Sons of Patriarchy

[Deleted member 6112]

I understand head to be source based on our representation of God internally, the Spirit proceeding from the Father and Son internally, as well as the primary manifestation of himself in the heavenly temple dwelling of God. The woman of Genesis 2 proceeds from the man and returns to the man representing the internal circulation of the trinity in perichoresis. So when I read that man is the head of the woman, I return to the woman of Genesis 2:21-22 taken from the sacred side of Adam, built by God, and brought to Adam. I see a temporal and earthly circular movement patterned after an eternal and heavenly archetype. We reveal Father, Son, and Spirit, equal in power and glory, and yet ordered internally.

So a husband is the source of his wife?

"For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body." - Eph 5:23

Is she supposed to submit to him because he is her source?

"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing." - Eph 22-24

 

[CasualWestminsterEnjoyer]

So a husband is the source of his wife?

Better yet, are our heads the sources of our bodies?

Does the brain and head command and control the body, or give birth to it?

 

[Deleted member 6112]

We should notice that the husband is never said to have authority (exousia) over the wife.

I know you came to this thread for a fight, and you're unwilling to be convinced by any argument, however Scripturally sound; however, I just want to point out that you're mistaken here.

"Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels." - I Cor 11:9-10

The word translated "power" is exousian. Here it's being used metonymically to refer to the sign of the husband's authority over his wife, i.e., the head covering.

 

[Cornelius Van Halen]

That is certainly untrue. Mankind mirrors God in his unity, as he exists as the simple, undivided essence. And mankind mirrors his diversity in our equally ultimate differences as male and female. Our unity as mankind and our diversity as man and woman take our thoughts to the God from whom we have come. Woman exists as the glory of man in that she points to his end in the feminized city of Sabbath rest. She points to the glory that awaits us in the throne room presence of God as the bridal city and people of God. Eve stood before Adam as his glory, representative of the realm that he was called to receive through personal and perfect obedience. Adam reveals the means (obedience of the covenantal head) and Eve reveals the end (Zion, the city of our inheritance).

Garcia is unafraid of comparing the husband's "headship" to authority. Embolded emphasis is my own:

As a sexual creature who embodies, in her sexual physiology, the degrees of sancta, biblical texts regarding the maltreatment of woman use the vocabulary of sexual violence and transgression not only for adultery and rape, but also for other forms of serious neglect, oppression, and the like. (Older Reformed writers were remarkably sensitive to this in their ethical manuals.) The biblical range of actions and destructive modes of relating are expressive of the primitive and universal sinful propensity, since the Fall, for men to fail to act with priestly care and concern for sancta, and which is captured in the language of mashal in Gen. 3:16 ("he will rule over you"). Mashal in Gen. 3:16 is, I will argue, not a reference to the (continuing, not new) fact of the husband's headship. It is instead a reference to what is new with the Fall: oppressive rule in the form of an exploitative misuse of the real and continuing fact of the husband's or authoritative figure's headship into a tool of harm. The Gen. 3:16 mashal specifically is an etiology for the wide range of those abuses of power throughout the OT and NT and in our own experience, whether political, social-communal, marital, or otherwise. By nature we sin, and we sin often in abusing positions of relative strength or power. ("No poison or sword ought to terrify you as much as the lust for domination." ~ Bernard of Clairvaux to his pupil, Pope Eugene. And as a friend of mine noted to me recently, "some guy named Tolkien wrote a story about this.") As D. Block has demonstrated, the second iteration of the Decalogue in Deuteronomy already indicates this concern to restrain mashal in the ways it differs from the Decalogue in Exodus, clarifying the tenth commandment through reorganization especially in order to restrain exploitation of the Exodus form of it. Judges is a book-length narrative depiction of Israel's devolution into Canaanitism precisely in the form of Canaanite-like mashal abuse of women: wives, concubines, and daughters. And so on.

He goes on to describe the dangers of overlooking the difference between man and woman:

If the Scriptures revel and exude in these ways regarding the significance of what makes a woman different from a man, and vice versa, then the tragedy of the homosexualist agenda and of family or ecclesiastical maltreatment of women is clearer. In the homosexualist agenda, the push for a distortion of equality as uniformity, of practical undifferentiated sexuality, of sexuality as mere cultural more, we lose what makes us meaningful. We lose, too, what makes a woman uniquely special. The homosexuality agenda is thus a great oppression of women. In family or ecclesiastical maltreatment of women, the urgency of the biblical proscriptions is lost on us if we ignore the motif of the feminine as a kind of sacred space which is violated in the failure to protect, nurture, provide for, and love—a violation which, in marital form, can be so severe that it ruptures the one-flesh reality.

