A Review of "The Making of Biblical Womanhood" by Beth Allison Barr
Review too long to read? Listen on our Podcast, Church Talk, for a summary.
Deconstruction is in right now. By deconstruction I mean the question and dismantling of the Christian faith you grew up with. Thanks to the publicity of social media, questioning our faith out in the open is increasingly normal. Many of our friends and family are openly redefining or rejecting the faith they once held. For many of us seeking to hold to the "once for all delivered" faith, this often feels tragic and troubling.
But is all deconstruction bad? Maybe there is a reason it’s hot right now. Are there certain Christian historical practices or beliefs, ancient and modern, that should rightfully be dismantled, put to death, ended outright? Dr. Beth Allison Barr, professor of history at Baylor University, is confident there is one deconstruction project that must be speedily carried out: the end of Christian Patriarchy.
If you preordered Dr. Barr’s new book The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How The Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth, you may have received a sticker with a rousing call to action: End Christian Patriarchy. I’m not really into stickers or public promotion of my ideals on my water bottle or laptop cover, but seeing a sticker like that in the wild, I’d imagine, would garner a positive reaction for most folks. Inasmuch as “patriarchy” means the subjugation, denigration, exclusion, devaluing and “de-imaging” of women made in the likeness of God, “Christian Patriarchy” is a contradiction in terms, and rightfully should be demolished, deconstructed, ended, and sledgehammered. But here is the thing about Dr. Barr’s book: the main argument is that the doctrine of complementarianism, a newer word used by conservative Chrsitians to define the differing, complementary roles of men and women in the church and home, is Christian Patriarchy. In this sense, her stickers are also meant to read: “End Christian Complementarianism.” As it turns out, this is an entirely different argument.
Why Review This Book?
Now, I hope it is no secret to you that Grace Church, while not requiring a personal conviction on the role of men and women in the church for membership (it’s not in our statement of faith), is committed to teaching and practicing the principle of male servant leadership among our church elders. In other words, at our church the office of elder is reserved for qualified men. Call this what you may, but in modern theological terms this falls under the umbrella of complementarianism. This means that our church polity falls under the scope of Dr. Barr’s criticisms.
Why review a book that is criticising the teaching and practices of our church? First, because of its proximity. For our congregation, I believe this book is particularly prescient. Not because I believe Dr. Barr’s arguments to be ultimately convincing (we will get to that in a moment), but because the conversation she is starting is here at home. It’s a conversation our students are having on campus, a conversation that some of our neighbors are having in the coffee shop. It’s an accessible book, written by a Baylor professor, on a controversial topic, with an eye-catching title. It’s going to come up for a church in Waco whether we address it together or not.
Secondly, because of the sanctifying opportunity. The purpose of reading and reviewing a book like this is not to hone our polemical sharpshooting by taking aim at a theological “enemy.” Even though the premise and promotion of this book is polemical and negative in tone, Dr. Barr’s intentions seem very genuine. Let’s treat her as a sister in Christ with a concern for our good. This book, whether we asked or not, has brought the tide of this issue to our small church in Waco, Tx. The question is, will we take advantage of the tide and learn how to swim more effectively and elegantly? Let’s pounce on this opportunity to sharpen and refine our understanding of God’s good design for men and women in the church and the home.
In reading this book, I also took the time to read or review other resources that helped me further sharpen my convictions on the topic of manhood and womanhood. I’ll include those in the footnotes. I also was able to get together with some church members who read the book with me and get their thoughts. So let’s first break down the book’s argument.
What is the Argument of the Book?
Dr. Barr is a medieval historian, which doesn’t naturally scream “popular author”, but her book was very accessible and engaging. Most of the book is woven together by her personal examples and stories, which add a specific flavor and emotion to the work. Let me do my best to outline the author’s main argument:
Problem: Complementarianism is equal to Patriarchy, hurtful to women, and is based on cultural norms supported by faulty “literal” interpretations of select verses.
The book starts with a personal story of Dr. Barr’s experience in a theologically conservative church where her husband served as a youth pastor. After many negative interactions with church leadership, including not being allowed to teach youth Sunday school, she decided, alongside her husband, to privately question the church’s teaching on gender roles. Because of this, her husband was dismissed from his position as pastor. In leaving her church, Dr. Barr admits to becoming aware of her complicity in a system that “used the name of Jesus to oppress and harm women” (6). This system was complementarian theology, a system of theological anthropology “based on a handful of verses read apart from their historical context” and “stands contrary to everything Jesus did and taught” (6, 8). This book is Dr. Barr’s story of deconstruction, coming out of the theological system of gender she previously swam in.
Before giving us a clear definition of complementarianism, she first moves to defining patriarchy. The definition of patriarchy Barr hones in on is this: “a society that promotes male authority and female submission.” This kind of societal structure is inherently harmful to women because it creates a culture that “values men and their contributions more than it values women and their contributions” (16). Barr goes on to equate complementarianism with this understanding of patriarchy: “Both systems place power in the hands of men and take power away from women. Both systems teach men that women rank lower than they do. Both systems teach women that their voices are worth less than the voices of men” (18).
Hold on a second, though. Is this actually what complementarianism teaches? If so, again I agree with Barr—this is not Christian. But here her entire argument stands or falls. If complementarianism does not teach this, then her entire book falls a bit flat, or at least it changes direction. Instead of a critique of complementarianism, it’s just a critique of how secular and sinfully oppressive patriarchal structures have worked their way into the church. [1] It is set up in such a way that in order for The Making of Biblical Womanhood to be ultimately persuasive, it must convincingly make the full link between complementarianism and patriarchy, not simply critique complementarianism for looking like patriarchy.
The rest of the book, then, is primarily about this equation of complementarianism and patriarchy. The first stone that must be unturned is the Biblical witness itself. If complementarianism is unbiblical, then of course it is much easier to affirm it as a cultural repackaging of secular patriarchy. So in chapter 2 she turns towards the Pauline epistles.
Dr. Barr’s dive into Paul’s understanding of gender is focused on overturning or casting doubt onto traditional interpretations of texts like 1 Corinthians 14:33-36 and Ephesians 5:21-33. In other words, her emphasis is on poking holes in what she calls a “plain and literal interpretation” of Pauline texts that seem to speak about Roman patriarchal codes in the New Testament context (46). Rather than upholding Roman household codes for the New Testament church, Barr posits that it was Paul’s intention to emphasize a Christian subversion of culturally acceptable gender roles in the home. Paul’s address to all groups in the home—men, women, children, and slaves, rather than just men—as well as his inclusion of maternal imagery, show clearly that his exhortations would be taken as a radical reversal of the patriarchal Roman household codes. To focus on the submission of wives to husbands, according to Barr, is to act just like the un-christian world, and to reject patriarchal structures, just as Paul did in his day, is what it means to showcase a distinctly Christian witness.
