John Mark Hicks

I have a vested interest in that question. Partly because I have a Ph.D. in Reformation and Post-Reformation historical theology, partly because I teach academic courses in historical theology, but mostly because I have found the study of historical theology illuminating, liberating and humbling.

Illuminating in the same way that studying my own family of origins shines light on my personal story. The more I understand about my experiences growing up, my own family’s history and the cultural context of those early experiences the more I understand myself. I begin to understand something of why I react at a gut level the way I do. As my unconscious becomes more conscious I am more aware of how many of my feelings and gut reactions are due to earlier experiences rather than reflective engagement with the present. In addition, the more I know about the stories of others, the more I understand them and thus appreciate their journey.

Historical theology can illuminate our theological past; it can describe our theological family of origins. This is a necessary part of developing theological self-understanding. Just as we cannot understand ourselves psychologically without some sense of our family’s history, neither can we understand our own theological proclivities, reactions and preferences without some sense of historical orientation to the faith in which we grew up. It may very well be that the way we read Scripture, what we believe and how strongly we feel about something is more rooted in our history than it is Scripture. If we don’t know our own history–our theological ancestry, we are limited in our ability to understand ourselves as well as others.

Liberating in the same way that acknowleding my family’s past history or patterns enables me to transcend some of the natural pitfalls that are part of my story. Living in ignorance of my own history endangers me since I am unaware of how my lenses have been colored by my own experience or why I react to something so strongly when the present circumstances really do not warrant it. Our own personal stories are often blind to how our histories have shaped us.  Blinded, we are thus shackled by the darkness and come to believe that the way we see it is the only way to see it.

Historical theology can liberate us from the chains that bind us and blind us; it can discern the critical difference between embracing something because it is so familiar or comfortable and embracing something because we have authentically heard an alternative and reflectively chosen to believe what we find most truthful. Discernment involves some kind of historical consciousness since history helps us see alternatives. Without historical perspective we are bound to our own limited perceptions.

Humbling in the same way that recognizing how my father and mother pioneered my faith and life teaches me gratitude. Whatever I am and have become is, in part, due to them. They have taught me, trained me, and guided me. In turn, they were shaped by their parents, and thus so all the way down. I am neither the first nor the center of my family, but one part of its history. I owe more than I could ever give back.

Historical theology can illuminate us as we learn from students of Scripture and practioners of the faith in earlier ages; they teach us and we are rightly awed by their faith, devotion and thought. We would be the most arrogant of people to think that we have nothing to learn from those who read Scripture and worshipped God in the past. We do not have to reinvent the wheel, but rather humbly acknowledge the gifts God gave to his people in the past, enjoy the benefits of that grace left for us, and use that sacred deposit  in our pursuit of a mature faith.

I research, reflect on and teach historical theology because it illuminates my own journey in faith, liberates me from the chains of my own blindness, and humbles me before the gifts God has previously given to his people. Whether I’m reading Tertullian, Jacobus Arminius, John Wesley, Alexander Campbell, James A. Harding or Thomas B. Warren, I seek illuminating descriptions, liberating discernment and humbling instruction.

Throughout 2008 I spent part of my time reading through the major journals of Churches of Christ from 1897 to 1907: Gospel Advocate, Firm Foundation, Christian Leader, Octographic Review, The Way, and Christian Leader & the Way.  I have shared some of my “findings” on this blog and will do more in the future.

Other than the increasing distance between the Christian Church and Churches of Christ (ranging on issues from instrumental music and missionary societies to ecumenical federation with denominational bodies and higher criticism), the most discussed question among Churches of Christ in the papers was rebaptism. I counted over 200 articles–not including notices of debates, books and pamphlets about the subject–from 1897-1907.

The specific question was whether Baptists (or other immersed persons) should be reimmersed in order to receive the “right hand of fellowship” for entrance into a congregation of the Church of Christ. On the one hand, David Lipscomb, James A. Harding, E. G. Sewell, J. C. McQuiddy, Daniel Sommer, and others (including all the editors of the Gospel Advocate) argued that anyone immersed upon a confession of faith in Jesus is a Christian. On the other hand, Austin McGary, J. D. Tant, J. W. Durst, and others (including all the editors of the Firm Foundation) argued that only those immersed with a specific knowledge their baptism was the appointed means of salvation are Christian. This is the most well known difference, perhaps, between the Tennessee and Texas Traditions within Churches of Christ.

This difference generated considerable friction. But where is the rub? Why was it contested so vehemently and passionately? What was at stake? Austin McGary, co-editor of the Firm Foundation, gives us a  feel for how critical this debate was (1898, 284–emphasis mine):

We cheerfully admit that neither the society nor the organ has anything to do with this vile attack upon us by the Advocate. But the trouble between us is traceable to the very same presumptuous spirit that brings the society and the organ into the work and worship of the church. Bros. Lipscomb, Harding and their wicked confederates in this attack upon us claim to speak where the Bible speaks and to be silent where the Bible is silent. But, like Homon and his confederates in advocating the society and organ, they speak where the Bible does not speak, and are silent where the Bible does not speak, in their defense of Baptist baptism….these brethren are tenfold more palpably culpable in their effort to defend their practice of receiving Baptists on their baptism, because, in holding to this practice, they prove that they are willfully going beyond the authority of the Lord.

McGary believed the root was “going beyond the authority of the Lord” on the basic question of who is a Christian. This, to him, was more liberal, damaging and insidious than the society and the organ. McGary thought this would ultimately lead to a “divided brotherhood” just like the instrument and society (FF, 1901, 8).  J. D. Tant, however, was more optimistic after a visit to Nashville and thought that in “fifteen years” churches would no longer receive members on their “sectarian baptism” because “the gospel,” he wrote, was having a “>leavening influence in Tennessee” (FF, 1899, 23). Tant assessed the trend correctly, though it took much longer than fifteen years.

The “rub” for the Texans was that it expanded the borders of the kingdom beyond those identified with the Churches of Christ. The critical issue was that congregations were receiving unsaved people into their fellowship. This was, as Tant revealed, a gospel issue. At root the Gospel Advocate “was teaching other ways that sinners may be forgiven and enter the kingdom of Christ” (McGary, FF, 1901, 8).

