NEW TESTAMENT IS BUILT ON AND UPHOLDS SEXISM

Religious sexism is appalling.  It is bad enough to have sexism anyway.  We don't need a religious version.

The Old Testament God is well-known for hating and sanctioning the abuse of women not just their inferiority.  The New Testament is built on it and refers to it as infallible.  Without sexism Jesus would not have risen to his place in the religious consciousness.  Not only is the fabric of the religion woven with sexism it goes out of its way to command it.  This is dangerous for it is well known that a bad religious text or even an irresponsibly worded good one has an uncanny knack of getting some to obey it.  Notably Jesus never even hinted at disapproval for slavery though it was mostly women and girls who were captive to it.  Female slaves were an effective cover if the man of the house wanted a sex toy to abuse and rape.

ANTI-WOMEN CORINTH EPISTLE

Paul is essentially a bigger influence over Christianity than Jesus.  He knew this which was why he said he was learning his teaching from the risen Jesus in apparitions.

When Paul's 1 Corinthians 14 says that women should not speak in Church and ask questions at home instead for it is shameful when a woman speaks in Church for the Law says that they should be subordinate to men, it is being sexist. Especially, when it says this is the rule in all the Churches. There is no evidence that women were ever allowed to speak in Church so then this is an absolute sexist ban. Chapter 11 permits women to pray and prophesy but only with covered heads. This does not mean in Church for Paul begins to discuss conduct in Church afterwards (v17). Paul never even hinted that only disruptive and chatty women were forbidden to talk in Church but talked as if he meant all women. This was sexist for men with the same fault were unmentioned. Paul believed that the Law did not allow women to speak at worship. This is true for they were not involved in Temple worship or synagogue worship. Paul had already given rules to make meetings orderly and did not need to urge women to be orderly. So, what he said was based on sexism and not on the desire for other.

Many meetings would have been comprised of tiny groups for some people prefer it that way which proves that Paul was being sexist for he never said it was okay for women to speak at small meetings.

The word for the silence the women were to keep was sigao which denotes total silence and since we are not told that just asking questions was banned they were forbidden to open their mouths. If women were a nuisance with questions he would have condemned their rudeness not their speaking. And pagan society had nothing against women in religion so don’t think the ban was just a custom to please others it was a law. If women were causing trouble and altercation in Church the men would have been as bad.

Paul cuttingly asked women if the word of the Lord originated with them or reached only them (14:36). The Amplified Bible tries to say that Paul meant if the word started with the Corinthians. But when the Bible itself says men decided prophetically what the word of God is, that interpretation is unnecessary and quite wrong. Corinth would not have been the only place where women or anybody wanted to chat about God in Church and proclaim the word of God. Paul meant that women were disobeying the divine ban on women teaching the word of God and because they disobeyed he decides to be sarcastic.

Some say that what Paul is doing is giving a hint that the women were claiming a monopoly on God which was why they were silenced by him. The Bible is clear that God did not give his doctrine through women. So Paul meant that only men get the word of God. If that justifies Paul’s criticism then God does not like women. So, the reason Paul says women act as if the word of God was theirs only is that he thinks they are doing what is forbidden by God in speaking as if God allowed it.

If God inspired Paul then it is a fact that God regards women as not being as important as men.
 
OBJECTIONS TO THE SEXISM FACTS

Does the Bible contradict itself on whether men and women are equal?

Paul declared that all were one in Jesus because all were baptised into him so that there was no slave or free or man or woman (Galatians 3:27, 28). This does not mean that all are the same and equally valuable for some are more wicked and some are more important than others. Paul does not mean that all are treated the same for all are at different levels of goodness and different jobs. It means that all are treated the same as regards being accepted by and united to Jesus for the context is union with him. They may be unequal in other ways. This is not denied. So this is no proof text against women clergy or sexism or racism.

Women were chosen as the first witnesses to the resurrection. That does not prove that women are as good as men because men saw Jesus later and men were the important witnesses or apostles in God and the New Testament’s eyes. It is the same with prophetesses like Deborah in the Old Testament. They had to prophesy and then male prophets passed them, they examined and approved their prophecies, so it was all under the control of men.

It is not said that Deborah in the Bible was able to give out scripture. She may have been a prophetess in the loose sense. And one woman among tons of male prophets who were able to write scriptures means nothing. It is an insult to women to say it does.

Jesus is praised for upholding the single life meaning that he liberated women in his society from the wife and mother role. But did he? His praise for celibacy was addressed only to men. He never encouraged any woman to be single.

It is said that Jesus denied that women were mere objects when he accepted even converted fallen women as disciples. Though he treated women as disciples, he never affirmed them as women. There are no sermons on the greatness of womanhood.

It is said that when Jesus said it is only what is in the heart that makes one unclean he was rejecting the Jewish doctrine that menstruating women were unclean. But he was talking about unclean food not menstruation. It could be thought that menstruation is the body's response to sin in the heart.

