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By Robert J. Willis, Ph.D.
Published on our website
with his permission
Introduction
On October 15, 1976 Pope Paul VI approved the
“Declaration on the Question of the Admission of Women to the Ministerial
Priesthood,” Inter Insigniores. The Sacred Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) prepared and published this work. It concluded that
“the Church . . . does not consider herself authorized to admit women to
priestly ordination” (Intro., para. 5). Its principal theological
rationale stems from the following:
The Christian priesthood is therefore of a sacramental nature. The
priest is a sign, the supernatural effectiveness of which comes from the
ordination received, but a sign that must be perceptible and which the faithful
must be able to recognize with ease. . . . In such a case it would be difficult
to see in the minister the image of Christ. For Christ himself was and remains
a man (para. 27).[1]
The document does not elucidate its understanding of “with
ease,” nor does it explain how modern Christians may easily
recognize Christ, a man of the people, in the splendor of a wealthy Church, or
may without much difficulty uncover the image of a meek and humble Christ
draped in the hierarchical trappings of a medieval monarchy.
Twelve years later, on August 15, 1988, Pope John Paul II reaffirmed the
Vatican’s position. He noted: “in calling only men as his Apostles,
Christ acted in a completely free and sovereign manner.”[2] He followed
that up in 1994 with a letter to the bishops of the world. Seeking to cut off,
forever, any and all discussion concerning women priests, he asserted with
blunt finality:
… the church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly
ordination on women and this judgment is to be definitively held by all the
Church’s faithful.[3]
Given such authoritative pronouncements, one might conclude that the
question no longer exists. Wrong! Since then the Anglican Church, whose
apostolic succession Rome recognizes, has ordained women priests and
consecrated women bishops. Some daring Catholic bishops, moreover, have defied
the Vatican; they have validly, if illicitly in Rome’s eyes, ordained
women as priests. These women-priests currently serve many Catholic faithful.
Their parishioners report scant difficulty in beholding in them, “with
ease,” the image and presence of Christ. Moreover, professional
theologians have challenged the Vatican’s argumentation. The renowned
biblical scholar, John L. McKenzie, minced no words in his assessment of the
Congregation’s declaration: “The church is never served well by bad
scholarship. I cannot think of any pontifical document which departed so from
the methods of sound learning as this document.”[4] Herbert McCabe, O.P.,
editor of New Blackfriars, a prominent Catholic journal in England, with
obvious disdain dismissed the declaration:
We refer, of course, to the ludicrous Declaration on Women and the
Priesthood which takes about 6000 words to say that nothing must ever happen
for the first time. It is full of superb non-sequiturs of which my favourite is
the argument that the equality of the sexes is irrelevant since the priesthood
is not a human right. The argument, of course, is not whether anybody has a
“right” to the priesthood but whether anybody has the right to refuse
it to someone simply on the grounds of her sex.[5]
Today, we should consider the Congregation’s declaration and John
Paul’s letter in the context of a Biblical Commission Report on the
question of ordaining women. In 1997, three years after the Pope’s
directive for non-discussion, it concluded: “It does not seem that the New
Testament by itself will permit us to settle in a clear way once and for all
the problem of the possible accession of women to the
presbyterate.”[6]
As I write The New York Times reports a current effort on
Rome’s part to contain this controversy. On May 29, 2008 the CDF
“reaffirmed a ban on ordaining women as priests, warning that the
consequences of any such ordination would be the automatic excommunication of
anyone involved.” “Anyone” refers both to the women and to the
bishops deigning to ordain them. Significantly, a spokeswomen for the Roman
Catholic Womenpriests organization commented that it interprets this action as
a positive sign “that the Vatican is taking us seriously.”[7]
American Catholics do not judge the dispute settled. The Gallup
organization has conducted a number of polls on the topic. When it asked
participants to respond to this statement: “It would be a good thing if
women were allowed to be ordained,” in 1970 30% agreed. By 1993 that
percentage had doubled. In 1999 the poll distinguished between ordaining
celibate women (63%) and married women (54%).[8] Obviously, the majority of
Catholic laity in this country rejects the current Vatican stance.
Any appeal to “The Church’s Constant Tradition” (Inter
Insigniores, Part I), depends not only on consistent hierarchical practice
or on relevant statements by Church Fathers and Councils; it also requires the
consensus fidelium (“the consent of the faithful”), during the
life of Jesus and among his early believers as well as down through the
Christian ages. Did Jesus leave his followers examples of discrimination
against women because of their gender? Did he and his early disciples exclude
women from authoritative roles in the fledging community? In a male-dominated
Hellenistic world and in the context of patriarchal Judaism, were god-seekers
able “to recognize with ease” Christ’s image in, and understand
his message through, his female disciples? In our time and place do Christians
agree with the Sacred Congregation’s opinion that they would find it
“difficult to see in the minister the image of Christ” simply because
of her gender?
Near the conclusion of Vatican II, the council fathers produced, and
Paul VI declared, “The Decree on Ecumenism” (Unitatis
Reintegratio). To our purpose, it urged: “all are led to examine their
own faithfulness to Christ’s will for the Church and, wherever necessary,
undertake with vigor the task of renewal and reform.” (chap. I, para.
4).[9] Our all-male hierarchy has staked its claim about women’s
ordination with stubborn determination. If we do not stand with them, then we
must spell out our own position, one grounded in faith and in our perception of
the Lord’s message.
In the pages that follow I will indicate how, in and through the
ministry of Jesus and the decisions of his early disciples, we may recognize
the authoritative, gender-blind roles of women in the New Testament.[10]
Jesus and Women
Mary, His Mother
Few would question the preeminence of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, in her
Son’s life, and in the beginnings of his Church. That being said, what
roles did she assume in the budding Christian community?
We know of her principally from the Gospel of Luke. It contains personal
details absent from the other gospels; scholars reason that Mary herself must
have shared them with that evangelist.
Confronted with the uncomfortable fact of Judas’s defection, the
Eleven decided, with urging from Peter, to select a substitute to reestablish
the core of the Twelve. Peter established this criterion for choice:
So one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the
Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until
the day when he was taken up from us—one of these men must become with us
a witness of his resurrection (Acts 1: 21-22).[11]
Consequently, they chose Matthias.
Later on, the persecutor Saul received the summons of Christ on the road
to Damascus. Converted, he became the “Apostle to the Gentiles” (cf.
Rom. 15: 16). He based his legitimacy, not on the criterion of Peter, but on
his conversion and subsequent dedication to the good news of Christ’s
resurrection:
Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are
you not my workmanship in the Lord? If to others I am not an apostle, at least
I am to you; for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord. (1Cor 9: 1-2)
Mary knew Jesus from the moment of his conception. As he grew she
contemplated him and his life, and “kept all these things in her
heart” (Lk. 2:51). She occasioned and witnessed his first public miracle
in Cana. She accompanied him as he visited the towns and cities of Galilee,
preaching and healing (Mk 3:31-35; 4: 1-34). She stood nearby as he hung on the
cross (Jn. 19: 25-27), she was present in Jerusalem when the Lord appeared to
his close followers (Lk. 24: 33-53), and she prayed with them in anticipation
of the coming of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:14, 2: 1-4). Clearly, Mary met
Peter’s criterion, except for being a man, for inclusion in the circle of
Twelve. In addition, she manifested Paul’s characteristics of an apostle:
1) she chose to believe in her Son; 2) she knew Jesus, both alive and as her
resurrected Lord; 3) she bestowed her faith as a gift upon his followers: Pope
Leo XIII in Adjutricem Populi Christiani declared: “She was, in
very truth, the Mother of the Church, the Teacher and Queen of the Apostles, to
whom, besides, she confided no small part of the divine mysteries she kept in
her heart.”[12]
No one disputes Mary’s apostleship; none claim for her membership
in the Twelve; but some, including the Vatican, confuse the two. When it argues
that Jesus chose only men to be among the Twelve and, therefore, no woman can
be a priest, they compound the confusion.
The Twelve in the New Testament filled two roles. In the first
place this group stood for the twelve tribes of Israel in the new dispensation.
In their community they would complete the revelation begun with Israel but
fulfilled in Christ. It met this task by being his people, just as in the Old
Testament the Israelites worshipped as Yahweh’s people. It did not do so
by functioning as priests. In the Old Testament only the tribe of Levi acted as
priests (cf. Num. 7: 1-6); in the New Testament no ordained priests served the
young community. Secondly, they would take on the eschatological role of
judging all the nations when the kingdom of Christ would be finally realized
(Cf. Rev. 21: 101-14).
