Text taken from the Preacher’s Commentary of the Bible.
1 Timothy 2:1–3:13
Let all things be done decently and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40). So Paul ended his instructions to the Corinthians, where worship services had become sources of confusion and conflict rather than renewal and unity. One of my friends is fond of saying, “People sure have a way of lousing things up!” And the church is not exempt. From the beginning, dealing with conflict and tension has been a part of being involved in a church. Even something seemingly as simple as worshiping God together can become a battleground.
We only make matters worse if we project our wish-dreams for our ideal human society onto the church. I began my Christian journey in the fellowship of folks who idealized New Testament Christianity. The “New Testament Church” was our way of referring to a church that was pure in its motives, programs, and relationships. As time passed, I discovered that the quest for this pure church was like hunting for grunion in the High Sierras. I abandoned my search for the perfect church when I accepted the fact that the New Testament church itself was far from perfect. Even that first church of the twelve, in the presence of Jesus Himself, couldn’t get it all together.
The fact that Paul had to appeal for things to be done decently and in order obviously meant that things were being done indecently and out of order. We might expect that in a wild place like the seaport town of Corinth. But in Ephesus? If there was one church in which Paul invested more of himself than any other, it was in Ephesus. He had lived and taught there for two years (Acts 19:10). He had sent his most trusted associate, Timothy, to be their pastor. And yet there were problems in their life and worship—problems relating to prayer, to the behavior of some women in the church, and to the standards and conduct of bishops and deacons. It is because Paul dealt with those practical matters of congregational life that this letter is rightly called a Epistle.”
2:1-8
Can Prayer Change the World?
Since Paul had digressed from the main thought of his charge to Timothy in 1:19 and 20, he uses a “therefore” to tie what follows to his continuing concern for the quality of Timothy’s pastoral leadership in Ephesus.
It’s best to begin by observing that the central theological thrust of the paragraph is not so much on prayer as on the universality of the gospel. The phrase “first of all” is to be read in the sense of “as of primary importance.” In other words, of all the pastoral advice that is to follow, this is the most important. And what is important is not just to pray in corporate worship, but to pray for “all men.” The emphasis is unmistakable—“all men” (v. 1), “all men” (v. 4), “for all” (v. 6).
The close connection that Paul makes between the universality of the gospel and prayer in public worship is far-reaching in its implications. The all-too-typical pastoral prayer in corporate worship can hardly be said to be of first importance. And it certainly can’t be regarded as a vital force in changing the world. Paul is reaching for something much deeper than mere liturgy. He is calling us to radical change in life and worship.
The kind of prayer to which Paul is calling us can indeed change the world. But it’s going to have to be something radically different from just saying eloquent prayers in public worship.
Paul’s logic is at its best. If we are really to pray for all people, we must believe that God loves them all without distinction and that Christ’s sacrifice on the cross was indeed on behalf of all. It’s difficult for us to appreciate the struggle that those early Jewish followers of Jesus had with this. Imagine being raised in the tradition in which the world was divided into two camps, Jew and Gentile, the children of light and the children of darkness, and then, through faith in Christ, learning that God loves all people and that the old distinctions are invalid. It took a lot of doing to work out this new reality in which Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female, educated and uneducated are called to live together in a fellowship that seeks and accepts all people alike.
As a matter of fact, we haven’t worked it out yet. The churches in America, for the most part, merely reflect the social, ethnic, and cultural distinctions of the world around us. It’s obvious that the world has shaped the church more than the church has impacted the world. This is not to accuse the churches of creating or of consciously perpetuating ethnic, cultural, and economic segregation. That’s just the way things are.
As I’ve come to know the pastors and people of hundreds of churches in East Africa, I have come to appreciate the complexities of their struggles with the divisive forces of ancient tribalism. Even in the Church of Uganda, where the Holy Spirit has been mightily at work through the Revival, a renewal movement which began in 1936, tribal divisions continue to be a source of tension. Baganda, Munyoro, Muganda, Bahororo, Karamajong all have great difficulty overcoming centuries of ill feelings and strained relationships. The great witness of the Church of Uganda is in those places where the power of Christ to create unity and love across tribal divisions is clearly demonstrated.
