Women, teaching and leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 : a rhetorical-critical study, with reference to Angola

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The perceptions on the role of women regarding teaching and leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 offer numerous challenges regarding its interpretative history. The central contested aspect is that the text appears to allow women to learn but forbids them to teach or to have authority over men. In Angola, if not in most African societies where there is a need for the empowerment of servants and for discipleship for the Kingdom of God, one is confused about how to understand this text as authoritatively forbidding women to take the roles of teaching and leadership. This study was undertaken on the assumption that the prohibition of women in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 was written to respond to a specific situation in Ephesus, regarding false teachings. Therefore, the primary aim of this study is to evaluate the use of 1 Timothy 2:11-15 by the Evangelical churches in Angola on the way they silence women. It seeks to investigate the interpretation of the verses from the perspective of the church leadership. The text challenges the contemporary readers because notwithstanding their literal interpretation, they express fundamental awareness of the social-cultural perception of gender importance and their respective roles. The literary context of the text was surveyed by means of a rhetorical-critical method in order to comprehend the passage in terms of its literal and social context. The text was analysed verse by verse and the concept of silence and submission of women in the first century was explained. It is argued that the writer of the letter arranged his arguments in a way that would most likely convince his audience to follow what he considers the sound doctrine for the church. The study, Women, Teaching and Leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 comprises six chapters. Chapter 1 offers a short outline of the purpose of the study, research problems and questions as well as the hypothesis of this thesis, in combination with the methodology. In Chapter 2 the text of 1 Timothy 2:11-15 is examined exegetically through a close interpretation of the text, with emphasis on principle concepts that function within the text, and are believed to be aimed crucially at the resultant debate on women, teaching and leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 in the setting first Mediterranean World. Chapter 3 elucidates the Social, Historical and Political context of 1 Timothy 2:11-15. It looks at the first century's social context, which formed the life background of 1 Timothy. It analyses the household within the Greco-Roman empire, and women's roles according to gender distribution, and how the church as the household of God has modelled itself along the same lines. Chapter 4 analyses gendered rhetoric in 1 Timothy 2:11-15. It seeks to explore implicitly gendered rhetoric in the text and to discuss the diverse issues involved in interpretation as they relate to gender roles in that context. Rhetoric as an art of persuasion in its context, makes use of gender language to refer to the cultural constructs of masculinity and femininity constructed in relation to biological sex, particularly, culture. Chapter 5 enquires about 1 Timothy 2:11-15 as a challenge for being a woman in the church in Angola. It attempts to apply the role of 'Women, Teaching and Leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 to the Angolan context. The chapter engages with some analysis done by scholars and uses two sermons from pastors in Angola as an illustration on how the text is interpreted among evangelicals. Chapter 6 connects the discussions of the chapters together and explains concisely the potential significance and influence of women, in teaching and leadership in 1 Timothy 2:11-15 for the suggested context of Christianity today.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University