In the New Testament the term “twelve apostles” appeared only
twice (Mt. 10:2, Rev. 21: 14). Additionally, in Luke (6: 13) Jesus summoned
together his disciples, “and chose from them twelve, whom he named
apostles . . . .” Indeed, after the ordination of the seven deacons in
Acts 6, references to the Twelve disappeared; the scriptures directed emphasis,
rather, toward individual apostles, such as Peter and Paul. Moreover, the
sacred authors denominated others outside of the Twelve as
“apostles”: Barnabas (Acts 14: 14, 1Cor. 9: 1-6); Paul (Rom. 11: 13,
1Cor 9: 1-5), Apollos (1Cor. 4:9), Silas and Timothy (1Thes. 2: 9), Andronicus
and Junia (Rom. 16: 7), and even Jesus, “the apostle and high priest of
our confession” (Heb. 3: 1). We know surprisingly little about the life
and activities of the “Twelve Apostles” after the resurrection. We
rightly consider them apostles, but other active apostles, including Mary, were
not numbered among the Twelve. It appears that the Twelve-circle occupied a
foundational position in the incipient movement struggling to gain legitimacy
as descending from the patriarchal religion of Israel. Yet as it earned public
recognition and separation from Judaism increased, the Twelve became less
relevant to the ongoing life of the community. As for all the apostles, in the
Early Church “the word, apostle, described a function and was not
restricted to any group like the Twelve.”[13] In this regard, John Meier
remarks:
The reasons for the swift disappearance or total absence of the Twelve
from most of the New Testament are unclear. Perhaps some members of the Twelve,
like the martyred James, the son of Zebedee, died in the first decade after the
crucifixion, and no attempt was made to replenish a foundational group that was
not viewed as ongoing in the church. Once this happened, it would make sense to
speak of influential individuals like Peter, but it made little sense to
continue to speak of the Twelve in regard to the present situation of the
church, as opposed to remembering the Twelve’s activity in the life of
Jesus or in the earliest days of the church.[14]
As mentioned previously, for historical and eschatological reasons the
Eleven selected Matthias to substitute for Judas. We have no indication that
subsequently the Twelve filled slots left vacant by death. When James, the
brother of John expired at the command of Herod, the fact bore mentioning (Acts
12: 1-4); however, Luke did not record any effort to choose a successor. Acts
ended with Paul in Rome, having been taken there in chains. Tradition tells us
that Paul, and Peter, both died there at the behest of the Roman authorities;
neither Scripture nor the writings of the Apostolic Fathers allude to elections
to replace them. For all we know, the Twelve did not succeed itself. With that
evolving recognition, we must question the meaning of apostolic succession.
Elizabeth Fiorenza commented on this:
The theological issue at stake is therefore not whether or not women can
be ordained even though Jesus did not call any woman to be a member of the
Twelve-circle. The theological problem is whether the theological construct of
“apostolic succession” can be maintained without any modification in
view of the historical insight that the twelve apostles had no
successors.[15]
We may argue that apostolic succession refers to the passing down by the
believing community its experience of, and recollections about, Jesus, the
Lord. Only as apostles serving the people of the Way, not as members of the
circle of Twelve, do the Twelve and other apostles, women included, bequeath to
us the true faith.
Speaking to the Corinthians, Paul lists the roles God has established in
his Church:
Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. And God
has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers,
then workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators, speaking in
various kinds of tongues. . . . But earnestly desire the higher gifts. (ICor.
12: 27-31).
We have seen how Mary served the Church as an apostle. Consider now
Mary, the prophet.
Luke set the scene. A young, unmarried girl experienced the breathtaking
presence of God. An angel appeared and announced: “you will conceive in
your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. . . . The Holy
Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you;
therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.” Mary
responded: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me
according to your word” (Lk. 1: 31-38).
Now pregnant, Mary traveled to visit her cousin Elizabeth, she also with
child. When “Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her
womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she exclaimed with a
loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women and blessed is your womb! And why
is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to
me’”(Lk. 1: 41-43)? Thus prophesied Elizabeth.
In response Mary offered up her acclaimed Magnificat. She
celebrated God’s action in her regard; she foretold that “henceforth
all generations will call me blessed”; she assured us all that God’s
“mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation”(Lk. 1:
46-55).
When Elizabeth gave birth to her son, her husband, Zechariah, named him
John. “And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit, and
prophesied”(Lk. 1: 67). After Mary bore Jesus, she took him up to the
temple for “purification according to the law of Moses”(Lk. 2: 22).
There she met Anna, a prophetess, an eighty-four-year-old widow. “And
coming up at that very hour she gave thanks to God, and spoke of him to all who
were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem”(Lk. 2: 38).
The spirit of prophecy permeates the accounts of these two births. Mary
and Elizabeth and Anna spoke in the tradition of Old Testament prophetesses
like Miriam, the sister of Moses, celebrating Yahweh’s triumph over
Pharaoh’s army (Ex. 15: 20-21), and Deborah directing the forces of Israel
against the Canaanites and subsequently proclaiming Yahweh’s victory (Jud.
4: 4-11; 5: 1-31). They manifested a gift detailed by Paul in his First Letter
to the Corinthians, and recorded by Luke as possessed by Phillip’s
daughters (Acts: 21; 9).
In addition, Leo XIII alluded to Mary’s role as teacher in the
Early Church. She instructed Luke about her son’s birth and boyhood. In
her responses to Jesus’ mission, she informed us all about the primacy of
belief and the dignity of the family of believers. From her quiet dignity under
the cross we surmise that she counseled the discouraged disciples after the
crucifixion to have faith and exercise patience. We further imagine the
influence she had on the evangelist John and upon his inspired writings.
Thus did Mary exemplify in her life the three crowning gifts in
Paul’s hierarchy of roles among Christ’s followers: apostle, prophet,
and teacher.
One other woman clearly took the position of teacher in the New
Testament. In the eighteenth chapter of Acts we meet Apollos, an Alexandrian
Jew. “Being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things
concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John” (Acts 18:
25-26). Two companions of Paul, Priscilla and Aquila, like him tentmakers and
zealous Christians, heard Apollos speaking in their synagogue in Ephesus.
Recognizing the deficiency in his understanding of the mission of Jesus,
“they took him and expounded to him the way of God more accurately”
(Acts 18: 26). We should notice that the New Testament writers in four
instances mentioned Priscilla, the wife, before her husband, thus indicating
her importance within the community (Acts 18: 8, 26; Rom. 16: 3; 2Tim. 4: 9).
Besides being teachers of Apollos, an apostle, Priscilla and Aquila earn
Paul’s praise for being “my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who
risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I but all the churches of the
Gentiles give thanks” (Rom. 16: 3-4). Whatever else they did, they earned
this encomium for leading a house church in Ephesus (1Cor. 16: 19). We should
understand two oft-quoted passages about women being silent in church and not
lording over men as their teachers (1Cor. 14: 33-36; 2Tim. 2: 11-12) in the
context of the actions of Priscilla and of Paul’s praise concerning her
efforts.
Three Female Apostles
Three additional women merited the title of apostle in the New
Testament: the Samaritan woman, Mary Magdalene, and Junia. On what may we base
these claims?
Jesus met a Samaritan woman at a well. He asked her for a drink. In the
ensuing conversation he progressively led her to knowledge of him. It
culminated in this exchange: “The woman said to him, ‘I know that
Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ); when he comes he will show us all
things.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am he’”(Jn.
4: 25-26). The woman left her water jar at the well. She “went away into
the city, and said to the people, ‘Come, see a man who told me all that I
ever did. Can this be the Christ?’ They went out of the city and were
coming to him.” As a result, “Many Samaritans from that city believed
in him because of the woman’s testimony. . . . And many more believed
because of his word. They said to the woman, ‘It is no longer because of
your words that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that
this is indeed the Savior of the world’”(Jn. 4: 28-42). Recall
Paul’s criteria for apostleship: knowledge of, and belief in, the Lord;
freedom to choose to believe in him; sealing that apostleship by bringing
others to a similar belief. All of these criteria she meets. In his commentary
on this scriptural passage, Origen said: “Christ sends the woman as an
apostle (άποστολω)
to the inhabitants of the city because his words have enflamed this woman. . .
. Here a woman proclaims
(έυανγγελίξεται)
Christ to the Samaritans.” [16]
In the male-dominated public life of Greco-Roman Palestine women enjoyed
few legal rights and rarely entered into legal or political processes, among
those serving as a public witness. In this regard, Tal Ilan remarks:
Josephus asserts that by Jewish law women were disqualified as witnesses
(AJ 4.219), and the rabbis made the same determination. . . . According
to Josephus, the reason why women were disqualified as witnesses was their
lightheadedness and brazenness, in other words their questionable morality cast
doubt on their testimony. The rabbis held a similar view . . . .
