In my book, Paul, Women and Church, I show the numerous women whom Paul recognizes as coworkers and fellow-ministers. He specifically refers to one woman as an apostle and another woman as his spiritual mother. He refers to another woman as having "stood before" many including himself. There is no reason to believe that these women were confined to teaching only women. In the case of Priscilla, it is specifically stated that she was equally involved with her husband in instructing the learned Apollos, "the way of God more accurately" (Acts 18:24-26). -- Eddie Hyatt
Here is the first plug for the book along with an irrelevant and inaccurate point. The reason why it is irrelevant has been explained already. In the Timothy and Corinthian verses we have clear and matching instruction regarding women not being permitted to teach/preach or exercise authority over men. The inaccuracies are varied. The Bible does not refer to any female as an apostle. The person he is referring to is Junia, who most scholars say was actually a man. Even if you wish to overlook this fact and make him female, the verse reads as follows:
Greet Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners. They are well known to the apostles, and they were in Christ before me. -- Romans 16: 7 (ESV)
Junia is a what? KinsMAN. That aside the verse simply says that these people were well known among the apostles. That means the apostles knew these people well, not that they were actually apostles themselves. I am unsure who he is claiming was a spiritual mother but it doesn't matter because that does not mean that she taught or exercised authority over men. Neither does "standing before many." Again these are the gymnastics one is forced to perform in order to ignore plain and clear Scriptures. Now let us see if the referenced Acts verses help his cause:
Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures.He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit,he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. -- Acts 18: 24-26 (ESV) -- Eddie Hyatt
As Priscilla and Aquila had spent time with Paul, they were better versed. So they explained the way of God more accurately to Apollos. Is this exercising authority over a man? No. Is it teaching/preaching to men? No. It even says that then Apollos went and spoke boldly in the synagogue. So because of this one event in a historical narrative, Eddie Hyatt wishes to toss aside the two much clearer passages that provide direct instruction. To quote him, this is not good hermeneutics. It is amazing that he can look at the Timothy and Corinthian verses and then write that there is no reason to believe that the women in historical narratives were confined to teaching only women. Yes there is Eddie! Because if they did then God is a liar.
In Paul, Women and Church, I also show how in 2 Timothy 2:2 (NIV), Paul exhorts Timothy to commit the things he has learned from Paul to "many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others." Although the King James and New King James versions translate the word anthropoi in the passage as "men," the 2011 edition of the NIV got it right for the word anthropoi is gender-inclusive, like the English word "people" or "person." If Paul had wanted to confine the teaching ministry of the church to males only, he could have easily done so by using a form of the Greek word aner, which is gender-specific and refers to males. Instead, he uses anthropoi and makes it clear that Timothy is to prepare women as well as men to teach others in the church in Ephesus. -- Eddie Hyatt
To those not versed in languages this might sound reasonable. A warning flare should have went off when you realize that his argument is that all translations of the Bible got this word wrong for millennia until 2011 when the NIV finally got it right. Uh-huh. Turns out when you refer to linguistics experts, they disagree with his conclusions regarding this word. Let's take a look at some other passages where the same word is used:
