Recently, I started wading through Mike Winger's 13 hour series on women in ministry and complementarianism. In this post, I start with the first 20 minutes of his second video. His second video is over 2 hours long and discusses Genesis 1-3. I'll start with what he says about Genesis 1.
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1. Winger's analysis of Genesis 1:26-27 is correct. The Hebrew אָדָם ('adam) in these verses is generic and refers to humankind in general -- not to males in particular (a mistake Mark Driscoll once made). God creates humanity in his image, in his likeness. Male and female he creates them. He gives male and female dominion over the earth.
Winger seems quite keen to make sure his friends know that, even though he sounds egalitarian, he's not done yet. But he is emphatic that both men and women are equal in value and dignity. This is key to his presentation of complementarianism -- the roles may be different but the value is the same.
I commend him on considering men and women of equal value. As Peter told the Gentiles, "God does not show favoritism" (Acts 10:34). The Holy Spirit fell equally on men and women on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:17). God doesn't love men more than women. Whatever Galatians 3:28 means, surely it at least implies that.
2. Winger wants to sharply distinguish complementarians from earlier "patriarchalism," where the man was considered superior in value to the woman. In straight patriarchalism, the woman is effectively inferior to the man in value. Complementarianism considers women "equal but different." Again, I want to commend the way complementarianism wants to consider men and women equal in value.
From a sociological perspective, complementarianism is a fairly recent development -- younger than egalitarianism in fact. The idea of complementarianism in this form arose in the late 70s and 80s by individuals like Wayne Grudem and John Piper. I commend those with this view for recognizing that valuing men over women violates Scripture in places like Genesis 1.
I also agree with those who see it as a fall back position -- it conceeds as much as it must while preserving as much of the human status quo as it can. You might argue that it is simply a passible version of the earlier patriarchy. We know we can't love our wives and treat them as beneath us. So we say we love them just as much as we love men but insist that it's just the rules that keep them in a box.
In his first video, Winger implies that it is a slippery slope fallacy to assume complementarianism always devolves into abuse. I agree logically. However, this doesn't mean that complementarianism does not have a structure that practically is more conducive to abuse than egalitarianism. It raises the stakes on getting this question right.
3. Before we get to Genesis 2, I want to talk a little hermeneutics groundwork myself. In the circles where we debate these things, the Bible is usually interpreted in a very "flat" way. That is to say, the discussion is two dimensional -- it takes place in the "world within the text," within the literary context. Similarly, the whole Bible is treated more or less as a single text, not dozens of texts written over a 1000 year period. In other places, I call this an unreflective reading of the Bible.
The third dimension of Scripture is the "world behind the text." This is not simply historical references -- most still think of those from inside the text. Reading the Bible in full context sees the books of the Bible themselves in history on a deep level. We can see Scripture as the story of God revealing himself to many different people in different places in different times, situations, and different cultures -- and thus in different ways.
Here's what I think. I'll leave out the 35 years of development for me to get here. Genesis 1 is an introduction to the Pentateuch. It is later than Genesis 2-3 by several hundred years. It is really even different in genre from Genesis 2-3. It's doing something different from Genesis 2-3.
Genesis 2-3 are part of an epic story of Israel's founding. Genesis 1 grounds that story (and Israel's religious practices) in God's sovereignty over the earth. Given the world of that day, Genesis 1 is quite remarkable. God alone orders the chaos of the world -- there is no conflict between him and other gods. He says it, and it is done.
And men and women are both given dominion over the earth. They are both created in God's image. As Winger says, Genesis 1 does not distinguish their value or dignity. This is quite remarkable, and it grounds the entire Pentateuch, including Genesis 2-3.
We will return to this deeper hermeneutical discussion as we move into Genesis 2-3.
4. I am pleased that Winger at least sees Genesis 1 as giving women dominion over everything except men. This is his complementarianism. For him, there is an order of authority in the home but it does not limit women in any way in relation to anything else. Women have dominion over trees like men. Women have authority over fish. Women have dominion over animals like men. They can cook beef and pig. Whew. This is the level of discussion we are at in American Christianity. Let that sink in.
He does address Titus 2:5, which says that wives should be "working at home" and "submissive to their own husbands" in the ESV. I ironically heard a very conservative woman preacher once point out the word "at" here from the pulpit, arguing that God's ideal was for a woman to stay at home. This was a quite remarkable moment of inner conflict for her no doubt.
I knew enough Greek at the time to see that the word at is not actually in the Greek. "working at home" is a single word in Greek (oikourgos). Her whole point was a coincidence of English translation. I suppose there's one small argument for knowing how to access the original languages.
We will get to Titus and the household codes in Colossians/Ephesians/1 Peter soon enough. Suffice it to say, their basic structure is completely in line with the culture of Paul's day. Their structure aligns completely with Aristotle in his Politics. In short, there is nothing distinctively Christian about them in their form. It was when early Christianity pushed against the culture of its day that it was revealing core Christian principles and values.
Titus 2:5 was thus depicting what an honorable woman looked like in that day. It is not transforming culture. It is not moving culture toward heaven or the kingdom of God. It was saying, "What does a virtuous woman look like in the late first century?" It was accommodating culture.
How deeply ironic is that! Applying the household codes literally tries to make a secular culture today -- which has been shaped by Judeo-Christian values -- to conform to the secular Greco-Roman culture of 2000 years ago.
Winger's interpretation of this verse in Titus is that it is about fulfilling the responsibilities of the home rather than staying at home. He shows that in Luke 8:2-3, women supported Jesus' traveling ministry -- which means they weren't staying at home. That's a good point on his part.
I hate that we're even having questions like these. How much time can a woman spend outside the house? This sort of crap sure helps our witness. Not. I get why some women are sick of the church. Some of us can't even recognize the Christian influence on our own culture and want to return to the weak and beggardly elements of fallen human culture.
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