Barr turns from household codes to church order in the Pauline epistles. With a brief primer in Roman history, she showcases how the women of the age were forbidden from public displays of wealth and told to be silent when they expressed protest. In a passage like 1 Corinthians 14:33-35, then, Paul cannot be saying something similar to the women in the church at Corinth when he writes: “It is shameful for a woman to speak in church.” Drawing mainly from the work of Lucy Peppiatt, Barr argues that Paul must be using a specific rhetorical strategy: stating the common view of the day (“women must be silent”) and then refuting it. Dr. Barr concludes that “If Paul is indeed quoting the Roman worldview to counter it with the Christian worldview, then his meaning is the exact opposite of what evangelical women have been taught” (62). Although she admits that such a view is uncertain, Barr finds this modern reading to be consistent with the hermeneutic that rejects the patriarchal structures of the Roman world with gusto. Barr ends with a section pointing out the plethora of women in respected positions in Paul’s letters, particularly in Romans 16, as further evidence that “we have read Paul wrong…” from the very beginning, as “Roman patriarchy had seeped back into the early church” (67, 69).
This concludes Barr’s statement of the problem in evangelical churches. Complementarianism is equatable to Patriarchy, hurtful to women, and it may not even be biblical either. She moves now in Chapters 3-5 to give her evidence to support the following claim:
Evidence 1: Complementarians have reshaped historical witness, scripture translation, and Christian theology to fit their agenda.
In Chapter 3, Dr. Barr gets into her field of expertise in medieval history. Centering on the life of Margery Kempe, she aims to prove by specific medieval examples that modern evangelical historians have cut out the witness of female leaders in the church and “present a masuline narrative of church history that minimizes female leadership” in order to “protect and enhance the authority of men” (98, 99).
In Chapter 4, she focuses on the reformation period, arguing that the accessibility of Biblical text and revival of Biblical preaching brought a reordering of the Christian family and expanded the role of the wife to primarily that of household worker, such that “women’s identities were now subsumed within the family” (126). “Instead of Scripture transforming society,” Barr writes, “society transformed how early modern Christians interpret the Bible” (127).
Chapter 5 skips ahead to the Bible translation controversy of the late 1990s, when Christian publisher Zondervan came under scrutiny for advocating for a new edition of the NIV bible with more gender-neutral language. Eventually that edition, the TNIV, was released in 2002, but not before the ESV was published in 2001 as, she argues, a “direct response to the gender-inclusive language debate… born to secure readings of Scripture that preserved male headship” (132). Because Bible translators are products of the culture they live in, she claimst, they are prone to biased translation which protects their particular social agendas, ultimately meaning that “women were written out of the early English Bible” (150).
Next, Dr. Barr moves to reveal evidence of the following claim:
Evidence 2: Complementarians have doubled down on the subjugation of women by claiming their positions are necessary for the gospel to be true.
Dr. Barr’s second line of reasoning falls under what she calls the evidence for “santifying subordination.” How did the patriarchal subordination of women in ancient, Roman, and Medieval society—which Barr sees evidenced in modern evangelical society through demands for strict modesty and domesticity codes—come to be seen as “holy” in the modern church? Well, they came first from the enlightenment. Quoting from Jean-Jacues Rouseaus’ Emile (a treatise on education and human nature), she posits that it was the enlightenment era that gave rise to the idea that women are seen as “built” for domesticity and child-rearing, biologically “preordained” for these kind of roles in ways that men were not. The industrial revolution only confirmed this line of reasoning, creating a pay gap between men and women based on their natural differences. Emphasis on these differences has led to creation of a “cult of domesticity”, which is nothing more than cultural creation used to subject a women’s identity into the spaces of the home. It’s this cult of domesticity, says Barr, that has seeped into evangelical life, a “nineteenth century construct” that haunts complementarians. As evidence of this, she quotes a marriage devotional called Happily Ever After by authors like John Piper, Francis Chan, and Nancy DeMoss Woldgemuth, comparing their advice to enlightenment thinkers. “The only difference between Rousseau and the Happily Ever After marriage devotional” says Barr, “is that now Jesus sanctifies these differences [between husband and wife]” (171).
In Chapter 7, Barr reaches her crescendo. The complementarian movement has gone too far, and she is stepping up to say so: “The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing Christians that oppression is Godly… that women’s subordination is central to the gospel of Christ.” With this claim, Barr steps up the tone of her critique. Not only is complementarianism, in her understanding, a serious error that stems from a desire to uphold patriarchal societal structures, it is equated to original sin, Satan’s greatest hit.
After a brief jaunt into historical examples of evangelical women who did not conform to traditional gender roles in the church, Barr comes to her theological critique. Two theological shifts happened in the twentieth century that promoted Christian patriarchy: “the championing of inerrancy and the revival of Arianism” (187). After the fundamentalist-modernist controversy at the turn of the century drove evangelical Christians to divide over the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy (the Bible is without error in its original manuscripts), what comes next for conservative Christians, according to Barr, is a blurring of the lines between believing the Bible to be God’s word and believing a “plain and literal” interpretation of God’s word. In other words, those who did not operate with a “plain and literal” hermeneutic were deemed to be a threat to the doctrine of inerrancy and less than faithful. Anyone who doubted the traditional or “literal” reading of Paul was dismissed by a culture of fear. The debate of inerrancy in the late twentieth century “provided a way to push women out of the pulpit (191).
Barr’s second theological critique regards the doctrine of Eternal Subordination of the Son (ESS). This teaching, Barr says, has “infiltrated the evangelical world”, teaching that Jesus Christ the Son is not only subordinate to the Father in his incarnation, but in eternity and in his essence. Barr claims she immediately recognized this as heresy, specifically a repackaging of Arianism, a fourth century heresy which taught that the Son was of a different substance (essence) than the Father, and was made, not begotten, of God. She goes so far as to equate ESS with Arianism, and states that this doctrine was “resurrected” by evangelicals as the “perfect weapon against women’s equality, the perfect prop for Christain patriarchy” (196). These two tactics used by evangelical theologians are meant to prove Barr’s ultimate thesis: the subjugation of women has been baked into doctrine of scripture and doctrine of God, and to deny it is to start down the slippery slope to forsaking the gospel of Jesus Christ. For complementarians, argues Barr, complementarism itself has become a litmus test for Christian orthodoxy.
Solution: We must stop believing in a complementarian understanding of gender, fight back against any teaching of it, and stand together in freedom for women from complementarian gender roles.
After outlining some of the truly abusive horrors she has experienced in the church, Dr. Barr comes to her solution. The evidence is overwhelming. The “fruit” of complementarianism is the same as the fruit of patriarchy—it subjugates women and creates atmospheres ripe for abuse. It leads to death, not to life, and it is contrary to the message and work of Jesus Christ: “Complementarianism is patriarchy, and patriarchy is about power. Neither have even been about Jesus” (218). What is the solution? Barr makes it simple: “Stop it!” she writes (206). Stop believing that complementarianism is God-ordained, stop affirming those who teach it, and fight back against it. There is freedom to be found from the abusive power of complementarianism, because “Jesus set women free a long time ago” (218).
Evidence That Sticks A Bit
Alright, take a deep breather for a second. You’ve just read quite a long summary, and chances are the material presented has you feeling confused, attacked, or vindicated (the ones who don’t feel anything probably stopped reading a while ago). All of this depends on your personal experience with complementarianism. But let’s do some work here—now that we have outlined the argument of The Making of Biblical Womanhood, let’s consider what parts of the argument stick, and what parts of the argument, in my estimation, fall flat.
