16," in The Romans Debate, revised edition. Edited by Karl P. Donfried (Hendrickson 1991), pp.216-230.

37] LaGard Smith, What Most Women Want, pp. 211-219

38] Robert Rowland has exposed our inconsistency in Churches of Christ.  Velma West could teach men New Testament Greek at Harding Graduate School of Religion just as long as she never told them what it meant!! An impossibility in my view.  I Permit Not a Woman ... To be Remain Shackled (Lighthouse 1991).

39] Deaver, Role of Women, p. 18

40] Gordon Fee, Gospel & Spirit, pp. 57-58

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Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Bible & America, #2

"Reading the Bible with the eyes of the poor is a different thing than reading the it with a full belly. If it is read in the light of the experience and hopes of the oppressed, the Bible's revolutionary themes - promise, exodus, resurrection and spirit - come alive." (Jurgen Moltmann, The Church in the Power of the Spirit)

An "Event"

The publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin (UTC) was significant. Theodore Parker, the famous Boston preacher, called it a "world event." And it was! Harriet Beecher Stowe had been contributing chapters of the book in the abolitionist newspaper The National Era throughout 1851-52 and the public was eating it up. When printed, the book was immediately (no international copyright laws back then) published in three Paris newspapers simultaneously. It's first print run was sold out in a few days. The book was quickly translated into thirty-seven languages.  It produced countless conversions to Christianity, such as the dying German poet Heinrich Heine.  It mobilized waning anti-slavery zeal of the day.

UTC  was also cursed by thousands. It was banned in southern states and caused a riot among students at the University of Virgina where it was burned publicly.  It was branded "pulp fiction." Conservatives labeled Stowe a "revolutionary" and an advocate of "higher lawism" (fancy words for civil disobedience to the Fugitive Slave Law). UTC was even branded forthrightly as a "pernicious book of sin."

Whatever one may say of the book, with one hundred and fifty years of hindsight, it cannot be said the book was neutral or conservative. Reading the book is a moral experience. I've never had to put Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn down (love them both) because they moved me so deeply in my inner being but I have Uncle Tom's Cabin.  Indeed I read recently from one English literature professor arguing that UTC should replace Twain in our prescribed canon of reading in high school. It has my vote. 

The Bible, How is It to be Used? Uncle Tom's Cabin's Answer

Harriet Beecher Stowe was brilliant.  She has not always been recognized as such by secular, white male, historical scholarship since WW II.  Much of this scholarship has been astoundingly biblically illiterate, incredibly uniformed on how religion and American culture were intertwined through the Civil War, and even (ironically) prejudiced against her and UTC. This trend has significantly reversed in the last fifteen years most significantly with the publication of David Reynolds tour de force Mightier than the Sword: Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Battle for America. Stowe read widely knowing such theological heavy weights as Schleiermacher and Feuerbach and was fans of the writers of the Romantic Movement. Her husband, Calvin, wrote her confessing how he misses their late night scholarly "discourses in sheets." He wrote of his longing to have her with him because he,

"wants to got to bed & talk about Tholuck, Dannecker, Jean Paul, Frederick William ... There is not a soul that I can say a word to about any of these matters, and I begin to find out, (what I knew very well before) that you are the most intelligent and agreeable woman in the whole circle of my acquaintance." [1]

Among the things that disturbed Stowe was the use of the Bible by Christians to justify slavery.   By 1852 there were plenty of biblical apologists for slavery and racism among United States Christians, North and South. This apparent biblical endorsement of slavery had a pacifying affect upon the anti-slavery temper that was building in the 1830s and was steadily loosing ground throughout the 1840s. For Stowe this was a serious misuse of the Word of God.  Her questions generated in the narrative properly force hermenutical questions upon us too. Near the end of her book she makes a direct appeal to the reader (not the only time she does so in the book) that gives a window into what she thinks the reader should do even if some of the technical aspects of the biblical text are in question.

"But what can any individual do? Of that, every individual can judge. There is one thing that every individual can do, - they can see to tit that they feel right. An atmosphere of sympathetic influence encircles every human being; and the man or woman who feels strongly, healthily and justly, on the great interests of humanity, is a constant benefactor to the human race. See, then, to your sympathies in this matter! Are they in harmony with the sympathies of Christ? or are they swayed and perverted by the sophistries of worldly policy?"

The "sympathies of Christ." Whatever one does about slavery, Stowe demands that the Christian side with Crucified One. This is her angle of attack against the biblical apologists of slavery and she weaves this in through her characters in the novel.  I want to look at a few of these characters as they express Stowe's criticism of the use of the Bible.

