i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
Wow. It's a big topic regardless of how people look at the verses.
Acceptance of gays is become a cultural norm, over 50% of Americans are pro-gay marriage now, and of course this percentage is higher in other countries.
Many Churches are having to really examine how much they're willing to maintain the status quo in regards to homosexuals given that some of their beliefs are starting to hurt how many differences they have.
Doctor Who reference in Pokemon B2W2? Headcanon accepted.
I wouldn't go so far as to call the Bible itself misogynistic, but within the book you can find childbirth-as-punishment, "no evil worse than a woman", stoning rape victims, the whore of Babylon, the ban on female priests, wives as property, etc.
So, yes, the Bible contains numerous instances of misogynistic imagery and ideology, and I think it would be irresponsible to deny that. It would be no less irresponsible to call it a uniformly misogynistic text, which would be both to ignore the more positive depictions of women in the Bible and to ignore the cultural context which produced the Bible.
I don't know what you mean as "childbirth by punishment", I'm guessing you mean that in the OT the woman had to carry to birth and raise a child she didn't want. In that case, this is true, because the life of a child was impressed on the Hebrew people for many reasons and not just God telling them to. They were also horrified by the practices of the people of Canaan and other neighboring nations who would regularly roast infants and children alive to appease their gods, and for good luck they'd entomb their firstborn into the cornerstone of their house. It was regular practice for the temple harlots of those nations to simply cast a newborn down a well so the could continue their prostitution unhindered.
I can't find any instance in the OT or NT of a rape victim being stoned. I looked through Leviticus and didn't see anything about it, and I'm not up to snuff on the NT to even remember of that occurring or not.
The Whore of Babylon is a metaphor, and a very timely one for the period the book was written. Temple prostitution was at its peak in Asia Minor at the time, and was another form of slavery instituted by their "democratic" Greek religions and governments. The latter half of the New Testament was mostly warning about the corruption of the new Christian religion and there were people attempting to win over converts by making Christianity more palatable to people who wanted to enjoy the more licentious pleasures of their own religion. That's who the Whore of Babylon represents at the time of its writing.
There were no female priests, persay, in the Old Testament, nor anyone else was allowed to be a priest who wasn't a Levite. That's not to say women were disallowed leadership in the OT or favor from God, which as we seen is far from true. There were not female priests in the OT, but to be fair, there were no male ones either. Catholicism is on its own for recreating that institution, and I'm not a catholic so I can't answer for them.
As for "wives as property", this isn't wasn't limited to a small desert tribe in Israel, nor to its era. Women were considered "property" well into the late 19th century England, for instance; so it's kind of unfair for expecting an ancient civilization to measure up to our modern concepts. Considering the world as it was back then, it was usually in the woman's best interest to go along with this system. Before you get upset, you have to remember how hostile even civilization was back then. It was a matter of survival.
My church has no problem whatsoever with female ministers.
The subject of homosexuality pretty much never comes up. I expect if you conducted a survey among the congregation you'd get a variety of opinions on the subject. I believe the wider Methodist church is generally against it, though.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
So, there is something of a regional bias...and it's sort of a true statistic in the US that the Black Baptists Churches are notoriously anti-homosexual. A lot of that has to do with them being influenced by other Southern Baptists churches. So, not really a race thing, but a product of races being in certain regions and there being a regional influence.
>I don't know what you mean as "childbirth by punishment"
Childbirth as punishment, or rather the pains of childbirth as punishment. See Genesis 3:16. >I can't find any instance in the OT or NT of a rape victim being stoned. I looked through Leviticus and didn't see anything about it, and I'm not up to snuff on the NT to even remember of that occurring or not.
To the best of my knowledge there is no specific instance in the Bible of a rape victim being stoned to death. Deuteronomy 22:23-24 prescribes stoning as punishment for any engaged woman caught in the act of intercourse with a man to whom she is not engaged in an urban area. The justification given for this is the assumption that if she had cried for help, she would have been heard, which doesn't necessarily follow and doesn't allow for the possibility that she was unable to cry out, for whatever reason.