Both quotes taken from https://www.greystoneinstitute.org/wince-sing/what-is-a-woman

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I understand head to be source based on our representation of God internally, the Spirit proceeding from the Father and Son internally, as well as the primary manifestation of himself in the heavenly temple dwelling of God. The woman of Genesis 2 proceeds from the man and returns to the man representing the internal circulation of the trinity in perichoresis. So when I read that man is the head of the woman, I return to the woman of Genesis 2:21-22 taken from the sacred side of Adam, built by God, and brought to Adam. I see a temporal and earthly circular movement patterned after an eternal and heavenly archetype. We reveal Father, Son, and Spirit, equal in power and glory, and yet ordered internally.

I don't know where you are getting this theology, but it is a species of the theological approach that is used by those advocating for the Eternal subordination of the Son. The Trinity is unique. The divine subsistence of the three persons is not an archetype of human relationships.

I've noticed you following this errant theology in several responses, and you need to know that it is heterodox and dangerous. Who is teaching you this theology? Nowhere in Scripture is man and wife (or any human relationship) said to be a type of the perichoresis of the Trinity. It is neither exegetically sound nor has any Confession or Creed in Church history ever confused intra-trinitarian relationships with the relationship between human persons.

 

[Ploutos]

I don't know where you are getting this theology, but it is a species of the theological approach that is used by those advocating for the Eternal subordination of the Son. The Trinity is unique. The divine subsistence of the three persons is not an archetype of human relationships.

I've noticed you following this errant theology in several responses, and you need to know that it is heterodox and dangerous. Who is teaching you this theology? Nowhere in Scripture is man and wife (or any human relationship) said to be a type of the perichoresis of the Trinity. It is neither exegetically sound nor has any Confession or Creed in Church history ever confused intra-trinitarian relationships with the relationship between human persons.

The idea of spouses mirroring the intatrinitarian relationship is found, wherever else it might be present, in Tim Keller's "Meaning of Marriage". It doesn't affect his overall argument, and I don't know why he chooses that line of reasoning when his overall point would be as well (if not better) served by using the Christ-church analogy instead.

 

[AnAnders]

William Gouge: "Nature hath placed an eminency in the male over the female: so as where they are linked together in one yoke, it is given by nature that he should govern, she obey. This did the heathen by light of nature observe."

That is not Paul's take in Ephesians 5, which ties the husband-wife bond to the Son's condescension to take on flesh and redeem a chosen bride he loves. Our natural differences are bound up with super-nature, that is with God himself. We were made in the image of God, not the things God made that preceded our creation in Genesis 1: the natural man (heathen) does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned (1 Cor. 2:14). The light of nature would also give eminence to the grizzly bear, so that when you were brought together, it is given that he should govern you. It doesn't work like that (Gouge) when we are talking about the unabashed, blatant supernaturalism of Genesis 1-2.

 

[AnAnders]

The divine subsistence of the three persons is not an archetype of human relationships.

Yes, I disagree with you precisely here. We are made like God, not the lower creation. If we consider what our foundational creeds (Nicene-Constantinopolitan, Athanasian) are concerned about when it comes to understanding God in whose image we were made, we may begin to understand what God is teaching us about himself by making us one mankind, male and female (Genesis 1), in procession and embrace (Genesis 2). Calvin writes about man’s representation of God as “many bonds” by which mankind is tethered to his personal Creator. For Calvin, the knowledge of ourselves and of God are inseparable. Calvin writes that although the divine essence is incomprehensible, God has engraved marks of his glory upon his works (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, vol. 1, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006, 51-52).

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[Ploutos]

Yes, I disagree with you precisely here. We are made like God, not the lower creation. If we consider what our foundational creeds (Nicene-Constantinopolitan, Athanasian) are concerned about when it comes to understanding God in whose image we were made, we may begin to understand what God is teaching us about himself by making us one mankind, male and female (Genesis 1), in procession and embrace (Genesis 2). Calvin writes about man’s representation of God as “many bonds” by which mankind is tethered to his personal Creator. For Calvin, the knowledge of ourselves and of God are inseparable. Calvin writes that although the divine essence is incomprehensible, God has engraved marks of his glory upon his works (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, vol. 1, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006, 51-52).

