Waneta Dawn

A possible interpretation of I Tim 2:15 is that in the first half “she” does refer to Eve, and in the second half “they” refers to all women. My understanding is that people of the OT era were saved by looking forward to Christ, and they did this partly by wanting to be the person who bore the Christ-child. Hence, “she shall be saved in childbearing,” which refers to the bearing and birth of Jesus. Eve appears to have been looking for Jesus when she anounced the birth of her sons. Genesis 4:1 she says “I have gotten a man from the Lord.” (This could also reflect that she didn’t know that her husband had anything to do with the procreation of her child, and it could indicate both.)

If those in the Hebrews 11 faith chapter were saved by trusting in God and looking forward to Jesus, then all women of all time would also be saved the same way–through faith. Those before Christ by looking forward to His coming, and those after his birth, death and resurrection looking back and also looking to God in us via the Holy Spirit as well as looking forward to eternity with Christ. But since faith without works is dead, charity and holiness with sobriety are good descriptions of a genuine faith that brings forth works.

In the case of Eve, because Jesus had not yet come to earth, died, and rose again, the “shall” is necessary. Hebrews 11:13 “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” In other words, although they had faith, they were not saved until Jesus did His atoning work on the cross and rose from the dead. v 16 testifies of their admittance to Heaven: “But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.”

Notice Paul does NOT say that Adam was NOT in the transgression, which some would like to insinuate. Instead, he is saying that being temporarily deceived does not make you permanently damned. If you have genuine, works-producing faith in Jesus.

In Susanna Krizo’s book “When Dogmas Die” she says a certain passage could have 2 meanings, (I don’t have time to look for page & text right now, but I did read that recently, and found that so fascinating I reread it.) since the Hebrews loved using words with double meanings. Although the NT is in Greek, Paul is a Hebrew, of the tribe of Benjamin if I recall correctly, and could well have used a double meaning. If so, the “she” for the deceived Eve, could also refer to the deceived woman.

Could the authority word mean something like “deceptive authority?” The source I have does not give the date the letters to Timothy were written, but it does say the letter to the Ephesians was written about AD 63. (I later googled this and my info says I Tim was written AD 62-64. Not much help. I also found that many modern scholars believe Tim & Titus were not written by Paul at all, that they were written by someone much later. Here’s one reason: “For example, Norman Perrin analyzed the Greek used by the author or authors of the Pastoral Epistles, finding that over 1/3 of their vocabulary is not used anywhere else in the Pauline epistles; more than 1/5 is not used anywhere else in the New Testament, while 2/3 of the non-Pauline vocabulary are used by 2nd century Christian writers.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Epistle_to_Timothy. Me, WD, again: If this is so, it would help explain the use of “authentein,” a word that wasn’t used in other writing in Paul’s time.)

If this is a genuine letter from Paul and the woman had heard or read the letter to the Ephesians and took from Ephesian 5:21-33 that more submission is required of husbands than is required of wives (the reverse of what comps claim today) she could also have been teaching that and insisting that her teaching had more legitimacy than the everyone-submit-to-one-another doctrine.

If she was using Ephesians 5 as a reason why women have more authority then men do (similar, but opposite to how comps use the passage today) and using Paul’s letter to back up her statements (like many husbands and pastors do today) that would make sense with the reference to deception in I Timothy 2:14.

Without the use of Paul’s letter (which we today call scripture) as a tool to deceive, because the woman could claim God-given authority from it, verse 14 is illogical. One could miscontrue Paul to be saying it is more important to silence someone because they are prone to be deceived than it is to silence someone who is prone to sinning on purpose. But if the woman is using unsound, twisted reasoning that sounded almost right to her listeners, and especially if she had something of authority like Paul’s own letter to apparently back her up, verse 14 makes perfect sense. Satan, through the serpent, used half truths or even quarter truths to deceive Eve.

Notice how many centuries the church has believed that Ephesians 5 granted husbands authority over their wives, even though the passage never states that, nor has that in the application. If Paul & Timothy had not silenced the woman, our churches could be dealing with the problem of wives taking authority over their husbands and claiming God ordained it to be so.

I realize this is speculation or hypothosis. I welcome comments to either support or discredit. For example, if the letter to the Ephesians was written after I Timothy, instead of before, the whole hypothosis falls apart.