Continuing what has turned out to be a rather lengthy
dissertation on widows (a normally dismissed and marginalized segment of the
populace---Paul’s extensive treatment of widows should tell us quite a bit
about the way the church should operate), Paul goes on to write “So I want
younger women to marry, raise children, and manage a household, in order to
give the adversary no opportunity to vilify us” (1 Timothy 5:14). From whence
might this vilification arise? It could arise from younger widows “going
around from house to house,” learning to be lazy, while also being “gossips and
busybodies, talking about things they should not.” Again, the directive
to marry, raise children, and manage a household fits well with that which has
been said about overseers and deacons. The overseer “must manage his own
household well and keep his children in control without losing his dignity”
(3:4). Likewise, “Deacons must be husbands of one wife and good managers
of their children and their own households” (3:12).
To the avoidance of
vilification, Paul adds “For some have already wandered away to follow Satan”
(5:15). Here, he still writes about widows. Lest one think that
Paul is specifically singling out widows or that he is calling out women in
general for being gossips and busybodies, it can be seen, once again, that the
same type of language has already been on offer in his talk of overseers.
One must not allow the thinking that Paul is being overly harsh with the women
of the body of Christ. Rather, he must be heard within the context of his
efforts at leveling out the church, realizing that Paul believes that all
classes of people are to be treated equally.
Whenever an initial reading of a
passage leads one to believe that Paul is placing general restrictions on a class
of people in such a way that could lead to the structuring of spiritual
hierarchies, to the demeaning or restricting of a group based on ethnicity
(Jew/Gentile), gender (male/female---especially the passages about women being
silent in the church), or social status (slave/free/widow/children), or the
erection of a spiritual authoritarianism inside the church, it serves the
reader well to re-read and re-think the text until the conclusion concerning
the text accords with the egalitarian nature of the church as it was envisioned
by Paul (as he attempted to live out and encourage what he understood to be the
mission and vision of the church as enacted by Jesus and informed by the
prophets).
Paul demands to be heard in his historical and cultural
context, as the church found itself attempting to countermand, through the
manifestation of the Spirit of the Creator God, the spirit of death that
animated the world into which the church had been placed and out of which it
had been called, that it may serve that world well (a bit of the paradoxical
mystery of the faith---called out to be separate so that it may serve and
transform, functioning as the kingdom of the covenant God and being the point
of overlap between heaven and earth---the Temple---as an ongoing foretaste of
the new creation and restoration of the earth).
So as one considers whether Paul
is being heavy-handed with groups of women, upon returning again to the third
chapter, one reads “He must not be a recent convert or he may become arrogant
and fall into the punishment that the devil will exact. And he must be
well thought of by those outside the faith, so that he may not fall into
disgrace and be caught by the devil’s trap” (3:6-7). This has followed
from “But if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he
care for the church of God?” (3:5), which has followed the fourth verse and
talk of managing a household, controlling children, and maintaining dignity.
Remember, an observer needs to encounter the text on the lookout for
Paul’s efforts at leveling out the body, in contrast to the culture, rather
than setting up hierarchies.
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