Our Amnesia Problem
Dr. Barr is a historian. She says so numerous times in her book, as a signal that we are in some sense to take her argument and filter through a specific lens: a historical one. Barr is well credentialed for her translation of difficult medieval texts, particularly medieval sermons. So it is no surprise that her sharpest critiques come in the form of historical evidence. Barr calls out evangelicals for having a “selective medieval memory” in her third chapter, and here I believe we must humble ourselves to listen. No doubt, the modern evangelical church suffers from an amnesia problem. We have forgotten Lewis’ warning against “Chronological Snobbery”, and many of our practices are rooted not in historic, biblical witness, but in utilitarianism. I resonate deeply with a desire for a kind of historical humility that really wrestles with God’s work in time.
Barr’s chapter helped me to be able to ask the question: “what is God doing through the voices of women in history?” If he is really the providential author of all our circumstances, we cannot be so quick to dismiss evidence of his working in ways that seem contrary to our modern sensibilities. It’s for this reason that I take Barr’s claim of the possibility that evangelical histories have intentionally buried women in the indexes of our stories very seriously.
There are no doubt many things at play here, as historical method is no small nut to crack. I believe it’s more likely that modern histories suffer from a breadth problem rather than a neglect problem. In other words, church histories may focus on the role of men because they aim to tell of the primary influences on historical events (of which men dominate), not to paint a moving picture of the undercurrents of history. Is this itself a critique worth mentioning? Possibly, yes—since focusing on breadth instead of depth is still making an intentional choice to exclude certain narratives, particularly those of historic Chisritan women in the background. Perhaps Christians need a better way of telling our story, a way that focuses more on God’s everyday minutia, a way that feels more like the literary narrative of Scriptural histories.
Barr’s critique is well taken regardless. If in our desire for the truth of history we have forsaken the truth of the working of God for all people, we must do better. Personal agendas in history don’t seem to lead towards illumination. I do not think there is enough evidence to prove that there is some secret agenda among evangelical historians to cut significant women out of the history books. After all, all historians must pick and choose at some point, and all are influenced by their own bias. But perhaps more humility is in order, more deference to the beauty of telling the story of God’s world and God’s people, more prayers for guidance, grace, and purpose in our consideration of the past. After all, the past is God’s domain as much as the future is.
Our Emphasis Problem
Barr’s book is helpful on a few more levels. At least three of the specific supports for her main thesis carried some weight with me: the problems of translation, the theological muddying of ESS, and the melding of specific societal norms with a vision for faithful Biblical womanhood. All of these can be summed up in a problem of emphasis.
By admitting to an emphasis problem I mean to concede the point that the modern understanding and definition of complementarianism arose from a desire to emphasize a specific point of doctrine. The ideas behind complementarianism are not new: they can be found in varying forms in the church fathers, in the reformers, in the puritans, in early American evangelicals, in the mainland reformed community, and onward. But the seminal book that effectively enshrined the word “complementarianism” was called Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood for a reason. The editors of that volume, published in 1991, did not intend to invent some new doctrinal position out of a “fresh” or “progessrive” reading of Biblical texts, but to recover a biblical anthropology that they deemed to be under attack from feminism. In other words, the desire of complentariaism from the beginning has been to emphasize what needed to be emphasized.
The strengths of this are self-evident. A narrow focus allows an idea to gain traction faster, it gives it a sharp kind of edge that hits counterarguments with force and clarity. In this case, the sudden emphasis on the roles of men and women served to fight against the feminist wave which many conservative evangelicals, both men and women, saw to be a serious threat to the Christian church. A reliance on timely emphasis is entirely normal. But now it’s 2021, not 1991. It’s fair to say that the need for emphasis may have shifted in 30 years. This does not mean that any truth presented to meet a specific emphasis is thrown out like last month’s news cycle, but it does mean that time brings more clarity. In the upper cut swing against feminism, perhaps we have forgotten to protect our midsection from counter-attack. To put it another way, I don’t think Barr is firing empty rounds. Her personal evidence is enough to show how a sharp and enduring emphasis on the differences of men and women has left her with a rotten taste in her mouth and asking the question: “how does the gospel make us one?” It’s no wonder many are in her shoes. For years, have men and women in conservative evangelical churches been fed a diet of complementarianism, forced to eat the vegetables of secondary doctrine while the meat of first principles has been cooked up a little too sparse and a little too dry? This does not necessitate a critique on the substance of complementarianism (vegetables are very good for you), but rather just on the prominence.
Of course, our doctrinal food chart is not so easily spliced. It’s a false dichotomy to say “preach this a little less”, since all of God’s truth is nourishing and should lead us to all other truth in a web of spiritual provision. This is no doubt why complementarians have opened themselves up to Barr's critique that they have made complementarianism a standard of orthodoxy. It’s no doubt that in their fight to sincerely produce healthy disciples of Jesus Christ, many churches and programs have failed to nourish the whole soul. [2] Many too have suffered from a lack of gospel care all together, fighting back feminism but restricting, silencing, or ignoring the ministry gifting of women in the process. And while abuse and degradation of women is not novel to the 20th and 21st century, we must acknowledge the fact that acts of outright abuse by both Christian leaders and husbands have been justified by the misrepresentation of certain tenets of complementarianism, such as the teaching of husbands as “head” in Ephesians 5.
An example of our emphasis problem is that I cannot remember a teaching in Genesis that stressed the significance of both man and woman being made in the image of God (while still upholding the beauty of their complementarity). When gender complementarity has been taught to me, it has majored on restrictions and rules and minored on beauty, grace, unity, and sacrifice. [3] There is a “sameness”, a unity in Christ that is important to discover our uniqueness, and the evidence for it is so overwhelming that I wonder why it has not been emphasized at least equally as the complementarity piece. [4] This is the emphasis problem at work—when we lack overarching theological acumen (both in dogmatics, exegetical, and biblical theology), the emphasis of our complementarianism ceases to become the wonder of unity, equality, sameness and fittingness, and simply a set pie chart of all the things women can’t do and men can do. Let me prove it to you by Barr’s evidence that complementarianism has struggled with an emphasis problem.
First, the translation piece. Here again I am stepping out of my lane a bit, since I will admit I know little to nothing about the Bible translation process. I sincerely doubt that the chief reason that the ESV Oversight committee was formed was to construct a translation that built a hedge of hermeneutical protection around patriarchal structures through sheer will of paragraph headings. And yet, we must take into account that the initial impetus of many Biblical translations is again an emphasis issue. Biblical translators cannot help but utilize the God given tools provided for them to attempt to faithfully translate complicated textual evidence. They are not robots, nor are they infallible prophetic agents. They must be informed by their tradition, by emotion, by their reactions, by their cultural moments, by their theological systems. None of this is inherently bad—we want living breathing Bible translators to help us along to see the living, breathing Word of God—but it does give us pause for caution. To put it simply, if we are trying to interpret and translate the Scriptures with a societal agenda in mind, we are walking on very thin ice. It’s why for pastors and teachers, studying the original languages is so important. It’s why parishioners must be diligent and thoughtful readers, coming to Scripture with a curious humility. Barr is right to point out the dangers inherent in Bible translation, and how the work itself may be susceptible to a problem of emphasis. In my estimation, no translation is free of this.
