J. Lee Grady's 25 Tough Questions About Women and the Church¹ A Review Article

J. Lee Grady-a staunch proponent of egalitarianism-wrote 25 Tough Questions About Women and the Church as a way of publicly responding to the kinds of gender role questions that he is frequently asked to address. As it unfolds, the book is presented as something of a popularly written egalitarian field manual (xi), addressing questions that range from matters of interpretation to assessing the value of moms staying home with children to counsel on how and when to defy the authority of church leaders. In all of this, Grady's underlying thesis seems to be that one's gifting and calling are the only relevant factors for discerning roles in ministry and in the home (ix). According to Grady then, any consideration of gender-be it for the office of elder in the church, for leadership in the home, or for other related considerations-is an evidence of unbiblical gender prejudice and therefore ought to be eliminated entirely from our thinking (viii).

Before proceeding to a detailed analysis of Grady's proposal, however, several preliminary observations need to be highlighted. In the first place, it should be noted that Grady is an evangelical and an inerrantist (ix), which means that he has committed himself not to dismiss key passages that are inconvenient for his view. This is, of course, a commendable starting point. What's more, several of his concerns are entirely valid and shared by complementarians. For example, biblical complementarians wholeheartedly agree with Grady's identification of the abuse of women as an intolerable injustice (4). He also appropriately counsels those who have been sinned against, even in this terrible way, not to harbor unforgiveness in their hearts (5). Grady even recognizes that "[g]ender differences are part of the creation order" (16).²

Despite those commendable acknowledgements, however, Grady's central aim in this book is the advancement of an egalitarian thesis, and it is this complex of interwoven arguments that calls for a response. The fact that the book is popularly written-and therefore likely to receive a wider reading-only heightens the need for a response. In offering this review then, it is my judgment that Grady, though undoubtedly well intended, has produced a line of argument that runs counter to the Bible's teaching and that will ultimately prove harmful to the health of the church. I note the unhealthy effect on the church not to be mean-spirited, but merely as an observation that any time someone counsels-even unwittingly-disobedience to what God has authoritatively laid down in the Scriptures, it will prove to have an unhealthy effect.

Evaluation of Grady's Case

In what follows, I will not attempt an exhaustive point-by-point interaction with Grady's book. Rather, my more limited aim will be to identify and evaluate several pivotal weaknesses that mark Grady's case. As I have already mentioned, it seems that, in one form or another, most of Grady's exegetical and theological arguments serve to support his claim that gifting and calling-but not gender-are the only applicable factors for discerning home and churchly leadership roles. Since this argument appears to have the status of a cumulative conclusion, it will be considered last.

A. Misrepresentations and Unhelpful Tone

In terms of the actual content of Grady's arguments for an egalitarian view of gender roles, this factor is the least significant. That is to say that the contents of many of these criticisms of complementarianism are irrelevant, because they attack misrepresentations and not the real thing. And, since they are irrelevant, it is fair to conclude that they are of no formal significance to the debate between complementarians and egalitarians. This formal observation, however, does not necessarily neutralize the potentially detrimental effect of such continual misrepresentations on a reader.

Allow me to expand on this point a bit. Of course everyone makes mistakes, but when an author writes a book, readers generally assume-and should be able to assume-that the author has a sufficient basis to support each of his claims. This obligation is further magnified when a given claim involves the criticism of another position. In other words, criticism of other views is entirely appropriate, but readers ought to be able to trust that the author is accurately representing the opposing view when he brings it in for criticism.³ When accurate representation does not take place, then readers are susceptible to being led to believe something about another view that is not actually true.⁴

Having said that, we need to consider a few examples of Grady's misrepresentations and unhelpful tone. Accordingly, we note how Grady routinely suggests that the "traditional" or "hierarchical"⁵ view is so deeply prejudiced against women that it actually encourages abuse and other harmful effects. Consider the following samples:

". . . the church seems powerless to protect women because its misguided theology actually encourages abuse" (viii).

"This pagan, hierarchical view of marriage has resulted in a skyrocketing divorce rate among Bible-believing Christians, as well as a growing problem with domestic abuse that Christian leaders don't like to talk about" (xi-xii, italics added).