We may conclude that the specific law disqualifying women as witnesses
was formulated as a general halakhic principle, just as in other matters
such as punishments, but that many exceptions arose from actual custom and
practice.[17]
When we consider the gospel accounts of women at the tomb of Jesus, we
see this ambivalence on display.
Luke in his account definitely accepted the culture’s negative
assessment of women as witnesses:
On the first day of the week, at early dawn, they [the women] went to
the tomb, taking the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone
rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body.
While they were perplexed about this, behold two men stood by them in dazzling
apparel; and as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the
men said to them, ‘Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not
here, but has risen’ (Lk. 24: 1-5).
He described the women as “lightheaded”: perplexed, bedazzled,
frightened, and ignorantly looking for Jesus in the wrong place. The encounter
continued:
Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of
man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on
the third day rise. And they remembered his words . . . (Lk. 24: 6-8).
Finally, with a little coaching from the men, not from their own
assessment, they got the message about the extraordinary situation. With that
they left:
. . . and returning from the tomb they told all this to the eleven and
to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of
James and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. But these
words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them (Lk. 24:
9-11).
Contrast the apostles’ reaction to the women’s resurrection
account with Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman and her
summoning of her townspeople to meet the Christ. Jesus trusted her, gave her
the command to go into town, she did, and her neighbors accepted her witness,
at least enough to check out the situation for themselves. In that earlier
instance, the men judged a woman’s witness to be reliable; in the later
one, unreliable.
The evangelist Mark went even further in discrediting female testimony.
Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James, and Salome stole away to anoint
Jesus’ body. In the tomb they discovered a young man dressed in a white
robe; “and they were amazed.” After explaining to them that Jesus has
risen, he directed them to “go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is
going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you.” This
proved to be too much for the women. So “they went out and fled from the
tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing
to any one, for they were afraid” (Mk. 16: 5-8). Not only did the women
prove to be “lightheaded”; out of all control, they did not attempt
to obey the stranger’s command. They became witnesses only to themselves.
Matthew recounted that Mary Magdalene and the other Mary at dawn of the
first day of the week went to anoint the body of Jesus. Similarly to the other
accounts, they found the stone rolled back, an angel in attendance, and the
body gone. Instructed to deliver the news to his disciples, “they departed
quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his
disciples.” On the way they encountered the risen Lord, “took hold of
his feet and worshipped him. Then Jesus said to them, ‘Do not be afraid;
go and tell my brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see
me.’” Matthew did not describe their meeting with the disciples; we
infer that it occurred as he ultimately recorded that “the eleven
disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed
them” (Mt. 28: 1-16). We may conclude that the women fulfilled their
apostolic role while the men’s response to their witness remained
shrouded. These Jewish men, in a gospel written for a Jewish audience, needed
not publicly to display their acceptance of the witness of women.
John’s account betrayed no hesitation about the testimony of Mary
Magdalene. When she came to the tomb and discovered the stone rolled back, she
ran back to the disciples, and returned with Peter and John, no hesitations
recorded. Not finding the body, the two apostles returned to their homes. Mary
stayed behind, weeping. Jesus appeared to her and said,
“Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?” Supposing him
to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away,
tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to
her, “Mary.” She turned and said in Hebrew “Rabboni!”
(which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold me, for I have not
yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren and say to them, ‘I am
ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
Mary Magdalene went and said to the disciples, “I have seen the
Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her (Jn. 20:
1-18).
This Evangelist portrayed Mary as decisive, one to whom Peter and John
immediately responded. Confronted with the supposed gardener, she engaged him
with courage and purpose. Though originally sad, she exhibited none of the
amazement, fear and trembling and astonishment laced through the other accounts
of the miraculous. After her encounter with Christ, she returned to the
disciples and stated, with simple directness, what she had witnessed. She acted
reliably; the disciples exhibited no hesitation in accepting her words.
Eisen comments: “Hippolytus of Rome in the early third century said
that Christ met women at the tomb on Easter ‘so that women, too, would be
Christ’s apostles.’”[18] During medieval times in the Western
Church religious leaders and commentators called Mary Magdalene “The
Apostle to the Apostles.” Ancient Jewish ambivalence about women’s
public role still holds sway in official Christianity, but the reliable witness
of Magdalene and her female companions chip steadily away at this male,
self-serving prejudice.
We see this prejudice played out in the reporting of the third female
apostle, Junia. We learn about her from Paul’s list of greetings to his
co-workers in the last chapter of his Letter to the Romans. The text in
question reads as follows: “Greet Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen and my
fellow prisoners; they are men of note among the apostles, and they were in
Christ before me” (Rom. 16: 7, R.S.V.). In this translation
Junia transforms into Junias, my relatives becomes my
kinsmen, a man and woman, probably a husband and wife, morph into two
men.
Brooten notes in this regard: “. . . no commentator on the text
until Aegidius of Rome (1245-1316) took the name to be masculine. Without
commenting on his departure from previous commentators Aegidius simply referred
to the two persons mentioned in Romans 16: 7 as ‘these honorable men’
(viri).”[19] Eisen demonstrates the before-Aegidius commentary by
quoting John Chrysostom:
It is certainly a great thing to be an apostle; but to be outstanding
among the apostles—think what praise that is. She was outstanding in her
words, in her good deeds; oh, and how great is the philosophy (ή
φιλοσοφία) of this woman that
she was regarded as worthy to be accounted among the apostles.[20]
Neither Chrysostom nor Paul appeared to have any problem with a female
apostle. Nor did Origen and Jerome, Theophylact and Peter Abelard.[21] Others,
following Aegidius, clearly do. A comparison of eleven current translations of
the bible bears this out. Seven of them favor “Andronicus and Junias, my
kinsmen”; four accept “Andronicus and Junia” while describing
them as “my relatives,” “my fellow Jews,” or “my
countrymen.” To confuse matters further, two Catholic bibles, Revised
Standard Version: Catholic Edition, and the New Jerusalem
Bible: English Translation choose the masculine Junias, while
the New American Bible goes with the feminine Junia.
What might we say about the preference for a male apostle? In the first
place, Brooten could unearth not “ a single shred of evidence that the
name Junias ever existed.” Proponents of the Junias
hypothesis have cited “ to date not a single Latin or Greek inscription,
not a single reference in ancient literature” to support their case. Her
research leads her to pose this question: “What can a modern philologist
say about Junias? Just this: it is unattestable.”[22] Secondly, we
must note that making Junia into Junias, turning a woman into a
man, fits well the a priori position of those who cannot accept that
women, like Mary and Mary Magdalene, the Samaritan woman and Junia, could be,
and indeed were, apostles.
The Outsider Women
The evangelists included in their history of Christ’s ministry his
interactions with a number of women who violated acceptable socio-cultural
norms. Authorities, both religious and secular, routinely condemned or, at
least, dismissed such women as subversive of right living in the community.
Jesus did neither. Instead, he pierced through the veil of their actions to the
person striving to find her way in a difficult world. He met the women there,
in their soul, and confirmed their right to be heard and to be validated in
their struggle to live. Like Jesus, we need to attend to them; they reveal to
us the personal role of the believer, one not simplistically reducible to civil
and religious laws or the dictates of conventional behavior.
The Book of Leviticus detailed restrictions imposed upon menstruating
women and those associated with them: “When a woman has a discharge of
blood which is her regular discharge from her body, she shall be in her
impurity for seven days, and whoever touches her shall be unclean until the
evening (Lev. 15: 19).” As Ilan notes: “A woman’s monthly
discharge was treated as a subject of fear and abomination. . . . Menstrual
blood, like most of the biological phenomena unique to women, was interpreted
by the rabbis as part of the punishment meted out to Eve because of the sin in
Eden . . . .”[23] Moreover, “ if any man lies with her [during her
menstrual period], and her impurity is on him, he shall be unclean seven days;
and every bed on which he lies shall be unclean” (Lev. 15: 24). This
“biblical law, probably following an ancient taboo, strictly prohibits
sexual relations with a menstruant.”[24]
The northern tribes of Israel separated from those of Judah in the south
after the death of Solomon. Because of Solomon’s disobedience, Yahweh had
declared that he would tear the northern kingdom from Solomon’s line. This
happened through a siege by the Assyrians in 724-722 B.C. The ten tribes of the
north intermarried with the Assyrians and other foreigners, thus creating the
Samaritan people in a land called Samaria. Eventually, the Samaritans
established a competing center of worship on Mt. Gerazim, where they practiced
a conservative form of the Old Testament religion. The Jewish people of the
south came to think of the Samaritans as no more than half-breeds and mongrels,
and the two groups became hostile and estranged. In this context, the
Babylonian Talmud declared: “The daughters of the Samaritans are regarded
as menstruants from their cradle.”[25] This judgment did not reflect that
the Samaritans disregarded the rites of purification, but rather that they did
not perform them properly. Therefore, the rules of cleanliness demanded that
Jewish men have no interaction with Samaritan women.
