What Paul Really Said About Women: The Apostle's Liberating Views on Equality in Marriage,...

What Paul Really Said About Women: The Apostle's Liberating Views on Equality in Marriage, Leadership, and ... | John T. Bristow | Bristow offers Fascinating insight Into Paul

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What Paul Really S...

	What Paul Really Said About Women: The Apostle's Liberating Views on Equality in Marriage, Leadership, and ... John T. Bristow HarperOne, 1991 - 144 pages average customer review:based on 31 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A challenge to the traditional understanding of St. Paul's epistles and sexism in today's church.

Incredible

I cannot say enough about the insight this book contains to clarify some of those things that we sort of 'knew to some degree all along', but didn't have enough background to really be able to explain clearly from a biblical standpoint. This book is not some propaganda...it is insight to the original context and language of the writers, things that are all but lost in our shallow English language and Westernized culture. A must, especially for ministers. No room for male supremacy here.

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Bristow offers Fascinating insight Into Paul

Inadequate understanding of languages coupled with cultural influences created an understanding of Paul that has led to Paul's being considered a male chauvenist. He wasn't.

Bristow explains, simply, that Paul has been misquoted and misunderstood. This book provides a simple explanation of Paul that can be understood by most people in the pews. A wonderful insight into the real Paul.

A Godsend!!

Truly an illuminating book on what Paul REALLY said about women! I can't recommend this enough. It will change what else you've read and been told about Paul. When viewed in the context of the times and using original language it makes ALL the difference in the world. Thank you, Dr. Bristow!

As has been mentioned in previous reviews here: Paul wasn't a male chauvanist. My apologies too, Paul. ; )

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Poor Saint Paul

At the risk of being bashed as a feminist, unorthodox or unbiblical, I have to say that on the whole I found this book very useful in critiquing many of the excesses of male domination as found among Christians today who try to use Paul as their back-up proof text. I also write this as an Eastern Orthodox man who has seen way too much of that sort of thing among his Protestant brethren. (Coincidentally, I have found very little of the male domineering among the Orthodox, which one might not have expected!)

The author does a pretty fair job, in my layman's view, of placing St Paul's writing into the socio-religious context of the early to mid-first century. As you can see from the table of contents, Bristow covers the usual bases of equality in marriage, society and the Church. He shows, convincingly to me, that Paul viewed women as equal partners in marriage, of high standing in the Church community and as educators within the community.

I feel that he could have made much more use of our Trinitarian faith, using the Father's role in relation to the Son and Spirit as a model for an equality within a context of hierarchy, or a first among equals. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all equally God, yet their unity is derived from the Father within an order. So I feel that this sort of usage could have helped make his case both stronger and more rooted in the scripture.

Ok, so all is well and good until we come to this quote on page 57: "While Paul did not establish the practice of having women lead in worship alongside men, he certainly approved of it." Oh, really? And here is my major point of disagreement with the author. As much as I may want to, I do not find any text in the NT or early church writings to support the ordination of woman to the priesthood. Every single text that he marshals to support this position has nothing to do with the actual sacramental role of the priest/elder/pastor whatever. They include teaching and prophecy (speaking), but not what is actually the exclusive role of the presbyter or episkopos (bishop). Simply put, there is no such thing as a Christian priestess. It is very true that women were educators, catechists, deliverers of Paul's epistles (Romans for example, meaning that she may be the first interpreter of it!), hosts of house Churches (think 12 people max) and deaconesses. But to go back to the role of Christ, the priest stands in the stead of Christ at the liturgy, since all of the sacraments are Christ's, not ours. This does not have much of an impact upon Protestant Christians, since they often have no acceptance of the grace of God in the sacraments (owing to Romaphobia and their own biased reading of St Paul, perhaps). Of course you may argue that the sex/gender of Jesus has nothing to do with his personhood, but I am not so sure to dismiss that on such weak grounds. Besides, what is at debate here is what St. Paul wrote, not what modern theologians may legitimately conclude two thousand years later. And that being the case, there is no grounds in St Paul for establishing female liturgical leader. What do the texts show us? Deaconesses who deliver the Eucharist to widows or the poor? Yes. Woman who teach? Yes. Woman who baptize outside of the liturgy? Yes. Women leading the prayer in the role of bishop or priest? Never, not once. Of course that may all change, but not upon any sort of "new reading" of St. Paul, I am afraid. (And believe me, I am very sympathetic to the idea.)

Other books of interest may include an article in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethicsby C.S. Lewis entitled "Priestesses in the Church?" It is fantastically brilliant. Also, Women in the Priesthood: A Systematic Analysis in the Light of the Order of Creation and Redemption and God or Goddess?: Feminist Theology : What Is It? Where Does It Lead?, both by Hauke, Women and the Priesthood and Ungodly Rage: The Hidden Face of Catholic Feminism. Now some of these books tend to be critical of the negative role that feminism can play in theology by really skewing it to modern desires instead of truth, so I think if you really want to learn both sides, you have to read these authors as well.

One last thing, consider Mary, the Mother of our Lord, as model for what it means to not only be a woman, but a true human before God. Here is a great place to start: Mary: The Untrodden Portal of God - Expanded and Revised Edition with a General Index.

Peace.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

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