Greg Anderson

Nope Don, it’s actually the old Warner Bros. Daffy Duck cartoon character.  I thought it would inject some humor here in light of Cheryl’s black ducks at the beginning of her essay on spiritual design.

It’s just the negation of the statement that if it’s just a world of ducks, then all ducks are Daffy.  All it does is expand the world of just ducks to all birds and allow for exception.

It was intended to show as Cheryl has shown, that the preponderance of evidence for women needing a “spiritual covering” in the form of male leadership is just not there.

In a world of birds, there is a bird that is a duck and it is not Daffy.

Cheryl,

The likelihood of any apology from CBMW for misrepresentation of a scholar’s work is virtually nil.

They have an agenda to advance, and any vehicle or gas for that agenda will be happily employed.

They believe with fervor and conviction that they have THE truth and the only truth from scripture as they see it.

What may be simply an historical narrative in scripture for one Christian, may be absolute and binding law for another.

When the world sees us divide and fight over things that have little to do with Jesus’ claim of being the way, the truth and the life, they want nothing to do with us.  They become as disillusioned as Gandhi became after his experience with Christian “religion” in South Africa—and this is the real tragedy.

Paula #3,

In addition to the irony you point out, it’s also rather funny when you consider an old episode of “All in the Family” when Edith Bunker caught Archie in a logical contradiction and says something to the effect of—“But Archie, you just said…” and true to form Archie retorts… “Never mind what I said Edith!…”

I don’t think it is at all unreasonable to conjecture that what the writer of Hebrews had in mind with the “authority” issue is the type of authority that comes with the knowledge of a particular subject, in this case knowledge of the Septuagint—which is what the Jews generally had for scripture in those days.

I also think that it is not entirely out of the domain of reasonable conjecture to say that copies of the Septuagint back then, were a very costly item, few and far between, and that readers may have had to travel to view a copy, and possibly pay a viewing fee too.

If this thesis is not too far off the mark, then the argument for the sense of authority as “boss over” is weaker than the one that would argue for “bearer of knowledge.”

Cheryl #14,

Aren’t you glad that religion and the coercive power of the state have not been allowed to ride in the same cart since they ratified the U.S. Constitution?

I know you’re Canadian, but consider for a moment that there are those who want you silenced, and would not hesitate a nano-second to enlist the power of the state to do it, because you threaten their power and constituency.

They would be more than happy to do the same thing to you as they did to Anne Hutchinson in the 1600’s.

Nope Paula, it was Richie Havens unplugged, not Jimi at all, totally acoustic.  Havens is of the old-school folksy genre.

And yes I’m an old dog from the Vietnam era, who has also managed to learn a few new tricks!

I don’t know why, but I keep hearing Richie Havens’ “Freedom” song from the old Woodstock flick.  Maybe it’s the time, and maybe it’s the season–And as Lin has pointed out, mayhap the day is coming when the institutional Church, and that includes the non-denominational mega-biggies, will no longer hold sway over as many as they did in their heydays.

The desire and laudable zeal to do all things “Biblically” can cause even the best of men (anthropos) to go against their consciences and what Lincoln called the better angels of our nature.

The mothers and grandmothers of these Southern gentlemen would be ashamed of them for the way they treated Lotz, and would surely want to take each one of them outside for a whippin’.

Cheryl,

Love the cartoon rendition of Dr. Einstein at the chalkboard!
Cute!

One has to admit that Phillips and the radical fringe element of patriarchy are at least consistent with their dogma.

CBMW however, is caught between a rock and a hard place.  How does an organization shoot for consistency when many of its adherents firmly believe that America was founded as a Christian nation and it is therefore desirable that it be governed in accordance with their interpretation of scripture?

Fortunately, the architects of the U.S. constitution ensured that all may freely practice whatever brand of religion suits them, but that none of them would ever be allowed to establish public policy.

Congrats Cheryl.  An appropriate musical footnote would probably be the C-major finale of Beethoven’s 5th symphony.

We truly have much to be thankful for, especially the freedom to study and make up our own minds about questions of religion.

There are those who would dearly love to revoke this freedom, and I thank my God we have a government (USA) that restrains them.

Paula #6,

So long as salaries are paid, papers get published, books get sold, and aspiring clergy cough up the tuition to their academic institutions, I don’t think they really care what nobodies (hyperbole) like us have to say.

Some would argue that my comment here smacks of a soulless cynicism found only in the world of secular politics, and I would agree that on the one hand it does.  But on the other hand, If I were in their shoes (CBMW) and wanted business to continue as usual, I would view it simply as a pragmatic reality.  If it’s just a few grumbling serfs, who cares?

I cant’ help but recall Ken Burns’ film “The Civil War”.
I remember Shelby Foote reading some old letters by a slave owner who in his inner conscience wished it wasn’t so.

Ironically, the opening salvos of a war that will split much of Southern protestantism as well as Northern, have begun at Irving Bible Church.

