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On “Let’s Include Women in the Pastoral Office” (Pr. Karl Wyneken) - By David Berger
David Berger addresses vocational issues brought up in Pr. Wyneken's article, "Let's Include Women in the Pastoral Office."
On “Let’s Include Women in the Pastoral Office” by Pr. Karl Wyneken
Dr. Robert Schmidt (emeritus CUP, NOW) recently circularized the faculty of Concordia Seminary with an essay on ordaining women by Pastor Karl Wyneken (emeritus CNH). Published more than a decade ago in Voices/Vision, a “Lutheran” newsletter with a strong feminist slant published in the 1990s, the essay is now featured on the DayStar web site, a most appropriate and predictable host for the online version. For full text go to the following link:
http://www.day-star.net/journal/3-3-wyneken.htm
One might first observe that the timing and current climate are interesting. Both men are now emeriti, and the convention at Houston passed a resolution relaxing the practice of doctrinal review for certain synodical publications, as long as they are clearly labeled as study documents. And, to be sure, there is Bylaw 1.8.2. on expression of dissent from synodical positions. One might ask, however, if a practice based both on Scripture and on the historic practice of the church catholic is in the same category as synodical “doctrinal resolutions and statements.” Regardless, the two pastors emeriti (SL 1960 and 1962) have deemed it an opportune time to give the essay entitled “Let’s Include Women in the Pastoral Office” another airing.
The writer of the essay appears to have learned his Gospel reductionism well in the seminary climate that prevailed between the Statement of the 44 and the establishment of Seminex. He holds the position that “the Bible’s all-important purpose is clear – to lead us in faith to a right and saving relationship with God in Christ” (Section 1). (Since there are no page numbers in the document, references are to the numbered sections.) Agreed, but that statement is followed by one of the reductionist’s favorite claims: that much in God’s Word is “conditioned by social circumstances and cultural norms that prevailed [at the time of writing].” In Paul’s case, that would be the first century A.D. in Corinth and Ephesus. A major task of contemporary theologians is thus to separate the wholesome kernels of the Gospel from the remaining time-bound cultural chaff scattered throughout Scripture. The category of adiaphora becomes increasingly broad.
An early sign that the case for women in the pastoral ministry is difficult to sustain is the pitting of I Cor. 11:5 against I Cor. 14:34 (Section 2). In I Cor. 11, the writer claims, women prophesy in public worship, while in I Cor. 14 they are told to be silent. He further claims that in 11:5: “What is there called ‘prophecying [sic],’ by the way, was probably very close to what we would today call ‘preaching’!” The first part of I Cor. 11 does not focus on public worship, but rather on the relationship of the sexes, of husband and wife, if you will, in a public or social context, including those times when the context involves speaking God’s word or praying. Certain accepted appearances and practices signify the proper relationship, e.g., appropriate head coverings. That Paul is concerned not only with cultural signs but with the relationship itself is made clear in 11:3, “the head of the woman is man,” and 11:8 “man did not come from woman, but woman from man.” Whether the text speaks specifically about husbands and wives rather than more generally about men and women may be less important than one might first think. Eve was created as a helper suitable for Adam (Gen. 2:21-25), and the Creator’s plan is that “a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife.” The husband / wife relationship is the norm, the foundation of God’s plan for His creatures, male and female.
In the context of Corinthians, the factors related to culture in the extended passage, e.g., covering of the woman’s head, are signs, not a permanent mandated dress code. What would we say today? Wives / Women should not wear bikinis or shorts while praying or witnessing to their faith in public? We have come a long way indeed. Who is to say that the signs of Paul’s day are not to be preferred? That they were observed for so many centuries is not to be taken lightly. The accepted practices in dress and hair style in the early church are manifestations of attitudes: modesty and accepting the proper scriptural relationship between man and woman, between husband and wife. Today’s outward signs may have changed (surely no evidence of social progress), but the relationships they signify have not.
The writer also observes (Section 2) that if today it is more likely to be culturally offensive to exclude women from leading public worship, in Paul’s time a woman’s preaching (or prophesying?) in public worship might have impeded the hearing of the Gospel – thus his prohibition on their doing so. Considering that Paul was often outspoken on many matters related to the Christian life, would it not have behooved him to promote the liberating of Corinthian women from the legalism of their cultural bondage (if that’s what it was) if it were an important aspect of their new life in the Gospel? Would Paul have consistently ignored a cultural prejudice against women, allowing it to trump their freedom in the Gospel? Would not he at least have confided in Timothy – that these restrictions were temporary, intended only to prevent offending non-believers and the weaker brethren?