When Jesus interacted with the Samaritan woman at the well, he violated
a number of cultural expectations. Most immediately, he engaged in conversation
with a woman unrelated to him. Pious Jews followed the teachings of the rabbis
in this matter. “Josef b.Yohanin famously said: ‘Talk not much with
womankind.’” And the Talmud explicitly stated: “It was taught:
Do not speak explicitly with a woman lest this ultimately lead you to
adultery.” Pertinent to this discussion Ilan reports:
A disciple of the sages would exercise special care not to enter into
conversation with a woman. An example is the following, expressed in the style
of wisdom literature: “Our rabbis taught: Six things are a cause of
reproach to a disciple of the sages: . . . he shall not converse with a woman
in the market. . . .”[26]
Jesus disregarded these counsels; to the orthodox he could not be a
rabbi and act in this manner.
Almost as bad, Jesus was conversing with a Samaritan. “It is
commonly acknowledged that pious Jews of Christ’s day avoided all contact
with Samaritans.”[27] As in all family disputes, divorcees often possess a
particular rancor toward each other. Previous closeness generates more intense
feelings when fractured and lost. In religion, especially when the break
occasions competition for adherents, the disputants often demonize their former
comrades and cling tenaciously to mutual condemnation: think, for example, of
the Catholic response to the churches arising out of the Protestant
Reformation. Such animosity between Jews and Samaritans explains, in part, why
“the disciples marveled that he was talking with a woman, but none said,
‘What do you wish?’ or ‘Why are you talking with
her?’” (Jn. 4: 27).
In addition, Jesus knew that this woman lived immorally, that many would
brand her a public sinner: “You are right in saying, ‘I have no
husband’; for you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not
your husband; this you said truly” (Jn. 4: 18). Dealings with such as she
would fuel the perception of the pietistic that “this man receives sinners
and eats with them” (Lk. 15: 2). When “a woman of the city”
anointed Jesus’ feet and wiped them with her hair, Simon, a Pharisee,
would say to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would have known
what sort of woman is touching him, for she is a sinner” (Lk. 7: 36-40).
In both cases Jesus beheld within the sinner a woman striving to believe and to
love.
When Jesus requested a drink of water from her water jar, he rejected
the Jewish taboo about the uncleanness of a menstruating woman, the perpetual
impurity of Samaritan women, and the transferring of ritual impurity to any man
who touches her or what she has touched. He treated her as he would any woman,
directly and with respect for her as a person, no matter the religious dictates
that disparaged her worth.
Leviticus extended the ritual uncleanness of menstruation to any
discharge of a woman’s blood:
If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, not at the time of
her impurity, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her impurity, all
the days of the discharge she shall continue in uncleanness; as in the days of
her impurity, she shall be unclean (Lev. 15: 25).
The writer offered the following reason for the prohibitions involving a
menstruating or hemorrhaging woman: “Thus you shall keep the people of
Israel separate from their uncleanness, lest they die in their uncleanness by
defiling my tabernacle that is in their midst” (Lev. 15: 31).
Mark related the account of a woman who for twelve years had suffered
from an unnatural flow of blood. She had tried everything, exhausted herself
and her means with physicians, but nothing helped. Having heard of Jesus and
his healing power, she joined the crowds pressing around him. She thought to
herself: “If I touch even his garments, I shall be made well.” In an
outburst of faith she reached out and, immediately, became healed. Jesus,
sensing energy flowing from him to another, inquired: “Who touched my
garments?” The woman in fear and trembling came forward. She confessed to
him and to the crowd her gesture, her long illness, and her present cure. She
knew she had broken the Jewish taboo about touching anyone during her
uncleanness; she could reasonably expect anger from Jesus and the crowd for
contaminating this rabbi; in her faith and gratitude she dared the truth and
believed in Jesus’ concern for her. Recognizing faith that outweighed
social rejection, Jesus with compassion said to her: “Daughter, your faith
has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease” (Mk. 5:
25-34). As with the Samaritan woman, Jesus placed greater worth on the person
and her health than on the unnatural strictures of religious legalism.
Two women anointed Jesus with precious ointment. Both dried his feet
with their hair. Onlookers fretted over both: Simon judged the woman a sinner
(Lk. 7: 38-50); Judas berated Mary’s wastefulness: “Why was this
ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor” (Jn. 12: 3-5)? In
each instance Jesus commended the women’s ministration. Jesus recognized
the first woman as a sinner; he also forgave her because she loved him much.
The evangelist explained Judas’s consternation as occasioned by his
ongoing thievery of their common fund. Jesus accepted Mary’s attention as
preparing him for his passion and death. These he had foretold, but his male
disciples refused to accept their approach. In addition, both women had acted
contrary to cultural decorum.
Nice people expected girls of marital age and married women to keep
their hair fixed on top of their head. Only women of the streets and women in
frenzy unloosed their hair in public. Modesty demanded bound hair.
A beautiful woman, Susanna, wife of Joakim, was bathing alone in her
garden, for the day was hot. Unbeknown to her, two elders, mad with desire,
were watching. After her maids had departed, as she had commanded for
privacy’s sake, the elders accosted her. They demanded she make love with
them or they would blackmail her: they would publicly claim that she had sent
the maids away in order to commit adultery with a young man. She brushed off
their extortion. The next day the elders accused her in front of her husband,
her family and friends, and all the people. At that point the writer commented:
“Now Susanna was a woman of great refinement and beautiful in appearance.
As she was veiled the wicked men ordered her to be unveiled that they might
feast upon her beauty. But her family and friends and all who saw her
wept” (Dan. 13: 31-33). They wept because her modesty was assaulted as she
stood before them with her hair let down like a sinful and disreputable woman.
The rabbis celebrated women who obeyed this rule of modesty. In the
aggadah we find examples of women so modest that they would not unloose
their hair, even at home. “Thus Qimhit, when asked by the sages how it
happened that seven of her sons served in the high priesthood, gave the
following answer: ‘The beams of my house never saw the hair on my
head.’” [28]
Commenting on the strictures laid upon Jewish women, Ilan summarizes
thus:
By the terms of this moral code, then, a woman was expected to remain
concealed inside her house, she was forbidden to walk in the market-place and
speak with strange men, and was required to wear only clothes becoming her
modesty, including a head covering.[29]
Commentators dispute whether modesty demanded a veil or hair bound up
into a head covering. See, for example, Paul’s First Letter to the
Corinthians. He wrote them because he had heard that “there is quarreling
among you, my brethren” (1 Cor. 1: 11). The dispute centered around the
conducting of worship services in a becoming fashion. The inclusion of women
prophesying was proving disruptive, both in matter of time and in behavior. As
regards the latter, the prophetesses during their inspiration were tossing
their unloosened locks about like possessed women. Paul offered this
resolution:
Judge for yourselves; is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her
head uncovered? Does not nature itself teach you that . . . if a woman has long
hair, it is her pride? For her hair is given to her for a covering. If any one
is disposed to be contentious, we recognize no other practice, nor do the
churches of God (1Cor. 11: 13-15).
Veiled or hair bound up, women should not act in immodest ways, as if
they were not married. With their husbands alone, should they “let their
hair down.” They owed that much to their husbands, not because originally
woman was made from man and for his companionship, but because “in the
Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; for as woman was made
from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God (1Cor. 11:
11-13).
In Roman law “a married woman was guilty of adultery if she had
sexual relations with any man other than her husband, a man only if the woman
was married, and his own marital status was irrelevant.”[30] The woman,
indeed, belonged to her husband and his family in a manus marriage,[31]
to her birth family if her father or grandfather still lived and she remained
in potestate (under their jurisdiction),[32] or required the legal
guidance of a tutor if she lived sui juris (on her own).[33] Adultery,
then, created an injury against the woman as property. In a polygamous society,
men could have more than one wife and any number of concubines. In such
instances, “A wife could not prosecute her husband, since in the eyes of
the law he had committed no offense against their marriage and women could
prosecute in criminal courts only for offenses against themselves. . .
