THE GENDER ROLES DEBATE– A SUMMARY
SUMMARY OF JACK COTTRELL’S “COLLECTED WRITINGS” SERIES:
VOLUME THIRTEEN: THE GENDER ROLES DEBATE, by Jack Cottrell
INTRODUCTION
Volume 13 of my “Collected Writings” series opens the door to the category of ethics, focusing on the specific subject of gender roles. The book is titled The Gender Roles Debate, and contains eleven rather substantive essays on various issues—especially what the Bible says about women preachers and teachers in the church. Three essays speak to the issue of gender roles in the home, and three of them address the subject of feminism in general.
In the Evangelical world, the subject of gender roles was not much of a debate until the mid-1970s. Until then, most Bible-believers accepted the Biblical view that church leadership and home leadership were assigned by God to males. The consensus was broken in 1974 by the publication of Letha Scanzoni’s and Nancy Hardesty’s book, All We’re Meant To Be, then in 1975 by Paul King Jewett’s Man as Male and Female. The 1980s saw a flood of writings and projects promoting the absorption of feminism by the church, including a radical Evangelical group called Feminists for Biblical Equality, led by Catherine Clark Kroeger.
Throughout this decade of the 1980s, I tried to keep up with the on-going debate, and by 1990 I was ready to write my Biblical analysis of it in a book. I planned out how the contents of the book would flow, and began to write my first chapter, which would be a brief introduction to feminism. By the time I was finished with this “chapter,” it had become a book in itself of 358 pages. College Press published it in 1992 as Feminism and the Bible: An Introduction to Feminism for Christians.
Okay – I proceeded to develop what was supposed to be the main content of the one planned book. I got about a third of the way through what I wanted to say, and had another book. This was about the general Biblical teaching on the God-intended relationships between men and women. It was published in 1994 (by College Press, 319 pp.) as Gender Roles and the Bible: Creation, the Fall and Redemption: A Critique of Feminist Biblical Interpretation. I consider this to be one of my best-written and most important books. It discusses gender roles in connection with creation (Genesis 2 -3), with Jesus, and with Galatians 3:28. (I don’t see how you could read this book and still be a feminist!)
The next volume covers God’s intended roles for husbands and wives within marriage. It came out in book form in 2008 (by College Press, 334 pp.), titled Headship, Submission, and the Bible: Gender Roles in the Home. This book shows that the feminist-invented concept of “mutual submission” (of husbands and wives), and the interpretation of head as “source,” are absolutely anti-Biblical. The book defends male leadership and female submission in the home.
Unfortunately, my work on this subject, book-wise, came to an end before I could produce what would be the most practical volume, namely, God’s intention for gender roles in connection with church practices. Some of that material is covered in this volume.
In my 65+ years of observing how the church has progressed—or more honestly, how it has regressed, I have noted how easily it has changed by allowing itself to become more and more open to the influence of modern secular culture—one of whose very goals is the secularization of the church. The ongoing acceptance of feminism (women preachers; mutual submission in the home) is a major example of this. This doctrine is not “a matter of opinion.” On this subject, God has spoken.
I will proceed now to summarize a few of the essays in this brief volume, and to list the rest.
I. THE REAL ISSUE IN THE GENDER ROLES DEBATE: THE RIGHT USE OF THE BIBLE (pp. 3-14)
A. MOTIVATION.
I ask myself a lot—why do I spend so much time on this one subject? Is it worth the bother, given the nasty attacks often flung back my way (e.g., I am “protecting the frail male ego”; I have a “dogmatic hidden agenda”; I am “that anti-woman Jack Cottrell”). So what IS my motive? The one main thing that moves me is the right use of the Bible. I want to protect and defend the truth, authority, and integrity of the Bible as God’s authoritative Word.
