Article: Women in Paul - reading between the cracks by Paula Gooder

A transcript of a talk given by Paula Gooder at the YFC staff conference, January 2008

When I tell people that I am a Pauline scholar, they look at me as if I’m a bit mad.
‘Paul in the New Testament? The one who hates women?’
‘Well actually no he doesn’t, but yeah, that one’.
The implication is that I need my head seeing to if I, being a woman, engaged in Paul for the whole of my life. What I want to do today is say, ‘well it looks a bit different to that’. One of things that happens is that we zoom in and focus on certain passages in Paul and we ‘do them to death’ - a bit like flogging a dead horse - and we miss some of the other things. So that’s why I’ve called this Women in Paul - Reading Between the Cracks because actually there are some really interesting cracks in the Pauline stuff. I want to start with some of the cracks first and work up to some of the more traditional stuff that you may be more familiar with.

One of the fascinating things about Paul is that he does talk about women occasionally, but he doesn’t talk about women’s ministry quite as much as you may think he does. And in any case, and this is the really important bit, What does it mean for Paul to talk about women’s ministry?

One of the things you have got to get out of your head are our modern churches, and into your head instead, are small tightly knit Christian communities. One of the fascinating things if you are interested in women in leadership, or leadership at all, is when you look for the word leader in Paul’s writing. It doesn’t come up very much; he talks about apostles, he talks about prophets, he talks about teachers but actually the word leader doesn’t come up very much at all, so when we talk about women in leadership we are asking a question of Paul that Paul doesn’t normally answer. Because he actually doesn’t talk about any type of leaders generally speaking, you could find exceptions (I could point to the exceptions if you want to) but as a rule he’s not so much interested in leadership as he is in proclaiming the gospel. Actually leadership is an alien concept to him. So to ask that question of Paul, about women in leadership, is an odd one to ask in the first place. So that’s the place we need to start.

But the next place that we need to go to is the fact that, once you get away from the big passages, you discover that there are quite a lot of women referred to both in Acts and in the Pauline epistles. This raises interesting questions. We are told that Paul is opposed to women in ministry/leadership depending on how you connect those two. Because it is important to recognise that ministry and leadership are not necessarily the same thing. Paul may or may not have a problem with women in leadership and we’ll look at those passages later. But if that is the case, what is ‘Priscilla doing? What is Lydia doing, what are Junias and Nympha doing? What are Lois and Eunice doing? We need to start our study of Paul and women by having a look at women in Paul’s writing.

Let’s look at some of the women we encounter in Paul and ask ourselves, what was going on? What were they doing in the Pauline communities? Before we do that we just need to have a little look at the context in which Paul was writing. It’s complex so we can’t say it is most straightforward, but we can’t afford to say we understand women in the Pauline communities until we understand women in any kind of communities. Often the first mistake we make is that we come to Paul and say, what have you got to say to us modern women in our 21st century situations, and we have an expectation of what we want Paul to say to us, and when we see that he doesn’t say it, we are cross and go off and not speak to him anymore!

But actually there is no way that Paul could say to us the kind of things that we as 21st century women or men expect (if you’re interested in these kind of areas) writing into a 1st century context. We need to recognise that he’s writing into an entirely different context than we are functioning in. And we need to understand a little bit about that context before we can understand about what Paul is doing. So what kind of context is it that Paul is functioning in?

And the answer is, loads of loads of them. Because the problem is that Paul is speaking into a whole variety of people. It’s like asking the question “what kind of context is the 21st Century world?” Well it depends where you are and who you are talking to and who’s there. Is it going to be somewhere in England? Or is it going to be somewhere in Africa? There are lot and lots of contexts.

You will remember that Paul travels around, and when we say what type of context is Paul speaking into – it depends where he is. He may be in Palestine, in which case he speaks into one kind of context, or he may be in Corinth, a different context again …….we can’t just say a 1st century context, but one of the things we can do, is to pull out a few threads, that help us to understand some aspects of the context into which Paul is speaking.

So we’re going to start with Judaism, the most straight forward situation in a sense. We have quite a lot of evidence about what Jewish attitudes towards women were like, and basically its not great news – prepare yourself !! Ben Witherington has said the Palestine/Jewish culture was one of the most patriarchal in the Mediterranean crescent. It’s one of those situations where the role of women was immensely restricted in some ways, and in other areas it was very much inclusive. Basically you can split it: public/private.

The public role of women within Judaism was limited in the extreme - public meaning anything that happens outside of the house. One of the really important things to understand about women in Judaism is that they had very little religious status at all. You may be aware that when Jews gathered together in the Synagogue, they had to be quorate before they could worship. You could have 9 men and 120 women at the Synagogue, and you wouldn’t be quorate because roughly speaking you needed 10 men. It didn’t matter how many women there were there, you would not be quorate and could not worship. So women simply didn’t function in a synagogue setting; you could not be a woman who counted in order for worship to take place.

