Re: Paul and women -- ExUBF's Parlor_Free wheel as far as u can from UBF

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Date Posted: 15:46:11 03/21/05 Mon
Author: Anonymous
Subject: Re: Paul and women
In reply to: Mike K. 's message, "Re: Paul and women" on 11:38:47 03/19/05 Sat

>2. In early Christian times, a rigidly patriarchal
>society was in place.
>I doubt that. We see much rather that the teachings of
>Jesus Christ spawned, for the first time, an
>"equality" movement, i.e. women not being considered
>full human beings in society. It was in "the world",
>but not in "the Church".

What are you talking about Mike? In the Gospels, the numbers of women and children weren't counted. It doesn't seem that Christ really instituted an "equality" movement. Most of the advances in equality between men and women were made recently in the 20th century.

> Could not Paul's admonitions about women keeping
>silent and being "submissive" come from this, rather
>than from a divine principle.
>Paul clearly preached that in the Church, "there
>cannot be male or female, greek or Scythian, freeman
>or slave but Christ is all and in all".

Then why are you insisting that man and woman are not equal?

> 3. If you want to take 1 Timothy 2:12 literally
>and apply it to today, you should know first that Paul
>himself didn't take it literally (I'll explain soon.)
>
>Who said I want to take things "literally"? Why do you
>think I'm talking about principles?

You said these things - look at the post that I originally applied to. You brought up the 1 Timothy verse yourself and started talking about principles. In a previous post, you said something like "I get greatly angered when people try to make the Bible say something other than what it says ad verbatim." My general impression of you is that you are a Biblical literalist and probably an inerrantist.

>You misunderstand the principle. This is not the
>principle I am talking about. Looking at Colossians or
>Ephesians, you would likely realize that the
>relationship of Christ and the Church is that of
>husband and wife, and as such, men and women can never
>be totally equal, lest you'd be implying that at any
>given point in time, the Church will be equal to
>Christ, that is: be God in life and nature, as well as
>an object of worship and adoration.

Here you are reading more into the scripture than is there. It makes an analogy between the relationship of Christ and the Church and husband and wife. But does the analogy necessarily apply to all aspects? Surely you aren't suggesting that a husband should be the object of a wife's "worship and adoration."

> Some people are now just coming out of the dark
>ages and discovering this.
>
>Again, like I said: the principle is not man and
>woman, but Christ and the Church. And this principle
>DOES NOT CHANGE. Regardless of how liberal people are
>today, the Church simply is not equal to Christ.

Again, scripture makes an analogy, it does not say Church/Christ = husband/wife in every possible way. Therefore it is still viable to say that men and women are equal.

>At this point, I'll quote someone else who's done
>the work already, "It is generally assumed that Paul
>is the author of a Christianity of female
>subordination. But more recent studies have shown that
>the historical Paul in fact continued most of the
>assumptions and practices of early charismatic,
>inclusive Christianity.
>I've answered this already. But it should eb noted
>that Christianity wasn't a charismatic movement, but a
>Christ-centered movement.
>
>Indeed, most of the New Testament evidence that
>women functioned as local leaders, as well as
>traveling evangelists, is to be found in the Pauline
>letters. Paul addresses almost an equal number of
>women along with men (sixteen women and eighteen men)
>in his greetings to Church leaders in Romans 16.
>
>We see that women were deacons, we see that they were
>in positions of caring for others, we see that they
>opened their houses for churches, but I lack the
>evidence that they were "local leaders".

You have me here. I don't have the evidence to back up the statement about women being local leaders. I will try to search this up somewhere.

>I wonder why Paul said "An elder must be husband of
>one wife...", I guess that means he also included
>lesbian elders?

Are you suggesting that there would be anything wrong with a lesbian elder?

> He addresses a woman name Junia by the title of
>"apostle,"
>Interestingly, Junia is "Junias", and that's not a
>genitive but a man's name.

Interestingly enough, Junia is a woman's name and appears in the earlier versions of Scripture. Over the ages people who were uncomfortable with the position of women in leadership changed it to read "Junias," which is a man's name.

I have to leave quickly now. Hope to get back to you on your other points.

Regards,
Anonymous ex-UBFer

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Replies:

Homosexuality -- Mike K., 00:42:40 03/22/05 Tue
- Re: Homosexuality and Junia -- Anonymous, 17:19:08 04/02/05 Sat
  - Re: Homosexuality and Junia -- Chris, 04:25:44 04/03/05 Sun
    - Junia -- Mike K., 05:59:22 04/03/05 Sun