One of the greatest threats to the church today is doctrinal relativism, the idea that what most of the Bible says is just matters of opinion, i.e., that there is no “one right way” to interpret the Bible. At the same time, the feminist community makes every effort to completely reinterpret every Biblical text that clearly teaches the traditional view of gender roles. This is one thing I have discovered in my many years of studying this subject, that every text that has traditionally been understood as teaching male headship or leadership, and female submission, has been systematically reinterpreted without regard to standard hermeneutical rules. (This is the main thesis of my book, Gender Roles and the Bible.) So here’s the deal: I simply cannot stand by and watch Scripture being treated this way!
B. EXPLANATION.
False doctrines often lie dormant in non-Biblical circles for long periods of time, until cultural circumstances open a door to make such doctrines seem “more acceptable” to the church community. The new cultural center that has made feminism the norm today is something called women’s experience, which has become substituted for the Bible as our authority.
I did not make up this concept or this term. The conclusion has simply been drawn that what (mostly) women feel and experience as true must be accepted as true. It is their inner feeling and conviction that women are fully equal with men in every way and must no longer be excluded from those spheres hitherto dominated by men. It is the desire and the demand and the struggle for liberation from the shackles of patriarchy and hierarchy. It is the feeling that THIS is “the way things ought to be.” Many conservative preachers and Christians are absorbing this new standard of truth.
C. ILLUSTRATION.
In this section I give several illustrations from conservative Christian literature as to how this approach has become normative. E.g., some such writers often simply ignore the most un-feminist Biblical texts by labeling them as “hard passages,” and just setting them aside.
Another approach is to search diligently for some way to reinterpret key texts so that they do not deny feminism. For example, 1 Timothy 2:12 especially has suffered numerous ungrounded false reinterpretations. E.g., some say this text refers to husbands and wives, not to men and women in the church (see “Collected Writings,” vol. 18, “Studies in Bible Doctrine,” pp. 207-218, “I Timothy 2:12: Woman or Wife?”). Others say Paul is addressing a problem that was present just in first-century culture, e.g., that the problem was simply uneducated women teaching false doctrine in the church (see pp. 61-131 in this volume). Others try to falsely reinterpret one of the Greek words in the text (see pp. 133ff. in this volume). Another example of this is that some have said that the word “exercise authority” means “usurp” authority in a false manner; thus it is OK for women to teach men as long as the elders permit it (see pp. 147ff. in this volume).
D. OBSERVATION.
Some have said we must choose between emphasizing doctrine and helping people. So let’s not make such a fuss about women in leadership! This is, of course, the fallacy of false choice. This is not an “either-or” issue, but a “both-and” issue. Besides, the greatest commandment is to love God, which includes loving and respecting His Word. Loving people is a must, but even this is secondary to loving God and His Word. Both are God’s commandments, though.
II. HEADSHIP, SUBMISSION, AND MUTUALITY (pp. 157-170)
This lesson is about Ephesians 5:21ff., one of the most disputed texts in the NT. The traditional (simple, Biblical) understanding of these verses and words embraces everything feminism hates and opposes; thus feminists have worked very hard to come up with a pro-egalitarian interpretation. The bottom line is that they have created a new meaning for the word “head” (see Part Two of my book, Headship, Submission, and the Bible), and have constructed a new way of applying the term “submission” (see Part One of the above book). Almost all of that book is devoted to exposing the serious falsehoods in these new ploys. This brief essay sums up what is at stake in the latter term.
The two key words here are (1) hypotassō, which means “to be subject to, to submit to, to obey”; and (2) kephalē, meaning “head,” either the physical head or “a leader over others, one in authority over another.” These concepts go together like hand and glove. The husband is the head over the wife, which is simply a fact (see pp. 171ff., “ ‘The Husband Is the Head of the Wife’—Ephesians 5:23,’ in this volume); and the wife submits to her husband (stated here as a command, not just as a fact). Where does feminism go wrong with the submission command?
A. One Extreme View: Absolute Submission (which feminism and the Bible both oppose).
One false view of headship and submission is not held by feminists but by Islamic believers. This is the idea that the husband’s headship is a kind of ownership, which makes the wife’s role that of a slave. I give here many prooftexts from Muslim writings, including the Qur’an. Their view is perverse, and is a wicked parody of real Biblical headship and submission. Christian men must be taught that this view is not equivalent to Biblical headship.