.”[34] “Augustus’ Lex Julia de Adulterius (18 B.C.) specifically
allowed a father to impose summary justice on a daughter caught in the act of
adultery in his or his son-in-law’s house. . . .”[35]
Jewish law paralleled Roman practice:
The transfer of the woman from the authority of her father to the
authority of her husband was viewed conceptually by the rabbis as the transfer
of property by purpose. They did not differ from the convention in the ancient
world whereby a daughter was the property of her father and then of her
husband.[36]
Should a man seduce a virgin, she was expected to marry him. If her
father refused to transfer ownership of his daughter to the seducer, then that
one had to recompense the father for the damage done to his property (Ex. 22:
16-17). Should a man have intercourse with a married woman, “both the
adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death”(Ex. 22: 10) if they
are caught in the act (Cf. Deut. 22: 22). But “Jewish law contains no
definition of or provision against adultery by the husband against the wife,
since he may marry more than one woman. The only way a man can commit adultery
is with another man’s wife.”[37]Only the married woman could commit
adultery defined as an offense against her husband.
The Book of Ecclesiasticus counseled Jewish men to refrain from looking
at women lest this lead to legal jeopardy, and to guard their property in their
daughter:
Do not look intently at a virgin, lest you stumble and incur penalties
for her (Sir. 9:5).
Turn away your eyes from a shapely woman, and do not look intently at
beauty belonging to another (Sir. 9:8).
Be ashamed of . . . looking at a woman who is a harlot . . . (Sir. 41:
19-20).
Keep strict watch over a headstrong daughter, lest, when she finds
liberty, she use it to her hurt. Be on guard against her impudent eye, and do
not wonder if she sins against you. As a thirsty wayfarer opens his mouth and
drinks from any water near him, so she will sit in front of every post and open
her quiver to the arrow (Sir. 26: 10-12).
Yet “Like the sun rising in the heights of the Lord, so is the
beauty of a good wife in her well-ordered home. Like the shining lamp on the
holy lampstand, so is a beautiful face on a stately figure” (Sir. 26:
16-17).
In this socio-cultural context, Jesus called for equality between men
and women in their intimate relationships. Matthew, an evangelist writing for
orthodox Jews, recorded in his Sermon on the Mount, the first of Jesus’
departures from Jewish law: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You
shall not commit adultery’ [Deut. 5: 18]. But I say to you that every one
who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his
heart” (Mt. 5: 27-28). Note that Jesus defined adultery as lustful desire
by a man for any woman, married or unmarried.
During the classical Roman era divorce “was easy. As marriage was
based on consent, so the will of either of the consenting parties in free
marriage to renounce it sufficed. . . . Divorce was a private act and as such
was subject to no limitation by law, with one exception, introduced by
Augustus: A freedwoman married to her patron could not divorce him without his
consent.”[38] As for Jewish law, “it should be clear that divorce was
always the right and responsibility of the husband to initiate. Jewish law was
a- symmetrical in this respect as opposed to Roman law, which grants the wife
the right to divorce her husband.”[39] A husband could divorce his wife
“if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some
indecency in her. . .”(Deut. 24: 1).
Jesus said: “For your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to
divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.” God permitted
divorce; he did not command it. Jesus issued his own restrictions on divorce,
applicable alike to men and women. Although he allowed separation from
one’s spouse for significant reasons, to do so in order to marry another
did not qualify. Remarriage for a divorced man or a divorced woman made either
an adulterer.[40] In this Jesus summoned up the ideal of marriage. When
“they are no longer two but one,” when such a marriage is actualized,
“what therefore God has joined together, let no man put asunder” (Mt.
19: 6).[41] To our point, we emphasize that Jesus did not accept any legal
inequality between the sexes.
The Pharisees dragged an adulterous woman before Jesus. “Teacher,
they said, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law
Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her” (Jn. 8: 4-5)?
They were hoping to force an impossible decision upon him: either he upheld the
law and forfeited the admiration of the people, or disparaged the law and
earned the condemnation of the religious authorities. Jesus, however, had no
facts other than their word. Had credible witnesses actually discovered the
woman in the act of adultery? What about the man? Had religious authorities in
accordance with the strict interpretation of the law already had him stoned?
Why had they not forcibly included him in this interrogation? Why humiliate
only her in front of the people; why not make their embarrassment as mutual as
their purported sin?
Jesus also could read the treachery in their hearts. He well understood
that they were using the law to further their own ends. In truth, they cared
nothing about the law or God’s will; nor did the supposed sinfulness of
the woman disturb them; they sought only to solidify their power
vis-à-vis this troubling prophet.
In addition, Jesus knew Jewish law. A man could do with a woman whatever
he wished, just as long as it did not offend her owner, her father or husband.
On the contrary, a woman had to remain a virgin out of respect for her father
and her future husband; a married woman faced divorce, public condemnation, and
even death for marital infidelity. He did not accept this unjust burden put
upon her while her brother had next to none. He would not publicly support this
injustice.
Jesus confronted the Pharisees in their righteousness:
Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce
you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why
do you see the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that
is in your own eye? (Mt. 7: 1-3)
They did not qualify as judges of another until they were willing to
seek their own forgiveness. In the meantime, let God, the almighty and all
merciful, do the judging.
Finally, Jesus was unwilling to give up on the woman. Although she came
before him against her will, still she could, by and through his compassion,
discover forgiveness and recover hope. He had already taught: “the sabbath
was made for man, not man for the sabbath” (Mk. 2: 27). Moreover, in the
name of healing, whether physical or spiritual, he would heal on the sabbath
(Mk. 3: 5); that is, no matter what the letter of the law required. This woman,
no matter her sin or her spoiled reputation, deserved God’s love just as
much as any other, including the righteous and hypocritical. God, above all, is
not an unjust respecter of persons, regardless the disparities sanctioned
within a given society.
A constant refrain runs through the Old Testament: I will be your God
and you will be my people. It began with Abraham: “Now the Lord said to
Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house
to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I
will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a
blessing’”(Gen. 12: 1-2). God confirmed this with Jacob, now Israel:
“I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of
nations shall come from you, and kings will spring from you. The land which I
gave to Abraham and Issac I will give to you, and I will give the land to your
descendents after you”(Gen. 36: 11-12). God acted directly to realize
this. He told Moses to say to the people of Israel: “ . . . and I will
take you for my people, and I will be your God, who has brought you out from
under the burdens of the Egyptians. And I will bring you into the land which I
swore to give to Abraham, to Issac, and to Jacob; I will give it to you for a
possession. I am the Lord” (Ex. 6: 7-8).
Christ instituted a new covenant in his blood, “which is poured out
for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Mt. 26: 28). “In speaking of a
new covenant he treats the first as obsolete” (Heb. 8: 13). “He
abolishes the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have
been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for
all” (Heb. 10: 9-10).
During his brief adulthood in Palestine, Jesus lived as a devout Jew and
brought his message of a new covenant to his compatriots. As in the original
covenant, those who believe in him would be his people and he would be their
God. His Jewish followers, then, became the new nation blessed by God. As in
bygone times, Israel still held prominence in the plan of God. Christ came
first and primarily to this graced people. No matter the changed covenant:
Israel remained a nation of insiders, special to, beloved by, and protected by
God.
The insider-outsider issue came to a head with the mission of Paul to
the Gentiles. “Some men came down from Judea and were teaching the
brethren, ‘Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses,
you cannot be saved’” (Acts 15: 1). In other words the new covenant
depended on fulfilling the requirements of the old one, Christ’s mission
rested on the promise to Abraham, Issac, and Jacob, the new people in Christ
must continue on as the ancient people of Israel. The brethren in Antioch
appointed Paul and Barnabas to proceed to Jerusalem, to pose the question to
the apostles and elders there. After much discussion and the influential
interventions of Peter and James, the church of Jerusalem decided that being a
disciple of Christ did not demand being a follower of Moses. It drafted a
letter to the church in Antioch telling it of their decision. “And when
they [the congregation] read it, they rejoiced at the exhortation.” It
read: “For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you
no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from what has
been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from
unchastity. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well” (Acts 15:
28-31). Christ’s salvific action belonged to humankind; no nation or group
or religion has possession of his grace to the exclusion of others.
Jesus recognized this tension between Judaism and his mission; he also
offered his solution to it.
As he was traveling through the district of Tyre and Sidon, a Canaanite
woman approached him. Loudly she implored him to cure her daughter
“severely possessed by a demon.” As a pious Jewish man, Jesus at
first did not respond to her: men, and especially rabbis, should not hold
conversations with unknown women in the marketplace. When his disciples
complained about the fuss she was making, Jesus commented as if to himself:
“I was only sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Here he
indicated the special place of Israel in God’s providence even as it
involved the new covenant in Christ. The Jews retained the position of
insiders; non-Jews, like this woman, remained outsiders.
Then “she came and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, help
me.’” Even with this plea Jesus still resisted: “It is not fair
to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” The children
of Israel, to whom he was sent by God, deserved to receive his grace before it
could be shared with non-believers such as she. The woman accepted what he
said. She would not contest that God could have a peculiar grace for the Jewish
people. Yet, she persisted with her request for God’s compassion for her.