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I'm open to being corrected here, but it seems wrong to say that we are made like God. We are made in the image of God, and per Scripture (and our confessional standards), that means that we possess knowledge, righteousness, and holiness. There is no scriptural basis that I am aware of for drawing a parallel between the distinction between the three modes of subsistence in one God, and the existence of two types of people, namely male and female. To draw these types of analogies between male-female relationships and the intra-trinitarian economy pushes too close to tritheism for my comfort.

I don't know where you are getting this theology, but it is a species of the theological approach that is used by those advocating for the Eternal subordination of the Son. The Trinity is unique. The divine subsistence of the three persons is not an archetype of human relationships.

I've noticed you following this errant theology in several responses, and you need to know that it is heterodox and dangerous. Who is teaching you this theology? Nowhere in Scripture is man and wife (or any human relationship) said to be a type of the perichoresis of the Trinity. It is neither exegetically sound nor has any Confession or Creed in Church history ever confused intra-trinitarian relationships with the relationship between human persons.

FYI, while social trinitarianism is often associated with eternal subordination, I sense that Anna is using trinitarian analogies to argue for a greater sense of equality between male and female rather than for an eternal subordination of the Son to the Father. Anna, please correct me if I'm misreading you.

 

[RamistThomist]

but it seems wrong to say that we are made like God

Depends on what the comparative "like" is doing. If it means we are metaphysically like God, then it is wrong. If like takes on more suzerainty/functional aspects, then that could work. In any case, Genesis 5 says we are made in the likeness of God, so there is some degree where "like" is apt.

 

[AnAnders]

To draw these types of analogies between male-female relationships and the intra-trinitarian economy pushes too close to tritheism for my comfort.

I would disagree. We were made one mankind (adam), male and female. The unity of mankind is analogous to God's unity. We are bound by our common essence as mankind, the human essence. And yet we are diverse, male and female. God's is one, existing as the simple, undivided essence, an absolute personality (Bavinck), and yet that essence is triune, three persons with incommunicable personal properties internally circulating in the movement of perichoresis. The models of anthropology in patriarchy are the ones that fall into tritheism by introducing hierarchy into the human order and then reading that into the divine order.

 

[AnAnders]

I'm open to being corrected here, but it seems wrong to say that we are made like God. We are made in the image of God, and per Scripture (and our confessional standards), that means that we possess knowledge, righteousness, and holiness. There is no scriptural basis that I am aware of for drawing a parallel between the distinction between the three modes of subsistence in one God, and the existence of two types of people, namely male and female. To draw these types of analogies between male-female relationships and the intra-trinitarian economy pushes too close to tritheism for my comfort.


FYI, while social trinitarianism is often associated with eternal subordination, I sense that Anna is using trinitarian analogies to argue for a greater sense of equality between male and female rather than for an eternal subordination of the Son to the Father. Anna, please correct me if I'm misreading you.

As I see it, our thoughts about ourselves should rebound to God if our chief end here and now, there and forever, is to know and enjoy him. Patriarchal models of anthropology actually lead us in the opposite direction. They lead to preoccupation with power below, in short earthly-mindedness. Our brief lives here give way to Sabbath rest, the consummation of our hopes in the world to come. Our existence as male and female, man and woman, husband and wife, should cause our thoughts to rise to our inheritance in the triune God who loves us. AS I see it, they are a shadow and type of things too marvelous, but things we will behold one day and receive in union and communion with our Lord in the city prepared for us.

 

[AnAnders]

but it seems wrong to say that we are made like God.

The same exact expression ( בִּדְמוּת֖וֹ) is used in Genesis 5:3 where it is talking about a metaphysical correspondence between Adam and Seth. This is the first genealogy of sons that leads us to the Seed of the woman. Genesis 5:3 is talking about more than Seth made like Adam in the sense of rational capacity.

 

[AnAnders]

the sign of the husband's authority over his wife, i.e., the head covering.

