Historical and Social Factors that influenced Christian Developments Flashcards
(23 cards)
Strict traditional views
- Conservative Evangelical churches
- Catholic church
- Orthodox Church
- Some CoE
More liberal views
- Society of friends- Quakers
- Some CoE
Positive attitudes towards the role/status of women in the NT
- P: Jesus regarded women highly.
E: He taught them the same way he taught men, for example eating with Mary and Martha.
E: He also defended a woman who anointed him during a meal at Bethany - P: Jesus was accompanied by women at his ministry, and they assisted at his burial.
E: Women were also the first to witness his resurrection.
St Paul:
- Pheobe was a female deacon at the time of St Paul and he wrote to the Roman CHristians to show him respect.
- Paul quote: ‘For there is no male or female. you are all one in Christ.’
-St Paul calls Junia an apostle.
-
Negative attitudes towards women seen in the NT
- Role of women in Jesus’ life was merely to care for his needs. They did not preach, and none of the disciples were men. (Feminist view)
- St Paul: ‘Women should remain quiet in the churches. They must be in submission, as the law says. It is disgraceful for a woman to speak in Church.’
- Also Paul: ‘I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man.’ He bases this in the doctrine of The Fall: ‘It was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.’
- Also Paul: ‘Wives, submit yourselves to your husband, as you do to the Lord.’
Pre Nineteenth Century views on women
Quotes:
- Tertullian: ‘Women are the devil’s gateway.’
- Augustine of Hippo: ‘The fall has damned mankind and it is the fault of women.’
Key date:
In the 5th Century, the Church Councils banned women from being ordained as deacons, and the Pope stated his opposition to women’s involvement in celebrating the Eucharist.
Roles of women:
- Generally restricted to marriage and motherhood.
Pre Nineteenth Century views on woman (Celibacy)
- Celibacy was developed, which gave women the choice to escape male domination and motherhood.
- This offered opportunity for study and some women rose to high positions.
Key examples:
- Hildegard of Bingen was an important Abbess, and wrote poetry and music. Medical men consulted her for healing herbs.
- Julian of Norwich wrote on religious matters. She wrote ;as truly God is our Father, so truly God is our Mother.’- Revelations of Divine Love
Women in the 19th Century
- The industrial revolution: generally women stayed at home to look after the house and children. Some women took on work for extra money.
- After the Enlightenment: bigger focus on reason and education, so some women started to receive more education.
-1870 Education Act: universal primary education for girls and boys
BUT: very few women held suffrage and husbands had rights over their wives’ bodies.
Women in the 19th Century (2)
Catherine Booth, wife of General Booth who founded the Salvation Army, argued:
‘God has given women a graceful form and attitude, persuasive speech and, above all, a finely tuned emotional nature, all which appear qualifications for public speaking.’- Female ministry: Women’s Right to preach the Gospel
Women in the 19th Century (3)
- First World War: Women played a key role in keeping the country going, forcing society to reassess their status.
- Women were given suffrage in 1918 if they were over 30.
-The attitude towards women began to shift, and the challenge became how to interpret passages in the NT that seemed to oppose the empowerment of women.
Social and Legal status of Women Today
- Varied depending on where you live in the world
- In the UK, it is illegal to discriminate against women at work. Although, there are some exceptions, for example Catholics do not accept female priests.
-‘The Glass Ceiling’: an invisible barrier that prevents women from reaching a certain level in the heirarchy. For example, there are more men in senior roles because women take maternity leave and therefore miss out on promotions.
Development of Biblical Criticism
- Protest Reformation: allowed people to study the Bible in their own language, instead of having to rely on Church doctrine or an intermediary priest to interpret it for them.
- The content of the Bible became key for the reformers as a principle guide for Christian belief and practise, as opposed to the authority of the Church.
- This gave some people the ability to interpret a particular passage of scripture in light of its context, for example the surrounding passages of the NT.
