Why Jesus and Paul Were Radically Feminist for Their Time
Deconstructing Christianity: Jesus' behavior was radically feminist. Paul assumed that women were equal and could hold positions of authority.
Jesus
Jesus flouted the patriarchal norms of his society and culture by publicly interacting with women outside the household, and by treating them as worthy interlocutors in their own right. Examples are numerous throughout the gospels. Recent scholarship has also highlighted the previously downplayed and misinterpreted status of women as co-equal disciples and ministers with Jesus.
In addition to Jesus’ society- and culture-defying interactions with women, his teachings are often given in pairs with many of these addressing women and men in turn. While they sometimes reflect traditional gendered roles and tasks from Jesus’ context, they show that he was serious about teaching both men and women and having both men and women as followers. Jesus considered women as equal to men in terms of their spiritual potential, worthiness to be taught, and ability to reason.
Paired Sayings
Luke 4 has one of Jesus’ paired sayings that there were many widows in Israel but Elijah was sent to only one of them, and there were many lepers in Israel but Elisha was sent to cleanse only a certain man. Luke 11 has a parable about a man persistently asking his friend late at night for some bread to feed a guest, while Chapter 18 has a parallel story about a woman persistently asking a judge for justice against her opponent.
In Jesus’ twin sayings about not giving children a stone for bread, a snake for fish, or a scorpion for an egg from Matthew 7 and Luke 11, their parallel constructions have the Greek word for son in the first part only. In Matthew 12 Jesus pairs the men (Greek ándres) of Nineveh rising in judgment of his generation with the Queen of the South similarly rising to judge them. In the Luke 11 version, the two are reversed.
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In Matthew 6 and Luke 12, the birds of the air or ravens neither sow, reap nor gather into barns—men’s work in Jesus’ time, while the lilies neither toil nor spin—women’s work in that context. In Matthew 13 and Luke 13, Jesus uses paired metaphors for his empire of the sky: a mustard seed that a man plants in his field, and yeast that a woman mixes with flour to leaven it.
In Luke 15 there is another set of parables paired together. One is about a shepherd leaving ninety-nine sheep to go find a lost one; the other is about a woman lighting a lamp and sweeping the house to find one of her ten silver coins that had been lost. In apocalyptic passages about the Son of Man coming in Matthew 24 and Luke 17, Jesus speaks of two men being in a field—or in one bed—and one being taken while the other is left; then he speaks of two women grinding meal together and one being taken while the other is left.
In Matthew 21 he pairs tax collectors and prostitutes as those who will enter the empire of God before the chief priests and elders because they believed the message of John the Baptist. Finally, in Matthew 10 and Luke 12, in speaking of the family division his teaching will cause, he pairs fathers and sons with mothers and daughters. These examples of Jesus’ paired sayings can be found in a slim volume entitled Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus: Women in Q.[1]
These sayings of Jesus pair men and women in equal measure—even if his male followers are given lengthier depictions by the gospel writers. He is shown interacting openly and publicly with women, a practice that was out of step with the patriarchal norms of his day. Jesus did not address men and expect them to instruct the women with whom they were associated. He addressed women directly as persons in their own right.
Paul
There is a book by biblical scholar Eric C. Smith entitled Paul the Progressive? that addresses the unfortunate misattribution, misinterpretation, and misapprehension of Paul as a misogynist, homophobe, anti-Semite, prude, slavery apologist, xenophobe, and debt and guilt monger. Concerning Paul’s attitude toward women, Smith writes the following (emphases mine):
By reading between the lines of Paul’s writings, in places such as Romans 16 we can see something of how Paul acted in the world. What we see there is that he deeply valued and praised women such as Phoebe, Prisca, Junia, and the other women of Romans 16. He spoke about them as deacons and apostles, as hard workers and risk-takers and colleagues. He assumed women were allowed to do this work, because he knew women were doing this work, often to his own benefit and on his behalf. These between-the-lines readings help us make sense of passages such as 1 Corinthians 7:2-7, where Paul describes marriage in egalitarian terms, and 1 Corinthians 11:2-16, where he assumes that women are praying and prophesying in church. Such reading also helps us to understand what Paul means in Galatians 3:28 when he says that “there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” Paul was no misogynist, no matter how much later Christians tried to make him one to serve their own misogynistic purposes. Paul understood that something new was happening—that “all of you are one in Christ Jesus”—women just as much as men.[2]
In 1 Corinthians 14, Paul’s discourse about speaking in and interpreting tongues is interrupted by unrelated material about how women should be silent in the churches and rather ask their husbands about anything they want to know at home. There is evidence from ancient manuscripts that these verses were not written by Paul but interpolated at a later time. The NRSV translation puts them in parentheses to show this. Smith has this to say (emphasis mine):
There is evidence from ancient manuscripts that these verses sometimes appear elsewhere in the text of 1 Corinthians, a sure sign that ancient scribes were uncertain about them, or that they had multiple texts that handled these verses in different ways. Such practices are often the biggest piece of evidence that something was added to a text later, and, in fact, that is what many scholars think happened here. This is called an interpolation, or an insertion into a manuscript. The ideas is that later on, after Paul’s death, a scribe or some other person added [verses] 33b-36 to Paul’s letter to try to get his own position heard. He didn’t think women should speak in church, and he thought that the way to get people to agree with him would be to have Paul say it for him.[3]
Not only are these verses inconsistent with Paul’s attitude toward women as depicted in writings undisputedly attributed to him, but they also directly contradict the passage in Chapter 11 of the same epistle where Paul assumes women are praying and prophesying in church.