Equally speaking, woman couldn’t say the “shema” - the great Jewish prayer “….Hear o Israel, the Lord is one.....” It could not be said by a woman. It can only be said by a man.

Women could not make pilgrimage to Jerusalem on their own; they could only do it in the company of men. They couldn’t receive an inheritance, they had no legal status outside of the home, so in a public setting, women had an immensely restricted life. Possibly the most important thing of all, was that anybody who wished to convert to Judaism, there is only one way to do, which is through circumcision. So use your imagination, and you can see where the problems of women wishing to convert to Judaism would arise. Can’t do it !! Because women did not have any particular outside role within Judaism, it wasn’t possible for women to convert to Judaism.

And therefore you begin to understand something of the nature of women’s role within Judaism, which was that it was through a man, and their whole relationship structure is through men – it simply was the way the religion was set-up at the particular time.

Conversely though, very importantly, woman had very much influence privately, even though they had none publicly. One of the crucially important things about Judaism, which we find very difficult to get our heads around, is that women may not have been important publicly, but they could and did have a massive influence within the religion of the home. They brought up children, they taught the children the faith from the mother’s knee – so you have this interesting split. Women were not important publicly, but vastly important privately, within the home and in the household. That’s still true within Orthodox Judaism today. There is no one more important within the household than the mother. You have to balance together these two different aspects to understand what’s going on in Paul.

Bernadette Bruden has written a book about 20 years ago, in which she has gone through a whole lot of Jewish Synagogue inscriptions, written above the door of the Synagogues. They told you who gave the money for the Synagogues, who led the Synagogue and who was important in the Synagogue, and other pieces of information. And one of the fascinating things was that there are a few Synagogues in which women were apparently leaders – causing everyone to scratch their heads because we know that women could not be leaders in the structure and yet here they are in the inscriptions in the Synagogues. It’s important to recognise that there were not a lot of them, but it is nevertheless a fascinating little crack that exists. She said that this is what women can do, and this is the occasion where women broke the mould…

Secondly the context is the role of women across the Mediterranean world.
But the problem is that there is not one view about what ought to happen with women across different cultures. So in the Roman Empire women did have power only if they were married, e.g . Agripino, mother of Nero, was hugely influential in the court of Roman history. In Egypt Cleopatra, in a society where women were not supposed to have influence at all, was immensely influential and became a very significant ruler in the particular period. In Asia Minor, the picture is completely different. If you are Jewish, you can’t inherit, if you are in Asia Minor, you can inherit and a woman did inherit and ran businesses within the Asia Minor culture. Which raises the question what about a Jewish woman from Asia Minor, what would she do? The answer is we have no idea!! It’s a very mixed picture - we cannot say that women were influential, or weren’t influential, in that culture. It’s all mixed up …some were some weren’t… We need to recognise that, whatever the dominant view, there were also other views and experiences happening alongside.

So what about these women in Paul? Who can we begin to understand as being important within the Pauline communities? As I said, there are quite a large number of women who are referred to within the Pauline letters and in the stories in Acts. We are going to have a look through them all, because I think you will be interested to see the kind of people that we begin to encounter.

You can split leaders in Paul basically into two categories of leaders, one of them was itinerant and the others were local. The itinerant leaders were Paul and others, who travelled around the early churches, proclaiming the gospel, and inspiring people; the local leaders, stayed put within the local communities.

So what I am going to do is split these groups of women into itinerant women, and local women, and look at the influence these types of women had in the early church.

We start with Prisca, or Priscilla, and she comes up quite a lot within the different texts:
Romans 16: 3 – Prisca and Aquilla who work with me in Christ Jesus,
1 Corinthians 16:19 – Prisca and Aquilla greet you in the Lord,
2 Timothy 4:19 – Greet Priscilla and Aquilla
Acts18:2, 18, 19 and 26 – Priscilla and Aquilla
What therefore do we notice about Priscilla ?
Have a look at all those references, and count up how many times they come up together as a couple, and you will notice that they are there pretty much all the way through. Now go through and notice how many times Priscilla comes first in the couple, and how often Aquilla comes first in the couple. In every single culture in which Paul was writing - be it Jewish, Roman, Asia Minor, Hellenistic, all the cultures - you always put the man’s name first. That’s just what you did. So why has he not done it here? It is a really striking thing….

And one of the conclusions that a lot of people draw was that he knew Priscilla better, she was more influential than her husband. You can’t push this far – but it is worth noting!

Even today, generally speaking, the man’s name comes first. Then it always, always, came first. So it is odd that her name came first, it’s worth noting. Note also that Priscilla and Aquilla are there at some of the most important times of Paul’s ministry. And you have little phrases like Rom 16:3 Priscilla and Aquilla who work with me in Christ Jesus….Priscilla is there alongside in her working with Paul, and it is therefore important to recognise this.