Aside from the “mights” and “maybes” in the essay, always a sign more of hope than of certainty, there are also occasional exegetical missteps. In referring to I Cor.14:13 [sic, i.e.,14: 34] (“they [women] should submit, as the law says”), the writer notes that “there is no clear source for this in the Torah.” Paul here refers to the law in a general sense, as he sometimes does (cf. 11:2-16 & Romans 2). The relationship of woman to man is set both by the order of creation (Gen. 2:22-23) and by the Fall into sin (Gen. 3:16). The writer is also concerned that Paul could not be speaking of headship in the relationship of male and female when he uses the following parallel in I Cor. 11:3: “the head of every man is Christ, the head of a woman is man [or her husband], and the head of Christ is God.” And so, the writer emphasizes that the Greek is uncertain, that maybe the word should be translated “source,” not “head,” so that Paul would not here be teaching the heresy of Subordination in relation to the Trinity. But it is precisely Paul’s point to draw this most appropriate and instructive parallel, i.e., that Christ willingly, in his human nature, submits to the will of the Father, just as woman willingly accepts the headship of the man, even as he reciprocates with love, care, and bodily protection. Headship is a two-way street in God-pleasing Christian roles and relationships. Proper spirit and attitude are key in the relationships of the redeemed..
There are other examples of exegetical misunderstandings. In I Tim. 2:15, the writer notes, Paul surely could not mean that women “will be saved by childbearing,” i.e., rather than by grace alone (Section 3). While there may be a question of precise meaning here, there’s nothing “puzzling” (the writer’s characterization) about Paul’s statement in the context. Women are kept safe in their accepting their role assigned by God, which includes child-bearing. The passage has been interpreted by some, e.g., Beck, as referring to the Child borne by a woman, by whom all are saved. In that sense God indeed used human child-bearing as a means of salvation (Gal. 4:4). Why plant the seed that Paul’s writing is so puzzling and his meaning so questionable that his statements on male and female relationships, however clear, are confusing and open to various interpretations?
God’s created order is not to be put at odds with the order of redemption; neither are the orders to be confounded. Rather, they are complementary. Even as we accept the Creator’s plan for his creation, sometimes referred to as natural law, so we recognize in our redeemed life a very different Model and reasons for accepting and living within the parameters set by the Creator. If the order of creation was later tainted by sin, as has been every aspect of our life, we still live in that sinful world and realize that the order has been established for the very purpose of establishing and maintaining order.
What about Luther? “Luther, it appears, did not understand these texts to be saying that subordination and hierarchy was [sic] an inherent feature of the original creation. He held that it was introduced with the Fall, in [Gen.] chapter 3" (Section 5). Even were Luther’s comments on the subject in his lectures on Genesis his complete and settled view on the subject, Luther does not conclude, or even suggest, that following Christ’s work of redemption the roles of women and men have been revised or superseded, or that the effects of sin no longer apply in their relationship.
Paul is quite clear, however, that the relationship of male and female is part of the original order and not merely the result of “fallen” creation: “Adam was formed first, then Eve” (I Tim. 2:13). Is that just Paul’s opinion? How that order is observed in attitude and practice, e.g., between man and wife, Paul deals with more expansively in Ephesians 5:21-33. We see there that it has nothing to do with a man’s “lording it over” a woman. Rather, the parallel is with Christ and his bride, the church. What is radically different in the order of redemption is the attitude that men (husbands) and women (wives) have toward each other in their mutual relationship in Christ.
Straw men (or women?) crop up here and there in the essay, e.g., the writer’s treatment of Acts 15. “How is it,” he asks, “that Blutwurst-loving German Lutherans wouldn’t dream of taking this [regulation against ingesting blood] literally? (Point 4)” It is doubtful that most “German Lutherans” relish blood sausage. Of those who do, would any purposely offend an Orthodox Jewish friend by eating it in front of him? Would they not rather refrain from doing so, as Paul recommends, not because they must but because they want to avoid giving offense? Again, the author trots out a number of visual signs (hair braiding, jewelry, holy kisses) as examples of outmoded cultural practices, rather than accepting them for what they are: reflections of Christian attitudes and aids to Gospel witness.