It doesn't say the husband's authority. It says merely "authority." --- διὰ τοῦτο ὀφείλει ἡ γυνὴ ἐξουσίαν ἔχειν ἐπὶ τῆς κεφαλῆς διὰ τοὺς ἀγγέλους.
(1 Cor. 11:10 BGT). The man represents first things, and the woman represents last things, the veiled angelic realm, Zion, the throne room of Isaiah 6. A careful reading of the next shows that whatever this "authority" meant, it would likely puff up the woman, so Paul introduces the next clause with πλὴν (1 Cor. 11:11 BGT), an adversative used to restrict a previous statement. "Nevertheless," the woman who wears "authority" is not independent of man. The woman's symbolism is Zion, the realm of authority.

So a husband is the source of his wife?

Yes, she comes from Adam's sacred side, is constructed by God (built like a temple-city) , and brought to Adam. Notice the differences in Adam and Eve's creation accounts --- Adam is "molded" and Eve is "built."

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Yes, I disagree with you precisely here. We are made like God, not the lower creation. If we consider what our foundational creeds (Nicene-Constantinopolitan, Athanasian) are concerned about when it comes to understanding God in whose image we were made, we may begin to understand what God is teaching us about himself by making us one mankind, male and female (Genesis 1), in procession and embrace (Genesis 2). Calvin writes about man’s representation of God as “many bonds” by which mankind is tethered to his personal Creator. For Calvin, the knowledge of ourselves and of God are inseparable. Calvin writes that although the divine essence is incomprehensible, God has engraved marks of his glory upon his works (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, vol. 1, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006, 51-52).

You do not disagree with me but with Christian orthodoxy. I'll say again that God's essence and the personal properties of the hypostasis are *not* an archetype for human relationships. Specifically, the separation of the Spirit from the Father and the Son is *not* an archetype of husband and wife. Your quotation of Calvin here says absolutely *nothing* about this and you will not find a reputable theologian or any Creed backing up the way you move from God's ad intra relations to how humans relate. If you persist in this line of heterodoxy, then we cannot allow you to continue on this Board. It is a heterodox belief and I'm trying to get you to turn away from this line of thinking but, if you refuse, we do not allow this kind of error.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

FYI, while social trinitarianism is often associated with eternal subordination, I sense that Anna is using trinitarian analogies to argue for a greater sense of equality between male and female rather than for an eternal subordination of the Son to the Father. Anna, please correct me if I'm misreading you.

She has repeatedly and specifically used the language of comparing the Godhead's subsistence and applying it to mankind. She compared the creation of the woman to the spiration of the Spirit. She grounds the nature of man and woman in connection to the nature of God in Three Persons. I compare it, in theological approach, to the ESS folks because they make the same error in failing to recognize the qualitative difference between God and man. It's not the same error but a species of the same.

 

[Ploutos]

She has repeatedly and specifically used the language of comparing the Godhead's subsistence and applying it to mankind. She compared the creation of the woman to the spiration of the Spirit. She grounds the nature of man and woman in connection to the nature of God in Three Persons. I compare it, in theological approach, to the ESS folks because they make the same error in failing to recognize the qualitative difference between God and man. It's not the same error but a species of the same.

I understand, and I don't disagree. I just wanted to clarify what I was perceiving: namely, that rather than using social trinitarianism to advocate for the type of complementarianism often associated with ESS, she is working outward from the Trinity by analogy to push a view of gender relations that is somewhat closer to egalitarianism. As you pointed out, it's a related species. Whether working from man upward to God to justify overdone notions of male headship, or working downward from God to man to flatten out the relations of authority between men and women, it's a problematic approach.

 

[darrellmaurina]

Scott Clark and Harrison Perkins are not liberals; but they should be careful of the company they keep. The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend.

That is an important distinction. Thank you.

Too many of us use the word "liberal" too freely. It has a definition. Adolf von Harnack and the classical liberalism of the late 1800s and early 1900s is very different from a lot of stuff in American evangelical circles that is problematic.

Egalitarianism more broadly, and women's ordination more specifically, simply are not on the same level as denial of the Five Fundamentals of the Faith, i.e., the inerrancy of Scripture, the Virgin Birth of Christ, the substitutionary atonement of Christ, the bodily resurrection of Christ, and the miracles of Christ.

Yes, there are arguments for the ordination of women that do reject biblical inerrancy. An obvious example would be a prominent female professor in the PC(USA) who argues that Paul didn't write the pastoral epistles, i.e., First and Second Timothy and Titus. There are others.

