Divorcing 1 Timothy 2:11–15 from the Context
A review of Women in the Church: An Interpretation and Application of 1 Timothy 2:9–15, edited by Andreas Köstenberger and Thomas Schreiner (Crossway, 3rd edn, 2016). 411 pages.
A primary book on a primary text
First Timothy 2:9-15 is the primary text relied on by complementarians as excluding women from leadership in the Church.
Women in the Church is the primary complementarian book on that primary text.
It is the gold standard. 2016 saw the publication of a third edition. As of 2026, a fourth is in preparation.
There are six principal contributors.
In chapter 1, Steven Baugh provides an introductory review of what is known about life in first-century Ephesus (the destination of Paul’s letter).
In chapter 2, Al Wolters considers the meaning of the unusual Greek verb used by Paul in 1 Timothy 2:12 (authenteō).
In chapter 3, Andreas Köstenberger discusses the Greek syntax of verse 12. This links to an Appendix at the end of the book.
Chapter 4, by Tom Schreiner, is the heart of the book. Over some sixty-three pages he offers a detailed and comprehensive interpretation of verses 9–15.
In chapter 5, Robert Yarbrough summarizes a wide range of views on 1 Timothy 2.
In chapter 6, Denny Burk surveys translations of authenteō in verse 12.
There is also an Application chapter. This is a patchwork of comments by seven further contributors. Some complementarians may be troubled by the fact that six of these seven are women.
The contents of the book are summarized in the Introduction and in the Conclusion.
This is a serious work. The authors of the principal chapters have sought to approach the issues rigorously. They have tried to avoid prejudice or partisanship.
I stand in awe of the prodigious labour and erudition that has gone into it. The Bibliography alone is over thirty pages long.
The book has certainly helped to clarify the interpretive issues.
It is therefore grieving to report that the reasoning is unsatisfactory.
The essential problem is that the book advances an interpretation which divorces verses 11–15 from their context. This problem is apparent both in the details of the argument and in the very structure of the book.
How the chapters separate Paul’s text from its context
Baugh’s historical survey (Chapter 1) has the express purpose of highlighting features of life in first-century Ephesus which illuminate the background of 1 Timothy 2, in order to assist with a correct understanding. After surveying inscriptions and other historical evidence, Baugh’s summary is that Ephesus was in most ways a typical, generally patriarchal, Hellenic society, which preserved its Greek roots in its political and cultural institutions. Baugh’s conclusion disposes of mistaken theories that women were widely dominant in Ephesian culture.
However, the chapter falls short of its expressed purpose, for Baugh tells us little about Ephesian beliefs, other than that the Ephesians worshipped Artemis and were polytheists. His section on childbirth does not mention the belief that Artemis was the protector of women in childbirth. He does not reveal her links with astrology and magic. He says nothing about the likely contents of the books of magic that were burned in Ephesus (Acts 19:18–19). He passes over in silence the pagan mysteries which, for Timothy and other readers in Ephesus, stand in contrast with the mysteries of the true faith and of godliness (1 Tim. 3:9, 16). We are left without any information that might help us have a better understanding of the false teachings which Paul mentions in the letter.
Based on the finding that Ephesus was in most ways a typical Hellenic society, and without reviewing 1 Timothy 1:1 – 2:8 or 3:1 – 6:21, Baugh concludes that Paul’s injunctions in 2:9–15 are not temporary measures in a unique social setting but are reminders to the wealthy women not to step outside their divinely ordered role in the new covenant community. This is an unwarranted leap. Baugh does not say how his conclusion about Paul’s intent can be derived from his general survey of the political and cultural institutions of the city, without a close consideration of the context that Paul himself provides in his letter. He has no ground for discounting the possibility that something particular had gone wrong in the Ephesian church.
Chapter 2 considers the meaning of authenteō. Wolters’ thesis is that in 1 Timothy 2:12 this word means ‘exercise authority’.
But this chapter suffers from a major problem.
Wolters’ attention to Paul’s context is minimal. His method is to look at usage of authenteō elsewhere, similar words, ancient versions and patristic commentary. But, as Köstenberger rightly notes in a 1994 article, word studies of authenteō can only supply “a range of possible meanings” (Gender Passages in the NT: Hermeneutical Fallacies Critiqued. Westminster Theological Journal 56, no. 2: 259–283, 265). And as Moo says in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (177): “good exegesis always takes into consideration the larger context in which a text appears.”
Wolters’ attention to context is negligible. It is limited to the use of didaskō (teach) in the same verse and a reliance on Köstenberger’s strange thesis that the two verbs in the verse are positive because the conjunction between them is oude (and not) (65–66, 113, 83–84).
The idea that the meaning of a rare and disputed verb in a sentence can be confidently determined by attending to two other words in that sentence, without considering the whole train of reasoning of which the sentence forms part, cannot be defended.
And there is an additional problem. Wolters’ conclusion that authenteō means ‘exercise authority’ does not follow from the evidence which he cites. (For explanation, see chapter 27 of Bartlett, True Complementarity: The Way of Christ for Men and Women).
This chapter sets up the structural defect of the whole work. The book proceeds with backwards logic. After Wolters, without due attention to context, has determined the meaning of authenteō as ‘exercise authority’, the expositions which follow in the remaining substantive chapters are largely fashioned on the basis of this meaning. This undermines the legitimacy of the rest of the book.
In chapter 3, Köstenberger provides a syntactical examination of verse 12 and a discourse analysis of verses 8–15.
In his 1994 article, he rightly insisted that the process of interpretation should include reconstruction of the historical and cultural background, a survey of the passage’s literary context and attention to the flow of the argument.