Relatedly, Deuteronomy 22:28-29 demands that any woman who is not engaged who gets raped be forced to marry her rapist. I am not sure whether there are analogous passages in Leviticus.
>The Whore of Babylon is a metaphor, and a very timely one for the period the book was written.
I won't argue too strongly for this one because it is indeed a metaphor and I'm aware that the Bible does in fact contain positive depictions of women who are prostitutes. Nevertheless, it's a gendered metaphor, and one that attaches a negative value judgement to certain expressions of female sexuality. It's not at all clear to me that we are supposed to see the Whore as being in any sense a victim (e.g. of sex slavery); the usage appears pejorative. >There were not female priests in the NT, but to be fair, there were no male ones either. Catholicism is on its own for recreating that institution, and I'm not a catholic so I can't answer for them.
I was referring specifically to the restrictions upon women in worship imposed (or perhaps merely supported?) by Paul, which I am aware is not found in the OT. Indeed, my point was that you can find multiple attitudes towards women in the Bible. Apologies for any confusion caused.
>As for "wives as property", this isn't wasn't limited to a small desert tribe in Israel, nor to its era. Women were considered "property" well into the late 19th century England, for instance; so it's kind of unfair for expecting an ancient civilization to measure up to our modern concepts. Considering the world as it was back then, it was usually in the woman's best interest to go along with this system.
I don't see this as a question of "fairness" or a failure to meet expectations so much as simple fact about a position which is expressed in the Bible. I don't think the Bible can easily be divorced from its cultural context, nor do I advocate doing anything of the sort. The fact remains that the cultural context is a sexist one.
Also note that historical attitudes towards women have varied greatly between cultures, and that this is still the case at present. >Before you get upset, you have to remember how hostile even civilization was back then. It was a matter of survival.
This seems like a patriarchical position to me and I don't really agree that such a stance is necessary, but I'm not upset. I certainly wasn't denouncing the Bible, merely pointing out that some of the views expressed in it are no longer deemed acceptable, and with good reason.
Doctor Who reference in Pokemon B2W2? Headcanon accepted.
Nevertheless, it's a gendered metaphor, and one that attaches a negative value judgement to certain expressions of female sexuality. It's not at all clear to me that we are supposed to see the Whore as being in any sense a victim (e.g. of sex slavery); the usage appears pejorative.
I can't see how it's a negative value judgment on an expression of female sexuality, as what it represents is figuratively prostituting what one holds dear, lit. their ideals, to achieve an end. We know this because in a few chapters before one of the female church leaders (in Thyatira) was being chastised for watering down the concept of Christianity to gain more followers -- this small "Jezebel" concept that John accuses her of at that point is the seed from where the "Whore of Babylon" concept grows.
And to say it's "gendered' is true from a modern standpoint, but if you were able to go back and tell John this, it'd probably go about the same as going back and correcting Moses about the taxonomy of bats and birds. They'd just look at you funny, as their only interest was to get a point across. As stated before, female prostitution was depressingly common in Asia Minor at that time, and that's what he abstracted from.
@Squid, the Anglican Church of North America was the first one to have a gay priest as the Anglican Church is in the NE corridor of the United States and Canada.
^^ That's what it represents. The image that was chosen to represent it was a prostitute.
I'm aware that their intent in doing so was to convey a point. I merely remarked upon the manner in which they chose to do so, which I think is very telling about the culture in which the metaphor originated.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
Yeah, but I'm not really sure anyone is really disagreeing here, then. We all know that some of the Bible teachings came out in a time where they had very different views on certain subjects and that women certainly weren't "equal" to men by that standards.
And it seems we all more or less agree that that fact doesn't really provide someone with a basis to deny female priesthood.
Though, I find the comments on this verse really fascinating. It seems it's not so much a blanket statement because of topics raised in 1 Corinthians 11, it's more conditional regarding specific temple proceedings.
It's also contingent on Jewish laws that I don't think appear in Biblical cannon (save for this sort of carry-over verse). I wonder if this is why many Churches disregard it, they figure it doesn't really apply.