There are all sorts of wrong biblical interpretations that are error but not heresy. I believe Spurgeon was wrong on baptism, and JC Ryle was wrong on the historic episcopate, and Luther was wrong on his view of the Lord's Supper. None of those men denied biblical inerrancy.

The linked article by SolaScriptura calls into question Bell's stance concerning egalitarianism. That's a liberal position. I'm happy to wait and see, however.

I will wait and see then. Sorry if I caused offense. That article didn't look great though. As mentioned, egalitarianism is liberalism.

 

[AnAnders]

You do not disagree with me but with Christian orthodoxy. I'll say again that God's essence and the personal properties of the hypostasis are *not* an archetype for human relationships. Specifically, the separation of the Spirit from the Father and the Son is *not* an archetype of husband and wife. Your quotation of Calvin here says absolutely *nothing* about this and you will not find a reputable theologian or any Creed backing up the way you move from God's ad intra relations to how humans relate. If you persist in this line of heterodoxy, then we cannot allow you to continue on this Board. It is a heterodox belief and I'm trying to get you to turn away from this line of thinking but, if you refuse, we do not allow this kind of error.

Grateful for the opportunity to interact with you. Thank you, brothers in Christ, for listening to what may appear to be the rambling thoughts of a sister who has been thinking about these things for quite awhile. I appreciate the interaction.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Grateful for the opportunity to interact with you. Thank you, brothers in Christ, for listening to the rambling thoughts of a sister who has been thinking about these things for quite awhile. I appreciate the interaction.

Anna,

I think you believe you are practicing theology in the Reformed tradition, but you do not seem to have the ability to use sources correctly. Your major thesis in your theological paper fails to even get off the ground.

I'm not sure I'll be able to help you (or any theological historian), but you don't even seem to understand that Calvin is no support when you write this in your theological paper.

AIMS AND METHODOLOGY​

Through his representational principle, Cornelius Van Til calls us to consider whether all God’s works are revelational of his being. I will suggest and develop that this most especially applies to God’s final work of creation, mankind, male and female, who alone bears his image.19 Seen in this way, anthropology becomes the servant of theology proper. Geerhardus Vos writes,
God . . . takes the first step to approach man for the purpose of disclosing his nature, nay who creates man in order that He may have a finite mind able to receive the knowledge of His infinite perfections. In Theology the object, far from being passive, by the act of creation first posits the subject over against itself, and then as the living God proceeds to impart to this subject that to which of itself it would have no access . . . God in so far as He has revealed Himself, is the object of Theology.20

Calvin similarly writes about man’s representation of God as “many bonds” by which mankind is tethered to his personal Creator. For Calvin, the knowledge of ourselves and of God are inseparable, for although the divine essence is incomprehensible, he has engraved marks of his glory upon his works.21 For Calvin, the works of creation, of which mankind is the pinnacle, are the appearance of invisible things, a mirror by which to contemplate not only God as he is in himself, but his unfolding works in time.22 He writes that “man is a microcosm because he is a rare example of God’s power, goodness, and wisdom, and contains within himself enough miracles to occupy our minds, if only we are not irked at paying attention to them.”23
I will propose an approach to gender based on the principle of our representation of God as triune. Representation is not new. The church fathers intently searched for analogies between God and mankind. I will suggest, however, that we may go one step further and connect the trinitarian theology they developed through their relentless battles with Arianism and Sabellianism to ourselves as male and female.24

After setting the polemical context I will use the disciplines of Theology Proper and Biblical Theology to make my arguments. Approaching gender through Systematics, I will suggest that in making them male and female, God is creating analogs of his own divine nature in five key respects—(1) numerical unity and divine simplicity; (2) incommunicable personal properties and relations of personal subsistence; (3) subsistence and the order of operations; (4) autotheos and autothean missions; (5) exitus and reditus, internal processions and perichoresis. Finally, I will suggest that male and female symbolize redemptive history by representing two parallel realms destined to converge on the last day, supporting this claim by a covenantal approach to Genesis 2, 3 and a perusal of the biblical scholar Jonathan T. Pennington’s work on “heaven and earth” in Matthew.25 While Pennington does not connect his research to gender, he does note the general connection between cosmology and anthropology in the book of Matthew. Finally, I will consider the images of the woman in the book of Revelation and her final identification with Zion.​

You quote Vos and Calvin as if they support your idea, but you fail to distinguish the qualifications they make. You would better demonstrate your understanding of their material if you stated: "Vos and Calvin believed that man's knowledge is limited and cannot approach God's infinite perfections. I disagree and will demonstrate that we can draw analogies from God's infinite perfections and come to novel conclusions about the nature of men and women."

