Sarah Sumner on the Need for Integrity in the Comp Egal Debate

Sarah Sumner writes in:

When I spoke of integrity [in the June 2008 Christianity Today article quoted here; go here for further discussion] what I meant is that the women's debate is calling us to exercise more honesty. If everyone would be more honest, we could at least see that both sides are genuinely being "biblical," and that both sides tend to marginalize certain verses they don't seriously want to embrace to the point of embracing them and promoting them to their readers.  The egalitarian bias of calling certain verses "problem verses" and the complementarian bias of calling Judges such an abnormal time in history that God's choice of Deborah doesn't count -- prevent us from being open-handedly honest. So I think the unresolve is largely a matter of a breach of integrity on both sides.

Personal integrity and corporate integrity. It's just so tempting to politicize the Scriptures instead of exegeting them fairly.

(personal communication, used by permission)

Here is a complete list of posts in this series:

• What is the Debate between Complementarians and Egalitarians really about?
• The Comp Egal Debate: Honesty is Such a Lonely Word
• The Comp Egal Debate: What does it mean that “the husband is the head of the wife”?
• The Comp Egal Debate: A Distorted View of Headship
• The Comp Egal Debate: A biblical definition of a wife’s submission to her husband
• The Comp Egal Debate: A “purely” historical take on Ephesians 5:22-33
• Sarah Sumner on the Need for Integrity in the Comp Egal Debate

Comments

[scott gray]

john, sarah--

i'm not arguing with the 'exegesis through integrity' process at all. i'm all for it. sarah, there is nothing unreasonable about your conclusion at all, from the point of exegetical integrity.

my concern is this: even through exegesis with integrity, some of the conclusions are immoral and unethical. and once you've argued yourself there, now what? how much authoritative weight do we give to the exegetical conclusion? do we set the text aside as no longer a source of wisdom? do we hedge the results so that one's exegetical conclusions match one's moral and ethical beliefs? do we force the conclusions on one's faith community (ad intra morals and ethics), because the sacred text and the exegetical conclusion say so? do we impose the conclusions on the world or culture at large (ad extra morals and ethics)? should faith communities limit women's involvement in leadership, for the sake of the text and exegetical conclusion? in america's liberal democracy, based on the exegetical conclusion, should we encourage limiting women's involvement in leadership in the culture at large (no women in the senate, house of representatives, president positions) by lobbying, financial contributions, and voting?

the conclusion is fine, and discerned with exegetical integrity. how do we then live out the conclusion morally and ethically? and if the purpose of the exegetical discernment is not to influence our moral and ethical behaviors and outcomes, then what is it for?

peace--

scott

[JohnFH]

Scott,

I am curious as to where you get the notion from the Bible that the involvement of women in politics should be limited.

I don't think the Bible settles the question either way. It's like that with a lot of things.

Understood as a set of guidelines or parameters - a very reductive understanding, to be sure - on many issues, the Bible is a big tent.

This has always bothered ideologists of both the right and the left. So ideologists who look to the Bible to vindicate their cultural choices are forced to distort the texts to their own ends. These same ideologists end up riding roughshod over people, too.

Pretty soon everyone but those who think exactly like them are thrown under the bus. Unless, of course, those in disagreement can be manipulated as useful idiots.

It's a very old movie, if you ask me, seen a thousand times. But some people never tire of seeing it again.

[scott gray]

john--

faith communities are constantly reaching exegetical conclusions and then forcing their moral and ethical responses on cultures at large. in the case of women in authoritative roles, perhaps not as much so (these days), but certainly in the area of abortion and homosexual unions. again, i'm not arguing about the integrity of any exegetical conclusion. my question is, once we've reached that conclusion, what ever it is, if we feel it requires a moral or ethical response, what do we do with it when the response is immoral or unethical?

[JohnFH]

Scott,

the examples you give are telling: abortion and homosexual unions. In the case of the first, at stake is not so much an exegetical conclusion, but an approach to life in general. To suggest that pro-abortionists have morality and ethics on their side whereas pro-lifers are immoral and unethical simplifies, at the very least, the debate. Furthermore, almost everyone admits that the situation in the US, where abortion is very frequent, at levels which in many European countries would be considered completely unacceptable, is a tragedy.

The question of homosexual unions is also complex. The phenomenon of homosexuals wanting to have the right to marry and adopt children is virtually a complete novum in the history of human culture. It is, as sociologists sometimes point out, a measure of the tremendous appeal of traditional Judeo-Christian values. That's one side of the question. On the other side is the judgment, expressed for example by the Catholic Catechism but very widely held by people of all kinds, religious and non-religious, that homosexual behavior is "intrinsically disordered," or "against nature."
There is nothing counter-intuitive about such a judgment. The opposite is the case. That being so, I don't think it's fair to describe those who are not in favor of gays and lesbians as having the right to marry as immoral and unethical. You have to go back to first principles, and on first principles, there is far from complete agreement.

This is where I imagine we might agree: the Bible does not represent a short-cut in the hard work of making responsible ethical decisions. Some people look to the Bible for such a shortcut. They often end up distorting its words.

On the other hand, I don't see how one can just dismiss the Bible's teaching when it doesn't agree with your own sense of right and wrong. More precisely, you are free to do that, but only insofar as you place yourself at the margins of the Jewish or Christian tradition, or outside of both altogether.