Now, I’ve never met anyone who professed a belief that God only desired the salvation of the rich, the educated, the whites, or the males. I’ve never heard anyone preach that Christ gave Himself as a ransom only for a particular group or tribe of people. Not even in South Africa. In a recent visit there, I was privileged to have lunch with a member of Parliament who was a staunch advocate of the official state doctrine of apartheid, the enforced separation of the races. An elder in his church, and a student of church history, he held strongly that salvation is for all, black and white alike, and we had no theological disagreement at that point. I think we’ve all pretty well covered that ground and agree that salvation in Christ is offered to all men and women without distinction.
But how long can we go on saying one thing and doing another? Whether it’s in South Africa, Sri Lanka, South Korea, or Southern California, the church rarely looks any different from the community center or country club nearby. Can we really pray and give thanks for all people if we’re not actively seeking to enter into active relationships with them? Can we really proclaim that God desires all people to be saved as long as they stay in their own places as determined by race, sex, or money? Can we offer the gospel of Christ’s redemption to all without offering ourselves? Absolutely not!
It is evident that churches have allowed the world around them to control their agendas. The “homogeneous unit” principle of church growth is a fact. Churches that slant their appeal to their own kind are the churches that most often grow in numbers. Churches in America that reflect the culture of affluence and success are more likely to be successful. Churches like the one I serve would not tolerate any thought of a gospel exclusively for well-educated, successful whites. But if someone from another planet were to visit us on a Sunday morning, they would have to get the impression that we are rather exclusive.
So what can we do? First, we can admit to the reality of our own indifference. We can stop ignoring the problem. As long as we defend our segregated churches on the grounds that there are no ethnics in our neighborhood or no poor people in our community, we simply perpetuate our own unwritten code of apartheid. There can be no forgiveness, healing, or change without the admission that we have a problem. We call this confession.
The step that follows confession is repentance, and that means a conscious change of direction. There is built-in resistance to change in all human behavior patterns. If you don’t believe it, try to correct the slice in your golf swing. I am troubled that the church I serve doesn’t really want to change in this area. It seems that we really don’t want to be an all-inclusive church. If we did, our people probably wouldn’t have moved to our suburban community in the first place. We prefer to be with our own kind. We are uncomfortable around folks who don’t think, talk, and look like us. We really have to decide whether we want to change. So far, I don’t see any dramatic changes in the offing. But certainly no change will ever occur until we begin with genuine confession and repentance. And I don’t see how we can go on affirming the universality of the gospel without trying to demonstrate it in actual relationships. To accept things the way they are is to continue to allow the world around us to write our agenda.
And how do we apply the universality of the gospel to the incredibly complex problems of nationalism, militarism, and warfare? To return to Paul’s logic: if we are really to pray for all people, we must believe that God loves them all without distinction, and that Christ’s sacrifice on the cross was indeed on behalf of all.
Can we sincerely pray for the salvation of people at the same time that we are arming to kill them? The basic problem that I feel in addressing this question is the confusion that exists in our categories. It’s as though we were trying to play basketball by the rules of football. The technology of warfare has moved rapidly in a short time. Our thinking has not caught up with the realities.
The ultimate example of this is talking about winning or surviving a nuclear war. The press recently carried reports of an evacuation plan for Southern California in the event of a nuclear attack. In the first place, anyone who drives the freeways at rush hour will attest to the impossibility of such a mass evacuation of more than five million people on what would most likely be less than thirty minutes’ notice! One of our officials even said that one could survive by digging a hole and covering it with a wooden door and a lot of dirt! Our thinking has not caught up with technology. The old categories of shields to ward off spears, steel helmets to deflect bullets, and thick walls to resist cannonballs are no longer applicable.