B. Another Extreme View: Mutual Submission (the false idea created by feminists).
This false view is the preferred feminist view, and has been literally created by some feminist scholars. It is called mutual submission, because it teaches that husbands must submit to their wives in exactly the same way wives must submit to their husbands. This view has now been accepted very widely within Christendom. But—it is a seriously false doctrine, a false view of the submission about which Paul is teaching in Ephesians 5.
1. Explanation of Mutual Submission.
This view begins with Ephesians 5:21, which says “Be subject [hypotassōmenoi] to one another [allēlois, from allēlōn].” Then immediately in v. 22, Paul commands wives to submit to their husbands (but neither here nor anywhere else does he command husbands to submit to their wives!). But since v. 22 says “Be subject to one another,” feminists declare that we must add to these verses an “understood” command to husbands, i.e., to submit to their wives in the same way wives submit to their husbands.
The immediate issue, then, is not the meaning of submission (though feminists do change this), but the meaning and application of “to one another” (Greek, allēlōn). The feminists claim that this word must always mean “everyone to everyone”; thus, wives and husbands must always equally submit to one another. This requires some adjustment in the meaning of “submission” as well; v. 25 is then appealed to in order to create a new meaning for this term, i.e., “loving service.” (This also helps feminists to resolve the difficult implication that “mutual submission” would require Christ to “submit” to the church.)
2. Critique of Mutual Submission.
The main flaw in the feminist argument is that in the NT in general, the word allēlōn simply does not always mean “everyone to everyone.” Sometimes it clearly means just “some to others,” and this is a fatal blow to the concept of mutual submission. (See, e.g., Luke 12:1; John 4:33; 13:14; Galatians 6:2; James 5:16; Revelation 6:4).
This use of allēlōn in Ephesians 5:21 means “submit to one another where your circumstances call for it,” which is seen in the fact that this command applies not just to wives, but to children and to slaves as well, in the total section, Ephesians 5:22 through 6:9. These constitute 2 other circumstances for “some to others” submission: children to parents (but not vice versa!) and slaves to masters (but not vice versa!).
C. The Biblical View of Ephesians 5:21-6:9: Biblical Responsibility.
We must see that vv. 5:21-24 do not stand alone, but are part of the larger section through 6:9. All together, these verses require submission from one party in three different household relationships: wives, children, and slaves; but the text also requires another kind of responsibility from the other party in these relationships: husbands, parents, and masters. In each case, Christ’s relationship to the church is the model for each, especially for wives and husbands.
The first relationship is between husband and wife, and Paul exhorts the wife to submit to her husband “as to the Lord” (v. 22), i.e., in the same way the church must submit to Christ (v. 24). But actually, this instruction to wives (vv. 22-24) is not Paul’s main point! His main point is the command in v. 25 to husbands, which is NOT about how they are to give submission to anyone, but how they are to receive their wife’s submission—namely, with love: the kind of love Christ has for His church.
So the emphasis here is not on the phony idea of mutual submission, but on the Biblical idea of mutual responsibility. Both husband and wife have a responsibility to the other—but not the SAME responsibility: the wife is responsible for submitting to her husband; the husband is responsible for receiving that submission in the spirit of love. The same pattern applies to children and parents in vv. 6:1-4, and to slaves and masters in vv. 6:5-9.
All of this is completely consistent with Paul’s statement in v. 23 that the husband is the head of the wife in the traditional sense of having authority over her in the same way that Christ exercises His authority over the church. (For an explanation of how he is to accomplish this, see pp. 171ff. in this same volume.)
III. GENDER ROLES AND SPIRITUAL GIFTS (pp. 185-203)
Another invalid feminist argument in their attempted defense of egalitarianism is called the phenomenon of giftedness. I.e., if anyone—male or female—possesses a specific gift or ability, he or she is responsible for using that gift in service to the church (see 1 Peter 4:10-11). In the context of gender roles, this “stewardship of spiritual gifts” is applied especially to the roles of teachers and preachers, and is used as an allegedly valid argument for women’s ordination into any church office traditionally monopolized by men.
