UNPUBLISHED BOOK: GOOD ORDER IN THE CHURCH

Leslie McFall

4.2 "THERE IS NEITHER MALE NOR FEMALE IN CHRIST" (GALATIANS 3:28)

A feminist is a man or woman who believes that the gender distinction has been done away with in Christ; that there is no distinctive way in which Christian men and women should dress or behave in His Presence; that Scripture is no longer authoritative in man-woman relationships; that parts of its teachings are out-of-date and out-of-place in the twenty-first century; that it is for the Church to decide in every age what parts of Scripture it can choose to obey and what parts to ignore.

The more dangerous feminist is the man or woman who already is a member of an evangelical church and from within sows doubt about the Truth. Doubt is cast over the clarity of the Spirit's teaching by subtly suggesting that His spokesmen did not quite convey His teaching; that His spokesmen mixed their own, contemporary views with those of the Spirit's, but that occasionally the Spirit's teaching does break through in places, such as in Galatians 3:28, and that it is these "break-throughs"&emdash;these "flashes of insight" that were intended to be the "seed" of the New Gospel that would emerge in time.

This "seed," not surprisingly, is the liberation of women from the headship of man, which is put on a par with the liberation of the slave from his master; and the casting away of the degrading treatment and presentation of women that is said to be normal in the Old Testament. Paul, it is carefully hinted, had a foot in both camps. He preached the continuation of patriarchy on the one hand, but the liberation of women from it on the other. But the Spirit permitted this to happen knowing that He would safely guide the Church of the twenty-first century into the "liberty of the Gospel" as encapsulated in "seeds" He had planted within the written Revelation. He knew that when the twenty-first century arrived He would "open the eyes" of Church leaders to see the "true germ of the Gospel" that lay hidden in ancient seed-texts such as Galatians 3:28 and in the idea that "you are all one in Christ Jesus;" that there is now no distinction between men and women "in Christ." It took two thousand years, we are told, for this "seed" to germinate, as it did for the "seed" that led to the abolition of slavery.

The only regret that the supporters of the new "Gospel within the Gospel" have is that those whose eyes the Spirit has not opened are being left behind and in some cases are actively opposing the work of the Holy Spirit as the work of the Devil&emdash;and declaring it a "new Gospel." This opposition, they feel, is led by misguided or misinformed Christians of both academic and non-academic ability who are not in tune with the new spirit of liberation and democracy that pervades the modern world, and who are looking to the first-century for their customs and standards while living in the twenty-first century. They are to be pitied as spiritual schizophrenics.

The belief that there is an inherent "life-force" within this ancient "seed" which is unstoppable is said to be seen in the debating chambers/session meetings/synod meetings, etc., where slowly but surely the "seed" inherent in Galatians 3:28 is dominating the life of the Church all over the world. They point out that those who oppose this "movement of the Spirit" will be, and are being, left behind and their numbers will dwindle because they did not "go with the flow" of the age in which they lived: that they did not conform to the new age of liberty; that they were too busy studying their Bibles when they ought to have been out enjoying the new freedoms that have now pervaded every aspect of Christian life, worship and doctrine.

It has been shown throughout this work that this new presentation of an old idea, of a "Gospel within the Gospel" is false; that it is, in fact, a subtle attempt by misguided and misinformed church leaders to conform the Gospel to the spirit of the age in which they live (but not the Church). This is the Feminist Age. Every age produces a deadly challenge to the Truth of the Gospel. The most deadly and subtle are those that come from within the church leadership. Paul pointed out to the Ephesian Church elders, gathered on the shore to see him depart for the last time, that "wolves" (false teachers) would rise, not from outside the Church, but "from among you"&emdash;from among the church leaders. No member of a Church should ever trust a church leader or teacher who is tainted with any form of feminism&emdash;the spiritual AIDS of our generation. A leader infected with feminism or "spiritual AIDS" is to be avoided like the plague.