I Timothy 2 (especially v. 13) presents the writer with a real problem, for here, as noted above, Paul has the temerity to cite the Scriptural basis for the relationship of male and female in the image of God. In essence, the writer ignores Paul’s clear statement. Instead, in an attempt to clean up Paul’s image in the eyes of modern day feminists, he appeals to the presence of an incipient Gnostic influence in the early church, one which might have actually held up women as “the superior sex,” a kind of “discrimination-in-reverse, ‘affirmative action’ carried to an extreme” (Section 4). What was Paul to do? The “solution” is worth quoting: “Presumably the teaching that some women were doing was creating a problem. The simple apostolic solution of that moment was to prohibit all women from teaching.” That’s it. Tell them all to stifle it. A brilliant solution! – for Paul’s time, that is. Today, of course, there is no such threat to the church. And if one thinks that there is, one surely would not, as the writer suggests, “tar and feather with this brush all who support reasonable and equitable inclusiveness.” (Maybe Paul’s sweeping solution was not so brilliant after all?) Is it also possible that the author’s “reasonable and equitable inclusiveness” means “including women in the pastoral office,” as the title of the essay recommends?
It is worth noting here that Gnostics were also known for their asceticism, for denigrating the body and repressing bodily appetites, including the sexual aspect of male/female relationships. From that perspective, Paul may just as likely here be defending the proper understanding of God’s plan for male and female (cf. the reference to child-bearing in v. 15 as noted above).
In Section 6, the writer rightly observes that New Testament Christianity “vastly enhanced the status and role of women.” In his book How Christianity Changed the World, Dr. Alvin Schmidt provides ample evidence and many examples of the differences in treatment of women in various religious contexts, demonstrating that in cultures strongly influenced by the Christian religion women do indeed have vastly greater freedom and opportunities than in most other cultures, enhancements that have, until recent times, been achieved without wholesale violations of the order of creation as revealed in Scripture. Jesus neither selected nor traveled with female disciples, yet He treated women with respect, taught them, and encouraged them in their faith. Paul had many women contacts in his travels and work, referring to them as valuable helpers and workers in the spread of the Gospel; yet he is quite clear – even emphatic – that their role does not include leading public worship. In fact, until the 20th century, the idea of a woman’s holding the pastoral office was all but unheard of.
To understand the relationship of the sexes and their profound created differences, as described and exemplified in Scripture, as generally outmoded cultural holdovers plays directly into the hands of those who see all sexual differences as culturally determined, with the possible of exception of the ability to bear children, and that only until the enabling technology eliminates this inequity. And so today, for example, we permit women in military combat because they have been enabled by technology to kill as efficiently and effectively as a man. In essence, in our confused and confusing culture, it has become acceptable for men to send their daughters and wives to war to defend them (the men) from the enemy. Where will one find precedent for that in either the Old or New Testament? In Christendom over the past two thousand years?
The socio/cultural aspects of the essay in Points 7-9 require further comment. Here again, the writer insists that “the Bible partakes of and reflects the human conditions of its human writers and their particular social and cultural setting and circumstances” (Section 7). He assumes (no evidence provided) that in the matter of sexual roles and distinctions the writers of Scripture were reflecting not the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but rather the practice of the surrounding culture.
The writer predictably repeats his pitting of doctrine against Gospel witness (Point 8, cf. Point 2). It is the perceived trump card of those who would create doubt about selected scriptural teachings. Not that there is any supporting evidence, but the belief persists that if only the church were more flexible in its doctrine and practice, more people would be open to the truth of the Gospel. Are you against reaching out to the lost? Shame on you. Yet, in what demonstrable way has, e.g., the inclusion of women in the pastoral office increased the effectiveness of Gospel witness of the ELCA or the ECUSA, or for that matter, of the Scandinavian state “Lutheran” churches? Is not the greatest offense inherent in the Gospel itself – the doctrine of the atonement and the cross of Christ? The writer claims also that the position of the LCMS on excluding women from the pastoral office has been a “roadblock” in relations with the ELCA. If the LCMS weren’t so rigid, he suggests, the ELCA might not have “gone in other directions for the expression of Christian unity,” e.g., to the ECUSA. The LCMS should accept the ELCA’s flouting of scriptural teaching and 2000 years of church practice to provide greater opportunity to influence that church body’s ecumenical relationships. One strains to grasp the reasoning.