Augustine St. Clare of New Orleans: Social Location & Vested Interests

Augustine, the father of Eva, is a complex character.  Augustine is married to Marie who "always made a point to be pious on Sundays."  Yet Augustine refused to attend church no matter how much his wife pleaded. Stowe tells her bigoted Christian readers that one of the greatest Christian thinkers in history was an African named Augustine  "Bishop of Carthage" and that not only he but most bishops were "men of color."  Augustine St. Clare however becomes her instrument to critique not only the church but the "clergy."  The unbelieving, slave owning, Augustine does not think the Bible actually justifies slavery.  When Marie and cousin Ophelia corner him on the matter he "goes off" on the ladies.  Slavery is controlled by economics and the hermeneutics of the clergy is put in service of justifying oppression.  I quote at length

"The short of the matter is, cousin, ... on this abstract question of slavery there can, as I think, be but one opinion. Planters who have money to make by it, - clergymen, who have planters to please, - politicians, who want to rule by it, - may warp and bend language and ethics to a degree that shall astonish the world at their ingenuity; they can press nature and the Bible, and nobody knows what else into the service ..."

But should slavery adversely affect the price of cotton, Augustine says

"Well suppose that something should bring down the price of cotton once and forever, and make the whole slave property a drug in the market, don't you think we should soon have another version of the Scripture doctrine? What a flood of light would pour into the church, all at once, and how immediately it would be discovered that everything in the Bible and reason went the other way!"

Stowe, through Augustine, pins the vested interest that drives the justification of slavery.  The real motivation was not exegesis and certainly not the "sympathies of Christ" but power and economic interest.

"If I was to say anything on this slavery matter, I would say out, fair and square, 'We're in for it; we've got'em, and we mean to keep'em, - it's for our convenience and our interest;' for that's the long and short of it,' that's just what the whole of what ll this sanctified stuff amounts to, after all; and I think that will be intelligible to everybody, everywhere."[2]

Looking back it is easy to see that Augustine (Stowe) was dead on in this critique.  In the Stone-Campbell Movement one who defended slavery was James Shannon.  Shannon was ne of the most educated men of the movement.  He was president of Bacon College (the first college in the SCM) and later the University of Missouri.  In 1844 he addressed the student body of Bacon College on The Philosophy of Slavery, As Identified with the Philosophy of Human Happiness. This was later published in a booklet in 1849 and went through several editions.  Shannon offered a myriad of interpretations in support of slavery as essential to "human happiness."  In his criticism of the abolition movement he freely uses the economic dimension.  Abolitionists were guilty of breaking the tenth commandment "thou shalt not covet." "Hence, the advocates of Emancipation without compensation to the owners, are involved in the deep guilt ... of violating the tenth commandment and exciting others to a similar violation." [3] Slave holders are entitled to their "property" regardless of any claim by abolitionists.  Stowe sees this argument for what it is ... vested interest and power play ... but Shannon would have denied that. Are we blind to our own vested interest and how that shapes our hermeneutic?

George Harris, Eliza's Husband: Spirit of Humanity & Fellowship

George is a powerful character we even meet him before Tom in the narrative. He is intelligent (taught himself to read). He is creative.  He is militant.  His was separated from his wife, Eliza, and baby son. He and Eliza's exodus to the north is the opposite mirror for Tom's descent further south. Doubt plays a significant role in his character.  Stowe believed that God, especially through Christ, was on the side of the sufferer.  She described him as "God the Omnipotent, the Creator, the Destroyer, is suffering himself to be detained in weak human hands, and controlled by the passionate earnestness of human desire ... He whose touch could annihilate, can yet be held by your infant hand--can be swayed by your prayer."

It is this suffering, caring Creator, that is so difficult for the oppressed slave - in George - has difficulty in believing.  During the journey George meets Mr. Wilson a law and order man. Mr. Wilson attempts to use the Bible to support the Fugitive Slave telling George it is his Christian duty to return. He told him how Paul sent Onesimus back to Philemon.  Yet the angry fugitive will have none of it.

"Don't quote the Bible at me that way, Mr. Wilson, ... don't! for my wife is a Christian, and I mean to be, if I ever get to where I can; but to quote Bible to a fellow in my circumstances, is enouch to make him give it up altogether. I appeal to God Almighty; - I'm willing to go with the case to Him, and ask Him if I do wrong to seek my freedom."