It is argued that Galatians 3:28 implies that Christian men and women are equal, and that it entitles them to serve in the ministry as if they were men, or on a par with men. The stock reply to this has been: It is written, "the head of every man is Christ, and the head of woman is man . . . . For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man" (1 Cor 11:3, 8-9). Just as man is not equal to Christ as regards authority, so neither is woman equal to man as regards authority; she is to be subject to man as man should be to Christ.

The Bishops at the Lambeth Conference in 1920 made the following observation on Galatians 3:28:

The oneness of the body allows, indeed implies, diversity of function. The passage does not touch the question of the character of the woman's functions in the Church. It does not in the least suggest that the functions of women are the same as the functions of men. It simply asserts that membership in the one body is not restricted by race or by social statues or by sex.

They might have pointed to Paul's teaching in Romans 3:22, "And we can all [male and female, free and slave, Jew and Gentile, etc.] be saved in the same way, by coming to Christ, no matter who we are or what we have been like." Likewise, in 3:29, he argued: "And does God save only the Jews in this way [i.e., "by faith in Christ"]? No, the Gentiles, too, may come to him in this same manner. God treats us all the same; all, whether Jews or Gentiles [and by implication male and female, free and slave] are acquitted, if they have faith" (Living Bible). Paul tells the Ephesian Christians (3:4-6):

In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to men in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God's holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are joint-heirs [with Israel], joint-body [with Israel], and joint-sharers [with Israel] in the promise in Christ Jesus.

These verses throw light on Galatians 3:28, because here Paul makes it plain that there is no Jew or Gentile in Christ. Both are heirs, both are members and both are sharers in the same promise of reconciliation through Christ Jesus. The key expression is "joint- [with Israel]," and that is precisely what Paul says again, but only negatively this time, in Galatians 3:28: "For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for as many as to Christ were baptized did put on Christ; there is not here [i.e., in putting on the image of Christ] Jew or Greek, there is not here servant or freeman, there is not here male and female, for all you are one in Christ Jesus." Note the emphasis on the oneness in Christ, not on their equality with one another.

L.J. Lietaert Peerbolte makes this point clear when he writes:

The thought Paul expresses by means of his description of the unity in Christ in Gal 3:28 is the fact that fundamental differences, even biological differences, no longer matter in Christ. The terms he uses for "man and woman," a!rsen kai\ qh=lu, verbally correspond to the LXX of Gen 1:27: a!rsen kai\ qh=lu e0poi/hsen au0touj. In his use of the words here Paul does not argue that there are no longer any differences between Jews and Greek, slave and free, male and female. Paul's argument is, that these differences no longer matter in Christ: the members of the Christian congregation are all united in Christ and within this Christian community social differences no longer matter.

The differences between slave and free continue after baptism into Christ, but their standing in Christ is the same. The differences between men and women continue after baptism into Christ, but their standing in Christ is the same. The slave and his master are treated the same by Christ. The man and the woman are treated the same by Christ. While the social (slave/master) and gender (male/female) distinctions remain after baptism they are to be transformed by living out their respective roles (one [slave/master] through accident of birth or misfortune, the other [male or female] by creation) conscious that they must have regard to Christ's headship of them at all times. It is "within Christ" that these class and gender distinctions can be used to the glory of Christ, not by crusading to abolish them, but by offering one's class, gender, etc. to Christ, and living out one's calling at the time one was called to follow Christ. If you are born a Jew, or circumcised, or male, or an AIDS victim, Irish, pigmy, or deformed, use this "calling" to the glory of Christ, for all such are united in, and members of, Christ's Body. If you called to be female then be female; and likewise, if you are born a man, then behave like a man and not like a woman. In this way you glorify your Maker who made men in His own image to be His glory, and made women to be man's glory.

It is taken for granted that no one interprets Galatians 3:28 to mean that when men and women become new creatures in Christ they are being gradually turned into sexless beings like the angels, or into unisex creatures. It is universally agreed that the sex distinctions remain after men and women are baptized into Christ.