Could God not help them too without depriving the Jews? “She said,
‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs [little puppies] eat the crumbs that fall
from their master’s table.’” She was not seeking any favor
equivalent to what the Jews enjoyed; she wanted only for grace to touch her and
her daughter in this one instance. Could not an outsider be saved while
remaining an outsider?
Jesus, moved by her plea, weighed her request. Certainly, his mission
extended beyond the boundaries of Israel, to all humankind. For those who
believe in him, any distinction between Jew and Canaanite, monotheist and
polytheist, Jewish Christian and Hellenistic pagan, should disappear. “O
woman, great is your faith!” Your trust in me touches me deeply; it
removes my hesitation; it demands God’s response. “’Be it done
for you as you desire.’ And her daughter was healed instantly” (Mt.
15: 21-28).
Roles in the Early Church
The Lady is a Deacon
In the 6th chapter of Acts, Luke described the ordination of
seven male deacons: “these they set before the apostles, and they prayed
and laid their hands upon them.” Community leaders instituted this order
in order to free themselves for prayer and preaching, leaving to the deacons
the task of distributing goods to the needy. This new office would incarnate
the role of helper within the community.
Preachers and theologians do not hesitate to refer to this scene for
validation for the church’s primitive hierarchical structure. Less often
do church officials speak of the ordination of women as deacons. This fact
causes uneasiness among the ecclesiastical circles of male power.
Toward the conclusion of his Letter to the Romans, Paul sought to be
remembered to many devout Christians. He began, however, by recommending to the
Roman community his “sister Phoebe, a deaconess of the church at
Cenchreae,” a port city east of Corinth, on the Aegean coast. Catholic
translations denominate her as a “deaconess” (Revised Standard
Version, New Jerusalem Bible), a “minister” (New
American Bible), and a “deacon” (Douay-Rheims).
Non-Catholic translations tend to call her a “servant.” The Greek
term behind these translations is
διάκονον, the same word
as in Acts (6: 2-6) for serving tables (έν τή
διακουία) and
for ministry of the word (τή
διακουία τοϋ
λόγου). The author of 1Timothy 3: spoke of
“deacons,” a translation of
Διακόνους. How should we
understand the office of “our sister Phoebe”?
As mentioned, Paul listed her first, thus emphasizing her importance. He
asked the Romans “to receive her in the Lord as befits the saints”;
that is, as a representative of her gathering of Christian believers. She came
with a task she needed to complete with them; Paul beseeched them to “help
her in whatever she may require from you.” He testified about her place in
the church, how she had been a patroness
(προςτάτις), one who
helps others with her resources, for many, including himself.
John Chrysostom, commenting on this passage, proclaimed her worth:
“It is no small thing to be called Paul’s sister, and he adds her
status by calling her ‘deacon.’”[42]
The Early Church chose other women to be deacons too. 1Timothy (3: 8-12)
spoke to the behavior required of both male and female deacons. Dealing first
with the men: “Deacons likewise must be serious, not double-tongued, not
addicted to much wine, not greedy for gain; they must hold the mystery of the
faith with a clear conscience.” In a parallel construction, the writer
said: “The women likewise must be serious, not slanderers, but temperate,
faithful in all things.” (Compare
Διακόνους
ώσάυτως
σεμνόυςwith the subsequent
γυνάίκας
ώσάυτωσ
σεμνάς) Some, undoubtedly trying to make the
case that women were not ordained deacons then, maintain that the women
referred to were their wives, not deacons themselves. Again quoting Chrysostom:
“Some say that he is talking about women in general. But that cannot be.
Why would he want to insert in the middle of what he is saying something about
women? But rather he is speaking of those women who hold the rank of
deacon.”[43]
Kevin Madigan and Carolyn Osiek have published a collection of all known
literary and archeological references to female deacons. They concluded:
“The overwhelming preponderance of evidence for female deacons comes from
the Greek East. Presented here are approximately sixty-one Eastern and four
Western inscriptions of known women deacons, along with forty Eastern and two
Western literary references to real women who held the office.” Their
survey encompassed data from the New Testament period to the sixth century.
In the beginning “there is no distinction by sex.” By the
third century, especially in the East, the office of female deacon or deaconess
developed “intended especially for ministry to women. It is clear that in
most churches that reflected this custom in the fourth, fifth, and sixth
centuries, the deaconess was considered an ordained member of the clergy with
special tasks.” Early on, the term
διακόνος designated both
male and female deacons. By the late third century the designation for women
deacons became
διακονίσσα.
However, these authors note: “The title diakonos did not give way
to the newer diakonissa; rather the original term diakonos
continued to exist side by side with the later term diakonissa after
the fourth century, often in contexts that seem to suggest the complete
interchangeability of the two titles.” They further comment: “English
translations tend to be inexact about this, assuming that ‘deaconess’
is the appropriate term for a woman (even sometimes for Phoebe in Rom. 16:
1!).”[44]
We know, therefore, the following: 1) male and female deacons existed
from the beginning with no distinction based on gender, 2) in the early church
its leaders ordained male deacons, 3) we presume they also ordained female
deacons, 4) they continued to ordain male and female deacons up through the
sixth century, 5) by the third century women occupied the office of deacon or
deaconess, 5) deaconesses had a special ministry to women in the church, but
their political roles often overlapped those of male deacons.
The available historical data compel no assertion other than this:
During the New Testament era, Phoebe and her co-deacons served the community no
more, no less than their male counterparts; they did so in an office
essentially the same as that held by Stephen and his compatriots in the sixth
chapter of Acts.
Women as Community Administrators
In our time we think of the parish as an extension of the diocese. The
bishop has administrative oversight of his diocese. He appoints pastors to
fulfill his responsibility at the local level. He ordains priests and deacons
who will serve worshipping communities through liturgy, the sacraments, and
preaching; they will also direct the various outreach activities that
constitute parish life.
It is tempting to discover this same organization in the churches
chronicled in the New Testament, especially in the quest for scriptural
authorization. Edward Lohse, quoted by Eisen, warns against any facile
comparison:
The earliest Christian documents, collected in the canon of the New
Testament, contain only sparse information about the external forms of early
Christian community life. Both the beginnings of the Church constitution and
the development it underwent in the first two generations of early Christianity
are shrouded in darkness, dimly illuminated only by a few hints that can be
drawn from these sources.[45]
With that salient point taken, what may we unearth about the role of
women administrators from the New Testament?
The term “bishop”
(έπίσκοπος) occurred only
five times. At the beginning of his Letter to the Philippians Paul addressed
“all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the bishops and
deacons” (Phil. 1:1). Peter exhorted “the elders
(πρεσβυτέρους)
among you . . . Tend
(έπισκοπούτες)
the flock of God that is your charge” (1Pet. 5: 1-2). Paul charged the
elders
(πρεσβυτέρους)
of the church of Ephesus to “Take heed to yourselves and all the flock, in
which the Holy Spirit has made you guardians
(έπισκόπους)”.
. . (Acts 20: 17, 28). The author of the Letter to Titus (1: 7-9) called the
bishop (έπίσκοπον)
God’s steward and enumerated the qualities expected in him. This echoed a
similar declaration in 1Timothy 3: 1-10.
From these passages we learn that bishops held the charge to care for
their people and to manage the affairs of the local church. They related to a
local council of elders, either as taken from them, or by functioning as their
presiding officer. This fits an observation noticed by Eisen: “Lietzmann
has shown that in Greco-Roman society episkopoi were public officials with a
broad variety of functions, but frequently entrusted with administrative
duties. In this context it seems probable that the episkopoi mentioned in Phil.
1: 1 are to be understood as the community administrators.”[46]
Scripture does not mention any gender requirements nor indicate the
gender of the bishops addressed. We have, however, clues in passages dealing
with women in the role of patroness
(προστάτις) or as conveners
of house churches.
Luke informed us of the women who accompanied Jesus throughout his
public life even to the end: “And the twelve were with him, and also some
women . . . : Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, and
Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others,
who provided for them out of their means” (Lk, 8: 2-3). After his death,
“the women who had come with him from Galilee followed, and saw the tomb,
and how his body was laid . . . (Lk. 23: 55). Returning later to anoint his
body, they discovered it missing. In his place they encountered two dazzling
young men who proclaimed his resurrection. The female witnesses carried the
news “to the eleven and all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna
and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told this to the
apostles” (Lk. 24: 8-10). These women because of their faith in Jesus used
their financial resources to support him and his ministry. Although Luke does
not specifically call them patronesses, they acted as such. In this regard, we
may also include Martha and Mary, who took Jesus into their home, where Martha
prepared a substantial feast for him while Mary “sat at the Lord’s
feet and listened to his teaching” (Lk. 10: 39). She later “took a
pound of costly ointment of pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus” in
anticipation of his burial with its customary preparations (Mk. 12: 3-8).
