Kristen

Here is a quote from Payne’s essay that encapsulates what I’m saying:
“Unless 1 Tim 2.12 is the one exception, none of Paul’s oujdev constructions selectively transfers only a qualifier from the second element to the first. Whenever Paul does use text following oujdev to qualify the element before oujdev, the entire construction
expresses this by combining the two elements to express one idea.”

With regards to the word “usurp” — based on your definition, that does seem to be the wrong word to use. Payne says the most likely sense is “assume a stance of independent authority” or “seize or assume authority for oneself.” This would relate specifically to men because it was towards the male teachers that this was being done.

Finally, I have looked up 1 Tim 1:6-7 in the interlinear: did you know that the word Paul uses there is not “men,” but the word “tisine” (plural, “tines”) that is most often translated “some”? So we cannot read 1 Tim 1:6-7 as if it were about “men” in contrast to 1 Tim 2:11-15 being about “women” (or “a woman”). Some of these false teachers in 1 Tim 1 could have been the woman or women of 1 Tim 2, in which case, both passages would apply to them (or her). Or it could be that there were no male false teachers at all; that the word “some” in 1 Tim 1:6-7 refers to EXACTLY the same group as in 1 Tim 2. That these are not the same group as in 1 Tim 1:19-20 is clear, in that the “some” there have gone beyond confidently teaching when they don’t know what they’re talking about, but have actually “rejected faith and a good conscience.” In any case, the issue is not that the “some” in 1 Tim 1:6-7 can go ahead and “assume authority for themselves” while the women in 1 Tim 2:11-15 can’t– if they are the same group of people.

BTW, Cheryl, I note that your blog software is starting to have trouble again with having so many comments in one thread. You might want to start a new one. 🙂