The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth

Notes and highlights for

The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth

Barr, Beth Allison

Introduction

Highlight (yellow) - Page 2 · Location 169

Elisabeth Elliot famously wrote that femininity receives . Women surrender , help , and respond while husbands provide , protect , and initiate . A biblical woman is a submissive woman .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 7 · Location 231

Ironically , complementarian theology claims it is defending a plain and natural interpretation of the Bible while really defending an interpretation that has been corrupted by our sinful human drive to dominate others and build hierarchies of power and oppression . I can’t think of anything less Christlike than hierarchies like these .

1. The Beginning of Patriarchy

Highlight (yellow) - Page 12 · Location 296

You see , Christians were not the only ones to argue that women’s subordination is the divine order .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 13 · Location 321

Complementarianism is patriarchy .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 13 · Location 323

patriarchy as having three main meanings in English : Male ecclesiastical leaders , such as the patriarch ( archbishop of Constantinople ) in Greek Orthodoxy Legal power of male household heads ( fathers / husbands ) A society that promotes male authority and female submission

Highlight (yellow) - Page 14 · Location 337

For evangelicals these attitudes are connected : limiting women’s spiritual authority goes hand in hand with limiting women’s economic power .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 17 · Location 386

Nice try , I thought . Tell that to my conservative male student . Because that student considered me to be under the authority of my husband , he was less willing to accept my authority over him in a university classroom . No matter how much Moore wants to separate “ pagan patriarchy ” from “ Christian patriarchy , ” he can’t . Both systems place power in the hands of men and take power away from women .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 18 · Location 389

Both systems teach men that women rank lower than they do . Both systems teach women that their voices are worth less than the voices of men .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 18 · Location 392

If men ( simply because of their sex ) have the potential to preach and exercise spiritual authority over a church congregation but women ( simply because of their sex ) do not , then that gives men “ in general ” authority over women “ in general . ” My conservative male student considered me under the authority of both my husband and my pastor , and he treated me accordingly .

Highlight (yellow) - Page 20 · Location 422

A gender hierarchy in which women rank under men can be found in almost every era and among every people group . When the church denies women the ability to preach , lead , teach , and sometimes even work outside the home , the church is continuing a long historical tradition of subordinating women .