Acts 2:16-18, citing the prophecy in Joel 2:28-29, is used to support this application of this principle to women; and the reference to “prophesying” is used to support the validity of women preachers by attempting to equate such prophesying with preaching of any kind. Therefore, it is concluded that we must allow both men and women equal access to all church offices.
A. What Constitutes “Spiritual Giftedness”?
It is widely assumed that any innate ability or native talent is a spiritual gift. It is then noted that many women have genuine gifted abilities in the areas of leadership, preaching, and teaching—often greater such abilities than those present in many ordained men. The conclusion drawn is that gender should be irrelevant in selecting church leaders, in light of the common presence of such abilities. “Gifts, not gender,” is the cry.
This is seriously wrong for two reasons. First, it confuses or equates spiritual gifts with providential gifts. Inborn gifts or talents are NOT “gifts of the Spirit.” If that were the case, millions of non-Christian and even atheistic men and women would be walking around with “gifts of the Spirit.” But “gifts” such as are listed or implied in 1 Cor. 12, in Rom. 12:6ff.; and 1 Peter 4:10-11 are never just simple, innate talents that have always been present but which are now plugged in for use by the church; rather, they are gifts and abilities specifically bestowed upon these individuals as Christians.
Second, these gifts cannot be thought of as “spiritual” gifts until those who possess them have been CALLED into specific service by God and church leaders. I.e., those who have special spiritual gifts from the Holy Spirit must first be identified by church leaders as being proper candidates for addressing needed tasks, and then must be the recipients of specific callings to serve in meeting those needs. This calling itself is part of the gift, i.e., the Spirit’s seal upon the gift. There are many examples of such a calling, e.g., Acts 13:1-3; Exodus 31:1-6; 35:30-36:2; Numbers 11:16-30; Matthew 10:1ff.; Acts 6:1-6. Whether these callings were preceded by the possession of providential gifts is not always indicated, but all the positions to which these individuals were called were blessed by the Holy Spirit.
When the church participates in bestowing spiritual gifts via the act of calling, it must always be done in accordance with God’s revealed instructions about who is qualified for these gifts. Providential abilities are not enough; Biblical qualifications for service in specific positions must be followed, e.g,, 1 Timothy 2:12. True giftedness (ability PLUS calling) does not exist without the conscientious application of such Biblical qualifications. To put it another way, ability alone does not constitute giftedness. Natural abilities BECOME spiritual gifts when the person is called in accordance with Biblical teaching.
B. How Does This Apply to Gender Roles?
Simple possession of a natural ability (e.g., the ability to teach) is in itself not a spiritual gift. No one, man or woman, who has good leadership skills thereby has the spiritual gift of leadership. Other qualifications besides ability must be followed. And we MUST recognize that often one of these specified qualifications is that the person called to a certain role must be A MAN.
For example, see Numbers 11:16ff., where the leaders appointed to help Moses were to be men (v. 1). See also Acts 6:1-6, where the seven deacon-like ones chosen to aid the Apostles were required to be men (v. 3, where the Greek is unequivocally anēr, i.e., “males”). See also 1 Timothy 3:2, where an elder is required to be a one-woman man, and 1 Timothy 3:12, where the same is required of deacons. The significance of this literal translation—one-woman MAN—is usually misleadingly replaced by “husband of one wife.”
All of this is totally consistent with 1 Timothy 2:12, which says that women are not allowed to teach Christian doctrine to Christian men in the church context (see 1 Timothy 3:14-15). Thus, any spiritual gifts related to functions that involve such teaching of men are gender specific: they are limited to men. This would involve especially the role or function of preaching minister. This does not mean that women are denied the gift of teaching as such, since women in the church need to be taught also.
Thus, to say that Scripture limits none of the spiritual gifts to one specific gender simply goes against Biblical statements and precedents to the contrary. Especially, in view of 1 Timothy 2:12, we must conclude that no woman actually has a gift (i.e., a valid call) that involves teaching men. (This verse also teaches the same about women having authority over men, i.e., the gift of eldership.)
