gengwall

Well, I would agree with him about patriarchy. It is a cultural phenomenon that is exposed in biblical history but not supported at all in biblical teaching. But I don’t agree about 1 Tim 2 and I can;t find any support for patriarchy in the garden. That seems like quite a stretch.

Back to 1 Tim 2. I still view that as a cop out. We need not be afraid of the text, especially if it is trying to teach us something. 1 Timothy 2 is not biblical history, it is biblical teaching. As such, it is trans-cultural. But for that very reason, because there are cultural elements at play in the context, we need to dig deep to understand the trans-cultural lesson. When one studies the lanuage really close, as Cheryl has done here, it becomes clear (at least it did to me) that what Paul is telling Timothy is not what comps say Paul is telling Timothy. Webb seems to accept the comp view but explain it away as irrelevant to the here and now. But the comp view simply does not fit the text. So accepting the comp view is accepting a lie. And explaining away the comp view as cultural is rendering the teaching meaningless. So I find Webb’s approach not only unhelpful to the egal cause, but unhelpful to the growth of the entire church.