Another text that throws light on Galatians 3:28 is Colossians 3:9-11, "Lie not one to another, having put off the old man with his practices, and having put on the new [man] which is renewed in regard to knowledge, after the image of the one creating him [i.e., the new man]; where there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, freeman&emdash;but the all and in all&emdash;Christ." (Cf. also 1 Cor 12:12-13.) Here Paul points out the oneness of the likeness to God in which all partake in Christ. This "image" is not "Greek" or "Jewish"; this "image" is not "male" or "female"&emdash;it is Christ's image&emdash;the New Man&emdash;the Second Adam, that all are baptized into. The renewed image is uniquely Christ's image and all (male and female, Jew and non-Jew) are being renewed in that one image in true knowledge, in true righteousness and holiness (Eph 4:24) if they are in Christ. This single image is referred to again in Ephesians 4:22-24, "You are to put off concerning the former behaviour the old man, that is corrupt according to the deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and to put on the new man, which, according to God['s creation] was created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore, putting away the lying, speak truth each with his neighbour, because we are members one of another." Once again note the idea of unity, not equality, here. All are constituted one body, and all share one "new man" image&emdash;Christ's image and Christ's body. The concept of equality is absent from all these texts. The emphasis is on oneness, unity, Christ's one image, Christ's one body.

That each of the national, social and gender distinctions remain in force after Christians have put on the one image that all share in common, is stated in Colossians 3:11: "Christ is in all things," i.e., in the list he has just enumerated: Jew, Gentile, foreigner, Sythian, slave, freeman, and he could have added, male and female. So the oneness works both ways: Christians are in Christ, and He is in Christians, whether they are male or female, Jew or non-Jew, slave or freeman. "I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you" (Jn 14:20).

It is a self-evident fact that all men are not born equal. In mental and physical capacity, heredity distributes its favours with uncompromising distinctiveness. There is a predetermined inequality in the genetic constitution of man. There is no equality between men. They may have a common gender which they share with the man Christ Jesus, but a common gender does not constitute all men equal. If this is the case within the male gender, then how great is the disparity between male and female! They are in different leagues: male and female created He them; they are poles apart as regards their gender and constitution.

Not by isolating one text&emdash;Galatians 3:28&emdash;from its context, but by comparing Scripture with Scripture, does it become clear that Paul is concerned to emphasize the oneness of the image into which all sorts and conditions of humankind are baptized. Whether Christians are black or white, English, Chinese or Indian, when they are baptized into Christ they all partake of the one image&emdash;Christ's. As an indispensable part of becoming a Christian, men and women are not baptized into a Jewish image, or a male image; they are baptized into Christ's image. To become a member of God's people before the coming of Christ one had to undergo Jewish circumcision. Circumcision was practised in other nations and religions but only the Jewish rite qualified one to become a member of the Old Testament Church. Similarly, there were many kinds of baptisms but Paul's Gospel is that only through Christ's baptism can one put on the image of Christ, which is open to all, male and female, Jew and non-Jew. "For all you are one [not equal] in Christ Jesus." All Christians partake of the one image, the one nature. They are not equal to Christ; they are one in Christ. Now just because all Christians partake of the one baptism and partake of the one Christ does not mean that God has done away with the gender distinction or His establishment of the headship of Man. Oneness has been confused with equality by many who exploit the words of Galatians 3:28. In what follows we will need to discern where and by whom this text is being exploited for purposes which are directly contradictory to what Paul teaches elsewhere. If this text is made to teach equality of the sexes then Christians ought to be on their guard because this is clear exploitation of the text.

