Priscilla Papers Vol. 14, No. 3 (Summer 2000)
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PriscillaPriscilla PapersPapers Priscilla and Aquila instructed Apollos more perfectly in the way of the Lord (Acts 18) Volume 14, Number 3 Summer 2000 Issn i 0898-753x ChristiansChristians forfor BiblicalBiblical EqualityEquality In This Issue: 3 Is the Head of the House at Home? by Joe E. Trull 4 Women As ‘Masters of the House,’ by Brian Neuschwander 8 The Southern Baptists’ View of Women, an interview with Joe E. Trull 13 Southern Baptists and Women in Ministry, by William M. Tillman, Jr. 16 One Woman’s View, an interview with Rosalie Beck 20 The Family Isn’t Always the Answer, by Evelyn Bence This journal is published quarterly by Christians for Biblical Equality, 122 West Franklin Avenue, Suite 218, Minneapolis, MN 55404-5451 E-mail us at [email protected] or view our Web site at www.CBEInternational.org © 2000 by Christians for Biblical Equality. Publisher CHRISTIANS FOR BIBLICAL EQUALITY Editor CAROL R. THIESSEN Executive Director MIMI HADDAD Editor Emeritus GRETCHEN GAEBELEIN HULL Consulting Theologians: DAN GENTRY KENT, STANLEY J. GRENZ, REBECCA GROOTHUIS, AIDA BESANÇON SPENCER, WILLIAM DAVID SPENCER, JOE E. TRULL Board of Directors: DAN GENTRY KENT, JOHN R. KOHLENBERGER III, THOMAS A. MCCARTHY, BRIAN NYSTROM, VIRGINIA PATTERSON, SARA ROBERTSON, LOLA S. SCOBEY, BETTY SHUNK, JOHN SWART, LILYA WAGNER, ROBIN L. SMITH Board of Reference: MIRIAM ADENY, CARL E. ARMERDING, MYRON S. AUGSBURGER, RAYMOND J. BAKKE, ANTHONY CAMPOLO, LOIS MCKINNEY DOUGLAS, MILLARD ERICKSON, GORDON D. FEE, W. WARD GASQUE, REBECCA MERRILL GROOTHUIS, VERNON GROUNDS, ROBERTA HESTENES, CRAIG S. KEENER, DAVID MAINS, KARI TORJESEN MALCOLM, BRENDA SALTER MCNEIL, ROGER NICOLE, VIRGIL OLSON, LADONNA OSBORN, T. L. OSBORN, RONALD J. SIDER, LEWIS SMEDES, ADA BESANÇON SPENCER, WILLIAM DAVID SPENCER, RUTH A. TUCKER, MARY STEWART VAN LEEUWEN, TIMOTHY WEBER Priscilla Papers (ISSN I 0898-753X) is published quarterly for members by Christians for Biblical Equality, 122 West Franklin Avenue, Suite 218, Mineapolis, MN 55404-5451. For address changes and other information, phone 612-872-6898; fax 612-872-6891, or E-mail [email protected]. CBE is on the Web at www.CBEInternational.org. regressive actions of the past several years. Editor’s Ink Southern Baptist “Why should I care about the Southern Baptists?” you Women may wonder. The truth is, what has happened in this group could well occur in others. In fact, the Presbyterian Church A funny thing happened on the way to an issue that was in America followed on the heels of the SBC in Orlando to originally planned to emphasize the family. The Southern say that women may not speak from the pulpit. So we need Baptists came to Orlando, not far from my new home, and to teach vigilantly the biblical basis of the full equality of they were in the news daily as their convention took anoth- men and women in Creation and in redemption. This is er step in affirming women as unequal with men. You may what Christians for Biblical Equality is all about. recall the furor resulting from action taken at the SBC’s con- So read about the Southern Baptists and be enlightened. vention two years ago to declare in their official “Baptist Then pray for them and their leaders that they will one day Faith and Message” statement that a wife must “submit renounce actions that deny women the full freedom and graciously to the servant leadership of her husband.” equality the Bible teaches. We wanted first to reprint an article by Joe Trull on the We did include one other family-related article by family and headship (with a sidebar by Brian Neuschwan- Evelyn Bence. She brings a refreshing view of what it der), and follow with other material on the same general means to be single in family-oriented churches. theme. But as things were developing for the SBC meeting ✳ ✳ ✳ about to begin, it seemed appropriate to follow Joe’s fine Beginning with this issue we have listed the names of sev- article by interviewing this longtime professor of Christian eral people who have agreed to serve on a new panel of ethics who had retired abruptly after the 1998 action. Consulting Theologians (listed above). All will be available So we talked to Joe and had him trace the recent history for consultation regarding theologically based articles of the Southern Baptist Convention for the readers of Pris- planned for future issues of Priscilla Papers. I welcome their cilla Papers, and we also discussed their declaration, in input since I have never personally undertaken an in-depth June, that women are unfit for pastoral ministry. study of theology. We hope their