14:34,35 Let your woman keep silence in the churches. This, in view of other portions of the Scriptures, is confessedly a difficult passage. We have the same teaching in 1Ti 2:11,12. On the other hand, Deborah was a judge and a prophetess (Jud 4:4); Huldah was a prophetess (1Ki 22:14); Joel predicted that in the Christian dispensation the sons and 'daughters' should prophesy (Joe 2:28), and Peter declared that this was fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost (Ac 2:4). In addition, the daughters of Philip prophesied (Ac 21:9), and Paul gives directions concerning women prophesying in 1Co 11:5. Probably these apparent discrepancies may be reconciled as follows: (1) Paul's prohibition of speaking to the women is in the churches; that is, in the church assemblies when the whole church is come together into one place (1Co 14:23). It is an official meeting of the church. Church in the New Testament always means the ecclesia. It does not apply to such informal meetings as the social or prayer-meetings, but to formal gatherings of the whole body. (2) It may be that even this prohibition was due to the circumstances that existed in Ephesus, where Timothy was, and in Corinth, and would not apply everywhere. If so, it applies wherever similar circumstances exist, but not elsewhere. Both were Greek churches. Among the Greeks public women were disreputable. For a woman to speak in public would cause the remark that she was shameless. Virtuous women were secluded. Hence it would be a shame for women to speak in the church assembly. It is noteworthy that there is no hint of such a prohibition to any churches except Grecian. Wherever it would be shameful, women ought not to speak.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
Huh, for a thing that's supposedly not real, Mermaid's are doing pretty well in the siting department:
Claimed sightings
Claimed sightings of dead or living mermaids have come from places as diverse as Java and British Columbia. There are two Canadian reports from the area of Vancouver and Victoria, one from sometime between 1870 and 1890, the other from 1967.[27][28] In some of the earliest accounts of Blackbeard's sail logs in the BBC documentary Pirates, he instructed his crew on several voyages to steer away from charted waters which he called "enchanted" for fear of Merfolk or mermaids, which Blackbeard and many members of the crew reported seeing and documenting.[29] These sighting were often recounted and shared by many sailors and pirates who believed the mermaids were bad luck and would bewitch them into giving up their gold and dragging them to the bottom of the seas.
In August 2009, the town of Kiryat Yam in Israel offered a prize of $1 million for anyone who could prove the existence of a mermaid off its coast, after dozens of people reported seeing a mermaid leaping out of the water like a dolphin and doing aerial tricks before returning to the depths.[30] The prize has not yet been awarded.
In February 2012, work on two reservoirs near the towns ofGokweandMutarein Zimbabwe stopped when workers refused to work there, claiming that mermaids had hounded them away from the sites. The claim was reported bySamuel Sipepa Nkomo, Water Resources Minister.[31]
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
As the one conservative Christian here, I suppose I should talk about the priestess issue.
The Bible says in St. Paul's First Epistle to Timothy (3:8-12) that the qualifications for a deacon are thus:
"Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. And let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober-minded, faithful in all things. Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well."
And the qualification "husband of one wife" is repeated for presbyter (priest) and episkopos (bishop). Now either you believe this epistle is divinely inspired, or you're not a Nicene Christian. If you believe the pastoral epistles are forgeries, as suggested by higher criticism, you're implying that the Church that compiled the New Testament canon is in part based on lies. One would have to be confused to believe that while identifying as a Nicene Christian.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
"Now either you believe this epistle is divinely inspired, or you're not a Nicene Christian."
You might want to go into a bit more detail about what you mean here. Believing Timothy to be pseudepigraphic doesn't seem to directly violate the Nicene creed.
I don't understand why we must go straight to a presumption of deliberate falsehood. The author of that passage is clearly identified as Paul, a human being and therefore subject to human biases and assumptions. He was writing from within a patriarchal society. Perhaps the possibility of woman priests, deacons or bishops simply didn't occur to him.