Second, Barr’s critiques about the errors of ESS do not fall on deaf ears. Suffice it to say that if our anthropology (understanding of man and woman) is allowed to illuminate our understanding of the essence of God, we have some problems. I studied with Dr. Owen Strachan (Strachan is featured in Barr’s book as a main proponent of ESS) at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and I remember our lecture addressing the subordination of the Son. Dr. Strachan is fiery and passionately convicted, I honor him highly for that. In his lecture he gave his case for ESS, not presuming his own infallibility, but genuinely desiring to raise up the future of faithful men and women for the church. Respected conservative theologians like Wayne Grudem and Bruce Ware argued similarly, and the doctrine had a humility to it, pointing us to the attractive and beautiful nature of Christ’s submission. So Barr’s critique is real and has weight: this is not majoring on minors.
Let’s be clear, to paint ESS as Arianism is to use a brush too broad to dip in the bucket of paint. It’s an error, but not because it posits that the Son is of a different essence than the Father or the Son is made from the Father, but because of a problem of emphasis. Stretching the emphasis of the Son’s economic (in time) submission to the immanent (essence of God) is stretching the emphasis too far into dangerous territory. And again, by God’s grace that emphasis has been eased by the beauty of Christian diversity. Evangelicals were not sold on ESS from the beginning—although it was taught through some facets, most noticeably in Grudem's popular Systematic—there is a reason it sparked a lot of controversy in evangelical theological circles. These were not primarily egalitarians fighting complementarians (although there was some of that), these were conservative evangelical “complementarian” theologians pulling no punches. None of them called the ESS position Arianism outright, which Barr seems to have done for dramatic effect.
But the result of her critique is the same. Evangelicals of all stripes must be committed to a theological grounding that is rooted in God’s truth revealed from all time, looking back to the past for our help into the future. [5] Our arguments on Trinitarian Orthodoxy are far more serious than our arguments on biblical anthropology, as important as both are for the Christian. We must be careful not to supplant our confessionalism with a modern Trinitarian framework in order to protect the doctrine we believe to be most in danger to us at the present moment. Doing so is fighting fire with fire.
Lastly, I want to make sure we wrestle with Barr’s critique on the “cult of domesticity” and it’s remarkably similar makeup to the complementarian vision for women’s roles in society. While we must be careful not to diminish the role of mother and homemaker in the kingdom of God (something I believe egalitarians must reckon with too), I have always been confused at how the doctrine of complementarianism has been used to wedge couples into boxes of conformity in the home. To “fit” together as one flesh, in my experience, is not a one size fits all. Two image bearers become made for one another, not simply (although necessarily) because they happen to be a man and woman, but because God has brought them together. Whether one folds the laundry or one changes the tire of the car seems less significant than the miracle of two becoming one. Again, the unique role of Mother and Father play into this, and we have to reckon with what the Scripture means by headship, love, honor, and submission between man and wife. But if we reduce the beauty of complementarity to a cult of domesticity (women behave this way, men this way) I think we have lost the Biblical vision. Complementarianism in marriage means that husband and wife fit together in an Ephesians 5 way. Complementarianism does not mean that women are, by design, meant to work in the home only, to be the sole educators of children, and are unfit for any sort of leadership or decision making.
Homemaking (as we see in Titus 2:5) is a glorious task because it, as with other vocations, is meant to glorify God. It is not meant to be squeezed into the meaning of the mystery of what it means to fit with a husband or to be a woman. After all, where might this leave our single sister but in a crisis of femininity? The problem is one of emphasis. In emphasizing the complementarity of men and women, we run the risk of truncating the beauty of complementarism to a set of household rules and restrictions instead of a way that men and women image together the glory of the Triune God.
Evidence That Fails To Convince
Now that we have examined some evidence that should stick to complementarians with an eye to take critique humbly, let’s turn to the less convincing evidence.
Is there Room in God’s Tabernacle for Both of Us? The Nuance Issue
Barr’s primary error in conflating complementarianism in all of its forms and expressions with historic, cultural patriarchy leads to her book reading with a lack of charity and nuance. A reader who is new to the evangelical debates over the last 40-50 years surrounding egalitarianism and complementarianism, picking up Barr’s book, would be convinced that the issue at hand is so serious and weighty that it constitutes a break in Christian fellowship. In Barr’s experience, the conservative church she and her husband belonged to concluded that because the Barr’s “dared asked permission for a woman to teach a high school Sunday school class”, they “were dangerous to the gospel of Christ” (200). Surely this is a failure by Barr’s old church to accurately address the problem at hand, but Barr’s book is prone to the same error, consistently portraying complementarianism not just as an opposing viewpoint held by faithful Christian brothers and sisters, but as dangerous to women, unbiblical and “never about Jesus” (218). I don’t think Barr is desiring to make her understanding of gender roles an Orthodoxy test. But because Barr fails to accurately portray the wide variety of complementarian convictions on an appropriate scale, her book is in danger of the same thing she accuses complementarians of: pointing the finger at the other side and saying “heretic!”.
What Barr seems to miss is that for most complementarians, it is not the position on gender roles that causes the primary need for warning and concern, but rather the hermeneutical principles that lead to such a position. It is one thing to say: “egalitarians are dangerous, heretical, and have forsaken orthodox doctrine” and quite another to say: “we are concerned that the way egalitarians interpret scriptural witness may lead to a forsaking of orthodox doctrine.” A warning of the possible dangers over a hermeneutical error doesn’t have to be a slippery slope fallacy. The idea that the debate between complementarianism and egalitarianism is a disagreement over a secondary doctrine is well established, but Barr’s book doesn’t paint it that way. By claiming that complementarianism is no different than abusive, secular patriarchy, she shrinks the spectrum of the debate down to tight “us vs. them” categories. In reality, the spectrum of understanding on the role of men and women in the home and church is very broad.
Complementarians have recently identified a growing gap in their position between what is commonly called “narrow” or “thin” complementarianism and “broad” or “thick” complementarianism. In its essence, the difference boils down to how pervasive gender roles apply. The broad position is what Barr is thinking of when she critiques complementarianism in her book. This position tries to make sense of how God’s design may have implications outside of what is immediately clear in the NT prescriptions of men and women in the church and in husband and wife in marriage. It’s why John Piper can argue that women should not teach in seminaries, and presumably why Dr. Barr’s former pastors decided it best for her not to teach in specific contexts in the church. When complementarianism extends further than what is immediately clear in scripture, there is less and less uniformity and more and more nuance in conviction.
But perhaps the NT passages teaching complementary roles are “narrow” in the sense that they are defining specific and limited situations? If so, then we must be careful not to expound much more on the differences between men and women beyond that. This is the narrow position. While all of these complementarians will agree that the role of pastor/elder is reserved for qualified men, many are permissible of women teaching and preaching from the pulpit. They are complementarians, but their application of their doctrine is fairly narrow. Barr makes no mention that these kinds of positions exist, instead assuming that all complementarians benefit from “keeping women silent” (69).
