Back in 2012, the Church of England voted down legislation to approve women bishops. The Prime Minister, David Cameron, expressed his frustration, saying that the Church needed to “get with the programme”. They did, of course, “get with the programme” a couple of years later, and so have many other churches. A few churches here and there still haven’t got on board. Why is that? Well, they recognise that the job of a local church is not to get with the programme set by politicians or society. There is another programme that Christians are called to follow, and it is laid out in Scripture. Because of this, they, and the Bible, have been charged with misogyny, i.e., “dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women”. This is a serious charge. Is the Bible guilty? Hardly. Let’s look at the facts.
The Bible asserts that men and
women are equal in value but different in role.
Equal in value
Genesis 1:26-27 emphasises
that men and women are both created in the image of God.
Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image,
according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,
over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over
every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own
image in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
The very first chapter of the
Bible establishes that women are equal in worth to men.
Genesis 2 teaches that God
made one woman for one man – the relationship was to be committed and
exclusive. Polygamy was not God’s will, and the Bible’s recording of it is only
intended to show how harmful it is. Everywhere it is found it is shown to be
bad.
From Lamech’s wives to those of Abraham, Esau,
Jacob, David, and Solomon, wherever we see God’s ideal of monogamy ignored, we
witness strife, competition, and disharmony. The Old Testament presents
polygamy as not only undesirable but also a violation of God’s standards. Old
Testament narratives subtly critique this marital arrangement.[1]
When we look at the New
Testament, we see that the Lord Jesus was counter cultural in His interactions
with women. For example, He had women amongst His band of followers (Matthew
12:49-50; Luke 8:1-3) and He let Mary of Bethany sit at His feet with the men
and be instructed by Him, rather than send her to help Martha with the cooking
(Luke 10:38-42). Eliezer, a first century rabbi, said that if anyone who
teaches his daughter the Law (of Moses) it is as if he taught her promiscuity,
and it would be better to burn the Law than teach it to a woman. Christ did not
share that view. We find Christian women had valuable roles in the life of the
early church (e.g., Acts 18:26; Romans 16; Php. 4:2-3). The gospel teaches that
there is no distinction between the standing of men and women before God in
Christ. In fact, Paul says all Christians (male and female) are sons of God.
Some take that to be sexist, but the very opposite is the case. In that time,
the sons, not the daughters, shared in the family business and got the
inheritance. Paul is saying that every Christian has that position before God.
For you are all sons of God through faith in
Christ Jesus…There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free,
there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians
3:26, 28)
But what about…?
That all sounds good, but
there are some passages that certainly appear to demean women. Let’s have a
look.
Leviticus 12:1-8
This passage teaches that
woman is ceremonially unclean for 40 days after giving birth to a boy, but 80
days after giving birth to a girl. So, are girls twice as unclean as boys?
Given what we have already looked at, this is a very weak basis to argue for
the Bible being misogynistic. There are various explanations for this law. The
period of ceremonially uncleanness meant the mother couldn’t come to the
temple, and the fact that this was twice as long for the mother of a girl
rather than a boy is taken by some to communicate a message of special
protection for girls rather than boys – the mum was given twice as long off
before she was expected to get back into normal life. Others suggest this law
communicated that, in contrast to the nations around with their fertility cults
and temple prostitutes, the temple wasn’t the sphere of women’s operation in
Israel.
Another plausible explanation focuses on a
natural source of uncleanness – namely, the flow of blood. Verse 5 refers to
the reason: it’s because of ‘the blood of her purification.’ The mother
experiences vaginal bleeding at birth. Yet such vaginal bleeding is common in
newborn girls as well, due to the withdrawal of the mother’s estrogen when the
infant girl exits the mother’s womb. So we have two sources of ritual
uncleanness with a girl’s birth but only one with a boy’s.[2]
And once the time of
purification is over, an identical purification offering is to be made whether
it is for a son or a daughter, showing that females aren’t viewed as being more
defiled than males.
Leviticus 27:1-8
In this section we learn how
people could show their willingness to serve Him, even though they couldn’t actively
serve in and for the tabernacle (because they weren’t Levites). In lieu of
their service they could give an equivalent value. But males are valued at more
than females – does this not mean women are less valuable than men? This is to
do with work connected to the tabernacle, and, generally speaking, men have
higher economic marketability than women for manual labour. Clearly it isn’t a
statement on one’s value as a person because a female aged between twenty and
sixty has a higher price than a male older age bracket, and that obviously does
not mean that the ancient Israelites thought older men had less worth than
younger women. This was a society that extolled the value of the elderly, but
it recognised that when it came to manual labour, there was more output from
younger women than older men. Similarly (and this shouldn’t be controversial),
there is more output from men than from women of similar ages (generally). Some
footballers are worth more than others, but this isn’t a statement of their worth
as people but as footballers. Similarly, this isn’t a statement
on the worth of men and women as people but as workers in the tabernacle.
Exodus 20:17
The tenth commandment forbids
coveting what belongs to someone else. It says you aren’t to covet your
neighbour’s house, wife, servant, ox, donkey or anything that belongs to him.
The implication is that a wife is lumped in the same category as house, servant,
ox and donkey, as being the property of the man. But a woman does belong to her
husband in the very same way a husband is said to belong to his wife
(e.g., Genesis 3:6; Song of Solomon 6:3). Wives, unlike houses, oxen and
donkeys, could not be sold. The fifth commandment commands that mothers are to
be honoured as well as fathers, but in other cultures in the ancient Near East
mothers were under the control of the son. Mothers are certainly not viewed as
chattel. The teaching throughout the Bible (see especially the book of
Proverbs) is that mothers are to be revered and listened to.
Marrying your rapist?