Mr. Wilson admonishes George to trust in God and his laws (which in this case would mean obedience to the Fugitive Slave Law). But George fires back at his antagonist: "IS there a God to trust in? ... There's a God for you, but is there any for us? [i.e. black slaves]"

George is reunited with his beloved wife (not legally married because they are slaves) and his son Harry in a Quaker community in Ohio. The Quaker's were on the outside of the orthodox religious establishment in America so these folks have a similar function as the non-believing Augustine. Through these unrepentant breakers of the Fugitive Slave Law George learns the true meaning of Christian faith.  Stretching all social bounds of the time, Stowe has George and Eliza sit down and eat at white person's table ... in a white person's home. As Jesus affirmed the human worth and dignity of social outcasts in the Gospels so George is moved deeply that a person accords him actual human dignity. The Quaker Simeon Halliday tells George that God actually bestows upon us goods for the purpose of being generous and merciful.  George is astonished that this man would risk going to jail to help him and his escaping family. Simeon and George read Psalm 73 together and it soothes his soul and the flame of faith begins to flicker in George.  Stowe says of this psalm that the words might sound like pious bosh from a self-indulgent exhorter but "coming from one who daily and calmly risked fine and imprisonment for the cause of God and man, they had a weight that could not but be felt ..."  Simeon demonstrated the sympathies of Christ. George rejected the use of the Bible as a prop for injustice. At the Table we are all equal ...

Uncle Tom: The Man of Sorrows

One of the "ah ha" moments for the followers of stereotypes is that Tom, as Stowe narrates him, was anything but an "Uncle Tom." He is introduced to us a "large, broad chested, powerfully made man." The "air" around him is "self-respecting and dignified." He is literate (it was against the law in many southern states for a slave to learn to read).  Tom is strong and stands his ground.  He sacrifices his personal needs for the sake of other slaves and refuses to disobey his conscience.  He is a principled man ... a serious stab at the ugly stereotypes of black men of the day.  He will not cooperate with evil and will not bring harm to others.

Tom is truly a Christ figure in the book. Tom is the ultimate embodiment of the true meaning of the Christian faith and the Bible in particular. As Tom is ripped from his wife (not a legal marriage again), sold down river to almost certain death we hear the pathos of the slaves come through with power in Stowe's imagery. The Mississippi is imagined to be the river carrying the lamentations of the slaves to the - absent - God. Would that "the tears of the oppressed, the sighs of the helpless, the bitter prayers of poor, ignorant hearts to an unknown God - unknown, unseen and silent, but who will yet 'come out of his place to save all the poor of the earth!"

Tom arrives at his new "owner," Simon Legree.  Legree is Tom's third owner in the narrative, each spans the kind of slave owners Stowe believed to be in the South.  It is easy to hate Legree. Legree is an inhumane tyrant.  But Stowe does not want us to hate Legree rather she invites us to pity him. He is the end result of the system of dehumanization of slavery upon the slave holders! He pales in comparison to Tom. He retains the brute power of force but is emasculated by the real power of Tom's presence. The more Simon rails at, and abuses, Tom the truth of what he is is revealed. Tom reads the Bible to the other slaves on Legree's plantation. An important text was Matthew 11.28, "Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." But the slaves cannot believe that God "is around" for "God never visits these parts." Stowe quote Ecclesiastes 4.1-2 to embody the darkness of Legree's place.

"Again I saw all the oppressions that are practiced under the sun. Look, the tears of the oppressed--with no one to comfort them. And I thought the dead, who have already died, more fortunate than the living, who are still alive ..." (NRSV)

Cassy, Legree's sex slave, laments to Tom - the Lord "isn't here! there's nothing here, but sin and long, long despair!" Truly Tom has arrived in hell.

To Legree Tom was a trouble maker precisely because he was such a powerful man. "Had not this man braved him, - steadily, powerfully, resistlessly, [sic]- ever since he bought him." This made Legree fear and hate Tom. Legree attacks Tom's faith saying "I'm your church now!" Legree succumbs to the irrational fear of the oppressor (echoes of Exodus 1.12) in his fear of Tom's mighty personality. When Tom refuses to flog another slave Simon he has Tom whipped nearly to death. After the whipping Tom says to Simon,

"I'll give ye all the work of my hands, all my time, all my strength; but my soul I won't give up to mortal man. I will hold to the Lord and put his commands before all, - die or live; you may be sure on't. Mas'r Legree, I an't a grain afeard to die. I'd soon as die as not. Ye may whip me, starve me, burn me, - it'll only send me sooner where I want to go."

