In Rule 11 of non-Christian Jungian psychologist Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules For Life, Peterson talks about how boys playing games with girls is not beneficial for boys. A girl can move up within the female hierarchy when she competes with and wins against other girls or boys. However, a boy only moves up in the eyes of his male peers when he competes with and wins against other boys. Competing against a girl puts him in an awkward position to begin with. What is he doing challenging or accepting the challenge of a girl? If he wins, he should have because he’s a guy, and guys shouldn’t lose to girls. He gains no respect from his male peers and may even be disrespected because he “beat up on a girl.” If he loses, he loses all respect from his male peers. He will never live it down. Men are created to protect women, not war with them physically or verbally.

It may seem inappropriate to bring a non-Christian Jungian psychologist to a debate about Scriptural truth, but what Peterson communicates fits the present situation. Aimee Byrd, in her recent book, Recovering From Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, challenges the church’s male-only ordained leaders to examine themselves. A truth that is intrinsic to our creation and recognized by Peterson but seemingly not recognized by Byrd is that this puts male theologians and pastors like me who review her book in a place to receive quite a bit unjustified unfriendly fire. The reactions are visceral because of the way God created the sexes to relate. If we disagree with Byrd, Byrd is a female martyr and we are misogynistic. Men shouldn’t be “attacking” a woman. Social media will explode with all sorts of condolences for her and condemnations for the patriarchy that “attacked” her. If we agree with Byrd, we forfeit historic and (I believe) Scriptural positions of the church in the area of intersexual dynamics within the world and the church. Men tend not to treat women the same as other men, generally speaking, when it comes to games or debates. We know that we will draw the ire of both female and male feminists, and, quite frankly, sometimes it’s just not worth the hassle.

Because I believe that this book has the potential to be influential in a church culture already rife with feminist tendencies, I enter this fray with a few other men who have gone before me to review this book. Byrd’s title and content reveal her ax to grind with the Counsel of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW). Andrew David Naselli’s review does a good job answering Byrd’s critique of CBMW’s positions as well as pointing out biblical flaws in her work. Mark Jones’s review is quite deferential but shows several errors in the way Byrd constructs her biblical-theological approach to the issues of intersexual relationships. (Scot McKnight will, no doubt, be seen as a champion for women because of his endorsement in the book blurb and his review in Christianity Today.)

As these men point out, there are glaring omissions in Byrd’s treatment of the subject. Byrd doesn’t deal with many of the Scriptural passages that address head-on the issues of intersexual relationships in the world and church. This may be because she believes that this is a simplistic “Biblicist” approach.

Biblicists emphasize proof texting [sic] over a comprehensive biblical theology. What often happens unintentionally is that the Biblicist readers become their own authority, since they often don’t notice they are also looking through their own lens of preconceived theological assumptions. Indeed, this is something we all need to be aware of in our Bible interpretations. The troubling teaching of biblical manhood and womanhood has thrived under this rubric of popular Biblicist interpretive methods. (159)

Apparently, Byrd’s biblical-theological approach is so advanced that it can omit key passages that deal directly with these issues. There is no discussion of 1Timothy 2 or 1Corinthians 11. There is a treatment of 1Corinthians 14 and the issue of women keeping silent in church, which she turns on its head by saying that women really can speak in the gathered assembly in some type of leadership in the worship service as long as it is not the sermon. The command to “let them ask their husbands at home” is conveniently left out of the exegesis. (231-2)

The reviews by Naselli and Jones do a good job pointing out the obvious deficiencies of RBMW. My review will overlap theirs at points, but I want to deal with what I see as some of the more fundamental, presuppositional issues of intersexual relationships throughout creation and in the church.

Whose House Are We In?

If you are familiar with the book at all, by this time you know about the yellow wallpaper, a trope she uses throughout the book. As she explains in the Introduction, the image comes from a nineteenth-century novella by Charlotte Perkins Gilman entitled, The Yellow Wallpaper. The wallpaper is a metaphor for the hermeneutical structures and strictures that determine the way we have understood the place of women, “the female voice,” in Scripture, and, thus, in the church. Byrd’s mission is to peel away the yellow wallpaper that distorts our understanding.

