1 Timothy 2:8-15 (NKJV) reads:
I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting; in like manner also, that the women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with propriety and moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, but, which is proper for women professing godliness, with good works. Let a woman learn in silence with all submission. And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression. Nevertheless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control.
There're many challenging and controversial passages in the bible, this one is at the top of the list as it was written in such strong language against women and thus it had earned a bad reputation for the whole church for being misogunistic.
The passage isn't
against women; it's for the spiritual authority God has invested in men that is given to them for the spiritual protection and health of women and the Church entire. In
1 Timothy 2:8-15, Paul doesn't prohibit women from teaching in the Church
completely, only from teaching men
as a spiritual authority over them, which is to say, in the capacity of an Elder/Pastor/Bishop. I have benefited many times and deeply from the spiritual insight of godly women. But none of these women shared their insight from the role of an Elder/Pastor/Bishop over me; and it wasn't necessary to being either insightful or impactful spiritually that they were occupying the role of Elder/Pastor/Bishop.
On face value, it bars women from church leadership with no wiggle room, on top of that it also restricts women with a repressive dress code and affirms the traditional gender roles, that men are born as leaders, women are mere "helpers" for house chores and childrearing.
??? This is a "Strawman" of what Paul actually wrote, a cartoonish, contorted version of his apostolic commands. He didn't bar women from leadership in the Church, only from the role of Elder/Pastor/Bishop that would put them in spiritual authority over men.
And the only restriction Paul put on women's attire is that it be modest, which is to say, not vain and showy. Should he have encouraged women to dress
immodestly, to dress in a manner that encouraged and communicated vanity? Do you think he taught something different for men; that they could dress immodestly when women couldn't? Nothing in anything that he wrote in the NT even hints at such a double-standard. So, why are you fussing about a standard of modesty for women's attire? How would an immodest dress code comport with Christ's own teaching to us all to be humble, self-denying and holy?
Where does Paul indicate that men are "born leaders" and women "mere helpers"? He wrote neither of these things in his letter to Timothy. Men often tend toward passivity, many of them preferring to be led rather to lead. Perhaps this is, in part, why God insists that they lead spiritually. And what does it mean to be a "mere helper"? Women were leaders in the Early Church, given mention as such in the NT, though they also birthed children and tended to matters of homemaking. These things aren't mutually-exclusive.
The worst part is the reference from Gen. 2 and 3 as a theological reasoning for this instruction, that women are not only physically inferior, as Eve was created second from Adam, but also intelletually inferior, as Eve was gullible and deceived while Adam was not, despite the fact that Adam was held accountable by God for the fall, and today women vastly outnumber men in college, in some places it's as high as two women per man.
Again, you're distorting what Paul actually wrote, assigning meaning to his words they don't actually contain. Eve was deceived
before Adam was, as Paul indicated, encouraging her husband into sin, but this doesn't mean she was intellectually inferior to Adam, or more gullible. Paul draws neither of these conclusions, stating only that Eve being deceived first disqualifies women from having spiritual authority over men.
This section is not an isolated case, there're many similar instructions in Paul's letters that corroborate this message with a negative image of women that are hurtful to take in:
But every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, for that is one and the same as if her head were shaved. (1 Cor. 11:3)
Let your women keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak; but they are to be submissive, as the law also says. And if they want to learn something, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is shameful for women to speak in church. (1 Cor. 14:34-35)
And besides they (younger widows, applicable to modern single women) learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house, and not only idle but also gossips and busybodies, saying things which they ought not. Therefore I desire that the younger widows marry, bear children, manage the house, give no opportunity to the adversary to speak reproachfully. (1 Tim. 5:13-14)
Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. (Eph. 5:22-24. Timothy was in charge of the Ephesian church at the time).
These are only "hurtful" passages of Scripture if you've taken up a modern, misanthropic second or third-wave feminism and through it assess what Paul wrote. Such feminism prompts you to massage Paul's words into anti-woman rhetoric, jumping to conclusions about his thinking that are unwarranted - as your remarks above illustrate.
In any case, anyone who comes to God's word proposing to be its inspector and judge misunderstands profoundly what God's word really is. Until you allow God's word to inspect and judge you, reading it will be pretty useless.
This makes me wonder if we have a flawed understanding of the principle "Sola Scriptura". It's never supposed to indicate that "the bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it". We need external sources about the the cultural and historic context to get a grip on Paul's true intention with these passages.
All you're doing here is making room for secular, cultural ideas that you've embraced but that the Bible condemns. Essentially, you're doing the "Has God really said?" thing, like the devil did with Eve in Eden and with Christ during his forty days in the wilderness. But doing so necessarily diminishes and weakens God's word in your thinking, contorting it to take the shape
you want it to have rather than dealing with it as it is: the objective, universally-authoritative word of
GOD. This attitude toward Scripture creates fertile ground for self-deception and error, for compromise with the World, which is why the devil is so keen to have us attack the Bible's authority, to doubt God's word.
Hebrews 4:12
12 For the word of God is living, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