You may have heard of the Priscilla Catacombs. I can’t express how dodgy they are or late they are, so don’t take this too seriously, as in any way definitely true, but there is a later Christian tradition about Priscilla which says that she led a Christian community, and there are some catacombs in Rome which date back to the second century, and in these are some pictures of women, and two in particular , one of whom is doing something with bread in the middle of a meal. But that is as far as you can go with this tradition. It is quite interesting that the Priscilla catacombs suggest that Priscilla had some sort of influence in the early church. I am going no further than that, but it is worth recognising that they are there. I wouldn’t take the catacombs too seriously, but I would the Biblical evidence, that suggests that Priscilla was actually quite significant in the ministry of Paul.

The next person we encounter is Phoebe of Cenchreae or Phoebe of Corinth, and we discover her in Romans 16:1 – 2.
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Bear in mind that Paul is writing this letter to the Romans, so Phoebe is no longer in Cenchreae, because she’s carrying a letter to the Roman church. Then Paul says give her help in whatever she requires of you, seemingly implying that she has been sent to the church in Rome by the church in Cenchreae to do something. What Paul doesn’t tell us is what she has been sent to do. The implication is that she has some sort of influence and official position. Notice also that she has been a benefactor of many people, and one of the things we discover about the roles of women, both in the Gospels and in Paul, is that are that they are benefactors.

Mary Magdalene was described by Luke as a benefactor, someone who helped Jesus and the disciples. Phoebe helps out a huge amount of people in the church, particularly Paul. So now to the title that I have been avoiding for so long now – Phoebe, a Deacon of the church at Cenchreae. The problem with this word is that no one actually knows how you should translate it. It depends on the church you are in; it assumes some sort of church structure. Deacon is closely connected to the word deaconia, meaning ministry, and deaconos, means a minister, a servant a server, a whole range of things. So this could simply be a word that says she has been doing something that the church has asked her to do, through to saying that she is quite influential in the church – we have no idea which one it is. I am not even going to try to guess, because I don’t think it is helpful to do that. Nevertheless Phoebe is someone who has been sent by the church to do something – and she has been given this title, which probably means a servant, a server, a something of this church in Cenchreae, and off she goes to Rome to do it.
Next we have Euodia and Syntyche, people who appear to have had great influence, and yet have gone wrong in a major way, and therefore quite intriguing. Read about them in Philippians 4:2.

They have struggled with Paul in the work of the Gospel, locking their shields together with Paul fighting for the Gospel – thorough and full co- workers for the Gospel. Although scrapping, they have been hugely influential.
Some debate about whether Syntyche is a man or woman, little evidence to support it. Therefore you have these two women that are quite strong and influential in the Philippians church.

Finally in this category of Itinerant leaders, is somebody called Junias.
Romans 16:7 tells us that she was one of Paul’s relatives who were in prison with him. ‘They are prominent among the Apostles, and they were in Christ before I was.’ Two intriguing bits: ‘Prominent in Christ’, and ‘before I was’. That they were prominent among the Apostles, raises two issues:
i) Was Junias really a woman or not ?
ii) What does prominent among the Apostles really mean ?

Prominent or well known ? There is a vast amount of discussion on these issues.
Quote from John Chrysostom, one of the early fathers, says this of Junias:
‘Even to be an Apostle is great, but also to be prominent among them, consider how wonderful a song of honour that is, for they were prominent because of their works because of their successes. Glory be, how great the wisdom of this woman, that she was deemed worthy even of the Apostles title.’ Amazing that someone like John Chrysostom should say that about a woman!

It is therefore important to recognise that there were some women who had significant roles within the itinerant ministry of the early church. They are there!

The next category is the Local Leaders: The local leaders are very interesting indeed, because generally speaking the local leaders were heads of households. You probably know that among early Christians, people gathered in houses, and worshipped together round a table, breaking bread together and telling stories about Jesus. And those that were the head of a household, would be the ones who oversaw the local communities. Now according to the cultural breakdown I gave you at the start, and all things being equal, there oughtn’t to have been any women who were heads of households. It shouldn’t really have happened in the culture. So let me introduce to a few people who were.

Chloe in 1 Corinthians 1:11
The problem with this verse is that we don’t really know who Chloe’s people are. But some people have taken that as a reference to Chloe having some sort of influence in a household.