Excellent scholarship and critical thinking Cheryl and Paula.  The last thing traditional hierarchalists want is for their people (especially women) to dig into interlinears and the original languages of the Bible.

What they want is an unquestioned authority structure based on what they say the Bible says.

In a macabre sort of way it’s almost like the sayers of the law in H.G. Wells’  The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896)

No wonder Jesus told them “Ye are of your father the devil…”

Ryan & Don ,

I never remotely meant to imply that I am free of any moral constraints.  Murder, theft, adultery, and other sins, are universals that must not be engaged in under any circumstances, and Paul argues that even the heathen world has a conscience that bears this out (Romans 2).

The main gist of my comment earlier, was primarily a defense of women in ministry based on what I still see as a manifesto of freedom in Acts 15 for all people, whether 1st century Jew or 21st century gentile believer.  I also see this same manifesto, or at least a corollary of it in Galatians 3.

So far as church governance goes, I believe that what’s written in 1 Tim. are nice suggestions, but they are by no means written on stone tablets and absolutely binding.  Some churches follow the autocratic Moses model, while still others opt for a representative checks and balances approach.  E.W. Bullinger (hardly a liberal theologian) had this to say:

3. To Timothy were given the earliest instructions for orderly arrangement in the church, these instructions being of the simplest nature, and as Dean Alford well observes with regard to the Pastoral Epistles as a whole, the directions given “are altogether of an ethical, not of an hierarchical, kind”.  These directions afford no warrant whatever for the widespread organizations of the “churches” as carried on today (Bullinger 1799).

Source: Bullinger’s  Companion Bible , first printing 1922.

Don,

For me it is pretty simple actually, from the book of Acts Chap. 15. The text makes it pretty clear to me that God was long finished with writing in stone out of the thick darkness atop Mt. Horeb.

In verse 20, and then repeated in verses 28 & 29, I am assured that there are only 4 things that I am to refrain from in my Christian walk, and that sitting under a gifted woman teacher of the Bible is not among them.

What then do I do with a personal letter from Paul to his protege Timothy saying that he “Suffers not a woman to teach…”?  I use common sense and the context of false teaching to conclude that it was never intended to bar Godly women from preaching & teaching Christ crucified.

Don,  I know that you have been magnificent in defending the sisterhood of believers from the depredations of patriocentric dogmatists and I salute you for it.  All I am saying is that I think we have overlooked Acts 15 as a pivotal manifesto of the freedom we have in Christ and his new covenant.

Cheryl #22,

The day has indeed arrived when egalitarianism is no longer just a secondary issue in the church universal.  Over at Denny Burk’s blog, he has posed the question:  Is Egalitarianism a Heresy? (Mon 11 Aug 2008).  It’s hard not to conclude that the push is on to make one’s gender stance a litmus test for orthodoxy.

So “courage” is said to be a mature male trait huh?  Corrie ten Boom had more courage in her little finger than several macho-men combined.  I submit that the most vocal proponents of “Biblical manhood” over at CBMW would have folded after 90 days in a Nazi concentration camp.

Janice #5,

Welcome to our blog community!  CBMW does rely on dogma and fear to maintain a power base.  Dogma that very few will check out for themselves by doing their own critical thinking.

Fear, because it takes guts to go against the flow of centuries of patriarchal abuse.  It’s much easier to just accept what your “betters” tell you the scriptures mean, rather than becoming a Berean and searching them for yourself to see if these things are so.

Wistful nostalgia for the “good old days” that never were, is part of the fabric of conservative Americana.  In her book, “The Way We Never Were-American Families and the Nostalgia Trap”, author Stephanie Coontz dismantles American conservatism’s love affair with a glorious past that never existed.

Cheryl,

I like the way you pose a series of questions just like a series of hypotheses, and then test them with scripture.

Too much of what has gone on in the past, and has indeed been passed off as sound theology, is nothing more than extrapolation into thin air.

Scripture testing scripture is what you’ve always taught here on your blog, and for that many of us are indebted.  If it ain’t in the text, don’t try to import it in, or build it on-site.

On the other hand, what does one do when observed reality seems to contradict scripture?  For example, Luther once took Copernicus to task over the then heretical concept of heliocentrism (earth revolves around sun), saying:

“So it goes now.  Whoever wants to be clever must agree with nothing that others esteem.  He must do something of his own.  This is what that fellow does who wishes to turn the whole of astronomy upside down.  Even in these things that are thrown into disorder I believe the Holy Scriptures, for Joshua commanded the sun to stand still and not the earth [Jos. 10:12].”

Pinklight #4 ~ I used the illustration above (Luther on Copernicus) to show that there exists a wide gulf between figurative Hebrew poetry used to drive home a deeper truth (God’s sovereign power) vs. a  literal mechanical truth (sun orbiting earth).
In the case of God putting enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, I believe that God allowed the hatred to germinate and become a malignant fungus vs. an actual mechanical decree.  Why? because the very next verse (v16) when understood in context is also descriptive vs. prescriptive.