If a man finds a young woman who is a
virgin, who is not betrothed, and he seizes her and lies with her, and they are
found out, then the man who lay with her shall give to the young woman’s father
fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife because he has humbled her;
he shall not be permitted to divorce her all his days. (Deuteronomy 22:28-29)
This passage seems unthinkably harsh, but there’s
more to it than meets the eye. First, marriage in that time was about survival
(building a family to defend and care for you) and carrying on the family name.
There weren't the romantic notions we connect with it now. Indeed, our view of
marriage is in large part due to the gospel's influence – it presents itself as
a love story, and encourages husbands to love their wives as Christ loves the
church.
Also, Exodus 22:16-17 needs to be read in
conjunction with this, because the Deuteronomy passage is seen by scholars as
being an expansion of what was said in Exodus 22.
If a man entices a virgin who is not
betrothed, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride-price for her to be
his wife. If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money
according to the bride-price of virgins.
The point here is that the father of the young
woman (no doubt in consultation with her) can refuse to let the marriage take
place. If he did so then the man was to pay a sizeable bridal price to ensure
some measure of financial security for a woman who would find it harder now to
find a husband. If this stipulation was in place for a woman who had been
enticed, then that stipulation would certainly be in place for a woman who had
been seized, so there is no forced marriage here.
This case is similar to the one mentioned in Ex. 22:15, 16.
The omission to mention the possibility of the father refusing to give him his
daughter for a wife, makes no essential difference. It is assumed as
self-evident here, that such a right was possessed by the father.[3]
It should also be noted that the word that
indicates rape is not used in Deuteronomy 22:28-29. It is used in verse 25:
“But if a man finds a betrothed young woman in the countryside, and the man
forces her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die.”
The word in verse 28 is a weaker word that is more in keeping with the thought
of seduction. The fact that it says, “and they are found out” indicates
culpability on the part of the woman as well, but only the man is held
responsible.
A woman who was not a virgin would have had her
chances for marriage severely reduced, and that is why when Amnon raped Tamor
she pled with him to marry her (2 Samuel 13:9-18). We don't have the right to
enforce our ideals of marriage back on people who would have probably looked on
them as a bit silly. The man was responsible to take and provide for the woman
he had violated and never divorce her – she would be secure for the rest of her
life.
We don't see a lack of concern for the woman in
this passage. As Paul Copan says, “Her well-being is actually the underlying
theme of this legislation.”[4]
No female priests
There was a practical
reason for this – the surrounding cultures had female priests and their
function was to engage in sexual immorality. The nation of Israel was
different. They exemplified their separation from the perversity of the
surrounding cultures in lots of ways, and one was no female priests.
There was also a prophetical
reason for this – the priesthood was one of the three anointed offices of
Israel (the offices of king and prophet were the others). Every priest was a picture
of The Anointed One – the Christ who would come, and so, the priesthood
was reserved for the males.
Then finally, there was a patriarchal
reason for this – the priests were the leaders and teachers in Israel, and,
like it or not, God’s will is that the man functions as the leader. This brings
us to our next major subject. Although men and women are equal in value, they
are different in role.
Different in role
The Bible teaches that men and
women have different God-given roles and spheres of responsibility. The man is
placed by God in a position of leadership. This was reflected in Old Testament
Israel, and it is to be reflected in the New Testament church. The Bible
teaches that the head of the woman is the man. This does not imply inferiority
because the head of Christ is God, yet the Bible teaches Christ is equal with
God. The headship of man is to be demonstrated in leadership and teaching in
the church (1 Timothy 2:11-12), and the woman observing the symbol of head
covering (1 Corinthians 11:1-16).
This is offensive to many, but
there are many things the Bible teaches that people find offensive – the fault
isn’t with the Bible, it is with our arrogant assumption that our culture is
right. Throughout history every culture has had problems with the Bible,
including the culture in which the Bible was written. This is because, although
the Bible was written within a culture, it was not sourced in that culture. The
things that our culture struggles with are not the things other cultures have
had difficulties with. For example, the average person in Britain today would
approve of the Bible’s teaching on loving and forgiving your enemies, but would
have big issues with the Bible’s teaching on hell, but in the Britain of 1000
years ago the opposite was the case. The idea of loving and forgiving one’s
enemy didn’t fit well within an honour and shame culture, but the idea of hell
fitted quite comfortably. It is what C. S. Lewis called “chronological
snobbery” to give “uncritical acceptance of the intellectual climate common to
our own age and the assumption that whatever has gone out of date is on that
account discredited.”[5]
Up until the very recent past,
everyone recognised that women are better fitted for some roles and men for
others. This is not oppression but reality. And it shows up when we aren’t
thinking about it. For example, when the husband hears a clatter downstairs
during the night, he doesn’t say to his wife, “It’s your turn to go down and
check; I did it the last time.” That’s an “equality” that no one insists on or
wants. It is the role of the man to put himself in danger for his wife and
family. Likewise, God has given the man the responsibility of leadership.
The real misogyny is not from
those who recognise the unique glory women have, but from those who say that
women have to suppress their God-given instincts, despise their uniqueness, and
try to behave like men.
A lot of churches have heeded
David Cameron’s call to “get with the programme.” However, God has another
programme. The roles of men and women reflect the love story of Christ and His
church. So, rather than being stuck in the past, biblical gender roles portray
the eternal future.
[1]
Paul Copan, Is God a Moral Monster?, p. 117.
[2]
Copan, Is God a Moral Monster?, p. 106 (emphases his).
[3] C.
F. Keil, Commentary on the Book of Deuteronomy in C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary
on the Old Testament, Volume 1, Hendrickson, 2006, p. 947.
[4]
Copan, Is God a Moral Monster?, p. 119.
[5] C.
S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy.
