Lisa,

I appreciate your concern. Yet I wouldn’t say that the perception that women who study gender issues are self-promoting is necessarily the problem of those women. It might be the problem of those perceiving it. The implication of the former would be that women shouldn’t apply their talents to such studies. Yet (in response to the latter) any work should be examined to see what value it actually has, whether it could be said to be self-serving or not.

Any significant conflict sees lots of words and ink spilled over it; gender issues are no exception. It is a topic of great interest to a great many people, and, I think, rightfully so. Yet it does seem that most of the women who have written on these issues have also done high-level scholarly work in other areas.

I also see gender issues come into play in areas in which they needn’t, and in which they are considered to be more primary, and less secondary, than they actually are. I’ve found this out the hard way. And wish it weren’t so.

dcljoy, I think you may have missed my point. I didn’t say the studies have no value. But it is the perception of women engaged in the study of gender issues that is problematic. It can actually undermine the point that is intended to be proven.

And this comment here is in line with what I was saying: “But when reputable male scholars of the caliber of F.F.Bruce, R.T.France, N.T. Wright, Ben Witherington111 and Gordon Fee say that the translation of these “proof” verses is not as cut and dried as we have been led to believe, then we should begin to look into the matter.”

It is a catch 22 as somebody else mentioned. How do you investigate the matter without it appearing like self-promotion. No easy answers. It is also is very stereotypical for women to be engaged in gender issues.

Lisa

I have enjoyed reading your articles (esp. the one on women and theology) … so I was saddened by this one.

Have you considered that women scholars bring up the gender issue because there is a genuine point which needs godly, bible-believing Christian men and women to really think about, and not just to follow what has always been taught in our churches.

I know all the arguments because I was taught them from the moment I began going to church as a young child. It wasn’t until I actually read what some of these women scholars (and some male scholars too) had to say that I began the long, slow, and sometimes painful journey of thinking differently. …. and it took a while.

From the other side, some of those arguments are almost nonsensical … like the order of creation for instance …. if taken to its logical conclusion, then using the argument of prior creation, animals are superior to humans …. from the other end, using the argument of progressive creation, then woman is the pinnacle of God’s work. All this proves is that we can always argue for our own point of view.

But when reputable male scholars of the caliber of F.F.Bruce, R.T.France, N.T. Wright, Ben Witherington111 and Gordon Fee say that the translation of these “proof” verses is not as cut and dried as we have been led to believe, then we should begin to look into the matter.

To say nothing of the wonderful women scholars who are a blessing to their sisters in Christ, and to the church.

Have you read any of Rebecca Groothius’ books or articles? She has a quite brilliant article on logic.

Lisa said:
“I think you missed my point. I never said they were not important and in fact, paragraph#5 supports that. My point is that it gives the perception of selfish ambition. Someone commented that it is also a stereotype for women to pursue gender issues. I would agree with that.”

This reminds me of a study I read about a while ago. It was addressing the wage gap between men and women in professional environments. It found that a large portion of the difference came from men asking for a higher starting wage during job interviews, and women accepting the first offer. But, it also found that women who haggled over their wages during interviews were less likely to be hired, because they were perceived as being overly self serving. Kind of a catch 22.

I think it’s the same situation here. If people don’t do gender studies, there will be fewer opportunities for women in perceived “harder” theology. But, when women do those gender studies, it’s perceived as selfish ambition.

(cont’d) And because of the confusing nature of what Paul is saying in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16 and our inability to understand exactly what he is saying, I think it’s risky to take his statement in 11:3 about the man being “the head of a woman” and extrapolate or conclude something about male headship vis-a-vis women from that. The verse/statement has a context, and in this case, we don’t understand the context (and I suggest that with our current level of knowledge of this passage, we can’t understand it), so if 11:3 is used to support a position about male headship, it could very easily become an example of D. A. Carson’s father’s statement: “A text without a context is a pretext for a proof text.”

Re: 1 Timothy 2: You are assuming that he is talking about a corporate church structure. He may be, but he may also be talking about husbands and wives, not men and women.