As noted above, Paul praised Phoebe, the deacon of Cenchreae, as “a
helper (προστάτις) of many
and of myself as well” (Rom. 16: 2). We presume that this support came in
the form of lodging, in offering her home for Christian worship, in financial
assistance and social networking. Whatever the apostle Paul and the community
of converts needed, a patroness would strive to provide.
Some women demonstrated their patronage by hosting house churches. We
know by name the following: Phoebe in Cenchreae (Rom. 16: 1-2), Lydia of
Thyatira (Acts 16: 14-16), Prisca and her husband, Aquila, in Ephesus (1Cor.
16: 19), Nympha in Laodicea (Col. 4: 15), Mary, the mother of John Mark, in
Jerusalem (Acts 12: 12-18), and “Apphia our sister and Archippus our
fellow soldier” in Colossae (Philemon 1: 2).
In periods of persecution from both Jewish and Roman authorities,
Christians gathered together as unobtrusively as possible. They met to pray, to
preach and to listen, to encourage and strengthen one another, to distribute
goods to the needy, and to share fellowship in a meal. At first, they
celebrated it in association with the remembrance of Christ’s death and
resurrection. Paul explicitly addressed this conjunction in his First Letter to
the Corinthians. He excoriated whoever “eats the bread or drinks the cup
of the Lord in an unworthy manner. . . . For any one who eats and drinks
without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.” He
concluded with this direction: “. . . when you come together to eat, wait
for one another . . . lest you come together to be condemned” (1Cor. 11:
17-33).
Someone had to organize these gatherings, host them, and see to the
necessary preparations and provisions. It seems reasonable to presume that the
homeowners filled this role. Remember, also, that the Christian community did
not as yet have any ordained priesthood, no special cadre to offer sacrifice on
its behalf as did the priest
(ίερέυς) in the Old Testament.
Indeed, the Letter to the Hebrews explicitly rejected any need for such a
priesthood: “For it is fitting that we should have such a high priest,
holy, blameless, unstained, separate from sinners, exalted above the heavens.
He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for
his own sins and then for those of the people; he did this once for all when he
offered up himself” (Heb. 7: 26-27). We must surmise, therefore, that the
host of the Christian gathering, he or she in whose house it occurred, oversaw
the feast and celebrated its eucharistic conclusion.
Given this pregnant evidence, Eisen makes this judgment:
“Leadership of the house church, with its technical administrative and
economic duties, was therefore an early form of the office of episkopos.
“[47] To the degree that this nascent episcopacy grew out of the
presbyterate, the council of elders, so much did women participate in that
office.
Conclusion
In the beginning, I posed a set of questions relative to the
consensus fidelium, the collective judgment of Christ’s followers
about women in his Church. As a summation, consider these answers.
Did Jesus Discriminate Against Women?
Jesus chose to be born of a woman, Mary. He obeyed and loved her; he
included her in his ministry to humankind. He cherished and honored other
women, like Martha and Mary and Mary Magdalene. He performed miracles on behalf
of women: recall his raising Peter’s mother-in-law from the dead and
freeing the troubled daughter of a Canaanite woman. He showed compassion for an
adulteress, and blessed a repentant woman of the streets. Jesus allowed a group
of women to accompany him in his ministry throughout Palestine, to care for him
in their own way, even as regards his death. He responded to their faith,
announcing that anyone, male or female, who “does the will of my Father in
heaven is my brother, and sister, and mother” (Mt. 12: 50). He disregarded
the strictures of Jewish law when he accepted water from a Samaritan woman,
conversed with women in the marketplace, cured a menstruating woman who dared
to touch him, and permitted a sinful woman to wipe his feet with her hair. He
revealed himself to women first after his crucifixion and entrusted them with
the news of his resurrection.
Did Jesus and His Early Followers Prohibit Women From Community Roles?
Consider Paul’s catalogue of God-given roles within the Christian
community: apostles and prophets, some speaking in tongues, and teachers;
miracle-workers and healers; helpers and administrators.[48]
In the power of God’s spirit Mary became “Queen of the
Apostles,” Mary Magdalene earned acclaim as “The Apostle to the
Apostles,” and Paul celebrated Junia, his sister, and praised her as
outstanding among the apostles. In that same spirit Mary and Elizabeth and Anna
prayed prophetically; women believers in Corinth, and the daughters of Phillip,
prophesied and spoke in tongues; at Pentecost “when they were all
together,” men and women, “they were all filled with the Holy Spirit,
and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance”
(Acts 1: 14, 2: 4). Jesus’ mother, Mary, taught the evangelists Luke and
John about him, his life and ministry. Prisca instructed another apostle,
Apollos, about the new baptism in Jesus.
The evangelists portrayed Christ as a healer and miracle-worker. They
made it clear that his followers would act likewise. At the Last Supper Jesus
declared: “. . . he who believes in me will also do the works that I do;
and greater works then these will he do, because I go to the Father (Jn. 14:
12). At the end of his gospel Mark has Jesus promise: “And these signs
will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they
will speak in new tongues; . . . they will lay their hands on the sick, and
they will recover” (Mk. 16: 17-18). Note that neither evangelist has Jesus
reserving these gifts to men alone.
The apostles chose deacons, both men and women, to assist community
members. They ordained them, a practice that continued for centuries. In the
beginning we have no evidence that gender affected the position, its official
sanction, and the tasks required. In testament times we know by name only
Phoebe, a deacon of the church near Corinth. Others undoubtedly served other
churches. The title of “deacon” applied to both genders as late as
the 6th Century, even as the concurrent title “deaconess”
signified women ordained specifically to assist women congregants.
The New Testament chronicled patronesses of Jesus in his ministry, of
Paul during his apostolic journeys, and of local groups of believers. Some of
these patronesses, other women too, hosted house churches. They opened their
homes to weekly meetings in which all affirmed their belief in Christ and
celebrated his resurrection and ongoing presence in the Holy Spirit. They
supplied the necessities for a communal meal, and guided the eucharistic
remembrance of the Lord as he had directed. These women served as forerunners
of the church administrators called episkopoi.
Note that Paul did not include in his catalogue of community roles the
following: mediators between God and the Christian people; celebrants of the
community sacrifice to God; liturgical representatives of the community of
believers. Priests modeled on the practice of Judaism did not exist in the
apostolic era. They were unnecessary: Christ, the high priest, sacrificed to
his Father once and for all through his death; believers prayed and shared
according to the gifts of the Spirit given them for the community.
Was Christ Easily Manifested Through His Female Disciples?
A pregnant girl visited her cousin, and Elizabeth’s child
“leaped for joy” in her womb. Three wise men from the East discovered
a young peasant woman with her newborn; they recognized here the promised
savior of the world, and adored him. At a marriage feast in Cana, Mary
instructed the servants to “do whatever he tells you.” Thus happened
“the first of his signs . . .and manifested his glory; and his disciples
believed in him” (Jn. 2: 11).
A Samaritan woman summoned her neighbors to come to Jesus and “many
Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s
testimony” (Jn. 4: 39). Jesus, loving the sisters Martha and Mary, and
their brother, Lazarus, summoned him back to life. “Many of the Jews,
therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him. .
.”(Jn. 11: 45).
A hemorrhaging woman touched the fringe of his garment and was healed.
She testified concerning his power to the crowd surrounding them (Mt. 9:
20-22). A young girl had just died. “He went in and took her by the hand,
and the girl arose. And the report of this went through all that district”
(Mt. 9: 20-26). After his own death, Mary Magdalene encountered her risen Lord.
Following an emotion-charged conversation, she went to his disciples and said,
“ ‘I have seen the Lord’; and she told them that he had said
these things to her”(Jn. 20: 1-18).
In these and like instances a woman met Jesus, believed in him, and led
others to such belief. We have no examples in the New Testament of women,
because of their gender, blocking others, except for those already ill
disposed, from recognizing Christ or from nourishing their faith. For many,
women offered the pathway to Christ.
Is It Difficult to See in a Female Minister the Image of Christ?
The Vatican answers that question with a resounding: “Yes.”
But do the Christian people agree?
Most Protestant denominations accept women ministers. We do not
routinely hear complaints about them being less Christ-like than their male
counterparts, less able to lead their people in belief in, and service of, God.
Given their experience, this portion of Christianity disputes with the
Vatican’s doctrinaire assessment, one based on theological deduction. The
facts belie any assertion that women cannot image Christ.