I'm not saying that the letter isn't a forgery, necessarily; I don't know whether there is sufficient evidence to support that. But I don't see why we have to say it must be if we don't agree with a small aspect of it.
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
"Now either you believe this epistle is divinely inspired, or you're not a Nicene Christian."
You might want to go into a bit more detail about what you mean here. Believing Timothy to be pseudepigraphic doesn't seem to directly violate the Nicene creed.
I mean catholic/orthodox (not to be confused with Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Oriental Orthodox). The proto-orthodox were aware of the argument that only ten Pauline epistles were authentic: it was Marcion's. If the higher critical truth claim about Paul's epistles is true, the proto-orthodox were dupes and the pseudo-Paul they accepted was a deceiver.
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
@Fouria: Why wouldn't it have occurred to him? The Hellenic religion had priestesses, and the early Church itself had prophetesses and other prominent figures.
@Justice: That's higher criticism. Higher criticism isn't necessarily true, and if it is, it means the Biblical canon was written in part by liars and the proto-orthodox were dupes.
So pseudepigraphy = “false attribution of authorship” or “falsely attributing a writing to someone different from the actual author.”
A pseudepigraphic work is composed as if it were written by a person from the past (the “attributed author”), while the actual author was someone else (usually anonymous).
The attributed author is usually either a famous person from the remote past, or the actual author’s own teacher (after his death).
These should not be called “false writings”; pseudepigraphy says nothing about the value of the work's content, but merely about the attributed authorship.
These are also different from “pseudonymous” works (“pseudonym” = “false name”), in which an author uses a fictitious name to conceal his/her own identity.
Pseudepigraphy was a commonly accepted practice in the ancient world, unless it was recognized as a deliberate deception.
In modern understanding it would be considered “creative writing” at best, or “plagiarism” or “forgery” at worst.
Our modern emphasis on “historical accuracy” leads us to ask: Who actually wrote this work? Who was the main or final author?
The ancient world had a broader sense of “authorship,” involving many more people in oral and written stages over the course of time.
A 50/50 split doesn't sound like "not a lot of debate" to me... derp, misread
I don't know, Gryphon. I'm not Paul, and I don't know what he was thinking when he wrote that passage. I know his background was Jewish and that the Jewish religious leaders were at least predominantly male, hence that particular speculation. But all I'm saying is that, the way I see it, one needn't dismiss an entire letter as fraudulent just because one doesn't entirely agree with its teachings, and I don't see why holding the belief that a small portion of the letter might be inaccurate should entail taking a side in an ancient religious dispute. To me that sounds like a false dichotomy.
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
^^Suggesting the author was a "deceiver" when he was indulging in a common practice of the time seems like judging someone by our standards as opposed to their own.
^ Maybe, but I think we're getting a little off topic or at least off focus. Pseudepigraphic may not even necessarily mean that something was a "deliberate falsehood", it may even be something closer to being ghost written...except in the twist that the original author is the ghost. :P
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
@Fouria: When you doesn't entirely agree with a text we say we believe is divinely inspired, choosing your own opinion over it implies you think you know better than divine inspiration.
@Justice: "Pseudepigraphy was a commonly accepted practice in the ancient world" Do we have primary sources saying this? The fact the exact issue of the pastoral epistles was argued over within a century of Paul's death and no one mentioned that a work could be pseudoepigraphic and divinely inspired seems telling.
Just to throw the possibility out there, is it possible that there was uh, another guy named Paul writing the others?
I will grant that it has been a very long time since I last picked up a Bible with any intent of reading the new testament (the Old is far more interesting from a purely literary standpoint, IMO), but I don't recall there being much continuity between the epistles.
^^ I've never understood "divinely inspired" to mean that every single word was hand-picked by the Almighty. That's the claim made by the Qu'ran, but is it made by the Bible?
But unless the true meaning of the Bible is being beamed directly into your thoughts, you have to interpret the text yourself, i.e. you're reliant upon your opinions of its meaning.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
"The fact the exact issue of the pastoral epistles was argued over within a century of Paul's death and no one mentioned that a work could be pseudoepigraphic and divinely inspired seems telling."