I write this with genuine concern. The nature of your writings suggests that you believe that I (and others) are trapped in false conceptions of men and women and that your project will rescue us. I'm urging you that, while you are not uneducated in theology, you do not know how to properly use the theology you are quoting. You'd be better off really studying what the Christian orthodox have written about Divine incomprehensibility and then you'll be in a better position to stop using these sources to convince yourself that you can use them to support your thesis.

 

[retroGRAD3]

Egalitarianism more broadly, and women's ordination more specifically, simply are not on the same level as denial of the Five Fundamentals of the Faith, i.e., the inerrancy of Scripture, the Virgin Birth of Christ, the substitutionary atonement of Christ, the bodily resurrection of Christ, and the miracles of Christ.

It isn't the same, but it is categorically wrong and it is the slippery slope to denying other plain teaches of scripture which almost always happens. Then, the process starts of reinterpreting a bunch of other passages to make it say whatever the person wants. I don't think there is any benefit to being ecumenical with teachers of this type on nonsense. Call a spade and spade. I would put the same caution to you that is in one of the quotes you used: Be careful of the company you keep (or in this case, of the errors you are trying to reduce in importance). The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend.

We need pastors who will stand upon the truth and protect the flock from false teaching/errors (whether they are official heresies or lesser errors). I don't believe we need to be told, this is an error, but it's not as bad as this other error. That is only going to cause those young in the faith to start exploring these teaches and possibly getting confused. We have seen this exact thing already in this thread. Call a spade and spade, mark and avoid.

 

[Deleted member 6112]

It doesn't say the husband's authority. It says merely "authority." --- διὰ τοῦτο ὀφείλει ἡ γυνὴ ἐξουσίαν ἔχειν ἐπὶ τῆς κεφαλῆς διὰ τοὺς ἀγγέλους.
(1 Cor. 11:10 BGT). The man represents first things, and the woman represents last things, the veiled angelic realm, Zion, the throne room of Isaiah 6. A careful reading of the next shows that whatever this "authority" meant, it would likely puff up the woman, so Paul introduces the next clause with πλὴν (1 Cor. 11:11 BGT), an adversative used to restrict a previous statement. "Nevertheless," the woman who wears "authority" is not independent of man. The woman's symbolism is Zion, the realm of authority.


Yes, she comes from Adam's sacred side, is constructed by God (built like a temple-city) , and brought to Adam. Notice the differences in Adam and Eve's creation accounts --- Adam is "molded" and Eve is "built."

You're pretence at exegesis is what Peter calls "wresting the Scriptures." May God grant you repentance.

“As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.” - 2 Pet 3:16

 

[MarrowMan]

That is an important distinction. Thank you.

Too many of us use the word "liberal" too freely. It has a definition. Adolf von Harnack and the classical liberalism of the late 1800s and early 1900s is very different from a lot of stuff in American evangelical circles that is problematic.

Egalitarianism more broadly, and women's ordination more specifically, simply are not on the same level as denial of the Five Fundamentals of the Faith, i.e., the inerrancy of Scripture, the Virgin Birth of Christ, the substitutionary atonement of Christ, the bodily resurrection of Christ, and the miracles of Christ.

Yes, there are arguments for the ordination of women that do reject biblical inerrancy. An obvious example would be a prominent female professor in the PC(USA) who argues that Paul didn't write the pastoral epistles, i.e., First and Second Timothy and Titus. There are others.

There are all sorts of wrong biblical interpretations that are error but not heresy. I believe Spurgeon was wrong on baptism, and JC Ryle was wrong on the historic episcopate, and Luther was wrong on his view of the Lord's Supper. None of those men denied biblical inerrancy.

One can hold a secondary doctrine found in liberalism without being liberal. That’s certainly true. That doesn’t change the fact that egalitarianism has its genesis in the liberal milieu of feminism. It IS a liberal doctrine. That doesn’t mean it’s heretical like the fundamental tenets of liberal Christianity are, or that anyone embracing egalitarian is embracing liberal Christianity en toto or its heretical aspects.