"This warped view has created a fragile foundation in many Christian homes, leading to strife, mistrust and, in some cases, abuse" (10, italics added).

"It may take another generation before we rid the church of this crippling spirit of gender prejudice-an attitude that continues to slow the advancement of the gospel" (91, italics added).

"I am grateful today that so many women are rejecting the unhealthy religious mind-sets that have been set up like roadblocks by Satan himself" (96, italics added).

"What an army of women we could release today-if the church would discard silly notions about headship that cripple our efforts to evangelize the world" (99, italics added).

"Why has the church silenced women? Why have we urged them to settle for less? Why have we coaxed them to avoid the spiritual battlefield? I believe the devil is behind this strategy" (167, italics added).

What these examples reveal is a harsh polemic against and consistent misrepresentation of the complementarian view.

With respect to the issue of abuse, for instance, it is true that some persons in what we might call the "abusive male dominance" camp have claimed male superiority as a basis for beating their wives (4). But what Grady should have noted is that the abusive male dominance view and the complementarian view are clearly not the same. Biblical complementarians do not claim that men are superior to women, and they vigorously oppose all forms of spouse and child abuse.⁶ Such abuse clearly violates Paul's command for husbands to love their wives "as Christ loved the church" (Eph 5:25).⁷ Hence, a distinction-which Grady appears not to make-is in order between an abusive notion of male dominance and a complementarian notion of male headship. Viewed in this manner, the ultimate solution to the problem with spouse abuse turns out not to be the elimination of gender role distinctions; rather, the ultimate solution stems from the embrace of a truly biblical complementarity, whereby the husband leads and sacrificially loves his wife as Christ loves church and the wife graciously submits herself to her husband's leadership just as the church submits to Christ (Eph 5:22-33).⁸

With respect to Grady's claim about divorce, two brief observations will suffice. First, Grady does not document the unlikely claim that complementarian marriages lead to higher divorce rates. Second, and more importantly, a moment's reflection should demonstrate the claim's implausibility. It is certainly the case that we are all sinners; it is also true that even the godliest marriages experience difficult times. Nevertheless, when a husband and a wife-equal in worth and dignity-seek, by God's grace, to live out their respective roles of servant leadership and gracious submission, we would probably be hard-pressed to find many prognosticators ready to project the ultimate doom of this marriage.⁹

Finally, Grady's most startling comments may well be those that link complementarianism to the hindrance of evangelism and other Satanic oppressions of women. Here again, two observations are in order. First, Grady's comments about demonic opposition to women are not really germane to biblical complementarianism. It is not the case, for instance, that complementarians urge women "to settle for less" or "to avoid the spiritual battlefield" (167). But insofar as Grady's comments resist any room for a God-given distinction in roles (85), the distressing reality is that he is labeling as Satanic what God deems good. Second, Grady seems to suggest that complementarians oppose virtually any form of female initiative in ministry.¹⁰ This is simply not the case, however. The Bible is replete with manifold depictions of women in ministry. Complementarians celebrate this reality, and seek to empower godly women to fulfill every ministry capacity that is biblically available to them.¹¹ That being the case, it is difficult to see how biblically limiting the office of elder (and other elder-like roles) to otherwise qualified men factors in as an impediment to world evangelization.

In regard to the quotations above, one sometimes wonders if Grady actually has complementarians in mind as the recipients of his criticism. For, these criticisms either involve a misrepresentation of the complementarian view, or they are only valid as criticisms of the abusive male dominance position. But, neither the misrepresentations nor the abusive male dominance position depict complementarianism accurately. Lumping these views together, as Grady often appears to do, would seem to indicate one of two things. Either, he does not differentiate between complementarianism and abusive male dominance, because he does not understand the complementarian view; or he does understand the complementarian view but misrepresents it as abusive male dominance anyway.¹² If it is a case of the former scenario (i.e., misunderstanding), then Grady's book is severely handicapped by virtue of not considering the most biblically viable alternative to his own position. If the latter scenario (i.e., misrepresentation) proves to be the case, then Grady's book is hampered by virtue of distorting the complementarian view.