Among scholars, or here? Because I'm open to the possibility that both can be true, especially if the work is simply second hand writings of Paul's.
Though, even if it where, I can see why that would give many Churches leeway to ignore it.
"I've never understood "divinely inspired" to mean that every single word was hand-picked by the Almighty. That's the claim made by the Qu'ran, but is it made by the Bible?"
As far as I know, the only scripture to touch on this is this one. And, of course, it's in one of the Timothys.
Now, if that isn't proof of some divine sense of humor, I don't know what is.
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
@Lazuli: Possibly. The New Testament probably contains texts written by at least two different Johns ("St. John the divine" is an ancient title for the author of Revelation, and the 2nd century father Polycarp mentions a "John the presbyter" who lived after the Apostle, who may be responsible for 2 & 3 John, whose authorship was disputed even among the orthodox).
Though in any case, orthodox Christians have to take 1 Timothy as divinely inspired.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
"Just to throw the possibility out there, is it possible that there was uh, another guy named Paul writing the others?"
I should probably mention that the popular scholar explanation for anypseudepigraphic letters of Paul is that his followers wrote them. The question might then be how well his followers did at capturing Paul's thoughts.
"It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
^^ I've never understood "divinely inspired" to mean that every single word was hand-picked by the Almighty. That's the claim made by the Qu'ran, but is it made by the Bible?
I don't understand it to mean that the human authors were God's stenographers, either. Were it so, God wouldn't need more than one. Each author writes with their individual personality (just like the saints are all unique, rather than dissolving into a Hindu-like unity).
What I think "divinely inspired" means is that they're more authoritative than any other human writings. To criticize them by the standards of 18th century skepticism or feminism or any other texts is exactly backwards for a Christian.
Doctor Who reference in Pokemon B2W2? Headcanon accepted.
Infallible? No. Even the most hardcore fundamentalists are aware of the Epistle of Jude referencing one of the sillier apocryphal texts, the Book of Enoch.
Well, I don't really consider myself much of a Christian, but of all the biblical (and I do consider the Book of Enoch biblical, it's in a couple bibles. I know it's in the Ethiopian Church's offhand) books I've read, I will say that Enoch was among the oddest, but I wouldn't really call it silly.
Doctor Who reference in Pokemon B2W2? Headcanon accepted.
The authorship of the book is dated very close to Christ's time, and as far as religious value goes it's not recognized by Judaism at all. I've never really read through it but from what I understand it's like a fanciful account of Enoch's acension to heaven with messianic prophecy that's just a bit too much for where such a book that should run current with Genesis.
Comments
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
So, yes, the Bible contains numerous instances of misogynistic imagery and ideology, and I think it would be irresponsible to deny that. It would be no less irresponsible to call it a uniformly misogynistic text, which would be both to ignore the more positive depictions of women in the Bible and to ignore the cultural context which produced the Bible.
I don't know what you mean as "childbirth by punishment", I'm guessing you mean that in the OT the woman had to carry to birth and raise a child she didn't want. In that case, this is true, because the life of a child was impressed on the Hebrew people for many reasons and not just God telling them to. They were also horrified by the practices of the people of Canaan and other neighboring nations who would regularly roast infants and children alive to appease their gods, and for good luck they'd entomb their firstborn into the cornerstone of their house. It was regular practice for the temple harlots of those nations to simply cast a newborn down a well so the could continue their prostitution unhindered.
I can't find any instance in the OT or NT of a rape victim being stoned. I looked through Leviticus and didn't see anything about it, and I'm not up to snuff on the NT to even remember of that occurring or not.
The Whore of Babylon is a metaphor, and a very timely one for the period the book was written. Temple prostitution was at its peak in Asia Minor at the time, and was another form of slavery instituted by their "democratic" Greek religions and governments. The latter half of the New Testament was mostly warning about the corruption of the new Christian religion and there were people attempting to win over converts by making Christianity more palatable to people who wanted to enjoy the more licentious pleasures of their own religion. That's who the Whore of Babylon represents at the time of its writing.
