This series is adapted from Sunday School lessons I wrote several years ago for women and teen girls. The goal was to form a “theology of woman” by looking chronologically at all of the major portions of Scripture regarding women and womanhood. What does the Bible say are the roles, duties, challenges, and opportunities that we have as women?
Introduction
“There were two lines of husbands in heaven, one for the dominant husbands and one for the passive, submissive husbands. The submissive husband line extended almost out of sight. There was one man in the dominant husband line. He was small, timid, appeared anything but a dominant husband. When the angel inquired as to why he was in this line, he said, ‘My wife told me to stand here’.”1
We laugh at this story because we see how far it falls short of the true heavenly ideal. As we examine a number of passages, we will see that God’s design for the roles of men and women is male headship and female submission.
The Role of Men: Headship
An Example of Headship
“For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior” (Ephesians 5:23 ESV).
Christ Himself is shown as an example of headship. He is Head over the man (1 Corinthians 11:3), over the Church (Ephesians 1:22; Colossians 1:18), and over all authority (Colossians 2:10). In a similar way to Christ’s authority over his Church, so also does the husband have authority over his wife.
The Theology of Headship
“But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God” (1 Corinthians 11:3 ESV).
The relationship between men and women is a reflection of the relationship among the members of the Trinity in two ways:
- Equality in person
All three members of the Trinity are equal in being. They are each fully God. Similarly, both men and women are of the same spiritual value in the eyes of God, as Peter points out in 1 Peter 3:7:
“Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered” (emphasis added).
- Difference in roles
The roles of the members of the Trinity differ from one to the other. The Father is over the Son and Spirit. The Son is under the Father and over the Spirit. The Spirit serves both the Father and Son. Likewise, though equal in worth in the eyes of God, the roles of men and women are different—men lead and women follow.
The Role of Women: Submission
We can think of the role of women in submission in terms of the home and the church.
Submission in the Home
“Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands” (Ephesians 5:22-24 ESV).
As the Church is commanded to submit to Christ, its Head, so also is the wife to submit to the husband, her head. The word submit means “to place or rank under, to subject.”2 Wives are to submit to their husbands in everything.3 A woman can beautifully picture the relationship of the Church to Christ through her own submissive attitude towards her husband.
Interestingly, in the Greek, verse 22 does not have the word submit. The word has been added to aid understanding, but the idea flows from verse 21: “Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Thus, verse 22 continues with the idea of submission: “Wives. . . [submitting to your] own husbands.”
Some claim that verse 21 refers to a mutual submission in which husbands and wives submit to each other in the same way. Thus, the wife is not required to submit to her husband specifically as one who has authority over her. This false idea of submission is an attempt to negate the biblical command for wives to submit to their husbands.
Rather, Paul begins his series of commands to husbands and wives with a command in verse 21 to “be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.” This subjection to one another is evidence that one is filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18). Paul goes on to apply this principle of subjection to one another to child/father relationships, as well as slave/master relationships (Eph 6:1-9).
One author explains,
Believers should not insist on getting their own way, so there is a general sense in which husbands are to have a submissive attitude to wives, putting their wives’ interests before their own, and similarly parents to children and masters to slaves. But this does not eliminate the more specific roles in which wives are to submit to husbands, children to parents, and slaves to masters (emphasis added).4
Submission in the Church
A woman’s demeanor
Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but every wife who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, since it is the same as if her head were shaven. For if a wife will not cover her head, then she should cut her hair short. But since it is disgraceful for a wife to cut off her hair or shave her head, let her cover her head (1 Corinthians 11:4-6 ESV).
During the time of the early church, women were allowed to pray and prophesy publicly in church. The gift of prophecy was unique to the early church and is not applicable today for men or women.
In the Corinthian culture of the day, women wore head coverings to show both their femininity (i.e., their distinction from men) and submissive attitude.
Paul’s point was that women were allowed to minister in the church, but they were to do so in a feminine way that did not usurp male headship.
A woman’s silence
Two passages explain how a woman shows submission through “silence” in the church.
- In 1 Corinthians 14:34, Paul says that “the women should keep silent in the churches.” The problem Paul was addressing was the inclusion of women as prophets in the judgment of male prophecy (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:34-35). A woman’s publicly judging a man’s prophecy in church contradicted Paul’s previous teaching in 1 Corinthians 11 that women were to submit to the male leadership.
- In 1 Timothy 2:11, Paul says, “Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness.” Paul here commands women not to teach or exercise authority over men, because teaching evidences one’s authority (1 Timothy 2:12). Women are not to have authority over men in the church.
A woman’s service
Submission to men does not negate a woman’s ministry in the church; it simply guides it:
Women participated in ministry in the Scriptures, but their ministry was a complementary and supportive ministry, a ministry that fostered and preserved male leadership in the church. Thus the ministry of women in the church was notable and significant, but it never supplanted male leadership; instead, it functioned as a support to male leadership. This view does not rule out all ministry for women. Instead, it sees the ministry of women as complementary and supportive (emphasis added).5
Several examples in the New Testament show how women served in the church under the leadership of men:
- In Acts 18:24-26, Aquila and his wife Priscilla explained Scripture more accurately to Apollos. Priscilla’s involvement in the private explanation was under the leadership of and alongside her husband.
- In Titus 2:3-5, Paul instructs Titus to make sure the older women were teaching the younger women. Women can have a teaching ministry to other women in the church.
- Paul also commends various women for their labor with him, for him, and for the sake of the Gospel (Romans 16:1-4, 6; Philippians 4:2-3).
Man is the head of the woman. In the home, this should be evidenced by a wife’s submitting to her husband in all things. In the church, this should be evidenced by a woman’s submitting to her husband’s leadership (if married) as well as to the male leadership in the church. Women should still take advantage of the many opportunities to minister within the church.
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Photo by Will Truettner on Unsplash
- 10,000 Sermon Illustrations: Logos electronic edition. [↩]
- Robert L. Thomas, in New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries : Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998). [↩]
- This never means that a woman must accept abuse from her husband. Any woman suffering from any form of abuse should seek help from her pastor and any necessary law enforcement. [↩]
- Andrew T. Lincoln, Ephesians, vol. 42 of Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, 1990), 366. [↩]
- Thomas R. Schreiner, “The Valuable Ministries of Women in the Context of Male Leadership: A Survey of Old and New Testament Examples and Teaching.” Online: https://bible.org/seriespage/valuable-ministries-women-context-male-leadership. [↩]