Mary Kassian has a helpful review of Rachel Held Evans’ “A Year of Biblical Womanhood.” At the heart of Kassian’s critique is Evans’ consistent caricature of complementarianism. Kassian writes: Sadly, the complementarianism portrayed in A Year of Biblical Womanhood is just another tiresome straw (wo)man argument. I think Rachel’s publicity stunt confuses rather than clarifies the issues. Most complementarians who read the book are bound to feel gravely misrepresented, misunderstood, and even hurt by it.

The following quote from Martin Luther is well-known in evangelical circles. Nevertheless it seems that every generation of evangelicalism has to struggle with the priority of Greek and Hebrew in theological education. For this reason, I think it’s worth reminding ourselves from time to time of Luther’s sage words. It’s a reminder to educators to hold the line. It’s an encouragement to students to remember the goal of their toil—to know God through His word.

Proverbs 21:9 says, “It is better to live in a corner of a roof, Than in a house shared with a contentious woman.” Doug Wilson excoriates Rachel Held Evans’ interpretation of this text, saying: What Evans did was this. Whenever she caught herself being verbally inappropriate, she put a penny in a jar, and every penny represented a minute she had to go up and sit on the roof of her house. This is where I clear my throat tentatively, not sure I could have heard this right. But I did, and there are three obvious things that can be mentioned right off the top. First, the text says that…

I’ve noted two negative reviews of Rachel Held Evans’ new book A Year of Biblical Womanhood, but we would do well to note the appearance of three positive reviews as well. They are written by scholars of the Bible, and each of them generally commends Evans as a reliable guide to the interpretation of Scripture. They even suggest that she has a more sophisticated hermeneutic than her complementarian critics. In their own words: Ben Witherington – “Rachel Held Evans is not just another woman using the Bible to write about women’s experiences. She actually is quite adept at Biblical interpretation and has done some good reading and research and exegetical…

Tim Keller’s wife Kathy has a hard-hitting review of Rachel Held Evans’ book A Year of Biblical Womanhood. She hits all the right points. In particular, she critiques Evans’ flat reading of the Bible that does not interpret specific scriptures in their redemptive historical context. She concludes by critiquing Evans’ notion of love and power:

Rachel Held Evans has recently asked readers whether or not there is room for Christians to “debate the nature of Scripture – like what we mean by ‘authority’ or ‘inerrancy’ or ‘inspiration’?” (source). In her own writings, Evans has certainly been calling these issues into question, and she has been giving answers that consistently land on the liberal end of the theological spectrum. She reveals that she herself long ago stopped believing in the “Bible’s exclusive authority, inerrancy, perspicuity, and internal consistency” (source). I for one am grateful that Evans is willing to engage this conversation. These issues do in fact relate to the nature of scripture, and I can…