1 Cor 14:33-35

Warning: Heavy Blog Item

Me: Hey, XXX just came back from Hawaii preaching in a women’s conference.
Friend: It would be best if she stopped doing it so often.
Me: Huh? Why? She’s a great preacher. I look up to her.
Friend: The bible says that women shouldn’t preach in church. Didn’t you know?
Me: *Kept quiet while having a faint memory of being taught of such verses*

This conversation took place about a month ago over supper with a friend. The thought of having such passages in the Bible was rather dirturbing, but I could not confirm the validity of such teaching, as I couldn’t remember where the passages were in scripture. Last week, reading through the book of 1 Corinthians, I came across these passages:

1 Cor 14:33-35 - For God is not God of disorder but of peace. As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church.

Whar… if we just read those couple of lines Apostle Paul sounds rather chauvinistic, doesn’t he? Disgraceful for a woman to speak in church? Just by looking at it squarely, made me understand how easily the passage could be distorted and misinterpreted to talk down to women today *pull hair*. I've blogged about this problem earlier; that many misinterprets passages out of context.

1 Corinthians was a letter written by Paul to the church of Corinth that had fallen into disunity. Prior to the letter written, the church in Corinth had actually sent Paul some questions and this letter was an answer meant to correct the abuses within the church. To me, it was disturbing to just take in the passage ‘as it is’ because:

• I know the God I worship does not practice favoritism – thus, no favorites between genders.
• Backtrack to Chapter 11:5 (And every woman who prays and prophecies…); So, we know that women were exercising their gifts in prophecy and prayer in church during the time.
• Fast forward to Chapter 12:27 (Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is part of it); We learn that each of us play a part within the body and are given spiritual gifts to exercise.

As I read through the totality of the book, somehow that passage just didn’t quite fit. Unable to figure out the answer, I picked a Life Application Study Bible and this explanation was taken from that source:

In the Corinthian culture, women were not allowed to confront men in public. Apparently, some of the women who had become Christians thought that their Christian freedom gave them the right to question men in public worship. This was causing division in the church. In addition, women on that day did not receive formal religious education, as did the men. Women may have been raising questions in the worship services that could have been answered at home without disrupting the service. Paul was asking the women not to flaunt their Christian freedom during worship. The purposes of Paul’s words were to promote unity, not teach about women’s role in the church.

Ooo… so, it was because of the culture at that time that caused Paul to make such a correction to the church. It was SO MISINTEPRETED :P So that's the reason why Paul wrote, “...but must be in submission, as the Law says” I was wondering why suddenly he was talking about ‘Law’ – actually, he was talking about the culture that it was disgraceful for women to speak in public.

*moment of enlightenment*

Sure is interesting, eh? This book called the Bible. Remind me to have a chat with my friend *wink!*