As mentioned in the quote earlier, Byrd acknowledges that we all come to the Scriptures with our “own lens of preconceived theological assumptions,” and for that reason, we need to take care in approaching the Scriptures and be ready to have those assumptions changed. I whole-heartedly agree with that sentiment. But that forces us to ask the question, With what preconceived theological assumptions is Byrd approaching the text?

Byrd gives her history with CBMW’s literature and trying to be a godly woman in light of what she learned from these men. Her assumptions changed. She triangulates herself above the fray now, being neither complementarian nor egalitarian. (121) The reader is asked to believe that Byrd has no wallpaper of her own anymore; that she is looking at the Scriptures through purely objective eyes. But the reader must ask, How much has literature such as The Yellow Wallpaper, written by a feminist, affected Byrd’s view of Scripture? How much has the general American feminist milieu colored Byrd’s thinking? Many of the views she espouses share much more in common with egalitarian feminism than they do with the historic Christian church’s interpretation of the callings of men and women. Byrd has her own wallpaper.

Battle For The Center?

In an attempt to prove to the radical feminists that God’s word is not an “androcentric text that lacks female contribution,” (91) Byrd directs the reader to hear the “female voice” of Scripture through figures such as Ruth, Deborah, Huldah, and others. She strives to prove that the male and female voices “operate synergetically in Scripture” (94, 126) as opposed to being at war with one another. However, her approach to prove synergism is to adopt language that pits the voices against one another.

Borrowing primarily from Richard Bauckham, Byrd speaks of the Scriptures in terms of gynocentric versus androcentric voices. (51) Throughout Part 1, she refers to “gynocentric interruptions” in an “androcentric” text when the stories of women such as Ruth (chapter 2) or the Canaanite woman (88) are told. All of these women are “overturning stereotypes.” (e.g., 90)

Though she wants to show how men’s and women’s voices work together, with the “centric” and “interruption” language, she is leaving the reader with this civil war of the sexes. Men’s voices dominate and the women have to “interrupt.” At best this leaves the reader confused as to whether or not men and women in Scripture are at war with one another or if they do work synergistically as Byrd proposes. At worst, Byrd disproves her own point by the language she uses, leaving the reader to think that women are oppressed and must fight–even in Scripture–to have their voices heard.

The concerns for the female voice being heard in the church are Byrd’s primary concern. This is done through teaching. “Any divinely ordained differences that men and women have do not prohibit women from teaching. It would be disobedient to Scripture to withhold women from teaching.” (174) Make no mistake about it, what she means by this is that she believes women ought to be able to teach adult men. That is the way the female voice is truly heard. She leaves the reader with the sense that women being relegated to teaching children and other women is some sort of inferior teaching. “While some give the nod for women to teach other women and children, they are sending the message that this is ancillary work to be done.” (188) Are they “sending the message,” or is that only what she is thinking? What if women, because of their God-given nature as women, are generally better than men at teaching children and other women? Is that a deficiency or just a difference?

Must a woman formally teach men to have the female voice heard in the church? Were not the female voices of Lois and Eunice heard through Timothy as tradents of the faith? (2Tim 1.5) Are not older women specifically exhorted to teach younger women how to be good wives and manage their homes? (Titus 2.3-5) Is there any married pastor who is not influenced by his wife in his teaching ministry? Byrd leaves the impression that if women aren’t able to teach men, then the church is an oppressive patriarchy, squashing the female voice. Just because women aren’t able to do exactly what Byrd thinks they ought to be able to do, doesn’t mean that the female voice doesn’t contribute to the work of the church. I’m sure that there are outlier churches that completely squash female voices, but I’m not aware of any conservative churches that “withhold women from teaching.” I’m not even certain that is possible, considering the fact that mothers and wives have tremendous power with children and husbands.

Women have tremendous power. The adage, “the hand the rocks the cradle rules the world” has much truth in it. The female voice is heard throughout the church. It doesn’t have to be heard in one specific area of teaching adult men to be heard.

