Letters are found in the Bible said to be written by Paul that were not actually written by Paul. An examination of the various doctrines presented in these letters is enough to demonstrate that they were not composed by a single individual (they span the spectrum from radicalism to reactionary conservatism, advocating freedom for women, and, like the Promise Keepers, advocating the oppression and subjection of women). The authoring of ‘pseudepigraphical' compositions under the assumed name of a famous classical teacher or author was common practice during the time of the early church, and the practice was also adopted by Biblical authors. It did not carry with it the stigma such a practice would have today . Oftentimes such letters would be judged on the basis of how accurately they reflected the ‘school of thought' of the emulated author. There are surviving examples of such pseudepigraphical compositions from antiquity and the Bible clearly preserves examples of the form as well.

      We can begin our examination of the various ideologies and schools of thought represented in what purports to be the Pauline corpus by considering the variants in dogma surrounding the status of women. The variations are polar opposites, coming as they do from radically opposite ends of the ideological spectrum. For example, consider the reactionary and conservative ideology laid out in the following passage:

"Let the women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but let them be in subjection, as also saith the law. And if they would learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home: for it is shameful for a woman to speak in the church. What? was it from you that the word of God went forth? or came it unto you alone? If any man thinketh himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him take knowledge of the things which I write unto you, that they are the commandment of YAHWEH. But if any man is ignorant, let him be ignorant." (1 Corinthians Chapter 14 verse 34)

      This one of the scriptures you don't hear being pushed by the Promise Keepers (their wives would wring their necks if they tried going that far). It is obvious that what you are reading here is a dogmatic squabble. The author stubbornly insists that ‘if anyone considers themselves a prophet' then let them acknowledge that severe repression of women (of a type that even the strictest fundamentalist literalists do not practice today) is all a ‘commandment of God.' If you don't agree, well then the author calls you ‘ignorant' and you can just stay that way as far as he is concerned. It seems the author was having ‘problems' with those who were ‘prophets' and were preaching a doctrine which allowed women to participate in the churches (a novel practice that the writer found downright shocking and ‘shameful').

      You can compare this backwards reactionary ideological response to the more radical approach to emancipation and freedom found elsewhere (the very sorts of ‘prophecy' that so outraged the above author that he called, it turns out, Paul himself, and other writers, ‘ignorant false prophets who did not understand the commands of God.' After all it was just this type of emancipation that so angered the author when he saw it happening in his own church-shocking! Shameful!')

"For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ. There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one in Christ Jesus. And if ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise." (Galatians Chapter 3 verse 27)

      The Promise Keepers would not promote this scripture in spirit. A typical 'explanation' is that men and women are equal in 'worth' but they are unequal in function. Now it turns out that the early church actually put this egalitarian statement of equality and freedom into practical application. Women, it turns out held the highest offices in the church. First note that a definition of the term apostle appears in the Church Testament which suggests that an apostle was someone who ‘saw the Messiah' and ‘worked in the church'. This definition of the term apostle is a broader than the limited sense of the term when it used to exclusively to refer to ‘the twelve apostles'. (Paul was an apostle, but Paul was not one of the twelve.)

"Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in YAHWEH?" (1 Corinthians Chapter 9 verse 1)

      In another passage the offices are described in the early church, beginning with the highest offices, those of apostle, followed by prophet, and so on. The fact that there is a division of function in the early church is then acknowledged (not everyone is an apostle).

"And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators, speakers in various kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles?" (1 Corinthians Chapter 12 verse 28)

      In the following you can see that the church (or should I say certain radical segments of the early church) were putting these egalitarian ideals into practice, for women are ‘working' in the church, running churches out of their homes, and one woman, Junias, is even holding the office of apostle, the highest office in the church. (One wonders how they could have managed to be ‘coworkers' of Paul and fill the highest offices without being allowed to speak, but then, it follows that in those other reactionary, backwards looking harshly conservative churches, women did not achieve any offices, and thus didn't need to speak. Speaking would only be one the job requirements at the more egalitarian and radical churches of that day.)

"Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for my life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles: and salute the church that is in their house. Salute Epaenetus my beloved, who is the first-fruits of Asia unto Christ. Salute Mary, who bestowed much labor on you. Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen, and my fellow-prisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also have been in Christ before me." (Romans Chapter 16 verse 3)

      So we can get some idea of what was going on in at least two factions of the early church. That the early church contained divisions and factions from that spanned the ideological spectrum should come as no surprise, for even today this remains true (you have liberal churches, and conservative churches, you have fundamentalists and radical liberation churches, and today, as in those times, their practices and their doctrines are in radical opposition. You have emancipation and liberation for women, and you have a reactionary backlash in the form of such movements as the Promise Keepers, trying to promote, naturally, conservative reactionary scripture to promote their cause.) Now, let us leave the radical church for a moment, and visit another reactionary church that was fighting the movement towards female emancipation in the early history of the church (not to mention fighting against Paul's doctrinal statement of egalitarianism and equality as described in Galatians, and put into practice in Romans. That people could insist that at least one set of these ideologically opposed sets of letters is not ‘pseudepigraphical' is remarkable to me. But then perhaps Paul was deeply disturbed and had multiple personalities - an egalitarian liberationist in the morning, a reactionary dogmatic at noon, and then back again by supper time, writing letters that fit his very mood swings the whole time of course...)

