pinklight

If Tim wrote about a woman and several men, then “she” would be the woman and “they” could be the men.
Does that make any sense at all as a possibility to anyone else besides me???

Craig,
On possibilities, here’s how I kinda look at that. Anything outside of what IS written (the box) is possible since I don’t know what was happening outside of what is written. I cannot determine then what is outside the box and therefore cannot make conclusions based on what is outside the box. So I have to stay with the text and from the text make my conclusions which is within reason rather than making conclusions based on possibilities that I have no idea about, which isn’t reasonable to me. Does that make sense? That’s how I kinda look at it. The point is to determine what is in the text anyway and not what is outside of it.
Then the thought of an individual woman “she” and men “they” brings me right back to the question, why did Paul use “a woman” and “a man”? To be consistant both would either have to refer to individuals, a woman and a man, or groups of women and men. I think consistency is better than inconsistency. So if Timothy wrote about a woman and several men how come Paul wrote back then about “a woman” and “a man” rather than “a woman” and “men”?