In either case, the complementarian position is not depicted as it actually stands. Consequently, I fear that trusting readers, who may be less familiar with the gender role debate, might conclude from Grady's book that the only two options pertinent to this discussion are either egalitarianism or the abusive misogyny of male dominance. If readers come away with that conclusion, then they will fail to see God's wonderful design of biblical complementarity.¹³

B. Exegetical and Theological Errors

The errors under consideration in the remaining sections do not so much misrepresent complementarianism as they misinterpret biblical data and draw incorrect theological conclusions. Since spatial limitations prohibit an exhaustive interaction with the contents of Grady's book, my purpose in these sections is simply to interact with representative examples of these types of errors. Along these lines, I find that many of Grady's most significant exegetical and theological errors often involve: imposing a meaning on a given text that the biblical author did not intend, arguing from silence, or basing an interpretation not on what is specifically stated in a passage but on a speculative suggestion about the unspoken mental frame of reference behind the biblical author's argument. In this section then, we will give sustained attention to two sets of errors that broadly represent many kinds of the exegetical and theological mistakes committed by Grady in his book.¹⁴

1. We begin by noting that Grady-in a common egalitarian approach-has removed the biblical category of "male headship" and replaced it, instead, with an appeal to "mutual submission." He gets at this issue in a variety of ways.

For one, he observes (correctly) that Eph 5:22-"Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord"-depends for its verb on Eph 5:21, which in the NASB reads ". . . be subject to one another in the fear of Christ" (13). Even though the rest of the Pauline household code-Eph 5:22-6:9¹⁵-and the rest of the Bible, for that matter, nowhere calls upon husbands to submit to wives,¹⁶ Grady nevertheless concludes that the passage does not really place an emphasis on male leadership. Rather, in Grady's view, what Eph 5:22 really calls for is a sense of "mutual submission" whereby "the husband and wife have equal authority in Christ" (13).¹⁷

Another way that Grady seeks to undermine "male headship" is by defining the Greek word kephale as "source" instead of "head" in 1 Cor 11:3 and Eph 5:23 (14, 95-96, 150).¹⁸ The force of this claim, if true, would be to indicate that the term kephale in these contexts has no connotation of authority. Rather, in Grady's view, the term "is about intimacy, mutuality and the unique connection that exists between a husband and wife" (150).

Finally, Grady opposes the doctrine of male headship by speculating about the backdrop to Paul's comments in Ephe-sians 5:22-33. Here he suggests that Paul was not endorsing the husband's marital leadership so much as he was nullifying the authority of the bride's father. Grady reasons that this was necessary, because fathers in that first century culture viewed their daughters as property and sought to exert continued control over them even after they were married (15, 22). In further support of this theory, Grady also proposes that Paul deviates from the common usage of the Greek term hupotasso in Eph 5:21-24, such that he is not calling for a wife's "submission" to her husband, but is simply pointing out that, upon marriage, a wife is now "attached" or connected to her husband as opposed to her father (22).

What of these attempts to replace male headship with mutual submission? Minimally, the following responses are in order.

First, the claim that Eph 5:22 teaches mutual submission, because it depends on verse 21 for its verb, is unsustainable in context. For, as a transitional verse, Eph 5:21 introduces the entire household code in Eph 5:22-6:9. Therefore, if one is going to interpret Eph 5:21 in such a way that it necessitates mutual submission in the wife's relationship to her husband in verse 22, then consistent interpretation requires applying the same conclusion to all of the relationships specified in this passage.¹⁹ That, in turn, would mean that Paul disavowed roles of leadership and instead expected mutual submission in the relationships between: parents and children (Eph 6:1-4), slaves and masters (Eph 6:5-9), and (most shockingly of all) Christ and the church (Eph 5:23-32). But to suggest-in the first century no less-that parents submit to their children or that masters submit to their slaves²⁰ or, especially, that Christ submits to the church just shows the absurdity of the claim. In short, Grady's interpretation imposes a meaning on the text of Eph 5:21-6:9 that Paul did not intend. A more contextual interpretation recognizes that, in 5:22ff. Paul unpacks the spheres of submission that he intends in 5:21. Hence, we are told that wives are to submit to their husbands, the church to Christ, children to their parents, and slaves to masters. But, while husbands, fathers, and masters are called upon (and Christ is seen) to lead lovingly and sacrificially, none of these parties are called on to submit to their counterparts.²¹