The “rub” for the Tennesseans was the sectarian attitude that undermined the obedient faith of others. Lipscomb stressed that simple obedience to Jesus through faith was all the motive required for effectual baptism (see his “What Constitutes Acceptable Obedience“). To require more is to undermine simple obedience itself because it is no longer faith but education, knowledge and doctrinal precision that determines acceptable obedience. Such a spiral ultimately destroys assurance because when knowledge becomes the ground rather than faith one can never be sure they know enough about their obedience for their obedience to be accepted. A faith in Jesus that moves one to obedience is sufficient faith no matter what else they know or don’t know or even falsely believe about their baptism.

The other part of the “rub” is the sectarianism itself.  According to Daniel Sommer, rebaptists “adopt the sectarian plan of sitting in judgment on the fitness of persons for baptism” (OR, 1904, 3) According to the Tennessee tradition, the kingdom is broader than those who were immersed for the specific purpose of the remission of sins (or to be saved) and they did not believe that all those outside the borders of the “Churches of Christ” were lost (see Harding’s comments). This gracious attitude toward those who walk sincerely among the denominations is what the editors of the Firm Foundation feared because it enlarged the kingdom beyond the borders of their vision of the “Church of Christ.”

The rebaptism controversy was, I think, a struggle within Churches of Christ about the borders of the kingdom of God. It was part of movement toward more pronounced exclusivism within Churches of Christ. While the Tennessee perspective (which was also the view of Alexander Campbell, J. W. McGarvey and Daniel Sommer, which means it is not simply a Tennessee perspective) lost the struggle on this point, it did not die but remained alive in various places among Churches of Christ (e.g., Harding College).  

References:

Austin McGary, “Editorial,” Firm Foundation 14 (13 September 1898 ) 284.

Austin McGary, “The Firm Foundation—Its Aims and Principles,” Firm Foundation 16 (8 January 1901) 8.

Daniel Sommer, “A Letter with Comments,” Octographic Review 47 (2 Feb 1904) 3.

J. D. Tant, “Too Many Papers,” Firm Foundatoin 15 (10 January 1899) 23.

Discipled in Family

Text: Luke 2:41-52

Jesus was an apprentice. Like F(f)ather, like son.

He apprenticed with his heavenly Father. He learned obedience by the things which he suffered (Hebrews 5:8-9). He taught and did only what he heard his Father teach and what he saw his Father do (John 5:19). He was the Father’s disciple. Jesus was discipled by the presence of the Holy Spirit in his life as a gift from his Father.

He apprenticed with his earthly (step)father as a carpenter. But he learned much more from his family than being a carpenter. They were devout believers. Jesus participated in the faith traditions of his family. According to the custom, he was circumcised on the eighth day (Luke 2:27).  Every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Passover. According to the custom, the family journeyed to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover when Jesus was twelve (Luke 2:42). Luke stresses the devout and habitual nature of the family’s faith practice.

Jesus was discipled in the faith of his father and mother, the faith of Israel. He was an obedient son to both his earthly parents and his heavenly father.

His training in the faith is seen by his keen interest in what was taught at the temple. When his parents found him, he was sitting with the teachers—listening, asking questions, and answering questions. He was fully engaged in a search, a yearning to know the God whom he recognized as Father. He did not isolate or withdraw, but sought out the teachers of the law to learn more. This was not a grandiose display of his knowledge to create shock and awe in others, but a devout and healthy fascination with his faith and his God.

Jesus is a human being. He grows up in a family that shapes his faith, customs and understanding. He learned as we all learn, and he grew up as a human being. It was “on-the-job-training” for the Incarnate Word.

Jesus, as human being, was not omniscient. Neither was his knowledge downloaded upon request as if he were Trinity in the Matrix needing to know how to fly a helicopter. His knowledge came like others—through learning, growth, discipling. He grew in his relationship with God and humanity.

As a human being, Jesus “grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God” and the people.

Jesus was apprenticed in his vocation as the Messiah by the Father. He was apprenticed as a child by his parents. He was also apprenticed by the realities of human life in a fallen world—he learned what it was like to be human, depend on God and live in a community of faith.

Jesus was a disciple, too.  We learn how to be disciples from how he was discipled, how he pursued discipleship, and how he modeled discipleship for his disciples.  We, as disciples of Jesus, follow Jesus, the disciple.

Small Group Questions

1. Do you ever imagine Jesus as a little boy? Where does your imagination take you? What is his relationship with his Dad, Mom and siblings like?
2. What does this text tell us about his family relationship? How did this shape his faith development? What does this text reveal about Jesus’ character and devotion?
3. What are some of your family faith traditions that identify you and draw you together as a family in the Lord?
4. Was Jesus an apprentice in his family? What value do you see in thinking about Jesus as an apprentice? What dangers do you see?

Note: This is the first of a series of seven lessons at Woodmont on which Dean Barham, pulpit minister of the Woodmont Hills Family of God, and John Mark Hicks  are collaborating.  It involves homily, small group material and Bible class material. You can hear the sermons on the Woodmont podcast when they become available.  The series begins the first Sunday in February.

They did not disappear into cyberspace. 🙂 Nor were they removed due to some sinister pressure. 🙂

I have removed them out of respect for a potential publisher of the material. The series will be published in a journal this Fall. After publication, I will make the articles available once again.

I appreciate the interest and the articles will reappear in the near future.

John Mark

I have uploaded one of my early articles in Restoration Quarterly to my Academic Page.  The article is a fairly technical discussion of Luke 18:1-8, the Parable of the Unjust Judge or the Parable of the Persistent Widow.  It is available here.

At the heart of the parable is a comparsion between God and the judge, and a comparsion between the disciples and the widow.  If an unjust judge will give a widow what she desires because she wears him out with her persistent pleas, surely God will hear the cries of his people.  If a widow will persistently go before a unjust judge for vindication, surely disciples should cry out to God without ceasing and refuse to giving up praying.