Of course, egalitarians cannot be so easily pinned down either. Their position might be called some sort of “feminism” in the sense that it has common markers with the feminist movement’s aims of promiting funcitonal equality among men and women, but an evangelical egalitarian position is a far cry from secular, radical feminism. [6] It is worth noting that the work Barr sets her aim so firmly against, Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, does not make such claims about Egalitarianism.
Christian egalitarian authors differ from secular feminists because they do not reject the Bible’s authority or truthfulness. They base their conclusions about egalitarianism using careful, but sometimes different, exegesis of the Bible. They may be called “evangelical feminists” because by personal commitment to Jesus Christ and by profession of belief in the total truthfulness of Scripture they still identify themselves very clearly with evangelicalism. Their arguments have been detailed, earnest, and persuasive to many Christians. [7]
Barr might claim that I am promoting or supporting a harmful patriarchal position, but I for one have no qualms in saying that I do not believe that her egalitarian position equates her with radical feminism. I take Dr. Barr at her word: she believes the authority of the Scriptures and desires to help Christian women live into the good news of the gospel of Jesus. It’s even a good sign Barr has received pushback from those more secular than her for not going far enough! [8] The fact that I am not convinced by her argumentation and even believe that her errors are serious enough to warrant robust discussion does not mean that I am convinced she is not a sincere sister in Christ or that we could not share Christian fellowship, even in the same church body. [9]
This is why it was so confusing to read The Making of Biblical Womanhood. I had to pray against a combative spirit both times I read through the book, because the lack of nuance and even charity consistently flared up in me a natural desire to defend and define. Others who read the book with me felt similarly, even going so far as to say the book made them feel “belittled” for believing that God has designed men and women with differing roles in the church and the home. I do not believe the intention of the book is to isolate men and women who hold differing convictions, but it struggles to show a way forward to that kind of unity short of dismantling and dismissing outright the traditional understanding of gender roles in the church.
So, What is Biblical Womanhood? The Solution Issue
My second critique of Barr’s work is based not primarily on what is included in her book, but what isn’t. In short, there are few, if any, positive arguments in The Making of Biblical Womanhood. By positive argument, I mean an argument with evidence that is not just meant to disprove an opponent, but prove a new point. Of course, I’ll admit that the purpose of the book seems primarily polemical in nature, and there is a place for work that exists solely to disprove an existing argument. But I found The Making of Biblical Womanhood lacking overall substance or staying power because, after deconstructing the complementarian argument, it left me high and dry with another question: “So, What is Biblical Womanhood?”
This is inherently the problem with a work centered on deconstruction. If complementarianism has actually gotten Scripture wrong, is not God’s plan for men and women in the church, and is a historical construct (as Barr argues), then what is left? For Barr, it seems to boil down to the concept of freedom. I resonate deeply with the last few pages of her book (216-218), wherein she calls evangelical Christians to remember the past, stop letting denominational divides separate us, refuse to let select passages drown out other scriptural witness, and follow the example of Jesus in empowering women for ministry. All of this is honorable work that she is right to call us to, but since in Barr’s argument this “banding together” of women necessitates a refusal to support complementarianism of all forms, she isolates too many who would be willing to work towards this cause with her. In Dr. Barr’s view, in order to move towards any positive work, women must be free from complementarianism, or rather, embrace the freedom Jesus gave them from it long ago. The ultimate “solution” that I was able to take away from The Making of Biblical Womanhood is that Jesus can free his people from complementarianism—but what if they don’t want to be free? By appealing to a positive freedom from a secondary doctrine, instead of gospel freedom from sin, death, and Satan, Barr’s positive charge to change feels hollow.
What kind of positive solutions do we need in order to untangle this web? Let’s consider a few.
We need historical solutions that place us rightly in humility before God’s work in the church and world throughout history.
Barr’s historical work is helpful in attempting to peel back the curtain of history to show us what we may be missing in how God is revealing himself and his truth. The problem is, all historians have to pick and choose what and who they focus on. The burden is incredibly high for Barr to offer a solution, to prove from the historical witness that God is revealing to us the dissolution of gender roles in the church or home. She does a stand-up job in revealing how complementary gender roles may have been abused in history, or telling the story of certain dissidents who made their mark in time. But the evidence is not a solution to our gender question more than it is a practice in asking more questions.
Not to say that is necessarily a negative thing. We have already addressed the need for historical humility among evangelicals, but I would also couple that with a kind of epistemological humility. Epistemology is simply the study of knowledge, it’s trying to ask the question: “how do we know what we know?”. Epistemological humility then, is a practice in grasping the limited nature of human knowledge. In short: we can only know so much. And to put a Christian lens on this concept: we can only know what God reveals. It makes sense, then, that history will be a helpful but incomplete and often inconclusive lens with which to arrive at knowledge, especially when that knowledge is knowledge of God and his ways in the world!
Is complementarianism patriarchy? Perhaps, if we define complementarianism only by any tendency to be perverted by human sin. Certain flavors of complementarianism might be prone to the dangers of patriarchy. If Dr. Barr’s critique of complementarianism was confined to a certain expression of Christian evangelical practice in the late 20th century, then her critique has more staying power. The problem is that some form of “complementarianism” has existed in the Christian witness since the beginning of the church. The burden Dr. Barr bears is to prove not just that sinful abuses of gender complementarity should be jettisoned, but all the distinctions of men and women in the church and home should be thrown out. The reason this burden is heavy is because it must prove novelty, that aside from a few historical examples, only in the last 100 years have more Christians finally been arriving at the “real truth” in relation to gender distinctions. This burden ultimately is too hard for this small book to bear.
Historical solutions, then, should be leading us not to assumptions or maxims about God’s revelation, but towards a simple and generous humility that we are not God, and his ways are not our ways, and our finite years are but a tick on his celestial timepiece. Barr stretches her historical findings too far. They are helpful in enlightening us to the need for prayerful vigilance to get God’s revealed truth right in practice, but they are not significant enough to give us a new solution.
We need theological solutions that accurately consider the nature of sin, the character of God, the image of God.
Again and again, Dr. Barr reminds us in her book that she is a historian by trade. I applaud her for those reminders, but I also recognize that to write a book on theological anthropology the nature of sin, and its pervasive force in the world, some theological acumen is required. Does Barr believe that sin is so serious that it influences judgement on both sides of any argument, that it can cause abuse to sprout up in both complementarian and egalitarian church contexts, that it can cloud our understanding of history and hinder our interpretation of God’s word? She seems ready to admit that complementarian Bible translators and leaders may have a sinful agenda, but does she believe sin is isolated to specific ideologies? Certainly, Dr. Barr has a more robust view of sin than this, but it doesn’t shine through this book.
Neither do other theological categories, such as the providence of God in history and time, the illumination of the Spirit, or the image of God. When theological categories are brought up, it is primarily to dismiss a misunderstanding made by complementarians (i.e. they have misused inerrancy or doctrine of God for gender-related purposes). Again, none of this I blame Dr. Barr for, since it is likely out of the scope of her short book. I just mean to say that it makes sense that a lack of theological categories leads to a lack of positive solutions. If we are to move forward in unity on this topic, as Dr. Barr desires, we need more theological categories, not less.
