Daily Archives: January 31, 2008

9 Comments

I posted the (short) list of how CBMW sees egalitarian teaching:

  • God created male and female as equal in all respects. Gen. 1:26-27 makes no distinction between woman and man insofar as both are equally made in His image (i.e., ontological equality), and both are given the responsibility to rule over His creation (i.e., functional equality).
  • Sin introduced into God’s created order many manifestations of disorder and corrupted relationships. Among the chief examples of sin’s defilement is the introduction of an illegitimate hierarchy in the relationship between woman and man.
  • 1. Gen. 1:26-27 - shows that man and woman share the same human nature, both are made in God’s image, and both are given God’s commission to rule the earth. Not only is there equality of being or nature between man and woman, there is also, importantly, equality of function or task - both are commanded to rule. And note: no distinction is made to give the man a superior position in this rulership.
  • 2. Gen. 2:18 - woman as “helper” is best understood as one who comes to complement (i.e., make complete something that is incomplete). So, far from the woman being subordinate to the man, this shows how indebted man should be to the woman.
  • 5. 1 Cor. 12:7-11 - Clearly, God distributes His gifts to His people as He so wills, but one’s gender is not a factor in His giving any particular gift to a person. Women and men alike are recipients of all of God’s gifts (e.g., see 1 Cor. 11:5 for a statement of women having the gift of prophecy). Since God’s spiritual gifting is gender-neutral, and since God expects His gifts to be used in the church, it follows that men and women alike are equal in their exercise of gifts in the church.

How are these false?  If this is not generally correct, why not explain how, rather than make accusations?

Another person speculated about integrity and further speculated about insecurity about a blogger using their personal information in a wrong way (so I set this blog to not require any personal information in an effort to reassure that any attack that might be leveled at my integrity with personal information  need not be a concern)

What I was doing was attempting to answer concerns about CBMW teaching.  I quoted commenters questions and concerns and then quoted CBMW in an attempt to answer that concern.

(NOTE:  when objecting to CBMW teaching, I seldom see CBMW quoted or linked to and there are many claims of wrong teachings - or worse, accusation of lies (resorting to falsehood, which has a much different meaning that "believing falsehood") without citation.)