Unaware of the misuse that Galatians 3:28 has been put to, many Christians feel that the bare words "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus' has actually brought about the present climate of "sexual equality" in the Church, so that it is now possible (for the first time in the Church's history) for women to be officially accepted into the Ministry of Word and Sacrament. What was latent in this seed-verse has become patent at last, they argue. Just as slavery was not condemned in the New Testament but eventually was phased out as the implications of the Gospel emerged, so many think that the barrier between male and female ministries must also be phased out. Just as it was inevitable that slavery would be abolished, so it is inevitable that the distinction between male and female in the Ministry will be abolished. This movement realises that many Christians opposed the abolition of slavery in the nineteenth century and that we are seeing the same situation all over again on the question of male/female distinctions. Those who oppose the abolition of the male/female distinction will eventually come round to see that they were opposing a movement of the Holy Spirit. In that day no one will think of trying to turn the clock back any more than they would try to bring back slavery. For these Christians, then, the present trend to introduce women into the Ministry is a hopeful sign for the future. They look forward to the day when the Church will have a woman Archbishop as head of the Anglican communion, just as we can have a woman as head of the secular state. They grieve over the deep-seated prejudice against women and feel that this has been perpetuated by having an all-male Ministry. They argue that the sooner this monopoly is broken the sooner will these prejudices evaporate. History shows, they say, that the best way to meet prejudice is to forge ahead and implement the new practice.

The theologians behind this movement are found continually expressing their thanks to the Holy Spirit for guiding the Church into the present favourable condition whereby for the first time women can be fully emancipated from twenty centuries of "slavery." They know it is going to be an upward and difficult struggle, just as the movement to abolish slavery in the 19th century was, but they are confident that their cause is just and so must eventually win the day, even if they meet many set-backs on the way. They feel privileged to be living through the spiritual revolution going on in the hearts and minds of Christians at this juncture of the Church's history. They are aware that this is the "work of the Holy Spirit" who is doing a "new thing in our midst" and are glad to know that their contribution is in some way part of the Spirit's work in bringing about this new era of unity and reconciliation. In this new era terms such as headship, submission, or subjection have no place; indeed they are the vocabulary of a by-gone age. One cannot ask a young, mature woman to get back into her school clothes; they belong to an earlier phase of her development which she is glad to have passed through. Therefore, to use these out-dated concepts in the modern situation is unhelpful and may even be offensive, we are warned.

Nearly every founder of a heretical sect had a woman to assist him (e.g., Simon Magnus had Helene, Montanus had Maximilla). One Montanist sect actually praised Eve for eating the fruit first, and applauded Miriam and the daughters of Philip who publicly expressed the right of women to prophesy. They allowed women to hold the offices of bishop, elder, and deacon, appealing to Paul's word in Galatians 3:28 for support. It is often argued that Galatians 3:28 is the voice of Paul reflecting one of his rare moments of insight and his other statements which oppose this one are the voice of Paul expressing his pre-Christian environment, feeling and thinking "in accordance with the social environment of his time." Is Paul divided? Is Paul confused? Has he reverted to his ingrained, rabbinical bias against women? If so, then why does he permit women to learn the Christian religion, when rabbinic advice was to keep them well away from learning Torah?

There is, however, another and equally large and influential body of Christians and scholars who would object to the analogy with slavery with regard to their opposition to having women in authority in the Church. They would point out that slaves were to remain slaves after their conversion to Christianity on the command of Christ (1 Cor 7:20-23). They were not to use Christianity nor the teaching of Galatians 3:28 as an excuse to desert their masters. They were called to be Christians in the situation which they were in when God called them. If they could become free legitimately they were to do so (1 Cor 7:21b). There are other texts and doctrines which make it difficult for the Christian to enslave another human being, but Galatians 3:28 is not one of them. For the discussion there is over faith and not Law as the means for all to be "one in Christ Jesus."

The New Testament does not advocate or support slavery. The writers of the New Testament lived in a culture where slavery was a fact of life (Eph 6:5-9; Col 3:22-4:1; 1 Tim 6:1-2; Titus 2:9-10; 1 Pet 2:18) but the writers were always looking at life from the viewpoint of eternity, or to be more accurate from the viewpoint of the Christian slave's relationship to Christ, and they loved to transform the earthly relations of "master" and "slave" so that the earthly "master" became the "slave" of the Lord Jesus, and the "slave" became "Christ's freeman." That relation was more significant than the earthly one which both master and slave must use to the glory of Christ, and not for their own profit. So whether a man was a slave or a master, both had Christ as their master. Substitute "employee" for slave, and "employer" for master, and the same texts will apply to those situations today: Christ is the Employer of both "employee" and "employer." All men have Christ as their direct head, and they are all responsible for their actions to Him, whether slave or master, employee or employer.

