Well, another annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) is now in the books. I returned home late Thursday night from Fort Worth, TX, where this year’s gathering was held. For those of you who don’t know, the ETS is a society of theologians and biblical scholars who are dedicated to biblical inerrancy and a belief in the Trinity. At the annual meeting, members come together to present academic papers, meet with publishers, and catch up with old friends. Keep in mind that I only experienced a narrow slice of things, but here are my reflections on what I saw nonetheless. 1. Fort Worth and Nostalgia I confess that…
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Elite Evangelicalism’s Allergy to Complementarianism
Former editor of Christianity Today, Mark Galli, wrote a jaw-dropping column last week. Galli’s essay discusses where the next generation of evangelical leadership is going to emerge from. Will it be from among “elite evangelicalism” (e.g., Fuller Seminary, CT, Intervarsity Press, World Vision, etc.), or will it be from among the constellation of “reactionary Reformed conservatives” (e.g., Doug Wilson)? Galli then goes on to talk about his tenure at Christianity Today and what it revealed to him about the priorities of “elite evangelicalism.” He writes, Elite evangelicalism (represented by CT, IVPress, World Vision, Fuller Seminary, and a host of other establishment organizations) is too often “a form of cultural accommodation…
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An Important Challenge to Egalitarian Claims about Ephesians 5:22
Peter Gurry has an important article titled “The Text of Eph 5.22 and the Start of the Ephesian Household Code” in the most recent issue of New Testament Studies. This article is significant for two reasons. One, this article presents a significant challenge to a common egalitarian reading of Ephesians 5:21-22. Two, the argument appears in the premier academic journal for New Testament scholarship. What does the article say? Here is a literal translation of the Greek text of Ephesians 5:18-22. I’ve laid it out so that you can see the structure of the argument: 18 …be filled with the Spirit 19a by speaking to one another in psalms…
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Complementarianism? What’s in a name?
Over the last several weeks, the evangelical interwebs have been astir with debates about women preaching and complementarianism. I have noticed in much of this discussion that there seems to be much confusion about what complementarianism is. As a result, some of us have been trying to address this confusion in hopes of shedding some light on the matter (see here, here, and here). But that is not my purpose in this short post. Rather, what I would like to do is make a brief historical point about the origin and referent of the term complementarian. While it was common for older commentators to point out that Adam and Eve…
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Thin Complementarianism?
David Talcott weighs-in late on a Complemenatrian controversey pitting Aimee Byrd and Carl Trueman against John Piper. Talcott explains: Several weeks back there was a bit of a dust-up in conservative Reformed Protestant circles over the following simple question: Does being a man or a woman have any ethical significance for the way we live together in civil society? Despite the success of feminism in radically reworking gender roles over the past half century, conservative Evangelicalism has maintained a modest conviction that our sexuality has ethical import. Certain New Testament passages compel conservative Evangelicals to maintain that women should not be pastors and that the husband is in some way…
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Complementarianism or Patriarchy? What’s in a name?
Rachel Held Evans recently made a splash with a blog post suggesting that complementarianism is merely patriarchy masquerading under a less offensive name. Her post generated a good bit of discussion not only on her blog but on Scot McKnight’s as well. Evans is riffing on remarks that Russell Moore recently made about complementarians who are big on gender orthodoxy but not so much on orthopraxy. Here’s how Moore expressed his concern, “What I fear is that we have many people in evangelicalism who can check off ‘complementarian’ on a box but who really aren’t living out complementarian lives.” Evans agrees with this statement and then offers three reasons why…
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Junia Is a Woman, and I Am a Complementarian
Scot McKnight is one of my favorite egalitarians. We are quite different in our theological perspectives, but he is an all around engaging personality. He is a fantastic New Testament scholar and a prolific writer. His interests are wide-ranging, and he is gifted both at producing serious scholarship and at reaching more popular audiences with his work. In my view, he’s a triple threat: serious scholar, popular blogger, and charismatic speaker. He has a gift for communicating serious ideas to wide audiences. His new little e-book Junia Is Not Alone (Patheos Press, 2011) is no exception. In this little pamphlet, McKnight argues at the popular level in favor of an…