We need hermeneutical solutions that move us beyond both Biblicism and criticism to an encounter with the living God.
To her credit, Dr. Barr does spend an entire chapter in New Testament texts. Her focus, however, is again not on a positive argument from the letter of Paul to Timothy, Corinth, Collosae and Ephesus, but rather on giving enough evidence to promote doubt in traditional interpretations. The chapter itself is called “What if Biblical Womanhood doesn’t come from Paul?”, showing that she doesn’t have any intention of showing what Paul does have to say about Biblical womanhood, but simply that he is not saying what complementarians (or the historic church) say he is.
Dr. Barr’s hermeneutical principles in The Making of Biblical Womanhood centers on a historical-critical method of interpretation, drawing primarily on the work of Egalitarian Biblical scholars like Scot McKnight, Lucy Peppiatt, D.W. Odell-Scott, and Craig Keener. If you are not familiar with what this means, just know that a historical-critical method is focused on understanding the cultural and historical origins of a Biblical text in order to better understand what the meaning is for the original audience. Historical-Critical methods look to the world “behind the text” in order to help arrive at applicable, real-world meaning. This method of interpretation is a helpful and necessary means of understanding the original audience and context of the Biblical witness. Barr admits that she is partial to this hermeneutical method: “because I am a historian, I know there is more to Paul’s letters than what his words reveal” (56). The strengths of the historical critical method are in its ability to showcase the Word of God as a living document and get to depths of meaning by showing us with better clarity the original audience. A historical-critical method helps the Bible reader to differentiate between what is specific to a cultural or historical context (and therefore may not be applicable to Christians in different contexts) and what is a principle of absolute truth. The negatives of relying too heavily on a historical critical hermeneutic is that it has difficulty addressing how the Bible really is Scripture, God’s Word handed down to us that is clear and life-giving, and not only unlocked after a rigorous and academic study of historical and cultural concepts.
In contrast, Dr. Barr repeatedly points out that she is avoiding a “plain and literal interpretation” or a “face value” interpretation of NT texts relating to gender (46). Although she never defines what she means by this, I assume she is talking about a form of grammatical hermeneutics or “Biblicism''. Biblicism is simply a way of describing the desire—not a inherently negative one—to interpret the Scripture with its readability in view, and to focus on the grammar and context of the text for interpretation, rather than relying on outside historical evidence to provide a new hermeneutical key to unlocking meaning. Positively, biblicism allows the reader to preserve the clear form of scripture and not risk imposing current cultural concerns or fallible historical methods on top of Scripture. A negative form of Biblicism focuses on a “me and my Bible” approach, and ignores the reality that God uses all sorts of means to reveal his truth, and that God’s word exists in time and history. It’s worth noting that very few protestant Biblical scholars are true Biblicists (I really can’t think of any!), but rather there is a general concern around theological conservatives to not place primary emphasis on interpretive methods that take away from or distract from the grammatical sense of the text (a biblicist “impulse” if you will). [10] It’s why most protestant Bible interpreters focus on what is called a “historical-grammatical” hermeneutical method, which takes into account the words of the text in both their literary and historical contexts.
I outline all of this not to say that a historical-critical, biblicist impulse, or historical-grammatical method of approaching Scripture are inherently wrong and unhelpful, but simply that these methods alone struggle to bring unity and clarity to difficult Biblical passages like those from the Pauline epistles on gender. We find this struggle apparent in The Making of Biblical Womanhood. As Barr places nearly all of her hermeneutical chips onto the historical square, she is left with enough evidence to allow us to question Paul’s meaning, but not enough to convictionally interpret his meaning. She tells us that Paul gave the church “blueprints” for egalitarianism, and that his grammatical structure in 1 Corinthians 14:34-25 may mean “the exact opposite of what evangelical women have been taught” (61, 62). But in the end, she is left with a flaky solution: “While I cannot guarantee this is what Paul was doing, it makes a lot of (historical) sense” (62). The problem with basing the weight of evidence on historical context is just that: historical context is very hard to guarantee. It’s a helpful tool, but so much force is needed to make a point that ultimately it can end up creating more confusion and more ambiguity to God’s word. While it may be enough to provide doubt and reconsideration, historical evidence that is not in the text itself is never clear enough evidence to overturn a traditional interpretation into an exact opposite. [11]
At the same time, Barr is right to criticize Biblicist interpretations of difficult passages on gender. It’s a bit of a strawman to assume that Bibliclism alone is how complementarians interpret Scripture, but it is right to say that even a historical-grammatical approach, when used on it’s own, struggles to provide robust definitions of what Biblical manhood or womanhood really is. It’s why we need solutions that move us not away from, but beyond historical-grammatical methods. We need to learn to read scripture with the church, with our fathers and mothers of the faith, with a theological eye to how God is revealing systematic truth, with a canonical bend to how books fit together in Scripture, with a christocentricity that points us to Christ and his new kingdom, and with a Biblical-theological lens that sees literary and theological themes pulling the Bible together as one cohesive unit. [12] All of this is to say that if we are to put forward gender complementarity as God’s solution for human flourishing in the home and the church, we must be able to find the beauty of our doctrine in the whole of God’s revelation, not just in specific prooftexts. God’s truth, found in his word and also in his general revelation of nature, must become not simply a list of do’s and don’ts, but a glorious unveiling of God himself. If complementarianism is God’s truth, then we must be able to find inside of it a robust encounter with the living God that is being taught to us from all aspects of God’s revelation.
I don’t see any forward momentum in The Making of Biblical Womanhood towards these solutions (granted, many “complementarian” books may not satisfy this either). For that reason, I doubt it will have lasting power beyond a critique of a specific brand of gender complementarity. It suffers from a solution issue, and leaves more questions than answers. What is Biblical womanhood? The jury is still out.
What’s the Heart of Complementarianism? The Conflation Issue
Earlier I stated that Dr. Barr’s book stands and falls on the conflation of complementarianism to patriarchy. If she can prove the equation patriarchy = complementarianism, then her argument is won. In the end, I believe her evidence is not solid enough to hold the weight of this conflation. Let’s consider the definitions of both terms.
According to Barr, Patriarchy is “a society that promotes male authority and female submission.” The strength of this definition is that it is broad—it has the square footage to house a lot of meaning. The weakness of this definition is that Barr assumes authority and submission is inherently harmful to women and promotes abuse. Nowhere does she argue this clearly, but it oozes from her book: any form of hierarchy is oppressive. Now, I am not arguing either way that it is or isn’t, but I do find it interesting that Barr never wrestles with unpacking why, in her mind, liberation from hierarchy of authority is a universal common good. [13]
The interesting thing about The Making of Biblical Womanhood is that complementarianism, for how much it is discussed, is never really defined well. The closest definition comes in a parenthetical statement on page 32. Barr defines egalitarians as “those who argue for biblical equality between men and women” and complementarians as “those who argue for a biblical gender hierarchy that subordinates men to women”. This definition of complementarianism feels unnecessarily truncated. In the Danvers Statement, arguably the best place to go for a summary of what is typically called complementarianism, no mention of the word “subordination” or “heirarchy” is made. Neither is any structure of headship or authority linked to roles outside of the home or the covenant church community, which Barr’s definition of complementarianism implies. The closest she gets to reconciling this lack of clarity on complementarianism comes on page 18, when she mentions the fact that every self-definition of complementarity argues for the full equality of men and women before God. Barr dismisses this with a simple statement: “[complementarians] insistence that ‘equal worth’ manifests in unequal roles refutes this.”
