Madwomen In The Vestry: The Bible, Women, & Ordination

Question from the Mailbag:

Our conservative [non-denominational] church is investigating the biblical case for ordaining women.  I’m on the committee looking into it.  Any insights?

Before beginning, I do want to say that this is one of many issues that has made attending church impossible for me.  I recognize that to challenge the non-ordination of women to some teaching ministries is to challenge scripture itself, which creates enormous problems for authority and Christian identity.  And even to ordain women at all is, in some churches, placing them in authority over men, which disturbs some pretty shocking language in (for instance) 1 Corinthians 11:2-16.

But not to challenge the patriarchal assumptions in scripture violates my conscience: when you read the denominational studies that commit themselves to honoring women for hard work while denying them ordained offices that enable men to do their work, it can make you want to spew.

Having said all that, this is one of those difficult areas where the Bible provides a lot of suggestive comments but can be maddeningly unhelpful, at least if the goal is to give women the rights, responsibilities, and privileges that men enjoy under scripture.  And also one of the few times in your life where the term “participial phrase” will become important.

Just to review: the major “ordained” offices in early Christianity were apparently bishop (overseer), presbyter (elder, later priest) and deacon (“servant”).   Apostles (basically missionaries or guardians of the tradition) also might have been an ordained office, though it was early tucked into the office of bishop as the original apostles died.

A lot depends on what offices you’re looking to open up to women.  I suppose, as your church is conservative, that you’re looking to stay on the conservative side.

For most of Christian history, women have been excluded intentionally from ministry on various grounds.  Christian faith did emerge in a very patriarchal world, and it reflects to some degree those beginnings.  1 Corinthians 14:34-35, 1 Timothy 2:12-13 and 1 Timothy 3:2 are often taken as evidence that St. Paul intended ordained at least some of these offices to be held exclusively by men.

And that’s a pretty tough hurdle to clear in churches that are committed to following the letter of the scriptural law: churches that allow women to teach men do step outside the boundaries of a scripture or two, for better and worse.  Change is painful, but stepping outside the authority of your own scriptures is just no small step.  Most churches that do elect to ordain women to teaching offices do so on passages that celebrate the liberty one has in Christ, which I think is a very good thing to do, but which you mustn’t pretend is a small thing: if one means to lay off New Testament directives on the grounds of one’s liberty, one cannot squawk too loudly when others (homosexuals?) do the same.

The office of deacon is a different matter: your church might not recognize the office of deacon, but if not, you might suggest they do so.  Paul writes in Romans 16:1 of a deaconess, Phoebe, which indicates that already women shared ordained office.   Some say that the word “deaconess” here (Greek diakonon) can be translated as simply “servant.”   But the participial phrase “being deacon” (Greek ousan diakanon) is habitually used of office holders in the New Testament: see John 11:49, Acts 18:12, and Acts 24:10.  (I wish I had some examples from Paul’s epistles.  If I can dig some up I’ll add them to an update on this post.)  

Then too in 1 Timothy 3:8-13 Paul describes the characteristics of deacon-candidates, and specifically in v. 11 says that the gynaikas [wives or women] “likewise must be worthy of respect, not speaking evil of others, self-controlled and faithful in all things.”  Gynaikas in many translations comes off as “[their] wives,” but the word “their” is not in the text: it’s interpolated by translators or editors who can’t imagine that female candidates for the diaconate inhabited the New Testament Church, I suppose.  Better: “The women likewise…”, implying female deacons were present in the New Testament.

Luminaries like John Piper, whose conservative credentials are well in order, advocate for women deacons on scriptural and historical grounds, also.  Robert Strimple of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church wrote a minority report on his church’s findings on this question that I think is the best and most lucid exposition of the biblical case for ordaining women to the diakonate.  Churches that don’t ordain women as deacons do have a very shaky grasp on the relevant scriptures, I think.

I know of one archdeacon who told me complacently that the office of nuns had taken over the office of female deacons.   That’s just whack: they should consider taking all the red-headed or overweight deacons and shunting them off to a celibate life for good measure.

All this to say that if you’re locked in on the Bible and the letter thereof (which kills, Jesus has said), well, start by killing the idea of women presbyters / elders / priests.