Conservative evangelical Christians have been wary of the false premise that "equality in some respects implies equality in all respects." Men and women are equal in having the same moral faculty; they are both human or "adam" (Gen 5:2), but does that somehow annul the fact that the "head of the woman is the man"? Christ and man are equally male, but does that mean that they are equal in all other respects?

Then there is the assumption that what is modern is more likely to be true. This is an idea largely produced by modern man's fascination with scientific and technological achievements where the equation on the whole holds good. It is when this rule-of-thumb is carried over into the religious sphere that many Christians have their doubts. Jesus went back to Genesis 2 for his teaching on divorce and the nature of marriage. Paul similarly, went back to Genesis 1 - 3 for the relationships between husbands and wives and men and women in the worship of God. Biblical history gives ample evidence of the decline and deterioration of pristine revelation among the people of God over a long period of time. Continually the prophets are having to call the people back to Yahweh's standards of morals. There is a natural process of moral and spiritual decay going on in every Christian's life, therefore he is told to "watch and pray." When Peter was looking for a model "Christian" woman to set before his new female converts he went back 2000 years to Sarah! and commended her submissive attitude and respect for her husband (1 Pet 3:6). When talking to herself, so not in a culturally conditioned act of polite address, she regarded her husband as her "lord" (Gen 18:12 [Heb. 13], )a3don|^; LXX [v. 12], o9 ku&rio&j mou ). The term indicates that Sarah was fully conscious of the implications of her womanhood and how she related to her husband from God's perspective. It also reveals her deeply respectful, inner attitude toward her husband that is taken to characterise her whole relationship to him. At the root level of her mind she had adopted a deeply submissive respect for him, the kind that one expects to find only between a man and God. She even obeyed her husband to the extent of telling lies on his behalf and putting her own life in danger, such was the depth and intensity of her love for him. The concept of a God-ordained headship, the fruit of which was patriarchy, penetrated her whole thinking and outlook.

It can also be argued that the patriarchal structure of Hebrew society was not an historical accident, but a provisionally prepared model for the Christian Church and the Christian family, grounded in creation and, though distorted by sin, redeemed in Christ and reaffirmed by the apostles Peter and Paul.

The movement to have women in the Ministry is not helped by certain of its advocates who, blinded by their own insight into the meaning of Galatians 3:28, regard any biblical verse or passage that contradicts this insight as either a "gloss" or an "interpolation."

Many commentators think that Galatians 3:28 means that women have been raised to the same authority status as men, something which they did not possess under the Old Covenant. Implied in this view is the idea that all women are now priests, whereas under the Old Covenant no woman was allowed into the priesthood (1 Pet 2:5). But since the Old Testament priesthood has passed away in Christ we now offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Christ's high-priesthood, and this is the privilege of the Church. Christians are exhorted in Romans 12:1 to offer themselves as "living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God&emdash;which is your spiritual worship." So while 1 Peter 2:5 and Romans 12:1 show that Christian men offer spiritual worship to God, they do not abolish the fact that the worshipping community comprises men, women and children, not to mention domestics and slaves. Peter a little further on in the same letter (3:1) says: "Wives . . . be submissive to your husbands . . . .," so that for him spiritual worship, and being submissive to one's husband were not two incompatible activities or callings.

As for Galatians 3:28 even the feminist advocate, Robin Scroggs, rightly points out that neither this text nor the context is concerned with the male/female relationship. He notes that in chapter four Paul draws upon the analogy of slave/free, the usefulness of which depends upon the reality of the distinction, not on its abolition. This raises the suspicion in his mind that the latter two pairs of 3:28 have been brought along by the rhetorical context, since they do not function within the thought-development of the Epistle. Recent studies appear to have got over the novelty of seeing Galatians 3:28 as a "breakthrough" into some kind of Christian utopian era and this text, with the other so-called "equality texts" (1 Cor 11:11-12; 1 Pet 3:7), are seen to have less to do with ecclesiology (doctrine of the church) than with soteriology (doctrine of salvation) and are, in fact, concerned to assert not equality but salvific unity within the body of Christ.