Second, though common among egalitarians, the claim that kephale, in 1 Cor 11:3 and Eph 5:23, means "source" without any connotation of authority cannot withstand the evidence. Wayne Grudem has repeatedly and conclusively demonstrated both that "authority over" is a common meaning for kephale in ancient Greek and that, as yet, no one has produced an uncontested example of the meaning "source" without authority from ancient Greek literature.²² Additionally, contextual exegesis requires that a sense of authority be retained in Eph 5:23 since the wife's submission to her husband is paralleled by the church's submission to Christ (5:24). And clearly, Christ stands in a position of authority as the kephale of the church. To claim otherwise is, once again, to impose a meaning on the passage that Paul did not intend.

Third, Grady seeks to advance the cause of mutual submission by speculating about the backdrop of Paul's mental frame when he wrote Eph 5:22-33. Recall Grady's suggestion that Paul's purpose in this passage was not to endorse the husband's role as leader but to nullify the authority that first century fathers hoped to continue exerting over their married daughters (15, 22). The problem with this theory, however, is that it is not the reasoning that Paul gives. Paul does not say that "the husband is the ‘head' of wife, as the father was formerly the ‘head' of his daughter." He says ". . . the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church. . ." (Eph 5:23, NASB). The parallel of the husband's authority in marriage is not with a father's former authority over his children, but with Christ's perpetual authority over the church.²³ To be sure, Paul does emphasize, in this passage, the "one flesh" relationship and the necessity of a young husband to leave his parents and cleave to his new bride (5:31, quoting Gen 2:24). But even here, Paul explains that the deeper "mystery" of the one flesh marital union points to the relationship between Christ and his church (5:32). In contrast, Grady's interpretation of male headship in Eph 5:22-33 replaces Paul's self-stated reasoning with a line of argument that Paul does not actually give.²⁴

2. We now turn to consider a second set of errors, by which Grady attempts to undo the force of Paul's prohibition of women "teaching or exercising authority over a man" in 1 Timothy 2:11-15.²⁵ While all the details cannot be rehearsed here, Grady essentially employs all of the following arguments: (1) First Timothy 2:12 is the only the verse in the Bible that can possibly be construed to prevent women from functioning as elders, but such a reading actually misinterprets the passage (173). (2) Elsewhere in the NT, we find Paul encouraging women to teach (e.g., Titus 2:3-5). Therefore, 1 Tim 2:12 does not really prohibit a woman's elder-like teaching authority over men (160, 173). (3) Instead, Paul was simply prohibiting uneducated Ephesian women from taking on teaching roles (141-142, 159). (4) Or, perhaps, he was attempting to restrain women who were teaching false doctrine-especially a Gnostic heresy that Eve was created before Adam (143-144, 159-160). (5) In either case-argument 3 or 4-Paul's prohibition was culturally and situationally bound, and therefore cannot be timelessly applicable (143).

We may begin our brief response, by stating the obvious point that Grady has gone to great lengths-as egalitarians frequently do-to contest the meaning of this passage. Taking his comments in order, however, we may evaluate them as follows.

(1) Grady's claim, that the traditional interpretation of 1 Tim 2:12 is askew, depends on his subsequent arguments that speculatively attempt to reconstruct the background to the epistle, and those points will be considered in turn. But this particular argument suffers from another major defect, viz., the claim that 1 Tim 2:12 is the only biblical text that can even be remotely construed to tilt in the direction of complementarianism. This observation is simply not true. The whole tenor of Scripture-going all the way back to creation, as Paul points out in 2:13-points us in the direction of male leadership.²⁶

