Should Women Be Silent In Church?

Spoiler: The answer’s ‘no’.

Every so often I get asked questions about how to understand Christianity and read the Bible that I think lots of people are asking. I want to provide a space where some of those questions can be answered. If you have a question you would like me to think about and help with then feel free to email me  or send me a message on Facebook. I will always keep the identity of the questioner anonymous.

I received this question from a friend of mine, Janet.[1]

Dear Phil,

I’ve been enjoying reading 1 Corinthians and thinking about how it applies to my life. I’m puzzled by what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:34-35.

Does he mean that as a woman I ought always to be silent in church? If so, how can I pray and prophesy or even sing? If not, what is he talking about?

Best wishes,

Janet

Dear Janet,

This is a great question. It’s brilliant that you are reading the Bible and that you are thinking so closely about what it means and how to live it out. These are difficult verses to understand and apply for various reasons, not least that they come shortly after Paul has commanded women to speak in church.

Whenever we are trying to understand the Bible and apply it in our lives, we are asking two questions.

1. What is being taught?
2. How should that affect the way we live?

What is Being Taught?

The first, and most important, principle when we are trying to understand what is being taught is to read carefully and in context. That means trying to understand the type of writing it is (eg is it poetry, a letter, a history, a polemic etc) and then reading the bits around our passage to understand the argument the writer is making.

When we do this for 1 Corinthians we find that:

1. The big context 1 Corinthians is that it is a letter. This means it was written to address a specific people with specific problems. While Paul gives big principles that apply everywhere, therefore, we might expect his application to relate to the situation of the church in Corinth.
2. Paul specifically approves women actively speaking in worship both in prayer and prophecy and provides for how that should continue (1 Corinthians 11:1-16). He therefore not only has no problem with women speaking in worship, he commands that they continue to do so.
3. There is, however, a specific problem in Corinth with people misusing gifts of prophecy and tongues. As a result the meetings are becoming chaotic (1 Corinthians 14:26-33).
4. The answer Paul gives is for there to be good order and for people not to talk over one another (1 Corinthians 14:30).
5. He then specifically says that the women present should keep silent during the meeting and ask questions at home instead, commenting that they should display an attitude of submitting (presumably to the rest of the congregation)(1 Corinthians 14:34-35). More broadly, we note that submitting to one another is the mark of everyone who is a Christian in the church (Ephesians 5:21).

What seems to have been going on, therefore, is that men and women were addressing the meeting to pray or share what they felt God was saying to the church. That was good. However, those speakers were talking over one another. Moreover, there were several women who were heckling with questions. Unsurprisingly, Paul says this has to stop and they should save their questions for later.

This is also the view of most of the commentators I have read.[2] In passing, we should note that most of 1 Corinthians deals with factions and division in the church, including the arguments about Spiritual gifts. It is very easy to imagine that people heckling and asking pointed, unhelpful questions would be a major part of this problem. Men undoubtedly do this sort of thing too but in Corinth it happened to be some of the women who were the hecklers. Again, we must remember that according to 1 Corinthians 11 the speakers they were heckling were both men and women.

How Should We Live?

What should this mean for us? The application is pretty easy. Both men and women should be encouraged to contribute prayer and prophecy to church meetings. Nobody should heckle speakers in the church. If there are questions about what someone is saying or teaching it is unhelpful and inappropriate to shout over them. Wait until later.

I hope that helps. Keep on pursuing God even as he pursues you.

With love in Christ,

Phil

[1] Janet is not a real person but a the question is real. ‘Janet’ is the name given to the computer assistant in the wonderful, The Good Place.

[2] For example, Anthony C. Thiselton, 1 Corinthians: A Shorter Exegetical & Pastoral Commentary, p.250; Ben Witherington III, Conflict and Community in Corinth, p.287; Keener, Paul, Women, and Wives, p.81ff.