Moving on to the more important one, Lydia appears in Acts rather than one of the Pauline Epistles, and Lydia is an incredible person. You’ve got to bear in mind where this occurs within Paul’s ministry. Remember Paul has been travelling around on his so-called second missionary journey, and he got to Asia Minor, and said ‘I don’t know what to do now!’ And he had a vision of the man from Macedonia, who says come over here and continue your mission. So Paul for the very first time leaves the East, and goes to the West – it’s a crucial point in Paul’s ministry, because it is at that point that he starts to move his journey towards Rome. After his vision, he goes to Greece, and in Acts 16, he encounters this woman called Lydia. ‘Lydia a worshipper of God was listening to us’. She’s from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth – very, very rich indeed! Purple cloth was more valuable than gold. Notice that it is she who is the trader in purple cloth – it shouldn’t be! When she and her household were baptised, she offered her house. She was the first convert within the Greek community, and she was the one the head of a household that invited Paul into her home, and from there the Greek church began to grow.

Nympha: Colossians 4:15,16 mentions Nympha and the church in her house, suggesting that Nympha is someone who is overseeing a church in her house – or does it? Is she overseeing the church ? or is it that the church meets in her house? Nevertheless the fact that Paul greets her and nobody else, tells us that Nympha is quite influential in Paul’s mind; whether she is leading the church or not is up for grabs.

The final couple of women we encounter: Eunice and Lois: in 2 Timothy 1:5 -7. What is important about this passage is that Timothy got his faith through his mother and grandmother, and through this passage we get a glimpse of how the early churches functioned. Just like Judaism, the women had a great influence in bringing about the faith of the children – evidence of women who have given birth to the faith in Timothy, and it is their faith that has inspired Timothy.

Nothing at all to do with leadership, but tells you something about the influence within the growth of the early church.

So then what can we tell from all of those women? The evaluating of this evidence becomes really difficult.

I think one of the fascinating things is that we really don’t talk about them, and it is interesting that when you lay them down one after the other, you realise that there were actually quite a lot of women who were regarded as being quite important in the early church.

It doesn’t necessarily tell us about women in ministry – nice that it would be if it did. It would help us fill a rather sparse Pauline picture. But it does tell us a few things. It tells us that there were women who travelled with Paul in his itinerant ministry; there were women who Paul considered to be important within early Christian communities.
There were woman who apparently headed households – whether that meant that they led them, is up for grabs, but they definitely were heads of households. So there were quite a lot of women in the Pauline community. What you do with that evidence is up to you; I am not going to press that any further.

With exactly the same kid of evidence two, three or four people can up with two, three or four ideas. And therefore we can’t say this is what it means.

But I do think it is evidence that is overlooked when we talk about women in ministry, and therefore we need to bring it back into the discussion and say ‘OK here were all these women, and what were they all doing if women were not involved in ministry in the 1st century?’ We may not have an answer to that but we need to raise it as a question.

So does this shed any more light on the big passages that we talk about when we talk about the women in Paul, particularly about Galatians 3:28; 1 Corinthians 11:2 -16; 1 Corinthians 14:34 -36, and the Timothy passage 1Timothy 2.

One of the things that we really need to be clear about, is that you can’t read each one of the passages in the light of the other passages. You have to read all the evidence together and give them equal importance, and then make your decision about what you think it means. So what is Paul saying about women in ministry?

Let me start with the Ephesians and Colossians passages:
In these passages it talks about women being subject to their husbands but this is very intriguing, given the cultural background. Paul is re-enforcing a very important part of Greek culture, that’s not there in Jewish culture. So that within the Greek culture, the man was the head of the household and the woman was subject to him.

Within Jewish culture, actually the woman had the power in the household, and the man was subject to the woman within the households, and its important that you bear that in mind.

Outside the household, everything is different. So what Paul is doing is moving away from a Jewish culture into a Greek culture. He is establishing Greek principles rather than Jewish principles. And that is telling you something about the context into which Paul is speaking - talking into Greek dominated cultures, rather than into Jewish dominated cultures. Therefore he is saying you must fit in with the society’s values of the time. The question then you have to decide is that was he saying for then or for now? And that is one of the big discussions that people have in that particular context!

The other passages are equally interesting:
1 Corinthians 14, about women not speaking in the midst of the congregation, has to be read with 1 Corinthians 11, which is about prophecy.

Paul uses the word lalio, which means chatter. Men praying in the synagogue, and woman talk/chatter behind screens. Don’t talk while the service is going on, ask your husbands afterwards.

Everything that we have looked at has shown us that women had a place in early Christianity. When we look at the cultural stuff, Paul was being radical, because in every ancient religion, women didn’t have a place, woman could not convert to Judaism - because they could not be circumcised; women could not join Greek mystery religions, because there wasn’t a role for them; and in most religions of the ancient world women did not have a role, they were there on the backs of the men they accompanied.

In Christianity, Galatians 3:28 tells us that it did not matter whether you were male or female, you could be baptised into Christ, and actually that was an amazing thing that Paul was saying - that you had a full and proper role within Christianity. The most important thing of all was that women were welcomed fully into the ‘in Christ’ relationship.