"Let a woman learn in quietness with all subjection. But I permit not a woman to teach, nor to have dominion over a man, but to be in quietness. For Adam was first formed, then Eve; and Adam was not beguiled, but the woman being beguiled hath fallen into transgression: but she shall be saved through her child-bearing, if they continue in faith and love and sanctification with sobriety." (1 Timothy Chapter 2 verse 11)

      Once again the Promise Keepers and the religious right do not actually apply this passage literally, because women would not stand for it. (There are elements of male sexual fantasy involved in the subjection of women, a desire for a submissive sexual object, in the form of a woman who absorbs just the right amount of submission from 'Bible doctrine' and to achieve this sexual dominance and the fulfillment of male fantasies, carrying Biblical oppression of women to its logical, literal limits is not required.) The Promise Keepers tolerate talking women in church, and also allow women to teach (neither of which interfere with male sexual fantasies of dominance), this in spite of claims to talking the Bible literally, or doctrines of the infallible inerrancy of scripture. In the early church (the right wing, reactionary early church) women were not allowed to teach. They had to keep quiet. Which would be a problem if, say, a woman were to become an apostle or prophet, but then, in this particular reactionary church women weren't becoming apostles and prophets. They were to keep quiet, and as for a job for a woman, well let them bear children, for that is ‘salvation' for a woman. As it states in the following reactionary scripture, a woman's place is in the home, doing housework.

"They may train the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sober-minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands." (Titus Chapter 2 verse 4)

      These are the types of passages promoted by the Promise Keepers of the religious right, because they fit in better with their true agenda, which is not one of inerrancy of the Bible, as talking, teaching women in those churches prove, but rather about sexual fantasy and sexual domination of women, and these types of passages fit the need. We read the following argument in the book of 1st Corinthians regarding the veiling of woman. This particular quotation is interesting, because in this church women are said to have held the second highest office in the early church, the office of prophet. It is obvious that in this church women were allowed to speak, speaking it would seem being a prerequisite to holding the office of prophet one would think. That women were speaking is not the ‘scandal' in this church, but they were becoming more radical and throwing off their veils, to the horror of this particular author. The author makes the foolish assertion that ‘man does not come from women, rather women come from man' (the notorious ‘pregnant man argument'). Ignoring the earlier traditions surrounding the Nazarites (who were never to cut their hair) or the long haired Samson (not to mention the perpetually long haired Christ depicted in church iconography throughout the centuries) the author argues that because ‘long hair is shameful for a man and good for a woman' therefore it is ‘obvious' that ‘nature teaches' that women have to wear veils, otherwise they might as well just shave their heads bald. The argument is thoroughly unconvincing to me, but for what it is worth it follows here. The author begins by insisting that ‘the head of every woman is a man'. He then begins to describe a tradition wherein women were allowed to speak (even to prophesy) but they had to do so while wearing their veils, an improvement of sorts over the tradition that forbid them to even speak.

"But every woman praying or prophesying with her head unveiled dishonoreth her head; for it is one and the same thing as if she were shaven. For if a woman is not veiled, let her also be shorn (bald): but if it is a shame to a woman to be shorn or shaven (bald), let her be veiled. For a man indeed ought not to have his head veiled, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man: for neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man: for this cause ought the woman to have a sign of authority on her head, because of the angels. Nevertheless, neither is the woman without the man, nor the man without the woman, in YAHWEH. For as the woman is of the man, so is the man also by the woman; but all things are of God. Judge ye in yourselves: is it seemly that a woman pray unto God unveiled? Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a dishonor to him? But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering. But if any man seemeth to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God." (1st Corinthians Chapter 11 verse 5)

      This passage is used by the Promise Keepers and the religious right, ignoring, of course, the head covering business, but playing up the male sexually dominant element, because that is, after all, the really important part here. This sexual domination and sexual complaince of women that results is a really big draw to bring men into the right wing church, and so the elements of male domination are played up, but the head covering business, not really being sexually required, except perhaps for those with such a fetish, is ignored. The author concludes his (unconvincing) argument with an appeal to custom (that was just how they did it in those churches). His stubbornly dogmatic assertion that ‘we have no other custom in the churches' was obviously false, for they certainly had another custom of not letting women speak in those other churches. But maybe he didn't travel much. Let's just say that was how they did it around where he lived. It was passages such as these that caused Jerome to have so many problems with the 16th chapter of Romans (he mistranslated all the female names to change them to males and thus ‘harmonized' these obviously deeply divided traditions), and which, in hindsight, make the preservation of this fragment of egalitarian tradition in Romans so valuable, because it gives us glimpse into an entirely separate tradition during the early years of the church, a tradition which was nowhere near as oppressive against women as the conflicting traditions described in the passages above.)

      Now for those who still want to stubbornly insist that they were no pseudepigraphical letters in the Church Testament, and that (multiple personality) Paul wrote the whole sorry business, well I can suggest only one possible harmonization of all the above that might bring the Bible into a divine unity on points of doctrine. Women can prophecy, and yes they can be apostles as well, provided of course that they wear their veils at all times (because of the angels and because they certainly don't want some man to shave their heads bald on them, now do they). They must keep silent for it is downright shocking for them to speak at church, thus they must restrict themselves to prophesying using only sign language. If they have any questions about something at church, well let them ask their husbands at home, and not shock the men by speaking at church. They must take great care that they never teach anything to anyone, thus restricting themselves to prophesying concerning the location of lost items or making various types of predictions of the future for people (making certain that no lesson might be learned from such predictions). They should also stay home doing housework, and while they can be coworkers for the gospel, and helpers, they can clean house for a male apostle and thus help out in that fashion. And women can be prophets. Well, of course they can. But let them keep silent in church. If they want to prophesy well let them wait and tell that prophecy to their husbands when they get home, because it would be a shocking and disgraceful thing for a woman to prophecy in the church. In just this way everyone of the above scriptures could be harmonized (what do you think of my proposal? In just this way we could insist that Paul wrote it all, and the church did not write letters that they then signed with Paul's name. If someone can come up with a better ‘harmonization' of all this let me know.)