In First World countries, women compete for and hold the highest
political positions, they manage corporations with a worldwide reach, they
preside over prestigious universities, and they take prominent roles in all
phases of art and entertainment. For the most part, modern societies have
banned discrimination solely on the basis of gender. Overt sexism does still
exist in rural areas and among the less educated, socio-cultural remnants of
Western patriarchal civilization; covertly, it remains in the locker-room
mentalities of “old boys networks,” and in ongoing efforts by its
minions to keep the choice jobs and the richest rewards in male hands. Educated
lay Catholics generally reject sexism as contrary to the example of, and
teachings of, Christ.
In the United States the Catholic Church lacks effective leadership. A
succession of European popes well schooled in male dominance and medieval
monarchy have appointed bishops to serve as minor lords in a male-only
hierarchy. They expect their appointees to be their regional mouthpieces,
preaching obedience and demanding compliance, in order to keep hierarchical
exclusivity in place. These bishops, in turn, ordain priests and appoint
pastors who will support this program at the local level.
With the recent scandal of clergy sexual abuse of children and the
concomitant complicity of bishops in protecting the church’s good name
instead of its children’s safety, American Catholic are abandoning their
long-accustomed role of thoughtless subservience to clerical authority. One
immediate sign of this: vocations to the priesthood have diminished to the
point that they can no longer replace priests who die, retire, or forsake their
hierarchical rank as being inappropriate to an educated and democratic Catholic
populace.
Older generations of American Catholics received their religious
education from their mothers and from religious sisters. That education took
root to the extent that these women inspired children to follow Christ in and
through their example. Only the inexperienced or the blindly rigid would dare
maintain that Catholic people in those days could not recognize the sign of
Christ’s presence in and through these women.
Today, Catholics meet fewer and fewer priests; those they do encounter
will most likely be elderly or foreign-born. Those who claim the priest as the
sign of Christ’s presence must first of all find a priest who can be
present to his people. In reality, the laity serves the day-to-day life of the
American Catholic Church. In large part women shoulder that burden as parish
administrators, religious education directors, CCD teachers and lay educators,
and hospital and prison chaplains. They have even penetrated into the deepest
sanctuary of male exclusiveness, the liturgy. Women read scriptures at mass; in
some places they preach. They lead the prayer of the faithful, and sing various
parts of the liturgical service. As eucharistic ministers they assist in the
distribution of communion and take the Eucharist to the sick. In all of this
few complain that these women obstruct the recognition of Christ among us; such
a claim would verge on the absurd.
In New Testament days Paul confronted the Jerusalem church with its bias
toward Judaism to the detriment of Gentiles attracted to the fellowship in
Christ. The Church leaders declared: converts need not be Jews as a
precondition of their Christianity. Given that most significant step forward,
they left in place other un-Christ-like socio-cultural discriminations. It took
eighteen hundred years before Christians recognized the evil of slavery. The
horror of the Holocaust and Christian complicity in it finally drove Church
officials to denounce anti-Semitism after nearly two millennia of vilification
and muteness in the face of sectarian savagery. Has the moment finally come
when our Church will renounce, once and for all, its sexism, a bias it supports
with concocted distortions of the Christian message?
Hans Kung, commenting on scattered sexist passages in the Pauline and
deutero-Pauline portion of the New Testament, describes with deep feeling the
true Christian position. I can do no better than end with his words:
No commands for women to be silent or submissive issues from the lips of
Mary and Jesus. Neither knows any “Eve myth” which makes women
responsible for all the evil in the world. Neither knows any vilification of
sexuality, any degradation of the woman as an object of pleasure or defamation
as a universal seductress. Nor does either know any law of celibacy, though
strikingly Jesus was unmarried; nor do they know any fixation on marriage. To
this degree the apostle Paul interpreted the cause of Mary and Jesus
sympathetically when he wrote about Christ, the exalted Lord, “For freedom
he has set us free.” “And where the Spirit of this Lord blows, there
is freedom.” In the sphere of this freedom there is no place for sexual
discrimination, devaluation of women, making sex taboo, emotionality, feminine
corporeality, submission to a male hierarchy. In the sphere of this freedom
which Christ embodies, “there is neither male nor female, for you all are
‘one,’ in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 5: 1, 2Cor. 3: 17, Gal. 3:
27).[49]
[1] Cf. http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Paul06/p6interi.htm
[2] Mulieris dignitatem, Para. 26. Cf.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_15081988_mulieris-dignitatem_en.html
[3] Sacerdotalis ordinatio, May 22, 1994, para. 4. Cf.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_22051994_ordinatio-sacerdotalis_en.html
[4] Swidler, Leonard & Arlene (eds.). Women Priests.
“St. Paul’s Attitude Toward Women.” New York: Paulist Press,
1977, pp. 214-215.
[5] Quoted in Swidler,” Introduction,” p. 11.
[6] Annuario Pontificio, 1997, p. 1073, part IV, section 2. Cf.
http://cara.georgetown.edu/pubs/authorindex.html
[7] The New York Times, Saturday, May 31, 2008, p. 8.
[8] Meyer, Katherine. National Catholic Reporter, October 29,
1999.
[9] Cf. Abbott, Walter. The Documents of Vatican II. New York:
The America Press, 1966, p. 347.
[10] I am well aware that the “Jewish Testament” and the
“Christian Testament” more adequately describe the two scriptures.
But because I am writing particularly for a Catholic audience, I will
throughout use the more common “Old Testament” and “New
Testament.”
[11] Unless otherwise stated, all scriptural quotations are taken from
the Revised Standard Version: Catholic Edition. Camden, N.J.: Thomas
Nelson and Sons, 1965.
[12] September 5, 1865. Cf.
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Paul06/p6christ.htm. Paragraph 8.
[13] Op. cit. Swidler. “The Twelve,” Elizabeth
Schûssler Fiorenza, p. 115.
[14] Meier, John B. “The Circle of the Twelve: Did It Exist during
Jesus’ Public Ministry?” Journal of Biblical Literature, vol.
116, #4 (Winter, 1997), p. 671.
[15]Op. cit, p. 120.
[16] Origin, “Commentary on John 4: 26-28.” Quoted in Eisen,
Ute. Women Officeholders in Early Christianity. Collegeville: The
Liturgical Press, 2000, p. 51.
[17] Ilan, Tal. Jewish Women in Greco-Roman Palestine. Peabody,
Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers, 1996, pp. 163 & 165.
[18] Eisen, op.cit, p. 51. Cf. Hippolytus “Commentary on the
Song of Songs.”
[19] In Swidler, op. cit. Brooten, Bernadette, “ Junia . . .
outstanding among the apostles” (Romans 16: 7), p. 141.
[20] Eisen, op. cit., p. 51. Cf. Chrysostom, “Commentary on
the Epistle to the Romans,” Homily 31, 2. Cf.
[21] Cf. Brooten, op. cit., p. 141.
[22] Brooten, ibid., pp. 141-142.
[23] Ilan, op. cit., pp. 100-101, 102.
[24] Ibid., p. 101.
[25] Tractate Niddah, Chapter IV, 2. Commentary on
Mishnah. Cf.
http://www.come-and-hear.com/niddah/niddah_31.html#chapter_iv ; cf. Ilan, ibid., p. 105; cf. also Massey, Lesly. Women
and the New Testament. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Company,
1989, p. 14.
[26] Ilan, op. cit., p. 126.
[27] Massey, op. cit., p. 14.
[28]Ilan, op. cit., p. 130.
[29] Ilan, ibid., p. 132.
[30] Gardner, Jane. Women in Roman Law and Society. Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 1986, p. 127.
[31] Ibid., p. 11.
[32] Ibid., p. 5.
[33] Ibid., p. 11.
[34] Ibid.,p. 127.
[35] Ibid., p. 7.
[36] Ilan, op. cit., p. 88.
[37] Ilan, ibid., p. 135.
[38]Gardner, op. cit., pp. 81-82.
[39] Ilan, op. cit., p. 143.
[40] Cf. Mt.19: 8-9.
[41] I do not address here the complicated theological question as to
when and how a God-given marriage actually occurs.
[42] Homily 30 on Romans 16: 1-2. Cf.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/210230.htm
[43] Homily 11 on 1Timothy 3: 8-11. Cf.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/230611.htm
[44] Madigan, Kevin & Osiek, Carolyn. Ordained Women in the Early
Church. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005, pp. 3-8, 203-204.
[45] Lohse, Edward. “Die Erlstehung des Bischofamtes,”
pp. 60-61. Quoted in Eisen, op. cit., p. 205.
[46] Lietzmann, Hans, “Zur altchristhedes
Verfassungsgeschichte.” Quoted in Eisen, ibid., p. 205.
[47] Ibid., p. 205.
[48] C. 1Cor.: 12: 27-32.
[49] Kung, Hans. Women in Christianity. John Bowden (trans). New
York: Continuum, 2001, p. 59.
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