The tenor of Byrd’s book exudes a battle for equality … in everything but the pastorate. She rightly concludes that men, and men only, should be ordained representatives of Christ in the preaching of the Scriptures. (231) Of course, everything else in leading the liturgy should be open to females (except the pastoral prayer of the church, 232 n. 54). Much of this push for equality derives from her conclusions drawn from certain linguistics describing certain women in the church. Paul speaks of women as participating with him in the ministry, giving them special status. (149) Byrd spends a great deal of time on Phoebe, whom Byrd assumes Paul entrusts with the explanation of the letter to the church of Rome. (146-51; 213ff.) She also speaks of Junia as an apostle. (223ff.; Naselli deals well with this in his review) Paul uses the same verb translated “work hard” about women as he does his own ministry. Because Paul uses similar words to speak about himself and women, because he speaks about Euodia and Syntyche as laboring side by side with him in the gospel (Phil 4.2-3), the reader is to assume, I suppose, that Paul has eradicated various callings for the sexes. So, if they “work hard” in the gospel as Paul does, does that mean that they occupy the same calling in the church? If Junia is actually a woman and is called an apostle in Romans 16, might that mean something different for a female than it does a male? If we look at those avoided passages in 1Timothy 2 and 1Corinthians 11 where the same apostle is speaking, we learn that he doesn’t commend women to occupy the same callings as men. They are … dare I say it … complementary. Women labor as women. Men labor as men. Both are working toward our common mission, but both must stay in their lanes.

Transcending The Sexes?

We are, indeed, working toward a common mission. Byrd affirms this by speaking of our joint telos. (111) She follows this up by saying, “However, this is not an androgynous calling.” (111) Both egalitarians and complementarians are critiqued in their views of the sexes. Because egalitarians don’t recognize distinctions, women feel undervalued because there is no development of the distinct masculine and feminine contributions. Complementarians set up femininity and masculinity as something to strive for in itself. Byrd shows us a more excellent way: a transcendent sexuality.

Several times she speaks of “transcending” our genders or sexuality. Jesus did it (122), and we should too. Quoting Andrew Bartlett approvingly, Byrd writes, Does your church witness to the fact that ‘relationships in the church are shaped by the new creation,’ where ‘created gender distinctions remain in existence, but are also transcended’?” (231) Indeed, “There are no exhortations in Scripture for men to be masculine and women to be feminine. As the Roman Catholic theologian Dietrich Von Hildebrand points out, the calling for both man and woman, our telos, is ‘to be transformed in Christ, to become holy and glorify God, and to reach eternal communion with God…. The specific tone of masculinity and femininity must appear by itself’ as we strive together toward this same mission.” (111) “We are not directed to biblical manhood nor biblical womanhood; we are directed to Christ. Our aim is to behold Christ, as his bride, as fellow sons in the Son.” (132) We need a communion between males and females that is “platonic–intimate but nonerotic.” [sic] (172) We are being prepared for eternal communion with the triune God and one another, (109, 233) and it appears that transcends our sexuality.

Don’t get Byrd wrong. Males and females have “distinct relational responsibilities that color our discipleship. Men will never be daughters, sisters, aunts, wives, or mothers. Women will never be sons, brothers, uncles, husbands, or fathers.” (116, emphasis mine) Even though males and females are colored by their sexuality in discipleship, masculinity and femininity are cultural constructs, not commands in Scripture (111). She agrees with Mark Cortez that there are cultural norms that are associated with our gender that should not be considered essential to our sexuality. (123)

What does transcended sexuality look like? If it is not some form of androgyny, then what is it?

By deconstructing the whole “masculine-feminine” paradigm while still upholding a distinction between the sexes, Byrd reduces the difference between men and women to physiology. Male = masculine and female = feminine are tautologies. “I simply am feminine because I am female.” (114) “I don’t need to act like a woman; I actually am a woman.” (120, emphasis original) The result of this little trick is to eliminate the distinctive responsibilities of men and women. Oh sure, our maleness or femaleness “colors” our discipleship. One is a sperm donor and the other provides a womb for gestation and glands for nursing, but those are the accidents but not the essence of our existence; they “color” our discipleship, but they are not specific callings into which we are to grow. In some sense, we need to grow out of them.

So, if everything a man does is masculine, how does Paul’s characterization of men as “effeminate” in 1Corinthians 6.9-10 fit into this construct? What does Paul mean when, in 1Corinthians 16.13, he says literally, “Act like a man?” (Byrd prefers other translations such as “be courageous,” “valiant,” or “brave.” 112) Must men act a certain way that is truly manly? If everything a man does is masculine by definition, why characterize certain behaviors as acting like a man and others as being non-manly?