It seems to me that’s where our theories of deterrence break down. The fact is that technology has advanced beyond the point of capable defenses. This is true with the new breed of conventional weapons as well as with nuclear weapons. Official estimates are that a conventional war, involving Russia and the United States, if fought in western Europe would produce 500,000 military casualties in the first sixty days. To the United States, this would mean more casualties than we suffered in World War II and Vietnam combined. Remember, this is in just two months, without the use of nuclear weapons. And I haven’t even mentioned the diabolical potentials for chemical and biological warfare. If you confront these realities openly and honestly, you may need more than a glass of warm milk to go to sleep tonight.
The maintenance of military strength with some equivalence among the nations is a fact of life in a sinful world. But the nuclear arms race, in which each superpower had the capability of destroying the other thirty times over, was a stark symptom of technology out of control and far beyond our thinking. And perhaps the greatest danger to the world still could come from a small country with nuclear capability and a dictator accountable to no responsible political process.
There can be no question in my mind that we as Christians must address these questions of nationalism, militarism, and warfare, not only because of their urgency and complexity, but also because of our beliefs as set forth in this passage. We are to pray for all people, especially political authorities “that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.” And the reason that this is of first importance is that God desires the salvation of all people, and Christ gave Himself as a ransom for all people.
It is this universality of God’s love and Christ’s death for all people that calls us to a new way of thinking and a newer way of living. Where will the initiative arise for a new ideology if not from the gospel? And where will the message of God’s love for all people without distinction be heard, if not from the church? The old competitive nationalisms, with their seeds of the destruction of humankind, must be challenged by Christians in every country. The insane pursuit of military expansion and adventurism must be exposed by the prophetic voice of the churches in every land. The disobedience to the Word of God entailed in the squandering of our resources on weapons of war while millions of the people whom God loves are starving places us clearly under God’s inescapable judgment.
To be silent or complacent in an hour such as this is to part company with Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos, and all of the prophets, and also with Jesus. To allow any nationalism to control the agenda of the church is too tragic a failure to even contemplate. I see no way to talk about the universality of the gospel, as Paul does here, without speaking out against the thought of sending millions of people into an eternity without Christ at the push of a button or the spray of a nozzle.
Can prayer change the world? I believe that it can. But not just by saying eloquent prayers in public. Paul closes our paragraph with the key in verse 8. He calls the men to “pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.” Most commentaries break the paragraphs between verses 7 and 8. I feel strongly that verse 8 is the conclusion of the previous paragraph.
The picture of lifting holy hands not only harks back to the ancient Jewish traditions; it is also a picture of coming before God with clean hands and a pure heart. How can we lift holy hands to God if we are not actively seeking to relate to all men and women, whom He loves without distinction? How can we lift holy hands to God if we are not speaking and working for the reduction and elimination of the forces and weapons poised to destroy the very people God loves and for whom Christ died? To raise holy hands, without wrath and doubting, is clearly of first importance in our worship agenda. Such is the prayer and the worship that could change the world.
When I reflect upon the prophets of the Old Testament, I often raise the question, why did God choose a particular nation, as He did Israel, to be His chosen people? They preferred to think of their election as a privilege, but the prophets saw it as a responsibility. The divine call and love, while indeed a privilege, must always be regarded as an awesome responsibility.
And why does God work through a particular people such as Israel then, and the new Israel, the church, now? I believe He does this in order to show to everyone else, through those chosen people, what His design for life, His love for all people, really is.
When Israel allowed the world around it to write its agenda, it failed to show the world God’s agenda. When we allow the world around us to control our agenda to fit its prejudices, its nationalisms, and its militarisms, we have failed to show our world that God desires all to be saved and that Christ gave Himself a ransom for all.
Saying prayers in public worship becomes an object of God’s scorn where those prayers are not expressions of the universality of the gospel in word and deed. How shocked were the people and priests when Amos presented God as saying:
“I hate, I despise your feasts,
and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.