Robert Banks rightly observes that despite the way in which the verse has been generally interpreted, we do not have here an insistence upon the equality of men and women with one another so much as upon their unity in Christ, and remarks: "This drives deeper than so much of the modern debate in which the demand for equality rather than unity predominates."

Despite the many warnings that liberal and conservative scholars are tired of making that Galatians 3:28 has nothing to do with equality but with oneness, it is still possible to find some exploiting this text to suit their own ends. Some are just simply confused over the terms "equality" and "unity." For example, "Before God and in Christ 'there is neither male nor female.' We are equal." Unqualified statements like this are confusing. Equal in what way? Note the mistranslation "male nor female" which is typical of those who exploit Paul's words to suit their own agenda. The Greek reads: "male-and-female" indicating that Paul is viewing gender as a single entity like all the others in the list which are preceded by the negative particle. Paul did not say: ". . . there is not male, and there is not female . . . ." Rather he said: "There is not Jew and not Greek; there is not slave and not freeman; there is not male and female." There are five, not six, negatives. Paul is denying that in the "new man" there is "male and female," just as in the spirit world there is not "male and female." At the disembodied spirit level we will not be able to distinguish a "Jew" spirit from a "non-Jew" spirit. Nor will we be able to detect a "male" spirit from a "female" spirit, because at that level all such earthly distinctions will fall away and we will be like the angels in heaven&emdash;sexless, stateless and classless (apart from rewards?) (Mt 22:30). Some go to the other extreme and define God as comprising male AND female attributes, others that he is male and only man is made in his image (1 Cor 11:7; pointing out that Paul avoids saying that woman was made in God's image), others that God is female. God is not any of these: God is a spirit. Christ is not "male AND female"; nor is he "male or female."

In God's perfect creation and by deliberate design men and women were not created equal in three fundamental respects:

1. They differ in glory. Man is the glory of God: woman is the glory of Man (1 Cor 11:7).

2. They differ in point of origin. Man's life came from God directly: Woman's came from Man's living body (1 Cor 11:8).

3. They differ in purpose. Man was created for God (cf. Gen 2:5b): Woman was created for Man (cf. Gen 2:18; 1 Cor 11:9).

These three areas of difference were designedly deliberate in the pre-Fall world and they are the model for all Christian men and women to respect and conform their lives to after conversion. Consequently we must be careful to define those aspects of their being where they are equal and those where they are not equal.

Scripture makes it clear that as regards the "moral image," God has given man and woman the same moral faculty which distinguishes them from the animal creation. They both share "human life." Even at the physical level they each have two eyes, arms and legs! However, Woman derived her life-force from Man, and he derived his directly from God.

In consequence of this order of creation and because one was made male and the other female, Man was made head of the Woman and that in a perfect world. At this level there cannot be equality between Man and Woman because you cannot have a headship relation between two equals, as we noted under section 1 above. To talk of "sexual equality" between two things which are totally different, such as male and female, is meaningless. Sexually, men and women are not equal; they are not the same; God made them "male and female," not two males or two females which would be equality! But some are guilty of arguing from "sexual equality" to "equal ministry" for women. God gave Man and Woman predetermined roles and it is this that the world seeks to break down. Their interdependence is based on sexual differentiation.

It will not do to obscure the New Testament teaching about husband-headship by appealing to Galatians 3:28: "there is neither male nor female." While in the eschaton, of which we are already members, that is true, until the redemption of our bodies we still participate in the first creation with its distinction between the sexes. The biblical instructions regarding the distinctive roles of men and women, of husbands and wives, address that obvious reality and serve the best interests of both sexes.

Possibly no text has been so abused as this one in the hands of the women's lib movement. It has been stripped of its context to become the pretext for overthrowing God's lawful authority structures in the family and the Church.

END OF SECTION