There were no female priests, persay, in the Old Testament, nor anyone else was allowed to be a priest who wasn't a Levite. That's not to say women were disallowed leadership in the OT or favor from God, which as we seen is far from true. There were not female priests in the OT, but to be fair, there were no male ones either. Catholicism is on its own for recreating that institution, and I'm not a catholic so I can't answer for them.
As for "wives as property", this isn't wasn't limited to a small desert tribe in Israel, nor to its era. Women were considered "property" well into the late 19th century England, for instance; so it's kind of unfair for expecting an ancient civilization to measure up to our modern concepts. Considering the world as it was back then, it was usually in the woman's best interest to go along with this system. Before you get upset, you have to remember how hostile even civilization was back then. It was a matter of survival.
The subject of homosexuality pretty much never comes up. I expect if you conducted a survey among the congregation you'd get a variety of opinions on the subject. I believe the wider Methodist church is generally against it, though.
Woah, ninja'd. Hang on.
I don't want to sound racist but the people who reject gay priests are from Africa.
Let me correct a statement up there:
There were not female priests in the NT, but to be fair, there were no male ones either.
there we go
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
Childbirth as punishment, or rather the pains of childbirth as punishment. See Genesis 3:16.
>I can't find any instance in the OT or NT of a rape victim being stoned. I looked through Leviticus and didn't see anything about it, and I'm not up to snuff on the NT to even remember of that occurring or not.
To the best of my knowledge there is no specific instance in the Bible of a rape victim being stoned to death. Deuteronomy 22:23-24 prescribes stoning as punishment for any engaged woman caught in the act of intercourse with a man to whom she is not engaged in an urban area. The justification given for this is the assumption that if she had cried for help, she would have been heard, which doesn't necessarily follow and doesn't allow for the possibility that she was unable to cry out, for whatever reason.
Relatedly, Deuteronomy 22:28-29 demands that any woman who is not engaged who gets raped be forced to marry her rapist. I am not sure whether there are analogous passages in Leviticus.
>The Whore of Babylon is a metaphor, and a very timely one for the period the book was written.
I won't argue too strongly for this one because it is indeed a metaphor and I'm aware that the Bible does in fact contain positive depictions of women who are prostitutes. Nevertheless, it's a gendered metaphor, and one that attaches a negative value judgement to certain expressions of female sexuality. It's not at all clear to me that we are supposed to see the Whore as being in any sense a victim (e.g. of sex slavery); the usage appears pejorative.
>There were not female priests in the NT, but to be fair, there were no male ones either. Catholicism is on its own for recreating that institution, and I'm not a catholic so I can't answer for them.
I was referring specifically to the restrictions upon women in worship imposed (or perhaps merely supported?) by Paul, which I am aware is not found in the OT. Indeed, my point was that you can find multiple attitudes towards women in the Bible. Apologies for any confusion caused.
>As for "wives as property", this isn't wasn't limited to a small desert tribe in Israel, nor to its era. Women were considered "property" well into the late 19th century England, for instance; so it's kind of unfair for expecting an ancient civilization to measure up to our modern concepts. Considering the world as it was back then, it was usually in the woman's best interest to go along with this system.
I don't see this as a question of "fairness" or a failure to meet expectations so much as simple fact about a position which is expressed in the Bible. I don't think the Bible can easily be divorced from its cultural context, nor do I advocate doing anything of the sort. The fact remains that the cultural context is a sexist one.
Also note that historical attitudes towards women have varied greatly between cultures, and that this is still the case at present.
>Before you get upset, you have to remember how hostile even civilization was back then. It was a matter of survival.
This seems like a patriarchical position to me and I don't really agree that such a stance is necessary, but I'm not upset. I certainly wasn't denouncing the Bible, merely pointing out that some of the views expressed in it are no longer deemed acceptable, and with good reason.
Nevertheless, it's a gendered metaphor, and one that attaches a negative value judgement to certain expressions of female sexuality. It's not at all clear to me that we are supposed to see the Whore as being in any sense a victim (e.g. of sex slavery); the usage appears pejorative.