The question mark in this relationship is not whether God will vindicate his elect for surely he will, but the question mark is whether the Son of Man, when he returns, will find “faith” (a people who continually pray) on the earth?

Note: Over the next few weeks or months, I will return to my “first love” (the reason I started this blog) project of attempting to make class materials, previously published materials, etc. available on my blog. One project will take me some time…my dissertation but there is, I’m sure, no rush for that. 🙂

The previous post stated the specific arguments for silence. This post presents the case for “privilege.”

In January 1904 the Christian Leader and The Way merged. Though a friendly merger, it was the union of a strong Tennessee paper with a Northern paper whose roots were shared by Daniel Sommer. This entailed some substantial difference at times (e.g., pacifism), including the “woman question.” The Christian Leader had a significant history of openness toward female participation in the assembly through reading Scripture, prayer and exhortation. In 1897, for example, Ben Atkins offered “a Scriptural call for women to resume Christian activity in the church, praying, speaking, exhorting, singing, teaching, as in the apostolic age in Corinth” (CL, 1897, 2).

Consequently, Harding immediately found himself in hot water with some readers when he quickly staked out his ground on the “woman question” as co-editor of the new Christian Leader & the Way (CLW, 1904, 8). W. J. Brown of Cloverdale, Indiana, for example, cautioned that “before we force upon the churches our narrow, ignorant interpretations of the Bible, we ought to go back and study the question again” (CLW, 1904, 5). Also, Harmon rebuked some writers (presumably Harding included) with some terse words: “Don’t forbid these women, as you have been doing” (CLW, 1904, 9).  And Foster, as if to let Harding know that Northerners did things a bit different on this question, wrote that “it is not counted immodest here, in these times, for a woman to speak or pray, even in the churches” and since “we find where they prophesied” in the New Testament, “why not now?” (CLW, 1904, 4). Further, Spayd asked the question directly:  “Why muzzle the women in the Church?” (CLW, 1904, 2).

Daniel Sommer, the leader of what is often regarded as the radical right wing of Churches of Christ at the turn of the century, defended the privileges of women in the assembly and in the work of the church (e.g., deaconesses; OR, 1897, 1). His article, “Woman’s Religious Duties and Privileges in Public,” summarizes his perspective in some detail (OR, 1901, 1). “Extremes beget extremes,” Sommer began. The extreme of women evangelists had begat the extreme of silencing women in the assembly. It had now become a hobby, in his opinion, for some Southern writers. He suggested a middle ground which had been the practice of churches in his experience for years. That practice extended the privilege of audible prayer to women as well as men. “Any reasoning which will prevent women from praying in public,” he contended, “will prevent her from communing and singing.” He thought it a woman’s privilege to “publicly read in audible tones a portion of Scripture” in the assembly as long as she did not comment, apply or enforce “its meaning” since she would thereby become a “public teacher” which 1 Timothy 2:12 forbids.  However, “it is a woman’s privilege to teach a class in a meeting house” since the class is not the publicly assembled congregation. Further, since exhortation and teaching are different, even during the assembly, “if a sister in good standing wishes to arise in a congregation and offer an exhortation it is her privilege to do so.” A woman’s privilege, then, includes audible prayer in the assembly, public reading of Scripture in the assembly, public exhortation of the assembly, and teaching a Bible class of men, women and/or children.

Within the Sommer tradition the phrase “rights, privileges and duties” was almost a mantra that sought to impress readers with the sanctity of the female voice in the assembly. These universal “privileges,” according to J. C. Glover, were “singing, praying, exhorting and teaching one another, giving thanks, breaking break, and laying by in store as the Lord has prospered” on the first day of the week, and “no local legislation” should “interfere with these duties in the Lord” (CLW, 1906, 4) Frazee stressed that the “rights, privileges, and duties pertaining to the worship” belong to all and everyone has the “same rights and privileges to participate as far as their ability will permit.” While this does not include teaching that takes the “oversight of the Church,” it does include “speaking unto men to edification, and exhortation, and comfort” which was the function of prophecy in 1 Corinthians 14 (OR, 1904, 2). 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 was contextualized in several different ways, including restricting the forbidden speech to tongue-speaking (Black, CLW, 1907, 4), interpreting “your women” as the wives of the prophets (Williams, The Way, 1903, 1045), or recognizing the restriction as applicable to disorderly women (Atkins, CL, 1897, 2).

While some within the Sommer tradition agreed with Harding and others that “teaching and usurping authority over the man” were forbidden “even in the social family relation,” they nevertheless strongly contended that audible participation in the assembly “was a right—privilege—or duty” (Glover, CLW, 1906, 4). There was, among some, a shared cultural assumption about the exclusion of women from public society. But this did not undermine female participation in the assembly because the Church was different from human society. Whereas society is governed by the principles inherent in the “family of man” where man is the head of the woman, in the “family of God woman takes her place by the side of man” and fully participates in the assembly. Since the assembly is a “meeting of the family of God,” where “there is neither male nor female,” everyone—both male and female—should “admonish one another” as per Romans 15:14. When “the whole church is come together,” women are authorized and encouraged “to speak to the edification, exhortation and comfort of the church” (Cameron, OR, 1905, 2).

References

Ben Atkins, “The Woman Question,” Christian Leader 11 (2 February 1897) 2.

Charles S. Black, “That Awful Woman Question?” Christian Leader & the Way 21 (19 November 1907) 4.
 
W. J. Brown, “Notes of Passing Interest,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (16 August 1904) 5.

W. D. Cameron, “Your Women,” Octographic Review 48 (11 April 1905) 2.

W. W. Foster, “Twelve Women and Two Men,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (18 February 1904) 4.

J. C. Frazee, “Your Women,” Octographic Review 47 (5 July 1904) 2.

J. C. Glover, “Questions on the Woman Question Answered,” Christian Leader & the Way 20 (19 June 1906) 4.

James A. Harding, “Woman’s Work in the Church,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (8 March 1904) 8.