 

[Elias_Amare]

FYI, while social trinitarianism is often associated with eternal subordination, I sense that Anna is using trinitarian analogies to argue for a greater sense of equality between male and female rather than for an eternal subordination of the Son to the Father.

Some Social trinitarians like Jürgen Moltmann will argue for "equality mutuality." In his book "The Trinity and the Kingdom," on the Preface, he writes, "I have developed a social doctrine of the Trinity, according to which God is a community of Father, Son, and Spirit, whose unity is constituted by mutual indwelling and reciprocal interpénétration. If this is correct, then we find the earthly reflection of this divine sociality, not in the autocracy of a single ruler but in the democratic community of free people, not in the lordship of the man over the woman but in their equal mutuality, not in an ecclesiastical hierarchy but in a fellowship church. " viii

 

[RamistThomist]

Original social trinitarians used the model to argue for democracy and women's full inclusions. Patriarchal tritheists took the model and changed some words.

 

[Ploutos]

Interesting; thank you. I am not really familiar with Moltmann's thought and have not read anything of his that I can remember. I wasn't really aware that there was this prior strain of social trinitarianism, though in retrospect what I read in Keller's book might have been a clue, and now I wonder if he was drawing from similar sources.

 

[MarrowMan]

Interesting; thank you. I am not really familiar with Moltmann's thought and have not read anything of his that I can remember. I wasn't really aware that there was this prior strain of social trinitarianism, though in retrospect what I read in Keller's book might have been a clue, and now I wonder if he was drawing from similar sources.

You should pick up Barrett’s Simply Trinity if you haven’t, yet.

 

[MW]

That is not Paul's take in Ephesians 5, which ties the husband-wife bond to the Son's condescension to take on flesh and redeem a chosen bride he loves. Our natural differences are bound up with super-nature, that is with God himself. We were made in the image of God, not the things God made that preceded our creation in Genesis 1: the natural man (heathen) does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned (1 Cor. 2:14). The light of nature would also give eminence to the grizzly bear, so that when you were brought together, it is given that he should govern you. It doesn't work like that (Gouge) when we are talking about the unabashed, blatant supernaturalism of Genesis 1-2.

I'm not sure of your source for biblical theology, but your method needs restraint. Natural theology is taught by the Bible. The literal sense of Scripture can be understood by the natural man. Blatant supernaturalism in creation does not overbear the natural things that are created. Male and female is a sexual distinction first and foremost. It is how God created them. I don't want to state the obvious because it is somewhat crude and it goes against my sense of modesty. But you need to think about it in order to grasp it. They have different sexual organs for a reason. They show the distinct roles of man and woman.

 

[darrellmaurina]

One can hold a secondary doctrine found in liberalism without being liberal. That’s certainly true. That doesn’t change the fact that egalitarianism has its genesis in the liberal milieu of feminism. It IS a liberal doctrine. That doesn’t mean it’s heretical like the fundamental tenets of liberal Christianity are, or that anyone embracing egalitarian is embracing liberal Christianity en toto or its heretical aspects.

It isn't the same, but it is categorically wrong and it is the slippery slope to denying other plain teaches of scripture which almost always happens. Then, the process starts of reinterpreting a bunch of other passages to make it say whatever the person wants. I don't think there is any benefit to being ecumenical with teachers of this type on nonsense. Call a spade and spade. I would put the same caution to you that is in one of the quotes you used: Be careful of the company you keep (or in this case, of the errors you are trying to reduce in importance). The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend.

We need pastors who will stand upon the truth and protect the flock from false teaching/errors (whether they are official heresies or lesser errors). I don't believe we need to be told, this is an error, but it's not as bad as this other error. That is only going to cause those young in the faith to start exploring these teaches and possibly getting confused. We have seen this exact thing already in this thread. Call a spade and spade, mark and avoid.

I think we mostly agree.

My concern here is that we identify errors and heresies by their correct name, because if we diagnose the disease incorrectly, the cure will be incorrect. Liberalism is real. It is extremely dangerous because it proceeds from denial of core doctrines such as biblical inerrancy. But when we accuse people of being liberals who are not liberals, we shoot ourselves in the foot because people will say we don't know what we are talking about and are crying wolf or exaggerating the degree of difficulty we face.