If it is true that men are called to act in certain ways that are considered manly or masculine, then would it not also be true that women must act in certain ways that would be considered womanly or feminine? Would these ways of acting not correspond with the creation and commands for the woman just as they do for the man? The attempt to deconstruct masculine and feminine into biological realities apart from responsibilities, or making masculine and feminine merely cultural constructs that don’t have the weight of Scriptural responsibilities is anti-Scriptural and dangerous.

Though Byrd would have us believe that we are not commanded to grow toward biblical manhood or Biblical womanhood, (132) I must ask, Are Christian virtues asexual? Does love, faithfulness, et al. look different in a woman than it does a man? Christian virtues are embodied in males and females differently. Of course, there is overlap between the two, but they express themselves beautifully in our different orientations toward God, one another, and the world around us.

For instance, Byrd speaks of how she is a fierce protector (125-6). I don’t doubt it. Women are protectors, but they are not protectors in the same way men are protectors. Women protect children, and men protect women. This is the way God set things up in Genesis. This is also why it upsets sports and the military to go coed. Add a female to the situation with males, no matter how much she wants to be treated as an equal, she won’t be. You, the reader, know this instinctively. It is a created part of us to the smallest strand of DNA in our bodies. It can’t be transcended into some semi-gnostic functional androgyny.

Seeking to show our equality before God through our culpability in sin, Byrd addresses the fact that Eve was “equally culpable for her sin, as God directly addressed her.” (116) “Equally culpable” is tricky. Yes, Eve was culpable for her sin, but she is not culpable in the same way as Adam. Adam failed his responsibility as a man, leaving Eve vulnerable to be deceived. Eve committed a sin of inadvertency or being led astray. Adam committed a high-handed sin. Because of Adam’s responsibility as a man, it is through him that sin and death entered the world, not through the woman (Rom 5.12). The man and the woman are judged differently based on their created and commanded differences, and the sins of each have consequences corresponding to their sins. The woman’s consequences correspond to her calling in child-bearing and in relationship to the man. The man’s consequences correspond to his orientation to the world. (Gen 3.16-19) Is each responsible for his and her sin? Yes. But the sin and its consequences correspond to the calling of males and females as males and females.

The promise of redemption is the restoration and glorification of the man and the woman, not the transcending of their sexuality into a communion that virtually eliminates the distinctions. The beauty is in the differences. Our sexualities are neither an immaturity that we must eventually transcend nor a remnant of sin that must be eliminated.

These created differences between us orient us toward the world in different ways, both needed to complete our common mission. While our differences do speak to our callings as husbands and wives directly, they also speak to our broader responsibilities in our dominion mandate. We know that our created differences establish a certain order in the church. Paul says this clearly in 1Timothy 2.8-15 and 1Corinthians 11.2-16. Even though, as Byrd rightly says, not all women are to submit to all men, (105) the world is gloriously patriarchal. The Man, Christ Jesus, is Lord of the world. His bride, the church, rules with him, but does so as the bride and not as the husband. Jesus hears the feminine voice, but he gets the final say (cf.107).

This patriarchal structure that governs the new creation is to be imaged in the world. Men should be leading societies, the church, and the home. Isaiah says that when women and children lead, that is an indication that a society is being punished. (Isa 3.12) Men are created to be oriented to the creation in a way that women are not. Women are created to be oriented toward men in a way that men are not oriented toward women. (1Cor 11.8-9) This is creation glorified, not transcended.

Because a woman can do something doesn’t mean that she ought to do it any time or in any space she wants. The same goes for a man. We have God-given lanes to stay in to use the abilities God has given us in the structures in which he has commanded us to use them. Not to stay in our lanes as men and women will be debilitating to our kingdom mission. Consequently, we don’t need to recover from biblical manhood and womanhood. We need to grow into and delight in the beauty of them.

Despite her best efforts to distance herself from egalitarianism, Byrd, in the end, practically promotes a baptized version of egalitarianism. In the end, I don’t think Byrd has a good eye for redecorating the church, so she needs to be careful about ripping down wallpaper in the church. 

Read more