F. U. Harmon, “The Woman Question,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (6 September 1904) 9.

Daniel Sommer, “Church Government. Number Two,” Octographic Review 40 (19 October 1897) 1.

Daniel Sommer, “Woman’s Religious Duties and Privileges in Public,” Octographic Review 34 (20 August 1901) 1.

L. W. Spayd, “Why Muzzle the Women in Church,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (17 May 1904) 2.

E. G. Williams, “Woman’s Work,” The Way 5 (3 December 1903) 1045.

In my next post I will turn my attention to “privilege,” but in this one I dig deeper into the argument for silence.

The Tennessee Tradition regarded public silence as godly submission on the part of faithful women. Given the Tennessee understanding that women were inferior to men in terms of leadership capacity and excluded from any “public” life as outlined in my previous post, it is not surprising to see the New Testament construed in a way that fits that presupposition. When seeking to inductively collect and harmonize the New Testament’s teaching on “woman’s work,” the Tennessee Tradition concluded that the most significant distinction was public versus private. Women “must pray and teach, but not publicly” (Bell, The Way, 1903, 1046).

Priscilla taught Apollos with Aquilla. Phillip’s daughters prophesied. Corinthian women prayed and prophesied. “Women announced the resurrection to the eleven” and the Samaritan woman “proclaimed” Jesus “as the Christ to the people of her city.” “The fact that,” Harding continued, “women in the apostolic age prophesied (spoke by inspiration) makes it clear to my mind that women who know God’s Word now should teach it.” But this “by no means necessarily implies that she taught in the public meetings of the church” (Harding, CLW,1904, 8).

The discerning principle is not whether a woman may teach or not teach, or pray or not pray. Rather, it is the sphere in which she teaches or prays, and the sphere determines the nature of the leadership involved. Her sphere is the home rather than the “great assembly.” Since God created man as “the leader, the ruler,” when a woman “assumes the leadership” through prayer or teaching in the public sphere as she “directs and controls” the “thoughts” of others she then “takes a place for which she was not made” (Harding, CLW, 1904, 8). That sphere belongs to men whereas woman was given “the humbler, better place and more difficult work,” that is, the domestic life (Hawley, The Way, 1903, 810). “Her place,” Poe wrote, “is at home to guide the house [and] rear the children” (Poe, FF, 1901, 2). This principle is rooted in Creation and illustrated by the Fall. Eve “wrecked things when she took the leadership in Eden” (Harding, The Way, 1902, 393).

The home, however, is a place where women may teach and pray, and she may teach even her own husband—“even though he be a very great man”—as well as her children. When, for example, Priscilla studied the Scriptures with Apollos, “no leadership was assumed;” but rather “there was a social home-circle talk about the things of the kingdom of God” (Harding, CLW, 1904, 8). In another place, Harding offers a further characterization of this kind of “home” environment. When there are “private meetings of a social nature, where no organization is thought of, no leaders appointed, a Christian woman may teach” men, women or children and pray with them. “But when the meeting is organized, called to order, and leaders are appointed, those leaders should be men always” (Harding, CLW,1906, 8). Bell—one of Harding’s prize students—summarizes it this way: a woman “can teach anybody anywhere except in cases where publicity is connected with it” (Bell, The Way, 1903, 777).

But may she teach in a “mixed” Bible class on the first day of the week? Is that connected to “publicity;” is it public? Both Bell and Harding believed that a woman may read Scripture (when asked), answer questions (when asked), ask questions, and thereby “teach” in a Bible class on Sunday when to do any of these in the public assembly would be sinful (Harding, The Way, 1902, 393; Bell, The Way, 1903, 777). Consequently, the assembly is “public” in a way that the Bible class is not. The distinction is important for them because “teaching is not denied her.” She may teach in a Bible class through reading, questioning and answering questions. What is forbidden is “publicity or exercising dominion” over men. Consequently, she may answer or ask questions in a Bible class when she does so “in a quiet, submissive way, being in subjection to the public leader” (Bell, The Way, 1903, 777).  

Interestingly and at the same time raising the question of consistency, the Bible class has a “public leader” even though it is not “public” in the same way as the assembly, according to Bell, but when a woman participates in the class she does not engage in “publicity” which presumably means the only “publicity” in a Bible class is located in the “public leader” or appointed teacher. Though a woman may teach other women and children in a Bible class as the lead teacher (Harding, The Way, 1903, 417), she is not permitted to teach men as the “public teacher” because this would involve a public exercise of authority over men. Yet, a woman is able to audibly participate in a class as a student (read, ask questions and answer questions) while she is not permitted to audibly participate at all in the public assembly. It appears that the definition of “publicity” shifted somewhat between the assembly and the Bible class.

Lipscomb and Sewell, however, do not seem to have a problem with a woman teaching a Bible class including men if they teach in a “quiet, modest, womanly way” (Questions Answered, 736).  Sewell gives the example of the Tenth Street Church in Nashville (Questions Answered, 741-2): 

“after singing, the reading of the lession, and prayer, the different classes take their places in different parts of the house, so that each class is entirely to itself as a class, and the lesson is gone over by each class, and the teacher, just as if each class were in a house to itself. Some of these classes are taught by sisters and some by brethren. But the sisters who teach these classes are as private in their work as if they were teaching at home…If churches can find enough competent brethren that will teach all the classes, that is all well; but that is seldom the case; and when that fails and women teach classes, we think that allright also.”

And, of course, “when the hour nears its close, the class work is closed, and at eleven o’clock the church assembles in one body and the regular service begins. In this service not a woman says a word, except in singing” (Questions Answered, 741). Not even a sound, we might say, because 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 says women should be silent in the assembly when the whole church is gathered as one body.