input will ensure the After interviewing Joe, we obtained an article from Bill sound basis for all biblical articles we publish. Tillman, also a professor of Christian ethics, on his percep- ✳ ✳ ✳ tion of how formerly unspoken rules for some in the Finally, don’t forget to give us your thoughts about articles denomination have now risen to the surface. Finally, we in Priscilla Papers. We have a good selection of letters to the asked a woman, Rosalie Beck, professor of church history editor on page 22, and we invite you to send us your com- at Baylor University, to provide us with her viewpoint. ments on this and future issues. What we have here is a package of articles describing the CAROL R. THIESSEN, editor 2 Priscilla Papers/Summer 2000: 14:3 Is the Head of the House at Home? The way to build a Christian home is for each member of the family to work at surpassing the other in love and voluntary submission. JOE E. TRULL HE PHONE RINGS JUST AS I SIT DOWN TO DINNER. THE ious (Phil. 3:4–6; 2 Cor. 11:22). In addition, Paul had the voice asks, “Is this the head of the house?” Should teachings of Jesus and Jesus’ treatment of women and chil- Tmy answer be brave or honest? I reply, “It depends dren as background. Out of these circumstances the mis- on what you mean by head.” sionary teacher penned one of the noblest statements in The answer to the title question is similar. Yes, there is a Scripture about marriage and family. head of the house at home, but probably not the one the 6 caller had in mind. For the Christian household, Christ is A foreign world the true head. In order to interpret Paul’s domestic teachings correctly, an Ephesians 5:21–6:9 is a Hausentafel (a code of household understanding of family roles and relationships in the first- duties) and a central Pauline passage on the Christian century world is absolutely essential. Although Jewish home.1 Often quoted in wedding ceremonies, these well- women occupied a position of dignity and responsibility in worn verses are sometimes used to support a traditional the home, in social and religious life they were little more view of male superiority and female submission in mar- than an appendage of their husbands. A Jewish woman riage relationships.2 The thesis of this article is that was entirely at the disposal of her father or her spouse. Ephesians 5:21–6:9 upholds a model of mutual submission Forbidden to learn the law, she had no part in the syna- under the lordship of Christ. gogue service, she could not teach school, and she could Jewish and Gentile moralists commonly wrote guide- not testify in the courts. Talking to women in public was lines to govern the behavior of family members. Biblical forbidden, even between a man and his wife or daughter. scholars presume Ephesians 5:21–6:9 was part of catecheti- The respectable Greek woman lived a secluded life; con- cal instruction given to new converts in Christian churches fined to her quarters, she did not emerge even for meals. along with other teachings (cf. Col. 3:18–4:1; Titus 2:1–10; Normally she appeared in public only once or twice a year: 1 Peter 2:13–3:7).3 The apostle Paul added a new element in during religious festivals or at a relative’s funeral. The rea- his household codes: the Christian home was to be differ- son for her seclusion is related to the role of the Greek wife. ent from the typical Graeco-Roman family. Every member Demosthenes explained the accepted rule: “We have cour- of the Christian family was to live under the lordship of tesans [hetairai] for our pleasure, prostitutes [that is, young Christ, and that revolutionized domestic relationships. female slaves] for daily physical use, wives to bring up Paul’s teachings about the home may have arisen be- legitimate children and to be faithful stewards in house- cause of the breakdown of the family in the New Testament hold matters.”7 The wife’s primary function was to bear a world. In Jewish families, the wife had no rights at all and male heir for her husband; love and companionship were was regarded more as a possession than a person. The to be found elsewhere. woman’s position in the Greek world was worse, for the In Roman society, a woman had greater practical free- wife lived a secluded life. As Xenophon put it, females dom. A Roman wife could appear in public with her hus- were to “see as little as possible, hear as little as possible, band and was allowed by law to initiate divorce, but and ask as little as possible.”4 The Greek way of life made beyond that, her rights were limited. In the Roman pan- companionship in marriage impossible. theon and the Roman theater, women were thoroughly In Rome the matter was even worse.