Even though you offer me your burnt
offerings and cereal offerings,
I will not accept them,
and the peace offerings of your fatted beasts
I will not look upon.
Take away from Me the noise of your songs;
to the melody of your harps I will not listen.
But let justice run down like waters,
and righteousness like an everflowing stream.”
—Amos 5:21–24 (RSV)
Prayer can change the world, but it’s going to have to be a way of praying different from merely saying prayers.
Troubling Questions About Women in the Church
I’ve been around long enough to remember reading this passage without batting an eyebrow. More than any other time in Christian history, this passage, along with others like 1 Corinthians 11:2–16; 14:34–35; and 1 Peter 3:1–6 cannot be read without causing many temperatures to rise.
2:9-15 Before we examine the text itself, it’s important to establish some ground rules on how we will read it. Let me suggest three:
We must read the passage in the light of all other Scripture. It is not the purpose of this commentary to present a thorough technical study, but the serious student may begin with Genesis 1:26–28, 2:18–25, 3:1–24 and work through numerous passages, all pertaining to our understanding of male and female. Simplistic generalizations barring women from public ministry have no place, for instance, when Priscilla is called by Paul “a fellow worker in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 16:3), and when Euodia and Syntyche are referred to as “these women who labored with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and the rest of my fellow workers” (Phil. 4:3). The whole of Scripture must be considered in the interpretation of any given passage.
We must distinguish between passages that describe events or practices at the time, and those that clearly teach principles designed for universal and timeless application. This ground rule is extremely important, for example, in the Gospels and in the Book of Acts. It’s one thing to read that Jesus turned water into wine, but that is no indication that we are called to do the same in the continuing life of the church. Similarly, just because certain things happened as described in the Book of Acts, does not necessarily mean that they are to be regular patterns in the church. It may not be easy to decide whether a given passage was intended primarily as narrative or teaching or both. But the question must be considered.
We must read the passage within its cultural, social, and historical setting. It shouldn’t startle anyone to be told that the Bible was written by real people, struggling with real problems, in real places and times. To read it with first century eyeglasses and hear it through twenty-first century headsets is not always easy. But that is our task and privilege.
With these ground rules established, let’s play ball. As stated before, I choose to relate verse 8 to the previous paragraph, but verse 9 clearly contains a continuity of thought. Remember, the original text did not have sentence or paragraph divisions. I see the “in like manner” saying in effect that as the men are to lead in public prayer, not just by the words that are spoken, but with “holy hands” by the quality of their lives, so the women are to show their faith both by their outward dress and by their good works. The paragraph deals with three themes: clothing and Christian witness (9–10), leadership in the church (11–12), and the Fall revisited (13–15).
Clothing and Christian witness (vv. 9–10). In Paul’s mind, which was steeped in the Scriptures, any description of a virtuous woman had to reflect Proverbs 31:10–31. No passage in the Bible, or perhaps in all ancient literature, exalts a woman with higher praise. The woman of that passage is no shrinking violet, blending into the wallpaper. Of her it was said, “strength and honor are her clothing;… Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised” (Prov. 31:25, 30).
The issue before us is that of values: what makes a person valuable, and what should a person hold valuable? Paul addresses the issue specifically for women. This could well indicate that Paul was confronting a problem that had arisen on the local scene. Perhaps some of the women in the church in Ephesus had begun to use their new freedom in Christ wrongly. This reality of their new freedom must not be overlooked.
Here is where an understanding of the social and cultural background of the New Testament period is essential. Christians in Ephesus were from both Jewish and Greek backgrounds. In the Jewish tradition, a woman was regarded more as a piece of property than as a person. She was without rights or power. In spite of the honor given to her in such a passage as Proverbs 31, in actual practice outside of the home, she was not regarded as a person. There was a Jewish prayer in which the man thanked God that he was not a Gentile, a slave, or a woman. One could have lovely daughters, but a marriage without a male heir was considered a disaster.