The theological/cultural crux of the writer’s position resurfaces in Point 9: “Theoretically we have no divine mandate either for or against ordaining women – all other things being equal. In our world and society today, however, there is something new in the equation. We have a sensitivity in society, together with appropriate legislation, that encourages all possible equity and fairness and restrains gender-based discrimination.” There is, indeed, no divine mandate for or against ordaining women because there is no divine mandate to ordain anyone. The divine mandate is that women are to refrain from leading and speaking in public worship. But that, we have been assured, is just Paul’s writing in his time and in his place. Thus, women in the pastoral office joins the host of adiaphora. Today we have a new “sensitivity” that “encourages all possible equity and fairness and restrains gender-based discrimination.” And so, the church needs to be sensitive to shifts in cultural values and tune its practices accordingly. Consider the ELCA’s recent convention action on restraint in disciplining active homosexuals in the pastoral office. In Lutheran circles, at least, can one think of a more egregious example of a church body’s “sensitivity” to the demands of the culture?
Promoting the acceptance of women as pastors and leaders of public worship is part of a much larger modern and post-modern cultural movement – the blurring of distinctions between the sexes that God has established according to His own unsearchable (but revealed) will. Blurring the distinctions is done only at great risk to the cultural and social fabric. We have already seen the effects: intentionally childless dual career marriages, adopting of children by two “mommies,” social acceptance of homosexual acts, promotion of “gay marriage,” women as combat soldiers. Male/female, “top/bottom,” what’s the difference? The body is an accident of nature. What you feel inside is what you are. Now, there’s a contemporary manifestation of the Gnostic heresy if ever there was one. It takes only a moment’s reflection to conclude that, from the perspective of historic Christianity, as well as in the broader context of a culture still living on the moral and spiritual capital of Christendom, most of this confusion is a late 20th-century innovation, including the promoting of women for the pastoral office. The advocating of such a change is historicist at its core: “Had our forebears only known better, known what we are privileged to know, they would have never excluded women from the pastoral office.”
The foundation of the matter remains: Male / female distinctions are inextricably interconnected with the image of the Creator (“male and female he created them”) and with the equally rich scriptural image of Christ (male) and his bride, the church. The key passage used by those who would do away with distinctions is, to be sure, Galatians 3:26 - 4:7, where Paul writes that “there is neither . . . male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Note, however, that he begins with the words, “you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus,” emphasizing that all the baptized are “heirs according the promise.” In the order of redemption, as in the human family, Paul does not hesitate to state that it is through sonship that the legacy is passed, making it even more striking that, as heirs of the Promise, male and female are not to be distinguished. Yet Paul nowhere extends that to mean that male / female distinctions in God’s created order are now to be ignored or done away with. In fact, the new order of redemption finds in that original order a most useful and meaningful image: Christ, the Bridegroom, as head and protector of his bride, the church. The distinctions are still part of the plan.
It is not in the least surprising that Pr. Wyneken’s essay should be recycled. There is really nothing new to add to the discussion. However, it is tempting to see an intent much the same as the strategy of the “troublers of Israel” in another Lutheran church body, who have consistently and persistently promoted the acceptance of homosexual practice in the context of the pastoral office – in the further context, to be sure, of a “loving relationship.” Keep the issue perpetually on the table. Schedule consultations and meetings. Distribute packets and DVDs of study materials. Talk and meet and write some more. Delay action. Eventually those who hold to the scriptural position will throw in the towel and/or leave the church body. Between the pressures of the culture and the unwitting (to put the best construction on it) support within the church, the change will eventually be effected and the church body, or what’s left of it, will have finally entered into the brave new world, satisfying the gender, i.e., sexual, equity concerns of every culturally sensitive being.
In one sense, we owe a debt of gratitude to Pastors Schmidt and Wyneken. The recycled essay reminds us once again that it takes much stretching and distorting of the biblical text even to create doubt that the pastoral office is restricted to men. On the other hand, it is impossible find clear scriptural support for including women in the pastoral office or serving as leaders of public worship.
God grant us the wisdom and humility to accept our roles and vocations according to His divine, revealed plan.
David O. Berger
August 2007
Written By: host
Date Posted: 9/28/2007
Number of Views: 3299
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