I can't see how it's a negative value judgment on an expression of female sexuality, as what it represents is figuratively prostituting what one holds dear, lit. their ideals, to achieve an end. We know this because in a few chapters before one of the female church leaders (in Thyatira) was being chastised for watering down the concept of Christianity to gain more followers -- this small "Jezebel" concept that John accuses her of at that point is the seed from where the "Whore of Babylon" concept grows.
And to say it's "gendered' is true from a modern standpoint, but if you were able to go back and tell John this, it'd probably go about the same as going back and correcting Moses about the taxonomy of bats and birds. They'd just look at you funny, as their only interest was to get a point across. As stated before, female prostitution was depressingly common in Asia Minor at that time, and that's what he abstracted from.
I'm aware that their intent in doing so was to convey a point. I merely remarked upon the manner in which they chose to do so, which I think is very telling about the culture in which the metaphor originated.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
The Bible says in St. Paul's First Epistle to Timothy (3:8-12) that the qualifications for a deacon are thus:
"Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. And let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober-minded, faithful in all things. Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well."
And the qualification "husband of one wife" is repeated for presbyter (priest) and episkopos (bishop). Now either you believe this epistle is divinely inspired, or you're not a Nicene Christian. If you believe the pastoral epistles are forgeries, as suggested by higher criticism, you're implying that the Church that compiled the New Testament canon is in part based on lies. One would have to be confused to believe that while identifying as a Nicene Christian.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
I'm not saying that the letter isn't a forgery, necessarily; I don't know whether there is sufficient evidence to support that. But I don't see why we have to say it must be if we don't agree with a small aspect of it.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
@Justice: That's higher criticism. Higher criticism isn't necessarily true, and if it is, it means the Biblical canon was written in part by liars and the proto-orthodox were dupes.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
As the one conservative Christian here,
Guess this is where I should point out that I am too
I don't know, Gryphon. I'm not Paul, and I don't know what he was thinking when he wrote that passage. I know his background was Jewish and that the Jewish religious leaders were at least predominantly male, hence that particular speculation. But all I'm saying is that, the way I see it, one needn't dismiss an entire letter as fraudulent just because one doesn't entirely agree with its teachings, and I don't see why holding the belief that a small portion of the letter might be inaccurate should entail taking a side in an ancient religious dispute. To me that sounds like a false dichotomy.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
@Forsythe: A pleasant surprise! I offer my apologies for my mistake.
Still, if as many as 20% of scholars think it's legit, that's hardly an insignificant figure.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
I am so thoroughly lost right now it's not even funny.
And I had a religion class as a required subject for six years.
@Justice: "Pseudepigraphy was a commonly accepted practice in the ancient world" Do we have primary sources saying this? The fact the exact issue of the pastoral epistles was argued over within a century of Paul's death and no one mentioned that a work could be pseudoepigraphic and divinely inspired seems telling.
Just to throw the possibility out there, is it possible that there was uh, another guy named Paul writing the others?
I will grant that it has been a very long time since I last picked up a Bible with any intent of reading the new testament (the Old is far more interesting from a purely literary standpoint, IMO), but I don't recall there being much continuity between the epistles.
But unless the true meaning of the Bible is being beamed directly into your thoughts, you have to interpret the text yourself, i.e. you're reliant upon your opinions of its meaning.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
Though in any case, orthodox Christians have to take 1 Timothy as divinely inspired.
i get so angry sometimes i just punch plankton --Klinotaxis
the Plato to a Socrates, eh?
amusing.
What I think "divinely inspired" means is that they're more authoritative than any other human writings. To criticize them by the standards of 18th century skepticism or feminism or any other texts is exactly backwards for a Christian.
Silly?
Well, I don't really consider myself much of a Christian, but of all the biblical (and I do consider the Book of Enoch biblical, it's in a couple bibles. I know it's in the Ethiopian Church's offhand) books I've read, I will say that Enoch was among the oddest, but I wouldn't really call it silly.