- Protestant Christians claimed the freedom to challenge traditional interpretations of scripture.
Key Terms for Biblical Criticism:
Liberal theology= an approach to biblical scholarship that aimed to analyse the Bible and Christian teaching using modern thought informed by reason and science.
Biblical Criticism= studying the bible using a range of different approaches to come to a fuller understanding. Liberal Biblical Criticism sees the bible as a text that is subject to analysis just like any other kind of writing.
Key Terms for Biblical Criticism (2)
Higher Criticism= how different passages and books relate to each other.
Lover Criticism= examining the content, language, and meaning of individual passages to identify the precise meaning of the original words.
Fundamentalism= early 20th Century movement which regarded certain beliefs as fundamental to christianity. These include: Biblical inspiration and infallibility of scripture, the virgin birth, belief in Christ’s death as the atonement for sin, and Jesus’ bodily resurrection.
Key Features of Biblical Criticism:
- Language in which the text was written, including differences in the early copies of the text. For example, in Mark’s account of Jesus healing a man with leprosy, most texts have the Greek word ‘filled with anger’, but some early manuscripts have ‘filled with anger.’
- Literary genres, for example considering whether a given book is a historical account, poetry or a letter.
- An understanding of the cultural context from which a text sprang. For example, considering whether the subordination to women verses in Ephesians reflects the cultural ‘blinkers’ of the 1st Century writer, rather than God’s purpose for marriage.
Challenges to Biblical Literary Criticism
Some disagree that the Bible can be treated or analysed like an ordinary text.
1) - Karl Barth: the Bible is not a book to be understand in a modern context by critical study. It is an inspired text which confronts and challenges enlightenment values of reason and science.
- The Bible is the measure by which science and reason are judged, not vice versa. Scripture should judge reason, but reason should not judge science. This view is supported by many evangelical Christians.
Challenges to Biblical Literary Criticism (2)
2) Fundamentalism/literalism:
- The Bible is the infallible word of God, so the role and status of women in the Bible is not up for debate. It is wrong to study the Bible critically.
- The same rules that applied to First Century Palestine should continue to apply today.
Bible passages for gender equality:
Paul: ‘I commend to you our sister Pheobe, a deacon of the Church. I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of his people’
‘You are all children of God through faith. There is neither jew nor Gentile, nor is there male or female. You are all one in Jesus Christ.’- Galatians.
Tryphaena and Tryphosa- ‘all wroked hard in the Lord.’
Bible passages against gender equality
‘Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord.’- Ephesians
‘Slaves obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, just as you would obey Christ.’- Ephesians. This author accepts existing power dynamics between wives and husbands, but emphasises that mutual love should guide it.
Critical Examination of 1 Timothy 2:8-15 (Passage)
‘I do not permit a woman to teach or assume authority over a man, she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first then Eve.’ But women will be saved through childbearing.’
Critical examination of 1 Timothy 2:8-15 (1)
Original language- Greek. The word ‘authentein’ has been translated as ‘assuming authority over’, but we cannot be certain of this meaning since this word only occurs once in scripture. In the time the letter was written, it has sexual connotations in the sense of ‘leading someone on’- which would change the meaning behind the letter.
Critical examination of 1 Timothy 2:8-15 (2)
- Form of the writing- letter, unlikely to be written by St Paul. We only know one side of the exchange, so we cannot know what issue the author was advising on.
- Background of the passage- Women did not have much formal education and so would be more likely to misunderstand teachings. Ephesus was also the most important centre for fertility worship in the region, and many converts came from that background; some of the women would have been temple prostitutes.
Critical examination of Corinthians 14:34-35 (passage)
‘Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their husbands at home; it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.’
Critical examination of Corinthians 14:34-35 (1)
- It is possible that this passage is a later addition to the text, based on 1 Timothy 2:8-15, because a number of early manuscripts omit this verse. This may suggests it is less important to take it seriously.