[scott gray]

john--

i feel i'm derailing your topic here, and i don't want to get you so far afield, so i'll email you instead...thanks for the fun thinking!

[JohnFH]

Thank you, Scott, for being engaging as always. You are remarkably good at sticking up for your sense of right and wrong, but not pushing it to unreasonable lengths. You help me to do the same - or so I hope.

It's a pleasure to converse with you.

[Iyov]

I don't think it's fair to describe those who are not in favor of gays and lesbians as having the right to marry as immoral and unethical.

This is a false analogy.

A valid analogy is: what is the moral/ethical stance of those who argue that homosexuals be treated as second class citizens, forced to undergo hormone treatment (e.g., Alan Turing), and imprisoned (e.g., Oscar Wilde, Bowers v. Hardwick [see also Lawrence v. Texas], Nazi concentration camps).

I argue violence against homosexuals is immoral. I also argue that violence against women is immoral.

Bringing the question of same-sex marriage into the discussion is an ignoratio elenchi.

[JohnFH]

Iyov,

you make an important distinction. I was following up on Scott's queries, which were specific.

Violence against minors, women, GLBT people, ex-gays, is immoral. Violence against anyone is immoral.

But that doesn't go far enough. John Stott, sometimes referred to as "Mr. Evangelical," in his book Same-Sex Partnerships? A Christian Perspective (1998), provides a theological rationale for the decriminalization of adultery and homosexuality. To those with little international experience (not your case), that may seem like beating a dead horse. But it isn't.

In a pluralistic setting, a number of (from one religious point of view or another) actionable offenses need to become of no interest in a court of civil law. It is, of course, not at all clear where to draw the line (example: polygamy; or, from another point of view, the mutilation of female genitals).

I am fully aware that Jews, Catholics, the Orthodox - and Protestants too, until recently - saw and sometimes continue to see things quite differently.

[Eclectic Christian - Michael Bell]

Hi John,

I have enjoyed lurking on your blog from time to time.

I have started a series on a similar theme. The first post is on Alternatives to Division - #1: The Christian and Missionary Alliance and the Role of Women as Elders and can be found at: http://eclecticchristian.wordpress.com/2008/06/13/when-we-cant-agree-1-the-christian-and-missionary-alliance-and-women-as-elders/

Mike Bell

[JohnFH]

Michael,

I appreciate your commitment to reconciliation among Christians on both sides of this issue.

This is what I've noticed on issues of this kind.

Some people are fine with reconciliation so long as the tide is going their way. Otherwise they are not. In the latter case, reconciliation is insincere, a power play.

[Don]

I admire Sumner's attempt, I wish her well. As an egal, I find her contrast a little unfair.

P.S. I want to have integrity in what I teach.

FWIIW, I do not call the "women" verses problem verses, but I do say they are puzzling or more technically crux verses. Perhaps the egals that used that term "problem" could have used a better term. From their POV, it was a problem and they used their POV in their writing. I see this as a minor point.

But this is contrasted by the biased reading of Deborah by non-egals? I see this as major in comparison.

In other words, if Sumner needs to look for a word improvement in some egal writing to contrast with the non-egal bias on Deborah, the egals are doing pretty good.

I guess she is trying to dink both sides and thereby claim a middle position. Despite all the verbiage, the questions boil down to, Biblically in the new covenant are males to be over females in home and church or not? The non-egals says males are to be leaders over females in both areas and the egals say both genders are to be leaders in both areas and I do not see a middle ground. If someone else sees something I am missing, please post it.

[JohnFH]

Don,

It is my observation that there is not much difference in practice between the way comps and egals exercise and delegate authority when it comes to home and family so long as 1 Cor 13's definition of love is being used as a baseline. Many comp families and many egal families are, within the usual human limitations, models of peace and love because 1 Cor 13 and the larger biblical witness relating to the exercise of authority as exemplified in Christ are taken seriously.

Comps and egals differ among themselves, not just over against each other, about who, in a particular family, has been given the task of handling the finances, cooking, gardening, child-rearing, etc., in what areas consultation is expected, in what areas not.

A stickier wicket concerns what roles women are to exercise in the church. Should they be allowed to be presbyters and/or bishops? Neither scripture nor tradition provide a resounding "yes" to that question. I don't have much truck with egals who pretend otherwise.

Still, I am an egal, and I see the blessings women pastors bring with them with my own eyes. I understand the reality I see as one fulfillment of the famous prophecy of Joel which Peter quoted on the birthday of the Chruch, Pentecost long ago.

[Don]

FWIIW, I base my belief that church leadership ministry is based on giftedness and not gender on my understanding of Scripture and a little tradition as some backup. Of course, I do not start with the puzzling verses, but I do cover them. And others can disagree as we know.

[JohnFH]

One person's puzzling verses are another person's anchors for a different position.

It is worth stepping back and reflecting on how people reach the conclusions that they do on this issue, and why some people start out as comp and become egal while others start out as egal and become comp.

[Don]

Yes, of course. I used to be benign non-egal as that was what I was taught until a Christian counselor suggested I study this more.

I sent a note to the EC admin who wrote you misrepresented egal positions.

[JohnFH]

Thanks, Don. You're a gem.