Shane Williamson > Recent Status Updates

...we have bodies connected to the natural world, such that our consciousness and rationality are tied to our bodily orientations and interactions in and with our environment. Our embodiment is essential to who we are, to what meaning is, and to our ability to draw rational inferences and to be creative. (30)

Just as water takes the shape of the container it fills, so textual meaning necessarily adapts itself to the theological worlds of those deciphering it: readers and their contexts sculpt the content they discover. (61)

The New Testament speaks of the inability of either authority and leadership or equality and rights to produce unity in and of themselves. Promoting personal rights is intrinsically about what benefits or is fair to the individual rather than building relationships between individuals. Authority may provide order and efficiency but not intimacy. (175)

[Paul describes] an ethic that asks the head to act in a socially shameful and dishonoring way, that is, the way of the cross (e.g., 1 Cor. 1:18-31). Rather than being accommodating, Paul proposes a way that would be seen as causing great social disruption. The irony is that he says that in Christ it actually leads to the opposite, creating intimate unity and harmony between husband and wife. (165)

[Paul's] language of headship and submission for husbands and wives in Ephesians may at first glance seem to reflect another attempt for Christians to live according to larger social expectations. But a closer look at the cultural context reveals that while Paul was aware of these expectations, he does not conform to them but rather subverts the traditional order...(165)

In the fall Adam distanced himself from Eve by blaming her, rather than manifesting a true "one flesh" union. Instead of taking responsibility for his own transgression, he was essentially willing to sacrifice her by trying to place the blame on her in an attempt to save himself (Gen. 3:12), thus displaying the antithesis of the attitude expected of a husband in Christ. (163)

When Paul tells wives to submit to their husbands and to do so because he is the head (Eph 5:22-24), he would seem to be agreeing with these values. But when he instructs husbands in the content of this headship, he presents a startling reversal. Contrary to common conceptions of what is fitting and thus honorable, husbands are to love their wives and give themselves up for them. (158)

[in Ephesians 5] the issue is not a clear-cut one of whether the husband has "authority" over his wife as the head as opposed to the wife's being an "equal" partner in the marriage. Rather the passage is shaped by ideas that are more immediately relevant to kingdom priorities, such as reversal, sacrifice, love, and unity. (148)

While Adam and Eve's relationship revolves around unity and love, it is also characterized by more than equality. At the same time, it lacks any explicit commands for Adam to exercise authority over Eve but does emphasize the obedience of both Adam and Eve to God. Whatever the nature of any authority Adam might have, it is not presented in a dominant fashion. (144)

At the same time, because Adam has a particular role in regard to the unity with Eve and the need for obedience to God's direct command, it is also difficult to see their relationship as primarily one of functional "equality." (143)

If God commissioned Adam to promote the unity of the marriage, then it is difficult to imagine that "authority" would be a main characteristic of his responsibility since power relationships tend to separate rather than create intimacy. (143)

...rather than considering how servanthood modifies a type of leadership, it may be better to ask how servanthood forms a necessary basis for leadership, even authority, and how a kingdom perspective of reversal explains this paradoxical notion. (107)

In this context [Mt 20.20-28], "servant" would seem to do more than qualify "leadership." Instead it provides an essential component so that one must be a servant before one can be a leader. In other words Christ indicates that servanthood is a prerequisite for being a leader. (107)

Acts 2 speaks of Jesus's promised giving of the Spirit to his followers. Women are "equally" included in the outpouring of the gift of prophecy and the reception of the empowering Spirit. However ... "inclusion" better captures the implications of Pentecost since it reflects the focus on participation of all in the blessings and mission of the kingdom rather than a distribution of rights or privileges. (100)

Although Gal. 3:28 is often used as evidence of an egalitarian theology, the passage does not speak of equality as much as unity, of being "one." Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, are not isos, "equal," but heis, "one." In other words, "universal integration into a new single community of Jesus followers is its point, not equalization of all members." (86)

Rather than an egalitarian community, the believers formed a surrogate family where people were included not by blood ties but on the basis of faith. The bonds among the members were the ties of brotherly and sisterly love. As Elliott notes, seeing Jesus's intent as establishing a "community of equals" is not only incorrect but can also obscure its true original model as one of a household or family. (86)

At the turn of the century, the importance of male authority waned as concerns for the moral good of society and the salvation of the world propelled women to the forefront of the very public arenas of social reform and missions. In the post-World War II period, as part of a homebound and peace-desiring nation, evangelicals emphasized a gendered order based strongly on male leadership centered on the nuclear family.

The early Christian feminists advocated equality not in order to pursue the opportunity for their own fulfillment, especially as it related to their identity as women, but as a moral and religious imperative to help those in need. (61)

While the home was still considered the most suitable place for a woman because of her nature, a different understanding of the woman's "home" and its relationship to her identity shaped the view of expected ministry. In line with the growing value of individualism in the culture, personal evangelism and neighborhood ministry took precedence over social reform. (47)

As the country turned inward during the post-World War II years and became more individualistic in its focus and values, evangelical women were primarily child centered, placed priority on their marriages over jobs, and concentrated on their own homes. The husband was the one who went out into the world, had the "authority," and made the "big" decisions for the household. (47)

In the 1950s evangelicals turned to the home. Whereas at the turn of the twentieth century, evangelical attitudes toward women reflected an emphasis on their virtue and subsequent obligation to be the moral guardians of society, now women's sphere of influence was mostly contained in the immediate home and nuclear family, without the duty to impact the larger "household" of the world. (47)

The shift was from the social value of gender roles to an "order of creation" that required male leadership and female submission...this idea was not new. However, in the postwar era, evangelicals proposed a stricter hierarchy, which they also pursued with more insistence. In the period of transition and uncertainty following two world wars, a creation order helped in "reducing the world to manageable proportions."

In many ways the mid-nineteenth to the turn of the twentieth century was filled with seeming contradictions. Women were domestic but not homebound. They were virtuous but not passive or fragile. They were under the authority of the men in the church and their husbands at home at the same time that they were to be moral and spiritual leaders and reformers. (33)

I have come to believe that the topic cannot be completely defined by either the complementarian or the egalitarian viewpoint, and that there is room, perhaps even a necessity, for an alternative way of conceptualizing gender issues. (1)