C. Did Pentecost Remove Such Gender Distinctions?
How is all the above consistent with Acts 2:14-15, where Peter’s sermon, citing Joel 2:28-29, says in effect that God calls both men AND WOMEN to prophesy – which feminists usually equate with all speaking for God, including both preaching and teaching? Feminists generally see Peter as here breaking down all gender distinctions where spiritual gifts are concerned. He is said to do this by citing Joel’s words, “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh,” including sons and daughters.
The major flaw in this reasoning is the assumption that the Spirit’s being poured out “on all flesh” is referring to the pouring out of the Spirit to equip Christians for acts of service. This is incorrect, however. This last-days bestowal of the Holy Spirit “on all flesh” is NOT for the purpose of bestowing spiritual gifts; this role of Holy Spirit was already present in the OT era. This new purpose for bestowing the Spirit—on all flesh, including males and females—was to bestow the salvation gifts of indwelling, regeneration, and sanctification (Acts 2:23, 38-39).
Joel’s reference to prophesying is meant to refer and apply here, ONLY to the Pentecost gift of prophecy (in this case in the form of tongues), which is always a miraculous manifestation designed to confirm new teaching from God, in this case about the new saving presence of the Spirit. “Prophecy” and tongues are sometime used interchangeably; see Matthew 7:23; Mark 16:17; Acts 19:6. Thus the bottom line again is that the Joel prophecy has nothing to do with spiritual gifts in general, as if it were referring to some new policy regarding the equipping work of the Spirit in general.
D. What Is the Nature of the Gift of Prophecy?
For the sake of the argument, what if Joel’s prophecy is referring to the gift of prophecy in general, and is thus saying that women may prophesy just the same as men? Would this be a new working of the Spirit that makes gender distinctions irrelevant? The answer is NO!
It is important to see that the gift of prophecy as practiced by women was already present in OT times (e.g., Exodus 15:20; Judges 4:4; Luke 2:36). When women in NT times were prophesying (Acts 21:9; 1 Corinthians 11:5), this was nothing new. Here are four comments on this:
1. The reference in Acts 2 is referring ONLY to the gift of prophecy (often equated with tongues); we cannot generalize this by applying it to all spiritual gifts.
2. In referring to the gift of prophecy alone (as it seems to be), this is not a new kind of spiritual gift but was already present in the OT era (see above).
3. The gift of prophecy (as well as tongues) has ceased: 1 Corinthians 13:8-13. Whatever would have applied in apostolic times does not apply today. (See my book, Power from on High: What the Bible Says about the Holy Spirit, chapters 10-11)
4. In any case, “prophesying” in both the OT and the NT eras is NOT inclusive of ordinary teaching and preaching. That idea is a serious false doctrine. In Scripture, prophecy was the supernaturally-given ability to speak under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit; its product was revelation from God. It never applied and does not apply to just any proclamation of the gospel. (See 2 Peter 1:20-21.)
In light of the nature of spiritual giftedness, the purpose of Pentecost, and the nature of prophecy as such, we must reject the egalitarian notion that all spiritual gifts can and should be shared by both genders. This simply does not square with Biblical facts.
IV. LISTING OF THE OTHER ESSAYS
A. How Feminism Invaded the Church: A Brief Historical Survey (pp. 15-21).
B. Was Jesus a Feminist? A Case of Mistaken Identity (pp. 23-51)
C. 1 Corinthians 11:3: Christ as Model for Headship and Submission (pp. 53-59)
D. 1 Timothy 2:12 and the Role of Women: Five Parts (pp. 61-131)
E. The O. C. C. Case for “Occasional” Women Preachers (pp. 133-145)
F. May Women Preach if the Elders Authorize It? (pp. 147-154)
G. Thoughts on 1 Corinthians 14:34 (pp. 155-156)
H. “The Husband Is the Head of the Wife”—Ephesians 5:23: Two Parts (pp. 171-184)