But did not women audibly pray and prophesy in the Corinthian assembly? Harding argued that when 1 Corinthians 11 is read as a positive answer to that question it contradicts 1 Corinthians 14:34-35. Rather, Harding suggested that 1 Corinthians 11 applies to “any time or place” when women pray or teach (home, class or assembly) but that 1 Corinthians 14 regulates this general instruction with a specific prohibition against speaking in the public assembly. The point of 1 Corinthians 11 is a woman should always, whether in public or private, pray or teach “with her head covered” (Harding, CLW, 1906, 8). Harding, along with many others in the Tennessee Tradition, believed a covered head was a normative obligation for women whenever they prayed or taught (though some, like Lipscomb, thought long hair was a sufficient covering; but if the hair was not long, then the woman needed a further artificial covering–see Questions Answered, p. 706). 1 Corinthians 11 does not subvert 1 Corinthians 14. Instead, 1 Corinthians 14 regulates 1 Corinthians 11. This is confirmed, according to Harding and others who argued similarly, by 1 Timothy 2:8 where the prayer leader—the one who raises “uplifted hands”—is specifically designated as a male (Harding, “Brother C. D. Moore,” CLW, 1907, 8).

The seriousness of this conclusion should not be underestimated. Paul’s prohibitions in 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14 were understood as “positive” instructions for the assembled, worshiping church. Below are some examples (emphasis mine).

 “The language is plain and positive” (Carr, CLW, 1905, 1).
“Paul’s language—plain and positive as it is…” (Elliott, CL, 1897, 2).
“[T]the Lord positively forbids it” (Hawley, The Way, 1903, 810).
“[S]he will preach in the face of God’s positive command not to do it” (Poe, FF, 1901, 2).
“This decree is like the one in Eden: it is positive” (Sewell, GA, 1897, 432).

This language is overtly legal in nature. The Stone-Campbell Movement inherited the use of “positive” and “moral” descriptions of divine law from their English Reformed (Puritan) heritage. A “positive law”—a specific legal injunction regarding the worship assembly, for example—cannot be disregarded without dire consequences. “When God positively commands,” Harding writes, “we should meekly obey”(emphasis mine; “Brethren Faurott,” CLW, 1907, 8). For example, “positive law” prescribed the five acts of worship and those who add to (e.g., instrumental music) that number sin against God’s law. “Nothing in the Bible is more positively forbidden” than public speaking by women in the church. When women are permitted to speak (teach or pray) in the public assemblies, the positive injunction against such is violated and violaters fall into the same category as Nadab and Abihu (emphasis mine; Sewell, GA, 1897, 692).

Consequently, the consensus among Southern churches—in both Texas and Tennessee as represented by respected editors—was that this was a line in the sand just like instrumental music or baptism itself. “That women are not allowed to make speeches in the meetings of the churches,” Harding noted, “is just as plainly and strongly taught as that believers are to be baptized” (Harding, “Was Paul Mistaken,” 1907, 8). When congregations permit women to “lead the prayers, to speak and to exhort in the meetings of the church,” Harding did not believe “God’s law was ever more flagrantly violated than…at this point” (Harding, “Brethren Faurott,” 1907, 8). These differences were just cause for separation and distinction, that is, division.

My next post will articulate a different perspective–the “privilege” of women to publicly lead prayers, read Scripture and exhort the assembly. The defense of that “privilege” comes from a rather unexpected source(s) within Churches of Christ at the turn of the century.

More to come….

R. C. Bell, “Woman’s Work,” The Way 5 (3 December 1903) 1046.

O. A. Carr, “Woman’s Work in the Church, What She Should Do in Public Worship. No. 3,” Christian Leader & the Way 19 (30 May 1905) 1.

J. Perry Elliott, “Queries,” Christian Leader 11 (5 January 1897) 2.

Harding, “Brethren Faurott, Sands and the Woman Question,” Christian Leader & the Way 21 (17  December 1907) 8.

Harding, “Bro. C. D. Moore, Sister Chloe’s Letter and the Woman Question,” Christian Leader & the Way 21 (29 October 1907) 8.

James A. Harding, “Questions and Answers,” The Way 4 (5 March 1903) 417.

James A. Harding, “Scraps,” The Way 3 (20 March 1902) 393.

James A. Harding, “Was Paul Mistaken, Or Did He Lie About It, or Are I Cor. 14:33-35 and I Tim. 2:8-13 Both True?” Christian Leader & the Way 21 (26 November 1907) 8.

James A. Harding, “Where and How Shall Women Speak and Pray?” Christian Leader & the Way 20 (31 July 1906) 8.

James A. Harding, “Woman’s Work in the Church,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (8 March 1904) 8.

Henry H. Hawley, “Woman and Her Work,” The Way 5 (20 August 1903), 810.

John T. Poe, “Female Evangelists,” Firm Foundation 16 (29 January 1901) 2.

Elisha G. Sewell, “What May Women Do in the Church?” Gospel Advocate 39 (4 November 1897) 692.

My previous post provided the common ground upon which Churches of Christ distinguished themselves from the “digressives” in the first decade of the 20th century regarding “women’s work in the church.” The editors of the major journals among Churches of Christ were agreed that (1) women are not permitted to preach the word publicly (as evangelists in the field or speakers in the assembly), (2) women are not permitted to exercise ruling authority over the church as elders or bishops, and (3) women should avoid participation in the various societies associated with the progressives.

Some, primarily those associated with the Tennessee Tradition (e.g., David Lipscomb and James A. Harding), grounded their conclusions in a broad understanding of the role of women in society. They believed that women were forbidden any kind of public leadership whether in the home, church or society. Consequently, not only should they not speak publicly in the worshipping assembly, they should not speak publicly anywhere.  Not only should they not function as elders in the church, they should not become business leaders, presidents, or school teachers. Some, like R. C. Bell, believed that they should not even publish in the papers. After all, “if it is a shame for a woman to be a public speaker, why is it not a shame for her to be a public writer?” (Bell, The Way, 1903, 777). Consequently, they should not lead in church or society; they should not lead, for example, temperance societies or become involved in any kind of social activism in a leadership capacity.

Elisha G. Sewell, co-editor of the Gospel Advocate, argued this point in several 1897 articles. Based on Genesis 3:16, Sewell believed that (GA, 1897, 432):

From the time that sin entered into the world, and entered through woman, she has been placed in a retiring, dependent, and quiet position, and never has been put forward as a leader among men in any public capacity from the garden of Eden till now…This seems to have been a general decree for all time, for God has never varied from it an any age or dispensation….’Thy desire shall be to thy husband,’ is indicative of dependence—not in any slavish sense, but in the sense that she is to look to man as a leader and protector, and, in certain measure, supporter and provider….God himself never changed this decree, and does not allow man to change it.