Women were also held to be nonpersons on the Greek side of the ledger. The life of the Greek woman was confined mostly to the home. And even at home, she was her husband’s property. She lived in her own quarters and did not appear in public alone. She was rarely involved in community meetings or activities. Though there were some women in business, such as Lydia in Philippi (Acts 16:14), they were the exceptions and not the rule.
I first experienced this view of women in a visit to Afghanistan in 1970. For the most part, the streets and bazaars were filled with men. I never saw a woman alone in public, and most of the women wore traditional long tentlike dresses and veils. In a dinner in an Afghan home, only the men gathered around the table and we were served by the young men of the household, though I assumed the mother and daughters were in the kitchen preparing the meal. As we left the home, the wife was brought to the door to greet us—and she was veiled. To be sure, those traditions are changing throughout the world, largely due to Western influence, but they can still be found in many countries, especially in Muslim culture.
One group of women in the New Testament period who did appear outside of the home were the sacred prostitutes. In Corinth, the Temple of Aphrodite boasted a thousand of them, and their activities were not confined to the temple. It may have been difficult to walk the streets of Corinth without being confronted by some of them. In Ephesus, the temple of Diana had hundreds of sacred prostitutes. Prostitution was regarded as a form of worship to some of the gods.
What we must realize is that when a woman became a Christian, she was, for the very first time in her life, regarded fully as a human being. The way in which Paul singled out women and preached to them (Acts 16:13) was a radical departure from Jewish and Greek culture. Treating a slave girl as a human being landed Paul in prison (Acts 16:16–24). From the very beginning, women were sought and accepted in the fellowship. When Mark underscored the fact that there were a number of women who traveled with Jesus, he was pointing to something very different and significant about the ministry of Jesus. And, of course, Paul summed up this radical difference that the gospel made: “There is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28). Does this obliterate all distinctions between male and female and make the Christian community unisex? Of course not! But it does make a clean break with all cultural mores based upon some assumed inherent superiority of male over female.
What does all of this have to do with clothing and Christian witness? A great deal. As women received their liberation in Christ from the old Hebrew and Greek suppressions, we have to believe that some of them went beyond the boundaries of common sense in expressing their new-found freedom and power. And one of the ways they announced their new-found status could well have been in the way they dressed and fixed their hair. That’s still a way that women work off some of their frustrations. Going out to buy a new outfit and stopping at the hairdresser on the way home is sometimes good therapy. But if a woman, or a man for that matter, starts measuring personal worth by the clothing worn and the outward appearance, it becomes a case of misplaced values.
The old cliché “Clothes make the man” applies to women as well. But, all it can really mean within the bounds of healthy values is that clothing is often the first statement we make about who we are to those who do not know us. If I wear my painting clothes to the first day of a new class that I teach at the seminary, I will be thought of quite differently than if I wear a jacket and tie. When I arrive to begin a conference with pastors in Uganda, I don’t wear shorts and a T-shirt. As people get to know me, what I wear might not make a great deal of difference in their opinion of me. But I cannot separate my clothing from what I want to say about myself.
Because clothing says something about the person wearing it, it is related to Christian witness. If the newly liberated women in the church at Ephesus were coming to the meetings in all kinds of finery and lavish accessories, they were making a statement as to what this new Christian community believes about values. Extravagance and ostentation are always to be avoided, partly as our witness to our belief that our money should be used, not for selfish consumption, but for the kingdom of God.
And let’s be willing to struggle with all of the ambiguities that this matter presents. Customs and fashions vary from time to time and place to place. On a tour group in Israel, one of our women was a good representative of accepted clothing styles in Southern California. Her sundresses and halter tops would raise no questions at one of our weekday Bible study groups. But in Israel? She was not allowed to enter the shrines and holy places. I overheard a comment from a local, “She looks like a prostitute!” No one would say that of her at home. But in another culture, her clothing made a different statement.