Cheryl,

You have my prayers too through this whole debacle !

Don # 37,

We have Constantine to thank (curse?) for laying the axe to our Hebrew roots as Christians.  The patristic theologians who came after him followed suit and did everything they could to rid the church of Hebraic influence.

It was probably Augustine of Hippo who devised the impeccable linear logic that was to box God up all the way through the reformation of Calvin and Luther.  Black or white, on or off, one or zero, the middle is excluded, paradox is not allowed.

Make no mistake, Greek thinking has helped make us very rich in science, art, and political institutions.  But no system of thought will ever figure out or contain the LORD of HOSTS.

As time goes on, I am becoming more astonished at what the Bible does not say more so than at what it does say.  Question is, where else do the facts in scripture point to something other than what has been accepted dogma since Constantine, Luther, and Calvin?

“… His watchmen are blind:  they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber …”

“… Yea, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot understand: they all look to their own way, every one for his gain, from his quarter …”

(Isaiah 56:10-11 ~ KJV)

Hi Cheryl,
Good to have you back!  You’ve written thoughtful stuff on asking the right questions.  Well, there’s bad news and good news.  The bad news is this:  No matter how many questions we ask about the origins of Paul’s purported new law (1 Tim. 2:12), complementarianism will always have an answer.

Dr. Wayne Grudem’s book Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth is usually the source book for many of these answers.  Dr. Grudem says “It’s a matter of obedience to the Bible.” (50), and “The Bible has to say something only once for it to be true and God’s word for us” ( 362).  If an eminent complementarian scholar says it, then it must be true, and no Christian in his or her right mind wants to go against the Bible.  Most are content to have a priestly class over them to tell them what the Bible means–no work required that way, and best of all, no personal accountability.

The good news is that through the efforts of free and open blogs such as yours, more and more Christians are not taking what they’ve been taught through tradition as some sort of Protestant Papal Encyclical on gender roles.  We are succeeding, we are helping to free brothers and sisters from mind tyranny, one human being at a time.

Paula, I must concur with you on what’s happening over at Burke’s blog.  I too am surprised that McCarthy hasn’t been shown the door and told not to return.  I’ve noticed that the pattern with comp. blogs is to eject people who show up with data that is not easily swept under their theological rugs with a hand broom.  What are they afraid of?  I have yet to see an egal. blog that kicks out people for promoting the comp. view.

Truthseeker,
I spent years in a Calvary Chapel environment, and it sounds like you are well aware that they are strict fundamentalists.  Fundamentalism actually began as a good thing in the early 1900’s to counter the theological liberalism that came out of European universities in the late 1800’s.  Originally, it was only meant to reaffirm the virgin birth, blood atonement of Christ, his bodily resurrection, and in general, the stuff that was laid down in the creeds of early church history.  Over time however, fundamentalism began to include much more, and the list of “required” doctrinal stances began to grow.  I began my own journey to freedom and liberty just as you did, by asking questions and doing my own homework on God’s word.  What does God’s word say and what does it not say?  Why does Paul appeal back to the creation in a personal letter to Timothy? Is it to establish a new law prohibiting all women from teaching scripture or is it simply addressing a specific false teaching to a specific audience?  How many chain-link fences do you have to build around Acts 15:28-29 and Galatians 3:28 in order to limit their application and make Paul’s apparent no no on women teachers stand?  I thought your analogy of the foot-bound women painted a poignant picture of how cruel the traditions of men can be.

Rest well Cheryl, you deserve a break.  Many of us look forward to the DVD series on the trinity and what scripture says and does not say about it.  That can wait, you rest and take your ease for awhile.

As I’ve said before on this blog, it’s far better to stick with the facts of scripture rather than trying to construct a theological belief system based on what we don’t know.  Good thoughts Cheryl, on the difference between romantic fancy surrounding the fall and what scripture actually shows as fact.  If more preachers would just stick to the facts, maybe we wouldn’t have the ludicrous claim that woman must have a “spiritual covering” in the form of a male husband, and or priest over her.  No matter how bombastically they posture or how loudly they bellow “inerrancy”, scripture says no such thing.

Good thinking all!  One of the hallmarks of abusive sects, churches- mega and small, is that they all require the suspension of one’s critical thought faculty.  Reason and common sense are frowned upon, and are equated with rebellion and witchcraft if they diverge from accepted dogma.  Even the vaunted Luther took a dim view of reason and common sense in his last sermon at Wittenberg: …”But since the devil’s bride, Reason, that pretty whore, comes in and thinks she’s wise, and what she says, what she thinks, is from the Holy Spirit, who can help us, then? Not judges, not doctors, no king or emperor, because [reason] is the Devil’s greatest whore…”  Funny how he wasn’t ashamed of her when he used her to go against papal authority and teaching.  Reason is what keeps us from taking what the Bible does not say and turning it into an absolute belief system that is above all question and examination.  Keep fighting the good fight Cheryl, the reformation is far from over…