Here Barr is showing her severe presuppositions. The claim that any difference in roles proposed by complementarians implies inequality is never argued in her book, only assumed. The underlying assumption that differing roles in church and home naturally creates inequality would mean that the call of the wife in Ephesians 5 to submit to her husband is an unequal role to the husband's call to love and sacrifice for his wife, and the role of the pastor/elder being reserved for men is an example of inequality, that someone being a pastor is not equal to being in the laity. Complementarians make arguments for differing roles in church and home, but never do so with an underlying assumption that differing roles = unequal roles.
Here an understanding of Christian work may be helpful. When God gave the command for mankind to fill the earth and subdue it, granting dominion over all things to mankind (Gen 1:28), the command was complementarian in nature. By this I mean that men and women need each other to fulfill this royal commission of ruling the earth together. How else are they supposed to fill the earth and subdue it, if one is not Father and representative and another not Mother and lifegiver? But nowhere in the Genesis account do we find that these differing roles imply inequality. Kings and Queens are different, but both together they are created to work the world and bring it into submission before God. Why then must we assume that, in discovering differing and complementarity roles in the church and home, we must now be dealing with inequality at every turn?
In what way may differing roles and vocations for men and women be equal? Not because of the worth we assign to different tasks, or because of the opportunity we all have to achieve a certain “better” role, but simply because all work, when done to God, is royal, subduing, ruling, beautiful, Genesis 1:28 kind of work. Not everyone can do the same kind of work, but all work has the opportunity of equality because it is God’s work. Hannah Anderson puts it just right in her work Made For More:
Ultimately working imago dei (in the image of God) means understanding that all work is sacred, all ground holy; not because of what the task is but because of who we are imaging... In this way, through our work, we become the very hands and feet of God; we reflect and represent him on this earth. [14]
No doubt, the differentiation of men and women does experience the nasty results of the fall. Far from an expression of beauty and co-rulership, gender differentiation can lead to abuse and yes, abusive inequality. Here I agree with Barr: this is a result of the fall! The propensity human beings and the societies they create have to elevate one sex over another is straight from the curse of sin itself, a result of the failure of both Adam and Eve to subdue the earth. But this evil of abusive inequality does not stem from a problem with the imago dei, but rather a dismissal of it. In other words, the presence of differing roles in the kingdom of God only becomes harmful inequality when those roles are abused for sinful purposes. And as we all know (think sex, food, drink, and play) the use of a beautiful thing for a disgraceful end does not negate the inherent beauty of the thing or render it obsolete. I lament that at Dr. Barr’s church, she was not supported in her ministry and dismissed without a hearing. Such examples are far too prevalent, but are evidence not of the danger of traditional gender roles in the church, but of a lack of church culture that centers around the humility and unity that the gospel of grace brings.
The heart of complementarianism, then, should not be found in difference, but in unity. [15] That is what complementarity means: to have equality of worth in the midst of diversity of form, function, and role. And here we get to the conflation issue of this book. If Dr. Barr’s main argument was that we have lost the heart of complementarity—that our sin has crept in and caused us to forget the beauty of the co-rulership of men and women over the earth, that our pride has caused us to so emphasize gender differences that we are in danger of dismissing the imago dei—than her reasoning may have held more weight. But that is not her argument. Her argument is that complementary gender roles in the church and the home are not just being abused, but that they are abuse, Satan’s greatest trick.
Furthermore, Dr. Barr argues that it is the expunging of hierarchy from society that is the differential work of the gospel. When Galatians 3:28 tells us “there is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male or female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus,” she sees this as “what makes Christianity so different from the rest of human history” (36). Every other society is patriarchal, promoting male authority and female submission, but the kingdom of God is different. As Barr discussed the emphasis of Paul in his writing showcasing the overturning of societal norms, I felt myself nodding my head in agreement. The gospel is not Roman patriarchy, and of course it is revolutionary! But neither is the gospel secular feminism. The flavor of Jesus’ message is folly to all who are perishing, whether they are committed to upholding patriarchal power or committed to tearing it down.
The equality of gospel cannot be reduced to making us the same. It’s something much different, something much more Edenic. The good news cannot be reduced to simply lifting women up to do all that men can do, nor it cannot be truncated to making all of us uniform. No, the beauty of “in-Christness” is not that we are equal in form, function, or role, but that we are equal in worth. The good news of Jesus Christ is that Eden is coming back, better than ever, and through the work of our Triune God men and women filled with God the Spirit can go back to being perfect co-rulers with Christ, our brother and Lord, over all of creation.
Does complementarianism = patriarchy? No, true complementarianism cannot be patriarchy because it teaches us that in the midst of differentiation and diversity, there is an equality of image-bearing that allows men and women to fit together in a beautiful image of God’s design. Differentiation of role does not have to mean inequality of value in the scheme of the gospel, where walls are torn down and the dead are raised equally to new life in Christ. Patriarchy doesn't have a way to get equality of value out of inequality of function or opportunity, but the gospel does. We cannot all be fathers, we cannot all be pastors, we cannot all be mothers, we cannot all be millionaires, but we can all be in Christ, with an equality of weakness before Christ and an equality of strength in the power of Christ. If complementarianism can get back to this identity, it will not fall to accusations of being a patriarchal wolf in sheep's clothing but will instead model the unified valuing of the gospel of Jesus.
Because The Making of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood struggles to provide room for nuance and charity, fails to provide positive solutions to the role of women in God’s design, and misunderstands the heart of gender complementarity (God’s beautiful design of man and women as distinct co-rulers), it ultimately fails to convince me of its central conflation that complementarianism is patriarchy. For that reason I believe it will be ultimately unconvincing to those who have witnessed the beauty of complementarity at work in the body of Christ and in the home.
What Is Next For Our Church?
If you have made it this far, you must care about how this particular theological issue impacts the life of our local body at Grace Church. I care too, and so do your pastors, deacons, and many other members. As I proposed at the beginning of my review, God in his kindness has given us an opportunity to clarify for ourselves how we can be faithful as one body with many members to his kingdom vision.
In many ways, we are still a church in theological formation. We have roots in evangelicalism, in the reformation, in Baptist theology and practice, and in the historic early church. But we are still working out what those roots are. We are a young church, planted with a gospel proclamation focus, as is right. But by God’s grace we are still learning together what it means to follow him together, to seek both unity and clarity in what we believe and practice and showcase to the world. Some of you may think I have been too vague and too generous in this review, that an Egalitarian position really is a slippery slope towards complete denial of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I understand your concern, and you have a voice at the table. Some of you may think I have been too harsh, that this really is such a secondary issue that we should just be able to get along and be less restrictive or less dogmatic. I understand your concern, and you have a voice at the table. God is calling us to unity together—where we can mutually face our fears and fight for faithfulness even as the strength of our convictions differ.
