Cheryl

Regarding Matt’s comments on the Greek word for teach which is didasko, Matt was trying to say that because the word for teach used in this passage is a normal word for teach not one specifically for false teaching, that Paul isn’t stopping the teaching of error. His reasoning does not hold water first of all because 1 Timothy 2:14 shows that the reason for the stopping of the woman’s teaching was related to the deception of Eve. Secondly didasko? is used in relation to false teaching twice in the book of Revelation.

Rev 2:14 ‘But I have a few things against you, because you have there some who hold the teaching of Balaam, who kept teaching Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit acts of immorality.

Rev 2:20 ‘But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols.

In both these examples the teaching is error and didásko is the inspired word that the Holy Spirit chose to use. If Matt truly believes that didásko can only reference true teaching and not false teaching, then 1 Timothy 2:12 would have to be stopping only the teaching of true doctrine and this just doesn’t fit within the reason given for the prohibition in verse 13 & 14 – the deception of Eve. The fact is that the only teaching in 1 Timothy that is being stopped is false teaching. If Paul was stopping the teaching of true doctrine merely because the one teaching the truth to a man was a woman, then there would have to be an explanation for the stopping of true teaching that would allow us to see that Paul was creating a new law prohibiting women’s teaching. Since Matt was not able to show that the OT restricted the teaching of women, Paul could not have been adding a law against women’s teaching without the proper scriptural back up. For Matt to say something to the effect that there is no allowance for women teachers in the OT is trying to prove something from silence. There was no specific allowance for Gentile teachers either in the OT. Yet there was no prohibition against Gentile teachers or women teachers in the OT. Matt was trying to make a point that was shaky at best and nonsensical at worst.

Matt’s other point about silence was also very weak. He tried to establish that since Paul was not completely silencing “a woman” that this proved that error was not involved in the prohibition. He disregarded verse 11 where the focus is on her learning and as dusman has pointed out in a previous post, as a student she would not be completely silenced since she would be allowed to ask questions so that she can clarify any misunderstandings and thus learn properly.

The authority issue is the key to Matt’s argument since he believes that only men are allowed to teach the word of God with authority. However nowhere does the scripture give an authority to speak God’s word only to the man. Each one of us is given a gift by God and we are empowered to use that gift whether we are male or female. Consider 1 Peter 4:10, 11 where the authority to speak for God (speaking the utterances or the oracles of God) is given to the one whom God has gifted. Nowhere is gender a part of the equation.

1 Peter 4:10 As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
1 Peter 4:11 Whoever speaks, is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God; whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

The problem that Matt faces too which unfortunately I was unable to get to since Matt was not in the listening mode, is that the ordinary word for authority is not found in 1 Timothy 2:12. If Matt is so concerned that teach is an ordinary word and not restricted to error, then what sense does he make of the word translated authority which is the Greek authenteo? This word has no positive usage in the Bible at all and is only used once in this passage in regards to the stopping of “a woman” which is related to the deception of Eve. Surely Paul could have used a word for authority that was given to a man to use. Yet men are never given permission to have authenteo over a woman or even another man. Matt’s belief that only a man has “authority” to give out the word of God to the body of Christ is faulty and without scriptural backing.

(For any one confused – I had been moving comments over to this post from a previous post and I inadvertently copied a poster’s i.d. on this one. It is corrected now)