(My browser/screen doesn't offer an html option, so excuse the un-hyperlinks).
Perhaps you've heard about the recent controversy over magazines pulled off display by Southern Baptist leadership.
They were recalled because they featured cover photo and article discussing women pastors.
A Southern Baptist leader, Richard Land, has written an article explaining SB views on women leaders in church (believed to be scripturally discouraged) v. women leaders in the secualr realm (permissible, since the New Testament is silent on that score).
I spent most of my churchgoing years in a Southern Baptist church, so I am very familiar with the subtleties of its doctrinal beliefs--subtleties that are often inaccurately presented in the wider media and even in other Christian denominations.
I have no doubt that Land and many of his co-SBers truly, unhypocritically believe that there is no tension between a woman pastor mag recall and a Palin vice presidency or presidency proper--they simply read the scriptures literally.
But my biggest issue here is that I struggle with Saint Paul's credibility. The more I read him (and about him), the more I believe I'm reading his personal opinions, some of which seem contradictory to Jesus' teaching. I have sort of copped out by vehemently upholding everything Jesus spoke of, but not making reference to Paul's much-publicized views on homsexuality, marriage, women (all of which I disagree).
The interesting thing is that even though there's an argument to be made that Paul and the apostles represent the backbone of Christian doctrine and religion, that argument is most logically emphasized NOT by SBs, but by Eastern and Oriental Orthodox Christians who trace their spiritual lineage back directly to these Church fathers. Southern Baptists, on the other hand, pride themselves on not being held hostage to early Patriarchs and Popes they perceive to be not based in Scripture and too hierarchical.
Sorry if this is too much theological analysis.
But I'm interested to hear what people--SB, other Christian, atheist, or other religion--think about the distinction Richard Land draws.
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Paul was not only expressing his personal opinions, I'm convinced they were his in-the-closet, sexually frustrated (or be stoned to death) opinions.
His writings always reminded me quite a lot of my childhood pastor...Ted Haggard. Who was declared (by the church) "completely heterosexual", even after the meth and male prostitute. Geez.
...But I became an atheist long before all that. It just didn't jive with reality and human complexity.
The #1 tool of the patriarchy is religion. The Biblical scriptures about women are the perfect illustration of Hegel's Dialectic...go extreme to keep 'em in line.
No amount of analysis is too much -- you go girl!
I don't wish to offend any Christians who might read this. I understand that not everyone who calls themselves Christian is sexist or hypocritical, but I find the article mentioned in this post to be ridiculously self contradictory, as well as the Bible its self. As an absolute atheist I have little knowledge of all of the potential interpretations of scripture, but taken literally at face value the bible calls for incredible misogyny. The article mentioned above claims that Southern Baptists do not call women inferior, yet it says that "a woman is not to usurp authority over the man". We know that in virtually every orderly social structure including a church, someone is always an authority over others. This statement says women can lead nothing with the possible exception of an all female institution. Never does this article (or as far as I know, the Bible) give any unique social abilities to women. It seems to me that if there are two people or things which have absolutely identical capabilities with only one exception, one having one capability that the other does not, the one with the added capability is superior. To make no mention of any uniquely female abilities while mentioning uniquely male abilities sounds an awful lot like a declaration of female inferiority to me.
Also, it seems quite impossible to me that there is any way to take the bible literally an not find women inferior, when the bible is full of disgustingly misogynist lines like this:
Tim 2:8-11 "I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works. Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. Men are to lead; women are to be modest, learning quietly, and in submission; in this way, they prove their claim to godliness."
or this:
Eph 5:18, 22-24 "And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; ... Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. [Can’t submit to husband if don’t submit to Christ.] For the husband is the head of the wife."
or this: "Tim 2:8-11, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing."
If those Southern Baptists took the scriptures literally, they would have probably tried to stone Sara Palin by now. A true Christian who believes in the scriptures and follows them literally is as sexist as is imaginable for me. I'm afraid I must disagree with your statement that "Land and many of his co-SBers truly, unhypocritically believe that there is no tension between a woman pastor mag recall and a Palin vice presidency or presidency proper--they simply read the scriptures literally."
I just wanted to give the perspective of someone who does identify as Christian and liberal at the same time. Much is made in my church of the fact that Jesus' longest conversation in the bible is with a woman, and that many of the pivotal stories explaining faith in Jesus involve women. We do follow the liturgy in terms of readings, but focus much more on the Gospels and Acts than the epistles. For me, the thinking is that the early church grew out of a patriarchal society, and I can believe in Jesus being right AND his church being wrong. It is one of the reasons why I am no longer Catholic. And it is why I have a problem with NOT thinking things like "you're doing it wrong" about other denominations' interpretations of their faith. All that being said, I am afraid that most of the individuals in my congregation are socially liberal FIRST and seek to integrate their faith into that viewpoint. Their faith is not necessarily making them more tolerant; they are making their faith more tolerant. If that makes sense. I would love to find an example where it was the other way around though.
First off, check out this illuminating link:
http://ydr.inyork.com/ci_10493254?source=most_emailed
I'll respond in separate post to the commentators.
Kinda, I agree that any personal theology that gives emphasis to Jesus' own words and teachings will always be a fairly "progressive" (in some cases, even radical) one. He was a pretty progressive person. The trouble is how much deference to give his followers who were upheld by later generations as "Church fathers" and the builders of the Christian faith. Different denominations, church communities, and individuals disagree over this.
Thanks for your analysis, Andromeda. The famous Timothy and Ephesians verses you point to are, in fact, attributed to Paul. Galavanting and I touched on why Paul's writings (indeed, IMO, those of potentially any of Jesus' followers) did not always align with Jesus' teachings.
There are other analyses of Paul's writings that may be of interest to readers. For example, some have pointed to the fact that other of Paul's writings praised some women in early church leadership. When that is combined with a contextual analysis of the churches in Ephesus and with which Timothy was involved , there's an argument to be made that Paul did not like women's involvement in those particular churches in Asia Minor. It's actually a pretty interesting scenario that echoes a 21st century one: apparently, the Ephesus and related churches in present-day Turkey had a racuous, congregation-participatory, hand-clapping, testimonal-preaching, and loud milieu that offended the decorous, stoic Paul's sensibilities. Given the widespread involvement of women in the burgeoning Christian church/religion, women were of course a large part of this milieu, and Paul's rebuke to them to pipe down was essentially a rebuke to that whole church environment. (This argument is very interesting to me because it has an ethnic parallel in the disapproval of "high church" types in the U.S. who look down on Pentecostal, traditionally Black, and immigrant congregations for precisely this reason).
There's also a similar cultural/historical analysis that looks at how women in some of these newly Christian regions were still dressing in the glitzy, gaudy fashion of their recently polytheistic society, and that Paul felt this wasn't consistent with Jesus' downplaying of worldly riches, hence his ruling against the gold braid and such.
These arguments interest me because they bring in the cultural element that I feel is all-important, which allows for a bridging of the gap between first-century Western Asia and, say, 1500s England and 2008 Sierra Leone.
I have some scholarly articles that make these points, but I can't link to them because I have access through my university's subscription-only journals. However, I found this woman-run blog that sums up some of these arguments, if you're interested.
http://wordandwomen.blogspot.com/2007/12/those-pesky-verses-of-paul-1-timothy.html
Here's a view from a West African professor, too:
http://ezinearticles.com/?An-Analysis-of-I-Timothy-2:12-and-Its-Implication-on-Women-in-Leadership-Positions&id=1051933
I'm enjoying this discussion and hope others can weigh in.