gengwall

There is a subtle circumstance at hand in this verse which is important not to miss. Cheryl does a great job bringing it to light in this post.

Often, when it is pointed out that the teaching involved must be false teaching and the “authority” being exercised by the woman is domineering and even violent authority, people are prompted to ask the question “wouldn’t the same prohibition be true if a man was engaged in the same behavior? Why does there need to be special treatment for a woman?” They then conclude that this can’t be false teaching and domineering authority because there are such parallel instructions for men. They conclude it must be normal teaching and authority and therefore the prohibition is gender specific.

But the circumstances would be different if a man was engaged in this behavior. Timothy would have direct authority to confront a man on these issues. He would not need to “name drop”. Because the circumstance here involves a woman who has a husband that Timothy must bypass, as Cheryl points out, it absolutely requires that Paul write what he has written.