The woman’s sphere of influence is the home, not public life. This is where she finds her purity and peace rather than engaging in the “busy cares of life” (Sewell, GA, 1897, 461).

While editors Lipscomb, Sewell and Harding all shared this perspective, probably the clearest case was made by R. C. Bell who studied at the Nashville Bible School and taught with Harding at Potter Bible College.  He suggested that women are superior to men in emotion but inferior in will while equal in intellect.  These differences reflect the function God has given to males and females.  Excelling in emotion, woman is tailored for home life but lacking in “will power” she “is not fitted for public life” since “she lacks, by nature, the will power to combat successfully against the cruel, relentless business world.”  The fact that woman was created from man’s side indicates that “she is to walk through life by man’s side as his helpmeet and companion, sheltered and protected from the world, and the rough, degrading contact of public life, by his strong, overshadowing arm.”  Bell’s conclusion then is that (The Way, 1903, 776):

woman is not permitted to exercise dominion over man in any calling of life. When a woman gets her diploma to practice medicine, every Bible student knows that she is violating God’s holy law. When a woman secures a license to practice law, she is guilty of the same offense. When a woman mounts the lecture platform or steps into the pulpit or the public school room, she is disobeying God’s law and disobeying the promptings of her inner nature. When God gives his reason for woman’s subjection and quietness, he covers the whole ground and forbids her to work in any public capacity…She is not fitted to do anything publicly….Every public woman—lawyer, doctor, lecturer, preacher, teacher, clerk, sales girl and all—would then step from their post of public work into their father’s or husband’s home, where most of them prefer to be, and where God puts them….You are now no longer a public slave, but a companion and home-maker for man; you are now in the only place where your womanly influence has full play and power

These are strong words and they are so distant from our contemporary context that we might cringe or at least blush reading them.  But one may admire the consistency, I suppose. If God created woman to serve under man’s protecting arm and God determined that man should rule over the woman as a result of the Fall, then this would apply not only to home and church, but also to society.  “That man should rule is the ordinance of God that grows out of the natures of man and woman. “God put in him the ruling qualities,” according to James A. Harding. While women are “very much superior to men” in many ways, “her superiority is not in leadership” (CLW, 1904, 9). Woman was designed for domesticity and reigns as queen in the home as a symbol of purity and love. “Woman may be queen, but she can never be king” and if she “seek and gain public place and power, then all is lost” (Hawley, The Way, 1903, 810).

This view was not only pushed by particular men but was also endorsed by some women. Effie S. Black, for example, scolded women who worked outside the home because “every woman who follows a profession or engages in a business makes it more difficult for some man to  provide the necessities for an invalid wife, an aged mother, helpless children, or whoever may be dependent upon him.”  Wives, of course, should work but in the home “for something better than gold,” that is, “better homes, nobler manhood and womanhood, higher ideals, purer thoughts, holier living, and all that can make our country–yes, and the whole world–better for having lived” (The Way, 1903,  397). 

Interestingly, this approach to the relationship of women to society and the church ran parallel with a strong cultural movement in the United States, particularly in New England and the South. It was called the “Cult of True Womanhood” or the “Cult of Domesticity.” This movement idealized women as the true embodiment of “piety, purity, submissiveness and domesticity.” Such idealization excluded women from public life but honored their influence in the home (See, for example, Smith, CLW,  1906, 2-3). This perspective was pervasive until the “New Woman” movement appeared in the late 19th century pressing for the vote and a larger role in public life.

The clash of cultural movements is reflected, for example, by John T. Poe (a native Tennessean who moved to Texas) when he noted that “since woman took her hand from the cradle and grabbed at the ballot box a few years ago, her course has been away from her God given path and mission into paths of her own blazing out, and as a consequence the world is growing worse.”  Poe insisted that “God made women as helpmeets for man. Her place is at home” and not in public speaking. “If God had intended for women” for public speaking, “He would have given them a voice adapted to public speaking.” As it is now, her “squeaky voice, weak lungs and generally weak mental ability” disqualify her (FF, 1901, 2).

Cultures were in conflict.   The editors of the Tennessee Tradition had grown up and ministered in the cultural atmosphere of “True Womanhood.” But now a new cultural movement was rising which would lead to female suffrage, political leaders, and business women.  This cultural shift was terra incognita, and the Tennessee Tradition was wholly opposed to it.

But that was not true of everyone within Churches of Christ at the turn of the 20th century.

More to come…..

 
References

R. C. Bell, “Woman’s Work,” The Way 5 (6 August 1903) 775-777.

Effie S. Black, “Whould Wives Work?” The Way 4 (19 February 1903) 397.

James A. Harding, “Woman’s Work in the Church,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (8 March 1904) 8-9.

Henry Hawley, “Woman and Her Work,” The Way 5 (20 August 1903)  810.

John T. Poe, “Female Evangelists,” Firm Foundation 16 (29 January 1901) 2.

Elisha G. Sewell, “What is Woman’s Work in the Church (Again)?” Gospel Advocate 39 (22 July 1897) 432.

Elisha G. Sewell, “Woman’s Real Position in the Church,” Gospel Advocate 39 (29 July 1897) 469.

F. W. Smith, “The Glory of  True Womanhood: A Sermon Delivered by F. W. Smith to Graduates of the Horse Cave High School,” Christian Leader & the Way 20 (1 May 1906) 2-3.

One of the forgotten debates from the first decade of the 20th century among Churches of Christ is whether audible participation in the assembly through prayer, singing, and exhortation was a woman’s privilege or a subversion of the created order. May a woman lead prayer in the assembly? May a woman lead singing in the assembly? May a woman exhort, edify or comfort the assembly through audible speech?  May a woman read Scripture in the assembly?