Sambo and Quimbo, slave overseers bought off with alcohol and sexual favors, finish the cruel torture of Tom. Yet in the book Tom forgives them and they break down: 'O, Tom! do tell us who is JESUS, anyhow?"  Sambo and Quimbo are victims of the system of evil too. Tom's forgiveness simply enrages Legree. His anger boils as he realizes that "his power over his bond thrall was gone."  Simon Legree literally beats Tom to death in an incredibly moving narrative. 

Tom is the Christ who willingly endures great suffering for others. As Tom nears death he reads of the Passion of Jesus. Soon "a vision rose before him of One crowned with thorns, buffeted and bleeding." Like Jesus he forgives his enemies and loves them. Tom is the embodiment of the sympathies of Christ.

Far from being an "Uncle Tom" the Tom that Stowe narrates was incredibly challenging and offensive to white Christians of her day.  And he is still a powerful figure when read today.  Tom is the model of nonviolent resistance found in Martin Luther King Jr and Rosa Parks.  Just how threatening Tom was we will see in our next blog.

In Worship at the Lord's Table

Harriet Beecher Stowe believed that God had moved her to write Uncle Tom's Cabin. While there were antecedents in her life for the contents of the book it was not until February 1851 that she began the novel.  While visiting Brunswick, Maine she attended the First Parish Church.  As she was taking the bread and wine she reflected upon the cross of Jesus. She says that she at that moment had a "vision that was blown into my mind as by the rushing of a mighty wind." The vision given her at the Lord's Table was of an old slave being whipped to death by two fellow slaves who were under the control of a white man.  Stowe was so disturbed by her vision that she began to write UTC and felt the entire time as if the words were from another source. The story of Tom's death in the novel is clearly the literary version of her vision. For her a visit to Calvary at the Table led her to another Calvary ... not the one of Christ but an American Calvary of slavery.  At the Table, in worship, she was moved to identify powerfully with the hated and oppressed nobodies in the United States ... the slaves. Worship changes lives - just ask Harriet.

Final Hermeneutical Thoughts

Stowe saw powerfully and clearly that God takes a side. Her frustration with the church and Christians in general because of their complicity in injustice reached a breaking point. We have only scratched the surface of how she explores biblical themes and how they might look in the eyes of the oppressed. Through her novel she forces us to ask potent questions.  Is it a legitimate reading of Scripture that endorses something blatantly contrary to the values and mission of Christ? She forces us to ask of ourselves ... are we so enmeshed in the machinery that our exegesis and theology always supports us in our own agenda? She forces us to ask does the fact that we have money or power control how we read the Bible and determine what is or is not righteousness? Again she saw that God does takes sides.  She saw this because she looked through the eyes of the slave.  Reading from that location is not always easy.

One powerful narrative that slaves in the South routinely gravitated to was that of the Exodus. There interest in the Exodus was not historical or critical but it was gripping.  They saw something that whites like James Shannon did not ... God took sides. If we look briefly at the Exodus we see four things that are theologically significant and call for response by God's People:

1) A struggle between the powerful and the weak is going on
2) God hears the cries of the weak and is fully aware of the situation of the weak
3) God is not neutral in this struggle between the powerful and the weak
4) God calls his people to join in the struggle for the weak  [4]

If this actually true then how should that affect our Bible reading? and more importantly our living in this world? Harriet Beecher Stowe believed it meant shelving self-interest and engage in the risky business of altering the status quo ... I think we can learn a lot from this small but powerful lady.

NOTES:

1] Quoted in Patricia R. Hill, "Uncle Tom's Cabin as a Religious Text," a paper delivered at the June 2007 Uncle Tom's Cabin in the Web of Culture conference sponsored by the National Endowment of the Humanities.  Pages are not numbered but on my print copy see p. 4.

2] All quotes from The Annotated Uncle Tom's Cabin, eds Henry Louis Gates Jr & Hollis Robbins (W. W. Norton, 2006).

3] James Shannon, The Philosophy of Slavery, As Identified with the Philosophy of Human Happiness, An Essay (A. G. Hodges & Co., 1849), 13.

4] For a very readable source on hearing the Bible from another location, and that looks at specific texts and works through them see Robert McAfee Brown Unexpected News: Reading the Bible with Third World Eyes (Westminster/John Knox 1984).  See pp. 33-48 on listening to the Exodus.

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