(2) The fact that Paul elsewhere endorses women's teaching cannot be used to silence his intention in the present passage. That said, I surely agree that the prohibition in 1 Tim 2:12 does not bar women from all forms of teaching. Indeed, many women are gifted teachers. Certainly, Paul instructed older women to teach younger women (Titus 2:3-5). And perhaps most famously Priscilla, along with her husband Aquila, privately instructed Apollos (Acts 18:26). What Paul's command has in view then, is the type of regular teaching and authority exercised by elders, which is to say that the pastoral office should be reserved for otherwise qualified men.²⁷ Again, the reason I say this is because the two activities-teaching and exercise of authority over men-that Paul prohibits women from exercising in 1 Tim 2:12 correspond to the two activities that are uniquely required for the NT office of elder/pastor/overseer (1 Tim 3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9).

(3) Here we come to the first of Grady's attempts to reconstruct the background to 1 Timothy 2:11-15, when he suggests that Paul was really just prohibiting uneducated Ephesian women from exercising teaching roles. His argument is that women in that culture were essentially sequestered at home and therefore ignorant (141-142), with the result that Paul forbade such women from teaching, not because they were women, but because they were not qualified educationally. Consequently, the cultural limitation of this prohibition is understood to be removed in societies where both men and women are educated.

The problem with this interpretation is that it is an argument from silence based on a speculatively reconstructed background. What's more, the following indicators show that Grady's suggested background is deficient: a) It has actually been shown that "many men and women in the first century had basic literary skills, and very few men or women had education beyond this level."²⁸ Hence, it is not likely that Paul was singling out Ephesian women as being particularly unintelligent. b) When we consider that many of the apostles lacked formal training, it becomes clear that formal academic education was not a requirement to teach the Bible in the first century. c) If ignorance was the issue, then we would expect Paul to prohibit such uneducated women from teaching anyone at all, and not just men. d) Again, if lack of education was the underlying issue, it would be inconsistent of Paul to prohibit uneducated women from teaching while not also prohibiting uneducated men from teaching.²⁹ In view of all this, Grady's proposal is found wanting. For his interpretation removes the reasoning that Paul actually gives-the creation order (2:13)-for his prohibition, and replaces it with an unsustainable hypothesis concerning lack of education that Paul nowhere states.

(4) If the previous theory is shown to fail, that is evidently of little consequence. For, Grady is ready with another speculative reconstruction of the background to 1 Tim 2:11-15. This time he advances the thesis that Paul's prohibition was intended to restrain women from teaching some form of false doctrine, most likely a Gnostic heresy about Eve being created first (143-144, 159-160). Once again, the force of this claim, if true, would be to limit the application of this passage, since the abiding element of Paul's restriction would pertain, not to the issue of women teaching men, but to the issue of anyone teaching heresy. In the Ephesian situation, according to Grady, it just happened to be the case that women were the particular purveyors of false teaching.

In addressing my response to this hypothesis, I will attend mainly to the broader suggestion concerning false teaching rather than to the specifics of the Gnostic heresy to which Grady appeals.³⁰ Consider the following points: a) Once again, if false teaching was the issue, then we would expect Paul to prohibit such female heretics from teaching anyone at all, and not just men. b) Interestingly, however, the only false teachers ever mentioned in Ephesus are men (1 Tim 1:19-20; 2 Tim 1:15; 2:17-18; Acts 20:30). Hence, if Paul's point was to disqualify false teachers, one is left to wonder why he singled out women. c) Finally, Grady's interpretation yet again removes the reasoning that Paul gives-creation order-for his prohibition, and replaces it with a thesis about false teaching that Paul nowhere states.³¹ Paul does not say that he restricts women from teaching men, because they are teaching heresy. Instead, he argues that his prohibition is intended to reflect the complementarity that was built into the creation order (1 Tim 2:13).

(5) All of the arguments offered by Grady on 1 Tim 2:12 attempt, in one way or another, to attach cultural limitations to the range of the command's applicability. Despite all of his efforts, however, the one feature of the passage that Grady never seriously considers is the reason Paul gives for his command in 2:13. Paul explicitly grounds his command on the divine ordering of creation-"But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet. For it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve " (NASB, underline added). The logic of the passage then, is actually fairly simple. Paul's prohibition has nothing to do with poorly educated women or female heretics. He prohibits a woman from exercising elder-like teaching authority over men, because he does not want to contravene God's purpose for men and women in creation. Since the command is grounded in creation it is necessarily trans-cultural.

