Paul covers a lot of ground in today’s passage. First, he concludes his instructions about the public worship services in Corinth. Last Wednesday I noted the danger in trying to develop a doctrine based on just a few verses. Verses 34-35 are a good example of that danger. Some people have read these verses and then concluded that Paul is commanding that women are forbidden to speak in public worship services. However, to reach that conclusion you would have to discard chapter 11 (as well as many others places in the Bible) where Paul clearly expects women to provide leadership in worship through praying and preaching.
Some scholars suggest that these verses were added as an editorial comment by a scribe copying the manuscripts. Others suggest that Paul wrote these verses, but that he was addressing a peculiar situation in Corinth that concerned an issue other than worship leadership.
In Paul’s description of worship he introduces the inclusion of an exhorter that is still practiced in some churches. An exhorter was a speaker that followed the preacher, who encouraged the congregation to apply the lessons proclaimed by the preacher to their daily lives. The situation in Corinth may have involved interaction during the service between the exhorter and their wives. It may be that Paul is suggesting something as simple as that there is a time and place for everything, and the time and place for a woman to criticize or critique her husband is not in the midst of a public worship service.
We do not know for sure what Paul had in mind, other than; this surly is not a prohibition on the leadership of women in the church.
Chapter 15 is one of the most important of all of Paul’s writings. He begins with affirming the resurrection of Jesus which is the foundation upon which everything in the New Testament church rests. As we continue our journey with Paul we will see that he believes the resurrection of Jesus is an event, because of which, the world can never be the same again. AND, those who believe it and live it will never be the same either, as Paul affirmed in what has become one of my favorite verses:
“By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace towards me has not been in vain.” (I Corinthians 15:10a NRSV)
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