These were live issues among Churches of Christ at the turn of the 20th century.  In writing an article to be published this summer, I read through the Firm Foundation, Gospel Advocate, The Way, The Octographic Review, Christian Leader, and the Christian Leader & the Way for the years 1897-1907.  During those ten years Churches of Christ established their “distinct and separate”  identity from the Christian Church.  1897 is a good beginning point since this is the year that David Lipscomb recognized a “radical and fundamental difference” between the disciples of Christ and the “society folks” (GA, 1897, 4).  1907 is a good ending point since that year Lipscomb acknowledged that the Churches of Christ were a “distinct and separate” body from the Christian Church (GA, 1907, 450).

During those ten years Churches of Christ also struggled (and continued to struggle beyond that decade) over the exact form and nature of that identity.  One issue that was debated–heatedly and pervasively–was the question of female privilege or silence. Is it a woman’s privilege  to participate audibly in the assembly or must they be wholly silent except for singing?  In the next few posts I will explore this largely forgotten discussion.

I begin with the common ground among Churches of Christ (represented by the papers listed above) that distinguished them from the more progressive among the Disciples of Christ (Christian Church). There are at least two areas in which the editors of these papers stood united against the “digressives.”

First, they all agreed that women should not be “public teachers” in the “public assemly” of the church or exercise ruling authority in the church such as belongs to the elders of the congregation (some, like Lipscomb, did not like the idea of “ruling authority,” but still objected to women functioning as shepherds in a congregation).  While arguing that women are not totally silenced in the assemblies by the New Testament, J. C. Frazee in the Octographic Review acknowledges that “we understand that they are not permitted to teach (usurp authority), taking the oversight of the Church, as officals (elders, bishops, etc.)” (OR, 1904, 2).  Some, like Theodore DeLong, argued that public teaching was the only thing denied a woman in the public assembly:  “Is there any other good thing that women are commanded not to do except teach in public?” (CLW, 1905, 2). More specifically, James A. Harding argued that “the speaking that is forbidden in the church is that in which the woman becomes a leader, one in authority” and the reason it is forbidden is because “God made man to be the leader, the ruler, and the woman to be his helpmeet” (CLW, 1904, 8).

It was one of the characteristics of the “digressives” or progressives that women sometimes functioned as preachers and evangelists. According to John T. Poe, it was “common among the digressives for women to preach, lecture and pray now as among any of the other sets. But,” he added, “it must not be so in the church of Christ” (FF, 1901, 12). This became an identifiable marker that distinguished the Christian Church (“digressives”), though not even all or most of their congregations, from the Churches of Christ. Indeed, this point (“woman is not to usurp authority, is to keep silence in the church”) is so plain, according to Lipscomb, that he did “not see why the teaching that Jesus is the Son of God may not be set aside by the same rule and reasoning” that this “teaching is set aside” (GA, 1897, 356). [Lipscomb’s article was reprinted in the Firm Foundation.]

Second, they all agreed that women should not participate in the organization, leadership and function of various ecclesiastical societies or any activist society (e.g., the temperance movement).

At one level this was directed against the “digressives” who encouraged women to organize local societies.  “Dear sisters,”  wrote William Wise in the Firm Foundation, “do not suffer yourselves to be organized into women’s aid societies. Do all your work in the Lord’s house–His church” (FF, 1904, 3).  Such participation is divisive because God has not authorized such societies.  Thus, “women who build societies and become presidents and public leaders,” according E. G. Sewell,  “bring troubles, bring wounds and heartaches among brethren, cause division and strife in churches and throw a blight over Christian unity wherever they prevail” (GA, 1897, 469).  [Sewell’s article was reprinted in the Firm Foundation.]  The standard warning, voiced by Wise, was: “Don’t let any digressive click organize you into their societies” (FF,  1901, 2).

At another level this was directed toward any activism by women outside the home or church. The public sphere was not accessible to woman as determined by God’s created order, according to the argument. This perspective was strongly embedded within the Tennessee Tradition flowing out of the teaching of David Lipscomb and James A. Harding.  I will begin my next post elaborating this position and how it shaped discussion among Churches of Christ.

More to come….

References

Theodore DeLong, “The Woman Question,” Christian Leader & the Way 45 (7 November 1905) 2.

J. C. Frazee, “Your Women,” Octographic Review 47 (5 July 1904) 2.

James A. Harding, “Woman’s Work in the Church,” Christian Leader & the Way 18 (8 March 1904) 8-9.

David Lipscomb, “The Church of Christ and the ‘Disciples of Christ,” Gospel Advocate 49 (18 July 1907) 450.

David Lipscomb, “The Churches Across the Mountains,” Gospel Advocate 39 (7 January 1897) 4.

David Lipscomb, “Women in the Church,” Gospel Advocate 39 (10 June 1897) 356.

David Lipsomb, “Women in the Church,” Firm Foundation 13 (13 July 1897) 2.

John T. Poe, “Female Evangelists,” Firm Foundation 16 (29 January 1901), 2.

Elisha G. Sewell, “Woman’s Real Position in the Church,” Gospel Advocate 39 (29 July 1897) 469.

Elisha G. Sewell, “Woman’s Real Position in the Church,” Firm Foundation 13 (24 August 1897) 1.

William Wise, “Woman,” Firm Foundation 16 (2 April 1901) 2.

William Wise, “Woman’s Work in the Church,” Firm Foundation 21 (3 May 1904) 3.

Winchester, Kentucky, is a small town of only 16,000 in a county (Clark) of 33,000.  The city lies in the heart of the origins of the Stone-Campbell Movement. Within a sixty mile radius are Lexington, Cane Ridge, Mt. Sterling, Georgetown and other famous cities of the early years of that history. The story of the Stone-Campbell Movement in Winchester, KY illustrates the progress and process of division within the movement.