It may well have been that the Christian women in Ephesus were looking more like prostitutes than like newly redeemed children of God. Could it be that in many of our churches on Sunday mornings we look more like commercials for the American image of success than like people concerned with the hungry and naked of the world?
Paul’s admonition to the women at Ephesus needs to be heard by us all. Our culture drives us to place all too much value on outward appearance. We need to be reminded that God looks upon the heart. We are each of infinite value, not on the basis of what we wear or own, but on the basis of God’s love for us. We should thus hold valuable, not the things on which price tags are so readily placed, but those things which are eternal. To adorn ourselves with good works is the best fashion advice ever given.
Leadership in the church (vv. 11–12). It’s my guess that these two verses will continue to be a source of disagreement among Christians for a long time to come. Our convictions and traditions in the matter of women in leadership in the church are often deeply imbedded and strongly felt. I have some Christian friends who will have nothing to do with a church that ordains women to leadership positions. I have other Christian friends who would have nothing to do with a church that doesn’t. I find myself praying that we’ll find a way to love one another across this battleline and stop fighting each other for the sake of our common mission to the world.
However, I have to express my conviction that if we read this passage and its companion in 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 in the light of our three ground rules, we will be able to come to some reasonable conclusions.
As is true in all of his letters, Paul is addressing specific people and specific situations. Rarely do we have access to the actual problems. But is it not safe to assume that some of these newly liberated women in Christ had become overly aggressive in the meetings of the congregation? The Jewish woman had never been allowed to read the Scriptures in the synagogue or to teach in a school. In the temple at Jerusalem, she could only go as far as the outer court. (To this day, she is confined to a smaller section of the Western Wall in Jerusalem.) The Greek woman had rarely had an opportunity to be heard by anyone outside of her home.
It would be difficult for me to believe that some of the women in this new and exhilarating climate of the gospel wouldn’t get carried away. It doesn’t take much imagination to visualize a scene in which a few women seized power and were dominating the leadership and worship of the church in Corinth and in Ephesus. There’s no indication that such problems existed in places such as Thessalonica, Philippi, or Rome. In fact, as we have already seen, Paul referred to women in Rome and Philippi as “fellow workers.”
What the interpreter must decide, then, is the scope of application. Were these only local situations that needed the drastic remedy that Paul prescribed, or was Paul setting forth a universal rule to be applied in all churches, in all places? I prefer the former. This preference seems to be supported by Paul’s use of the first person singular in verse 12. Paul is clearly referring to his personal practice. It seems to me that this practice is to be limited rather than universal in the church.
And, by the way, the admonition to the women to learn in silence isn’t bad pedagogical advice for men either. How else does most learning take place? I get the feeling that Paul was addressing some women who had lost the art of listening. Coming out of the deprivations that had long been imposed upon them, they had a lot to learn, a lot of catching up to do. They needed to do a lot of listening, and thus the appeal to “learn in silence with all submission” may not have sounded to them the way it sounds to us. I prefer to hear it as good pedagogical advice in that particular setting, a corrective to some local abuses which could occur anywhere, anytime.
Before we leave this subject, I need to express a conviction and a hope. My conviction is that we have no basis for relegating women to subservient roles in the church on the basis of the whole of Scripture. Functional roles are not clearly established by the New Testament. The long history of the emergence of different structures and officers in the churches certainly attests to the fact that no single pattern is set forth in the Scriptures. To take the Bible seriously must mean that we begin with the creation of male and female, both in the image of God. It must also mean that we honor the gifts of the Holy Spirit given to all believers. To restrict the recognition of such gifts on the basis of sexuality is hardly consistent with Paul’s classic statement: “There is neither male nor female; for you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28).
My hope is that we will grow in our ability to love and respect one another in our differences. I want to grow in my willingness to accept those who insist on a universal application of what I consider to be a local and historical matter. At the same time, I pray that those who differ will recognize that we take the Scripture no less seriously in departing from the traditional views of all-male leadership in the church. To make this matter a test of orthodoxy can only be detrimental to the body of Christ.