Of course, when it comes to our convictions together on the topic of gender in the church, we have some clarity as a church. We belong to the Southern Baptist Convention, and the Baptist Faith and Message speaks on the topic. We partner with the Acts29 Network, and in doing so affirm their theological distinctions. Our Statement of Faith speaks broadly on the topic of gender. We teach the complementary nature of men and women in the church and the home as being part of God’s beautiful design, not something created or crafted by our church's attempt to uphold patriarchal societal structure. But I believe more work can be done together to clarify how as one body, men and women, we can work together in equality to fulfill the commission of the Garden to subdue the earth and the commission of Christ to make disciples of all nations.
This next year we have more opportunities in front of us. We will be updating our Core Values and clarifying other secondary doctrinal positions with Teaching Statements. And we will be preaching through Ephesians, a wonderful epistle concerning the unity of the church around the transformative gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s my prayer that somewhere in this process we can pull together a team of leaders and laypeople for an in-depth study of God’s revelation on the topic of gender in the church. This team will assist the pastors in making painstakingly sure that our congregation and our context are submitted to God’s will, and that we can move into an increasingly unstable cultural future with a foundation for the flourishing of men and women at Grace Church. If you are interested in being a part of this team, just reach out to me at drake@gracewaco.com.
Church, God is good, and his Word is true. Let us press forward, taking advantage of every opportunity given to mine the depths of his revealed beauty. Maybe that means a bit of deconstruction, but let us remember that in our union with Christ we are ultimately not being torn apart but put back together, “built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”
FOOTNOTES
[1] That book has basically already been written. It’s Recovering From Biblical Manhood and Womanhood by Aimee Byrd.
[2] Carl Trumeman put it this way: “...another part of the problem with evangelical complementarianism: It is in danger of becoming simply a reactionary movement, defining itself over against feminism, and apparently seeing any criticism of the party line as a fundamental betrayal of the cause.” I tend to agree with him, that we have struggled to define complementarianism as more than just reactionary.
[3] I found Michelle Lee-Barnewall’s book Neither Complemtarian nor Egalitarian: A Kingdom Corrective to the Evangelical Gender Debate to be helpful. Not because it actually provided new “solutions” or a true third-way, but because it refreshingly seemed rather agenda free and therefore brought good emphasis to underemphasized concepts in this area.
[4] To this end I have been helped by Hannah Anderson’s little book Made For More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image.
[5] For our part in this, our church has been helped by a fantastic book by Matthew Barrett (another of my professors at MBTS) called Simply Trinity. We have been using this book and corresponding video lectures to go dive into the “great tradition” of trinitarianism in our Trinity equipping class.
[6] Margaret Kostenberger has great work on these distinctions in her book Jesus and the Feminists: Who Do They Say That He Is?. I believe she does a good job stating her concerns with egalitarianism while not lumping faithful Chrsitians into the camp of radical feminists.
[7] John Piper and Wayne Grudem, ed. Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, web, 10.
[8] I have recently been encouraged by a new organization called The Pelican Project, a collection of kingdom minded women who hold diverse views on gender roles. Yes, egalitarian and complementarian women working together. Their work primarily is in resource curation at this point, but I’m guessing it may expand.
[9] As I have mentioned, I generally believe that while a specific congregation must work out what they will teach and practice together regarding gender in the church, that does not necessarily mean they must share all the same convictions. It’s why our statement of faith is broad enough to include different understandings of gender in the church, while our teaching and practice is more clear. From what I have seen, few statements of faith in evangelical churches take require firm convictions on this issue for church membership.
[10] It’s why inspiration is such an important evangelical doctrine. If the words of Scripture are God’s inspired words, we would to best to center our interpretation of God’s words on the words themselves.
[11] Thomas Schreiner’s warning is helpful here, which he gives in a generous review of an Egalitarian gender argument: “In any case, we need to be careful of reading into letters situations or backgrounds that aren’t clear in the text. NT scholarship is littered with gravestones of alleged backgrounds for particular letters and texts.”
[12] Good work is being done by conservative evangelicals to expand hermeneutical methods, particularly in the theological interpretation of Scripture. I recommend Craig Carter, Interpreting Scripture With The Great Tradition, J. Todd Billings, The Word of God For the People of God, Kevin Vanhoozer, The Drama of Doctrine and with Danierl Treir, Theology and the Mirror of Scripture. Better yet, read Augustine On Christian Teaching.
[13] Herman Bavinck, in his work The Christian Family, gives the argument that a kind of “inequality” is inescapable in any society. It’s not then the overcoming of inequality that makes the Christian family distinct, but rather the unity of the complex parts. To disregard the multiform diversity of the family in the search for “equality” is to make what is natural into what is artificial. “Moreover, the fact that society displays such textured diversity is not to be blamed on accident or arbitrariness, but flows from the nature of society itself… Members of the family, from which society is built, are unequal in gender, age, and relationship… so one who opposes the diversity of class and property in society thereby opposes its organic composition and must see to it that all organic, moral relationships are released by artificial contractual relationships.”
[14] Hannah Anderson, Made for More, 120.
[15] Hannah Anderson again hits it out of the park with this recent piece on Christianity Today, arguing that the distinguishing factor between patriarchy and complementarianism is equality of worth. If complementarians can shift their focus to the gospel that creates unity among diversity and equality of worth among differing roles, instead of focusing on restrictions and exceptions, the charge of patriarchy won’t ultimately be able to stick. Instead, we should be fighting against paternalism: limiting the effectiveness and ministry of women through arbitrary restrictions.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
What I read, re-read, or consulted to help me prepare for this review (and some good places to start if you are interested in more reading in this area, recent debates and exegetical works)
Beth Allison Barr. The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How The Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth
Aimee Byrd. Recovering From Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: How The Church Needs to Rediscover Her Purpose
Hannah Anderson, Made For More: An Invitation to Live in God’s Image
Elyse Fitzpatrick and Eric Shumacher. Worthy: Celebrating the Value of Women
Kristen DuMez. Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted A Faith and Fractured A Nation
Ronald W. Piece and Rebecca Merrill Froothuis, eds. Discovering Biblical Equality: Complementarity Without Hierarchy
John Piper and Wayne Grudem, eds. Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response To Evangelical Feminism
Andreas Kostenberger and Thomas Schriener, eds. Women in the Church: An Interpretation and Application of 1 Timothy 2:9-15
Andreas Kostenberger and Margaret Kostenberger, God’s Design For Man and Woman: A Biblical Theological Survey
Michelle Lee Barnewall, Neither Complmentarian nor Egalitarian: A Kingdom Corrective to the Evangelical Gender Debate
Linda Belleville, Craig Blomberg, Craig Keener, Thomas Schreiner, Two Views On Women in Ministry
Cynthia Long Westfall, Paul and Gender: Reclaiming the Apostle’s Vision for Men and Women in Christ
Herman Bavinck, The Christian Family