To say every women minister and every woman elder is automatically a liberal is neither accurate not helpful. Women in office is a symptom of a problem, but it's not the root of the problem, and sometimes it comes from a different root -- for example, a low view of office and ordination, which is common in broadly evangelical circles that make lots of people "pastors" who shouldn't be called that.

I spent ten years of my life fighting the women in office issue in the Christian Reformed Church. Nobody who knows my history can seriously question my stance on this issue. I didn't do that because of the issue of women's ordination per se; after all, I was a member of the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference which had officially decided to tolerate churches with women ministers several years before the first of a series of CRC synod votes that eventually allowed women's ordination.

The issue was the underlying theology. I studied under the professors at Calvin Seminary who were pushing these things, and I do not use the word "liberal" lightly. The malevolent influence of G.C. Berkouwer, who began as a theological conservative and ended up being seduced by Barthian neo-orthodoxy, has been documented by a number of people who studied at the Free University of Amsterdam having been recommended to go there by men like John Gerstner and RC Sproul, who later realized what was being taught in the Gereformeerde Kerken (the mother church of the CRC), and realized Berkouwer had made a fundamental shift in his doctrine of biblical authority that led to all sorts of awful things happening in the GKN that later spread to the CRC.

For those who don't remember my history in the 1980s and 1990s, I was the primary reporter for Christian Renewal prior to and during the CRC secession. Before I went to work for Christian Renewal, after I saw what was happening in the Christian Reformed Church as a student at Calvin College and Calvin Seminary, I made a decision in the late 1980s that I might as well remain a Congregationalist because the CRC was well down the road to the same truly liberal heresies, and transferred from a liberal Congregational denomination to the 4Cs rather than the CRC back when there weren't a lot of options available, long before the URC began.

 

[MarrowMan]

I think we mostly agree.

My concern here is that we identify errors and heresies by their correct name, because if we diagnose the disease incorrectly, the cure will be incorrect. Liberalism is real. It is extremely dangerous because it proceeds from denial of core doctrines such as biblical inerrancy. But when we accuse people of being liberals who are not liberals, we shoot ourselves in the foot because people will say we don't know what we are talking about and are crying wolf or exaggerating the degree of difficulty we face.

To say every women minister and every woman elder is automatically a liberal is neither accurate not helpful. Women in office is a symptom of a problem, but it's not the root of the problem, and sometimes it comes from a different root -- for example, a low view of office and ordination, which is common in broadly evangelical circles that make lots of people "pastors" who shouldn't be called that.

I spent ten years of my life fighting the women in office issue in the Christian Reformed Church. Nobody who knows my history can seriously question my stance on this issue. I didn't do that because of the issue of women's ordination per se; after all, I was a member of the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference which had officially decided to tolerate churches with women ministers several years before the first of a series of CRC synod votes that eventually allowed women's ordination.

The issue was the underlying theology. I studied under the professors at Calvin Seminary who were pushing these things, and I do not use the word "liberal" lightly. The malevolent influence of G.C. Berkouwer, who began as a theological conservative and ended up being seduced by Barthian neo-orthodoxy, has been documented by a number of people who studied at the Free University of Amsterdam having been recommended to go there by men like John Gerstner and RC Sproul, who later realized what was being taught in the Gereformeerde Kerken (the mother church of the CRC), and realized Berkouwer had made a fundamental shift in his doctrine of biblical authority that led to all sorts of awful things happening in the GKN that later spread to the CRC.

For those who don't remember my history in the 1980s and 1990s, I was the primary reporter for Christian Renewal prior to and during the CRC secession. Before I went to work for Christian Renewal, after I saw what was happening in the Christian Reformed Church as a student at Calvin College and Calvin Seminary, I made a decision in the late 1980s that I might as well remain a Congregationalist because the CRC was well down the road to the same truly liberal heresies, and transferred from a liberal Congregational denomination to the 4Cs rather than the CRC back when there weren't a lot of options available, long before the URC began.

Sure, it is good to be accurate in identifying things for what they are. Nor should we call everyone a liberal who holds to a liberal theological position. However, when we notice people espousing things that have their genesis in 19th and early 20th century liberalism and have only been on steroids since then infecting even conservative evangelicalism, we need to perk up and pay attention. Just as pointing out that Bell's podcast uses the CT verbiage of "deconstruction" should have us alert and wary moving forward with it.