The Fall revisited (vv. 13–15). The third, and by far the most complex, issue raised in this paragraph is Paul’s view of woman in relationship to the Fall. Even as I say “Paul’s view,” I recognize the fairness of pointing out that the statements in verses 13 and 14 were probably representative of the prevailing view of the rabbis at that time. The same idea is expressed in 1 Corinthians 11:8–9, in which the fact that man was created first, and that woman was created from the man, is said to establish man’s priority and superiority over the woman. The rabbis also added that though woman was second in creation, she was the first to sin.
It need not be surprising that Paul reflected the view of the Fall which prevailed in his time. To make this a case for the inherent inferiority of women is neither necessary nor good. This is not the only passage by Paul which presents us with difficulty. His allegorical treatment of Sarah and Hagar, with Hagar corresponding to Mount Sinai and the earthly Jerusalem in contrast to the heavenly Jerusalem (Sarah) (Gal. 4:21–31), is not as clear as we might wish. Likewise, his argument in Romans 11 and the statement that “all Israel will be saved” (11:26) is a source of continuing difficulty, and interpreters have been unable to agree upon a universally acceptable solution.
Rather than make a case for a rigid view of the inferiority and subservience of women, why not place this passage in the category of those remarkably few statements of Paul which best be admitted to be beyond our grasp? There’s no question in my mind that it reflects a debatable view. To argue that the sequence of the creation narrative teaches the superiority of the man certainly goes beyond anything said in Genesis.
Two classic statements in Matthew Henry’s eighteenth century commentary are worth recalling: “Eve’s being made after Adam, and out of him, puts an honor upon that sex, as the glory of man (1 Cor. 11:7). If man is the head, she is the crown… . The man was dust refined, but the woman was dust double-refined, one remove further from the earth.” The second has been more widely quoted: “… not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved.”
While the traditional view didn’t leave much hope for the woman, we can be grateful to Paul for daring to go beyond that view in verse 15. Unfortunately, scholars still can’t agree on what he meant. The exhortation to women to continue in “faith, love, and holiness, with self-control” applies to men as well and expresses the norm for Christian living. What is perhaps the most difficult phrase in the pastorals, however, is “she will be saved in childbearing” (v. 15). A number of interpretations have been suggested.
Some of them have to do with the meaning of the word for “saved” used here. To make childbirth a means or requirement for being saved is clearly inconsistent with Paul’s view of salvation “by grace through faith in Jesus Christ” (Eph. 2:8–9). But the Greek word for “saved” is not used in the New Testament exclusively in the sense of spiritual salvation. It is also used to mean “health or wholeness.” It is used in the gospels in connection with Jesus’ healings. But even if it is taken in that sense here, we still have the implication that women can find true wholeness only through bearing children. Many single women would testify otherwise.
A more ancient interpretation emphasizes the presence of the definite article in the Greek text before “childbearing.” Here, the reading is “the childbearing,” meaning the birth of Jesus by Mary. If Paul wanted to say that the salvation of women would come by the birth of Jesus, this was an awkward and obscure way of saying it.
Others tie the statement to Genesis 3:15, in which, after the Fall, it is said that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent’s head. This, again, is a variation of the messianic theme above.
Yet another approach is to regard motherhood in general as a very wholesome and health-giving experience, reinforcing the traditional view of the Hebrew and Greek cultures that woman’s basic value was in giving birth to children and raising them.
I’m convinced that the meaning of these verses will never be resolved and that we do well to accept our limitations in interpreting them.
As Paul has begun these practical instructions for the life and worship of the church, it is certainly clear that he did not intend to deliver a comprehensive manual of polity and worship. He is only addressing some specific needs in that particular situation, out of which comes helpful guidance for the churches in all times.
He will now turn to questions about officers and leaders in the church.
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