But in chapter 3 Köstenberger pays scant attention to any of these. He dismisses the relevance of the historical and cultural background.
His analysis does not acknowledge that in 1 Timothy 1 Paul expressly states his concern. It is to combat false teaching and promote saved lives of love and goodness.
Nor does Köstenberger’s analysis notice that Paul explicitly connects what he writes in 1 Timothy 2 to that concern by starting with ‘therefore’ (2:1, repeated in 2:8).
Attention to context and to the flow of the argument only begins substantially at 2:8, largely ignoring 1:1 – 2:7. Paul’s stated concern therefore plays no role in Köstenberger’s analysis of verses 8–15.
Having ignored the false teaching in his analysis, in his conclusion he summarily dismisses its relevance for understanding Paul’s train of thought (158–161).
These flawed steps enable him to conclude that Paul’s concern is not as Paul has stated but is for upholding a proper authority structure.
For a thorough critique of Köstenberger’s syntactical theories, see chapter 27 of True Complementarity.
In chapter 4, over some sixty-three pages, Schreiner offers a detailed and comprehensive interpretation of verses 9–15.
He correctly notes:
- Paul’s concern in 1 Timothy 1 is to respond to false teaching, and the word ‘therefore’ in 2:1 and in 2:8 connects Paul’s remarks in chapter 2 with this topic (174).
- The appointments of elders and deacons discussed in 3:1–13 are for the purpose of making the church a bulwark against false teaching, as 3:14–15 indicates (179).
- Paul immediately returns to the threat of false teaching and the need to resist it in chapter 4 (179).
One might conclude from these uncontroversial remarks that 2:8–15 is concerned with the topic of resisting false teaching. However, the false teaching plays no role in Schreiner’s interpretation of verses 9–14 (176–216).
Schreiner expounds those verses on the only basis which enables him to support the complementarian ban on authoritative teaching by women, namely, by arguing against the relevance of what Paul says he is writing about (205–206, 210–212).
But Schreiner then brings Paul’s concern about false teaching back in for the purpose of trying to explain 2:15 (221).
This inconsistent procedure must lead any dispassionate reader to doubt his exposition.
Chapter 5 is of limited usefulness, because Yarbrough does not engage directly with Paul’s reasoning in the passage in question.
In chapter 6, Burk arrives at his conclusion without any consideration of how the chosen meaning for authenteō might or might not fit into Paul’s train of reasoning in the actual context. Yet again, the conclusion lacks a sound basis, because it is divorced from the context.
The central question to which these expositions give rise is this: why do these complementarian scholars believe or assume that verses 11–15 are largely unrelated to Paul’s main topic of combating false teaching?
Once we see from the context what 1 Timothy 2 is about, the translation of authentein as ‘exercise authority’ strikes an evidently discordant note.
Paul is not writing in chapter 2 about who should exercise authority over the church assembly.
He is not writing about this subject anywhere in 1:1 – 2:10, so why should we suppose a sudden switch to this subject in 2:11–14?
He does not say that the quarrelsome men (2:8) or the immodest wealthy women (vv. 9–10) have been exercising authority over the public assembly, whether legitimately or illegitimately. Eve did not exercise authority over Adam (vv. 13–14). The childbearing (v. 15) has nothing to do with exercising authority over the assembly.
Even when Paul moves on to the subject of elders in chapter 3 of his letter, he makes no remarks about elders having or exercising authority over the church, whether in the public assembly or otherwise. The exercise of authority is not the issue that he is addressing.
Unanswered questions
Despite the length of the book and its very detailed discussion of 1 Timothy 2:9–15, it leaves some basic questions with no effective answer or with no answer at all.
Supposedly, verse 12 is a general statement. It is sinful for women to have authority over men, because that is contrary to God’s revealed will for men and women.
Why, then, does Paul introduce it with ouk epitrepō, (“I do not permit” or “I am not permitting”)? How could compliance with God’s revealed will be a matter for Paul to permit or not permit? This would be inappropriate and unprecedented language for such a rule. This is a fundamental objection to the complementarian interpretation. But no answer is offered.
How can it be that, according to Schreiner, the prohibition is not on a woman teaching “a man” (as Paul says) and instead is on a woman teaching men in the assembly (which Paul does not say)? No answer is apparent.
In Schreiner’s exposition, Paul is referring to eldership functions in verse 12. If so, why does Paul step over every normal Greek word used for functions of eldership, leadership, authority or pastoral care among God’s people, whether in the New Testament or even in the Septuagint? Why does he choose, instead, the rare word, authenteō? Schreiner gives no answer.
Burk’s chapter proposes a tentative answer. He suggests Paul chose authenteō “to avoid the potential pejorative connotations” of other terms for exercising authority. But that is not credible. None of the regular words is pejorative. And authenteō itself is unsuitable for the proper exercise of authority by an elder. (Again, see chapter 27 of True Complementarity.)
The language of 1 Timothy 2:15 about salvation through childbearing is agreed on all sides to be very strange. But why did Paul choose such strange language? No answer is offered.
Artemis was dominant in the civic and religious life of Ephesus. Beliefs about the function of Artemis as a midwife provide a ready answer. Yet Schreiner insists that the Artemis cult is not clearly implied anywhere in Paul’s letter (172).
In sum, the context of chapter 2 shows that Paul is concerned that a woman might teach a man falsely, not that women might authoritatively teach true doctrine to men. Women in the Church resists this conclusion by divorcing 1 Timothy 2:9–15 from the context.