Division One, Baptist-Christian: In 1812 the Strode’s Station Church (formed in 1791), a member of the North District Association of Baptist Churches, moved 1.5 miles to a lot on Lexington Road in Winchester and became known as the “Friendship Church.”  In 1821 it reported 125 members led by Elder Quisenberry.  In 1822 Quisenberry was dismissed by a minority in the church because of his interest in the teachings of Barton W. Stone (since 1814) and Alexander  Campbell’s “Sermon on the Law” (given in 1816). Though Quisenberry withdrew his leadership, the result was two congregations known as “Friendship Church” in Winchester–one (ultimately the First Baptist Chuch) belonging to the Licking Association and the other (ultimately the first Stone-Campbell congregation) a member of the North District Association. The Stone-Campbell group renamed themselves “Christian Church at Friendship” in 1825 and moved their membership to the Boone Association.

Division Two, Baptist-Christian:  In 1828 Elder William Morton, the regular preacher for the Christian Church, preached the introductory sermon for the Boone Association when it met at Winchester. At this meeting a resolution was proposed to abolish the Association’s constitution and accept the Bible alone as their rule of faith and practice.  In 1829, the Christian Church at Friendship, along with five other congregations, withdrew from the Boone Association. These churches were now independent and informally associated with the work of John “Racoon” Smith and Jacob Creath, Sr.  Elder Morton himself baptized 300 persons in the first six months of 1828 through his intinerant evangelism. The Winchester “Christian Church at Friendship” was clearly situated within the orbit of Alexander Campbell’s influence though Stone held a camp meeting at Winchester in 1832. Campbell preached at Winchester in 1834 (and later in 1851). Aylette Rains served as a monthly preacher for the Christian Church from 1834-1861. Raines lost favor with the congregation due to his unionist proclivities when the church essentially wanted to stay neutral. The congregation erected a new building in 1845 and became known as the “Court Street Christian Church,” started a Sunday School in 1850 ,and by 1865 numbered 300.

Division Three, Black-White:  Prior to the Civil War the Friendship Church and its descendent the Court Street Christian Church counted some blacks among their members. Sometime after the Civil War an African-American Christian Church appeared in Winchester (there were only four in Kentucky prior to the Civil War), one of nearly seventy African-American congregations organized from 1865-1900 in Kentucky. The Broadway Christian Church obtained property in 1868. Little is known about the origins of this particular congregation. The congregation never grew above 100 and still exists.

Division Four, Instrumental-Noninstrumental: In 1887 the organ was introduced into the public worship of the church at Winchester (the same year it was introduced in Georgetown and Hopkinsville, KY).  Trouble had apparently been brewing for a while. This is the home church of James W. Harding (1823-1919) and his son James  A. Harding (1848-1922). J. W.’s mother and grandmother had been members of the original Friendship Church and J. W. was baptized by Rains in 1839. Though a local buisnessman, he was an Elder at the church and an intinerant evangelist in the region. He was close friends with Moses Lard and J. W. McGarvey. While the organ was originally introduced into the Sunday School as a compromise, when it was moved into the public assembly this “drove out a number of the oldest, wisest and best members” (according to W. F. Neal).  The organ remained in the church despite a petition signed by “forty-five conscientious members.” They began a new congregation in the home of J. W. Harding with fifteen people and was known, after the erection of a building in 1891, as the  “Fairfax Street Church of Christ.” By 1898 the membership was 378. At the turn of the century, the Fairfax Street Church of Christ (400 members) and the Court Street Christian Church (600 members) were the largest churches in Winchester.

Division Five, Premillennial-Amillennial: The Fairfax Church employed their first regular minister in 1912, H. C. Shoulders. When he was dismissed in 1917, 240 members organized a new congregation on January 19, 1918 known as the Main Street Church of Christ. Apparently, generational and leadership issues (growing dissatisfaction with the Hardings) as well as millennialism were the center of the tension. The Fairfax Church was only left with 68 members. Though briefly reunited in 1926 after the deaths of some of the Hardings and some agreement about toning down the millennialism, fifteen people began to meet at the Fairfax building by the end of the year (the same number that started meeting in 1887). Eventually the Fairfax church grew to 100 and has hovered in that neighborhood ever since. The division between the two churches was acerbated and written in stone by the debate on premillennialism held in Winchester between Charles M. Neal and Foy E. Wallace, Jr., from January 2-7, 1933. The premillennial movement within Churches of Christ operated a Bible College at Winchester from 1949-1979.

Division Six, Disciples of Christ and Christian Church/Churces of Christ:  The Court Street Christian Church, now known as the First Christian Church, moved into a new building in 1908 and employed a well-known minister by the name of J. H. MacNeill. He became a board member of the College of the Bible (now Lexington Theological Seminary), ultimately its chairman, and was a major player in the formation of the United Missionary Society.  Between 1917-1918, at the time of the heresy trials at the College of the Bible, MacNeill began reporting his work through the Christian Evangelist rather than the Christian Standard.  However, a few in his congregation opposed his College associations and he resigned in 1923 (4 accepted, 2 abstained and 20 refused the resignation). The First Christian Church was well-entrenched in the direction of the Disciples of Christ, the United Missionary Society, and “liberal” higher education. It would not be until 1973 when an independent Christian Church/Churches of Christ congregation would be planted in the city (Calvary Christian Church) and another followed known as the Christview Christian Church (though three  congregations in the County were listed in the 1960 direction of Christian/Churches and Churches of Christ:  Log Lick, Antioch, and Ruckersville with Forest Grove added in 1965).

Division Seven, Institutional-Noninstitutional:  Throughout the 1950s Churches of Christ nationwide debated whether churches should support Colleges, children’s homes, and sponsored missionaries. For one side (institutionalists) it was an expedient means, for the other it was the machinery of denominationalism (noninstitutionalists). In 1964 a small group in the Fairfax Church of Christ withdrew after several years of discussion when the church decided to support orphans homes out of their church treasury rather than simply providing an optional “non-worship activity” box for such contributions in the foyer. This group ultimately planted a new congregation in Winchester in 1966.

Winchester, KY, is Exhibit A for the history of division within the Stone-Campbell Movement.  Within the city limits of this small town in the heart of Stone-Campbell history, are two Christian Churches, three Churches of Christ, and two Christian Churches/Churches of Christ.  They number about 1600 out of a popuation of 16,000 people.