Re: 1 Corinthians 11: It’s too vague and confusing to understand WHAT Paul is saying. E.g.:

a. One cannot clearly tell which parts of what Paul wrote there are from himself, are his quoting of what someone else said or wrote to him, or are his response(s) to what someone else said or asked.

b. One can’t tell from 11:16 if he’s referring to the custom of women not being covered when praying or prophesying or the custom of women being covered when praying or prophesying.

c. If nature has given woman long hair in place of a “covering” (11:15) and if a woman is to cover her head when she is in God’s presence, that could support a long-haired woman NOT having to cover her head when praying or prophesying.

d. While one can find support for translating 1 Corinthians 11:10 as “[a sign of] authority on her head,” this is not at all certain. It could mean a woman has her own authority over her own head. See BDAG on εξουσια, #7.

e. One can’t determine what Paul is finally concluding or affirming or rejecting here, or what he is telling them to do or not do.

f. Due to the confusing nature of the passage, the vagueness of some of its statements, and the vast cultural differences and assumptions and practices that separate us from Paul and his readers, which add to our confusion about his intended meaning, I cannot find support in this passage for concluding or insisting that men today are to pray or prophesy with their heads uncovered and women today are to pray or prophesy with their heads covered.

g. Some argue that κατα κεφαλης εχων (lit. “downward-from head having”) in 11:4 is referring to (long) hair, and not to an additional head covering, and that the adjective in 11:5,13 from ακατακαλυπτος (its component parts can literally mean “not-downward-covered/hidden”) is referring to the absence of long hair. The verbs in 11:6-7 from κατακαλυπτω have the literal component parts meaning “to downward-from cover/hide,” and also don’t specifically refer to a covering other than one’s own hair. Such an interpretation perhaps explains the comments about κομαω (“to wear-long-hair/let-hair-grow”) in 11:14-15. If this understanding is correct (though it is not without its problems, and no version I know of translates the passage this way), then the debate on whether or not women should cover their heads in church is based on a misunderstanding and mistranslation of this passage.

Eric, I concur that Paul does not mention male headship in 1 Tim 2. But why does he then talk about the creative order in reference to women not exercising authority over a man in a corporate church structure? The same question applies to Paul’s description in 1 Corinthians 11 of the creative order.

Bridget, thanks for that contribution. You said,

The tone of this thread (and not all of it is coming from Lisa’s OP) seems to be, “gender studies is not a serious issue and women do not establish themselves as serious scholars when they devote themselves to this topic.”

I think you missed my point. I never said they were not important and in fact, paragraph#5 supports that. My point is that it gives the perception of selfish ambition. Someone commented that it is also a stereotype for women to pursue gender issues. I would agree with that.

I also agree with you, that selfish ambition can exist on both sides of the equation, as I noted in an earlier comment.

Jugulum & Lisa Robinson ~ It sounds like you’re both unaware of the history of the term “complementarian” and its use in the so-called complementarian-egalitarian debate. Prior to its appropriation by the male headship movement in the mid-1980s, the terms “complementary” and “complementarity” were most often used by egalitarians to express the idea that men and women had differing, interdependent gifts which functioned best when exercised together at all levels of church ministry. Before then, male headship advocates usually called themselves “traditionalists.”

So it isn’t that the egalitarians are appropriating complementarian terminology; they’re simply hijacking back a term that was hijacked from them in the first place.

I also have to concur with EricW’s critique of the male headship use of the term “complementarian.” Male headship advocates restrict women from fulfilling certain roles in the church and home while men have no restrictions whatsoever. Men provide the leadership; men can also provide the followership. Women possess no roles in the church or home which are uniquely theirs, so male headship complementarianism simply isn’t. Call it hierarchicalism, call it restrictivism, call it patriarchy, but to call it complementarianism is to call it something that it is not.

@ the topic ~ I’m rather disappointed to witness the denigration of women scholars for participating in gender studies. I’ve been working through Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism by John Piper and Wayne Grudem, eds. (Wheaton: Crossway, 1991), and one of the first things I did when I began reading it was to take a head count on the genders of the contributing authors. 3 of the book’s 27 chapters were authored by women, and 2 of those were brief, personal essays, so women contributed a grand total of 21 pages to a volume with approximately 423 pages of main text. In other words, men wrote 95% of a volume dedicated to arguing for male headship. Does that not appear equally self-serving?

How, then, should we remedy this problem? Female scholars are in trouble for writing about gender issues, be they egalitarians or male headship advocates. Male scholars are just as bad for promoting male headship. Are male egalitarian scholars the only ones who can’t appear self-serving? I don’t think that’s fair. How do we know they don’t feel compelled to get involved in that field on behalf of their wives, sisters, mothers and daughters?

The tone of this thread (and not all of it is coming from Lisa’s OP) seems to be, “gender studies is not a serious issue and women do not establish themselves as serious scholars when they devote themselves to this topic.” And if that’s a correct assessment, I heartily disagree. I’m happy that gender studies are going on, and I’m happy to see women involved in scholarship and academia at all.

Paul never uses the word “head” or says that “man is the head” in 1 Timothy 2, where he is talking about the man being created first.