It is said the gospels honour female testimony to the risen Jesus. That would only hold water if the gospels do not mention the names of males who saw the risen Jesus but only the women.  But they do spend more time on the males.  The women remember are the first to speak of Jesus rising but with the men in white at the tomb!  This is not a female only testimony.  And even if it were it was not that for long.  Only males including Thomas are mentioned later. Also, it tells us elsewhere who the disciples are and does not count women. Plus it was men, the gospel writers, who were saying the female testimony was valid. So the testimony of women had to be approved by men - it is no better than a male testimony.

The fact that the Virgin Mary in her apparitions that have been “verified” by the Catholic Church never says she is a priest, for you would expect God to have ordained his mother, and condemns women priests indicates that it is wrong to ordain women. The message this sends is this: it is right to hurt women’s feelings over faith though there is no harm in them functioning as priests. That is hatred towards women and these apparitions should be given no credence. The Roman Church says that women are priests and have the right to offer Mass but not as ministerial priests. The Church teaches the priesthood of all the validly baptised so to say women are priests but cannot be ordained priests so that they can consecrate the sacrifice that the priest together with the people of God offer to God shows the intrinsic misogynies of the Christian faith

We conclude that Jesus by erasure failed to validate the place of women.  If he founded the Church he founded a powerhouse of chauvinism armed with toxic patriarchal scriptures.
 
BOOKS CONSULTED

A CALL TO HERESY, Robert Van de Weyer, Lamp Press, London, 1989
ALLEGED DISCREPANCIES OF THE BIBLE, John W Haley, Whitaker House, Pennsylvania, undated
ASKING THEM QUESTIONS, Various, Oxford University Press, London, 1936
CHRIST IS GOD, Rev JP Arendzen DD, Augustine Publishing Company, Devon, 1987
CHRIST OUR LIGHT, J Buys SJ Geoffrey Chapman and Gill & Son, London-Melbourne, Dublin 1966
CHRISTIANITY FOR THE TOUGH-MINDED Ed John Warwick Montgomery, Bethany Fellowship Inc, Minneapolis, 1973
DID JESUS CHRIST REALLY COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN? Alan Hayward, Christadelphian ALS, Birmingham
DO CHRISTIANS BELIEVE IN THREE GODS? Radio Bible Class, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1992
EVIDENCE THAT DEMANDS A VERDICT, Vol 1, Josh McDowell, Alpha, Scripture Press Foundation, Bucks, 1995
FOUR GREAT HERESIES, John R Rice, Sword of the Lord, Murfreesboro, Tennessee, 1975
GOD AND THE HUMAN CONDITION, F J Sheed, Sheed & Ward, London 1967
HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS, Peter Kreeft & Ronald Tacelli, Monarch, East Sussex, 1994
HONEST TO GOD, John AT Robinson, SCM Press, London, 1963
JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES John Wijngaards, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1998
JESUS AND EARLY CHRISTIANITY IN THE GOSPELS, Daniel J Grolin, George Ronald, Oxford, 2002
JESUS GOD THE SON OR SON OF GOD? Fred Pearce Christadelphian Publishing Office, Birmingham
MERE CHRISTIANITY, CS Lewis, Fontana, Glasgow, 1975
MIRACLES, CS Lewis, Fontana, London, 1960
PRIESTLAND’S PROGRESS, Gerald Priestland, BBC, London, 1981
SCIENCE AND THE BIBLE, Henry Morris, Moody Press, Bucks, 1988
SET MY EXILES FREE, John Power, Logos Books, MH Gill & Son Ltd, Dublin, 1967
SOME MODERN FAITHS, Maurice C Burrell and J Stafford Wright, Intervarsity Press, Leicestershire, 1988
THE CASE FOR CHRIST, Lee Strobel, HarperCollins and Zondervan, Michigan, 1998
THE EARLY CHURCH, Henry Chadwick, Pelican, Middlesex, 1987
THE GODHEAD EXPLAINED, Christadelphian Press, Beverley, South Australia
THE METAPHOR OF GOD INCARNATE, John Hick, SCM Press, London, 1993
THE MYTH OF GOD INCARNATE, John Hick ed., SCM Press, London, 1977
THE NEW CULTS, Walter Martin, Vision House, Santa Ana, California, 1980
THE SPIRIT OF GOD, John Bedson, Lightstand Burbank CA 1984
THE UNAUTHORISED VERSION, Robin Lane Fox, Penguin Books, Middlesex, 1992
UNDERSTANDING THE CULTS, Josh McDowell and Don Stewart, Campus Crusade for Christ, San Bernardino, 1983
UNITARIAN CHRISTIANITY AND OTHER ESSAYS, William Ellery Channing, The Bobs-Merrill Company Inc, Kansas, 1957
WHEN CRITICS ASK, Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe, Victor Books, Illinois ,1992
YOU CAN LIVE FOREVER IN PARADISE ON EARTH, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, New York, 1982
 
THE WWW
 
http://www.kevinquick.com/kkministries/books/reasoning/nwt.html,
Kevin Quick discusses the Jehovah’s Witnesses claim that the Bible never says that Jesus is God

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Father and/or Son by H Wayne Hamburger