1 Timothy 2:11-12 is sometimes trotted out to assert that no woman should be permitted to teach or hold authority over men. This is inconsistent with what Paul has to say in the epistles that are undisputedly written by him. And it is no wonder because 1 Timothy was almost surely not written by Paul. The books of First and Second Timothy and Titus are referred to by scholars as the pastoral epistles. Concerning them, biblical scholar Stephen L. Harris has this to say:
In the opinion of most scholars, the case against Paul's connection with the pastorals is overwhelming. Besides the fact that they do not appear in early lists of Paul's canonical works, the pastorals seem to reflect conditions that prevailed long after Paul's day, perhaps as late as the first half of the second century C.E. Lacking Paul's characteristic ideas about faith and the Spirit, they are also un-Pauline in their flat style and different vocabulary (containing 306 words not found in Paul's unquestioned letters). Furthermore, the pastorals assume a church organization far more developed than that current in the apostle's time.[4]
First Timothy, attributed to Paul by its very first word, was not written by Paul; and, the Paul of the undisputed epistles would not deny positions of authority to women, or consign them to silence in the church.
Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3 both contain instructions that wives be subject to their husbands. Concerning these, Eric C. Smith writes the following (emphases mine):
Ephesians 5:22-33 and Colossians 3:18-19 are part of larger sections that scholars sometimes call “household codes,” because they give advice to people who are living within household systems. In every case, the “household codes” assume a hierarchy between the parties, and they call for obedience on the part of the “inferior” parties. Slaves were inferior to masters and therefore should obey them; children were inferior to parents and so should obey them; and wives were inferior to husbands, and should obey them—at least according to Ephesians and Colossians. These letters argue for the status quo of the time, not for the leveling of hierarchies and overturning of boundaries taught by Jesus and advocated by Paul. ...The focus on household life is a sign that these letters come from a time after Paul’s own lifetime—a time when Jesus’ return was not so immediately expected, and when family and gender roles were shifting back toward social norms. A dozen or so parallel passages between Colossians and Ephesians—such as the one about wives being subject to their husbands—suggest that both of these documents were part of a larger pseudo-Pauline tradition. The authors of Colossians and Ephesians seem to have been creating their letters by taking words and phrases from some of Paul’s authentic letters, from tradition, and from other pseudo-Pauline materials, and recombining them to make new letters with some of the characteristics of the old ones. They were doing this because they thought that something needed to be said about a number of issues, including the role of women, and that it needed to be said with the authority of Paul’s voice.[5]
It is important to remember that just because epistles attributed to Paul were not written by him does not mean that they are less inspired or profitable. All scripture requires background knowledge and careful attention to detail to rightly interpret it. These pseudo-Pauline writings that de-radicalize Paul are a fascinating record of early Christianity wrestling with its place in the society and culture of its day.
Scripture is a developmental record. Just because YHVH is depicted as a storm and warrior deity who slaughters his opponents does not mean that these concepts have to be reconciled with every other concept of God in scripture. There was a time when the average level of consciousness was at a tribal or warrior stage, and scripture is a record of that, too. It is also a record of how we have developed in our understanding over time. God doesn’t change; people do.
Conclusion
Misogyny will interpret the Bible accordingly. The assumption that women are equal to men in capabilities and rights will interpret the Bible accordingly, as well. People see women becoming qualified for leadership and exercising authority in measures equal to men, and they assume women have the capability and right to do so. A church that denies women positions of equal authority is out of step with this obvious reality, and as such, makes itself irrelevant to a society that is turning away as a result. The future of Christianity in the postmodern world depends in part on whether or not churches adapt to current reality and change their attitudes and actions toward women.
[1] Parks, Sara. Gender in the Rhetoric of Jesus: Women in Q. Lanham, Boulder, New York, London: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2019.
[2] Smith, Eric C. Paul the Progressive? The Compassionate Christian’s Guide to Reclaiming the Apostle as an Ally. Saint Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2019, p. 34.
[3] Ibid., p. 27.
[4] Harris, Stephen L. The New Testament: A Student's Introduction, 4th ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2002, p. 366.
[5] Op. cit., pp. 22-23.