C. Argument from Experience

Here, we can afford to be brief and simply point out that Grady frequently appeals to the evident success of women serving in pastoral roles as a basis for claiming that God favors this practice (91, 177, 192-195). He even asserts that complementarians will find it "increasingly difficult . . . to ignore the anointing that is on prominent female preachers, pastors and Bible teachers today" (91).

This argument must face an obvious question, however. We might put it this way: Is experience-even the experience of evident success-an adequate basis for concluding that the affirmation of female pastors is right? Surely, as self-professing evangelicals, we should only acknowledge Scripture as our ultimate authority. So, our decision on this issue must finally come down, not to a set of experiential observations, but to a glad-hearted embrace of whatever Scripture teaches. And, of course, the view here articulated is that the Scripture teaches a complementarian understanding of gender roles.

What's more, we should be careful about jumping immediately to the conclusion that the Lord approves of female pastors just because we find some evident blessing on their ministries. Indeed, we should never be surprised to find a measure of blessing attached to the preaching of God's word, regardless of who is doing the preaching. For the Lord has promised to be faithful to his word (Isa 55:11), and that promise is not compromised by the disobedience of any given pastor. In fact, this reality is so sure that Paul was able to rejoice in the proclamation of the gospel by his enemies, when their singular motivation for preaching was the desire to increase Paul's hardship in prison (Phil 1:12-18).³² Clearly then, the blessing that attends the proclamation of God's word does not necessarily indicate that the Lord approves of everything about the one preaching. Surely, for instance, God did not approve of the motives of Paul's enemies in their preaching (Phil 1:15, 17). It does not follow from the fact that the Lord has blessed the preaching of some female pastors, that he is therefore an egalitarian proponent of female pastors. Experience does not decide this issue. Scripture alone does.

D. Grady's Conclusion: Gifting and Calling Only

As mentioned above, it seems to me, that all of Grady's aforementioned arguments funnel toward one overarching conclusion, viz., that the only regulative feature for discerning leadership in the home and church is a privatized understanding of how one has been gifted and called (viii, ix, 40, 42, 78, 81, 152, 160). In Grady's view, it seems that a personal sense of calling cannot be questioned-not even by Scripture. Therefore, according to Grady's logic, any woman who senses a call to the pastoral office is not only allowed to do so, but must do so lest she risk disobedience to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

Once again, though, this issue finally comes down to a question of whether or not we are ultimately subject to biblical authority. The simple fact is that we are never "called" to disobey Scripture. So if the Bible is correctly understood to teach complementarianism, then God will not "call" women to disobey that teaching.³³ Undoubtedly, Scripture makes it clear that God does call and gift women to teach and lead in certain contexts (Titus 2:3-5; Acts 18:26). But Scripture is equally clear that certain teaching and leadership activities are reserved for otherwise qualified males (1 Tim 2:11-15, 1 Cor 14:34-35). So we take our stand with Scripture and affirm that complementarity is part of God's good design for men and women.

Conclusion

In this review of J. Lee Grady's 25 Tough Questions About Women and the Church I have attempted to point out several of the most significant errors in his defense of egalitarian gender roles. To review briefly, Grady routinely misrepresents-intentionally or unintentionally-complementarianism. For his exegetical and theological conclusions, Grady often appeals to speculative theories that the text does not mention to the exclusion of reasons that the text does give. Finally, he seems willing to allow personal experience and a subjective sense of calling to trump biblical authority.

Unfortunately, these errors hinder Grady's ability to see the beauty of complementarianism's twin truths (xi, 18-19, 96), viz., the full personal equality of men and women and the divinely ordained differences in role whereby men are specially charged with providing sacrificial leadership and love in the church and home, and women are specially called to submit graciously and support lovingly the godly male leadership in the home and church. In the end, I believe that this discussion of Grady's errors is sufficient to demonstrate the unconvincing nature of his overall argument.