Man and Women - Role Models ...

Wednesday, Nov 20, 2013. Many Christian churches today have a big discussion about the role of women in church life. The discussion is old, but nevertheless it is often a heated debate - which goes along with a similar debate in our parliaments and our society about the role of men and women. Its background is a society, which traditionally was dominated by men; and today it is also a society with 300 years of feminist movement and influence.

One in Man and Woman …

We had this discussion recently in our own church, and in our national union of churches in Germany. It is a discussion which has been part of the Anglican church, the Lutheran church has gone through it, the Baptist churches in all western countries have been involved … the debate is natural and needs to be done!

But let us dig a little bit deeper into the biblical texts, and understand what it teaches about the role of men and women. Jesus once was asked about divorce, and his words are very important, they reflect his understanding of the role of the two sexes, of man and woman:

1 Now when Jesus had finished these sayings, he went away from Galilee and entered the region of Judea beyond the Jordan. 2 And large crowds followed him, and he healed them there. 3 And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” 4 He answered,

“Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

6 So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” (Matth. 19: 1-6) You probably know the passage from various marriage ceremonies. But it is a quite strong statement about the creation and role of sexuality. Man and woman are not two, but one. They belong to each other. They complement each other. They are made to live with each other and, TOGETHER, they are man. Roles … **

Man and women are one. Mankind is created in men and women. But what is their roles? What roles do we want men and women to have? What are the roles which God wants them to have? One main social stream today is driven by the idea that there should not be any differences between man and woman. They should have the same rights, the same roles, the same possibilities. This idea applies to all parts of human life, to all parts of social life.

Of course, man and woman are not the same physically. Man and women are different. Children are born by the woman - and usually the relationship between the mother and her kids is much closer in the first years of their life. This is already given by the simple fact that women can feed their infants. With all our efforts to make man and woman the same, we cannot completely ignore the human physiology and the roles which are given to men and women by their physical constitution.

Traditionally, the ability of the woman to nurture infants and the pure muscle strength of men has led to different role models. Men were able to care for food and housing, women were able to provide clothing and direct care. Modern societies with their technical capabilities have led to a strong change in these role models. Today, the ability to provide food for a family is usually based on a set of mental skills, which opens this role to both men and women. So today in western societies we come closer to an equal treatment of men and women.

But we need to think more carefully about men and women, about skills of leadership, about academic skills, about teaching and responsibility, about different concepts to lead a life as a family, about preferences and physiology and psychology. Why do we need to do that? We need to gain a full and balanced understanding of the biblical teaching about the role of men and women. Often, individual biblical sentences are cited with strong claims about how things have to be run, or - by critics - to condemn the bible and step back from taking it serious. But it has to tell us a lot. It is God's word, a source of deep wisdom and understanding for modern men and women! (Roland Potthast) ... more texts