Modern Day Witch Hunting in the Christian Church

A guest post by author, Shirley Taylor 

from her blog,  

bWeBaptist Women for Equality

CBMW on Women 

and the Devil

(originally published July 29, 2016)

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Tim Keller, Sex, and Eternal Submission Doctrine: Summing up the Sexualization of the Trinity with Shirley Taylor

This series of posts started with a simple reference to my great disappointment in the statements that Tim Keller has made concerning the Trinity.  Someone at Spiritual Sounding Board asked for more information regarding the specifics of what Keller teaches, not realizing how significant I found this question.  I couldn't just quote him without demonstrating that his peers also taught and said the same kinds of things, and I wanted an opportunity to refute them.  As this meme demonstrates, Keller is not some odd example who made a few poorly communicated statements.

These doctrines argue that husbands rule and reign over their wives because, as the teaching asserts, Christ is subordinate to God the Father who rules and reigns over His Son.  The Father is the exemplar for men and the Son is the exemplar for women within this paradigm.

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A Connection between Marriage and Holiness? Part V of Tim Keller on Sex: A Virtual Discussion with Shirley Taylor

I posted this while bleary-eyed, so please let me know about typos!

In an earlier post in this discussion, we read Shirley Taylor's summary of the writings of Tim Keller and those who ascribe to the misogyny that arises from Eternal Subordinationism.  This doctrine is used to argue that husbands rule and reign over their wives because, as the teaching asserts. Christ is subordinate to God the Father. who rules and reigns over His Son.  The Father is the exemplar for men and the Son is the exemplar for women in this paradigm



In the chapter entitled "Sexualization of the Trinity" in her book Dethroning Male Headship, she writes:

Keller is saying that when husbands and wives have sex, particularly when they climax (when else would there be “shouts of joy?”), they are emulating how the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit rejoice in each other.  [. . .]. The ‘union’ between the Son of God and his bride the Church, according to Piper and Keller, is sex. Just as sex supposedly points to the love between the Father and Son, now the bride (the Church) is involved.

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Is the Trinity a Sex Orgy? Part IV of Tim Keller on Sex: More Virtual Discussion with Shirley Taylor

  **This September is book month at UnderMuchGrace.com, but today, I want to discuss two books that I don't recommend purchasing.  I feel bad enough because of the necessity to purchase them myself to read them with my own eyes.**

Sex and the Trinity?  (Continuing the discussion of Tim Keller's views on sex)

I didn't intend to include this element of these teachings because I really don't like discussing this aspect of the topic of the Eternal Subordination of the Son Doctrine, but this element keeps surfacing.  In a way, I'm glad to see people discussing the convoluted nature of the doctrine and how bizarre it is when you have time to think about it.  I think that people who sit in a seminary lecture or a sermon and hear these ideas take in the ideas fall into the traps of social proof and the appeal to authority.  They don't have time to pull apart the rapid "pile on" of thoughts in order to make sense of them.  By the end of forty minutes of twisted logic from someone trusted in a room full of fans who accept what they're told, I think people sitting there just absorb it as fact out of the fatigue of overwhelm.  But we who read here can take apart these ideas at our leisure with the freedom of time and logic apart from social proof and pressure.

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The Genesis of Eternal Subordinationism -- Part III of Tim Keller on Sex

Having discussed this issue privately with Shirley Taylor, and as a continuation of this theme and topic, I include it here as part of our dialogue.  In a post that will follow in a close to this theme, I will include Shirley's summary statements concerning this theology and what those who find it problematic can do.  Before hand, I will delve into the connection between holiness and marriage in subsequent post.  It's all so much to take in because it is so convoluted, and the Calvinist learning curve is steep.

The previous posts discussed statements made by Tim Keller in his book, The Meaning of Marriage.  Along with many others who are held in high esteem within the Southern Baptist movement which embraces Covenant Theology and gender hierarchy, Keller professes the Doctrine of Eternal Subordination of the Son (ESS) to validate his views on marriage.  Through a very convoluted interpretation of Scripture along with the extension of what I personally find to be the already dubious "Covenant of Redemption" by inserting hierarchy, Keller claims that marriage relationships are patterned after the love relationship between God the Father and God the Son. 

NOTE:  In this post, I refer via links, in particular , a website devoted to the study of the Trinity, though I may or may not agree with the information presented there.  Links used here mean to give the reader some working understanding of the concepts in some depth.  If needed, google the terms if you need a more basic summary of them, as rank and file folks don't often use them in our common language.

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Tim Keller on the Meaning of the Sex Act in Marriage: A Virtual Dialogue with Shirley Taylor Part II

The previous post discussed the Doctine of the Eternal Subordination of the Son in the Trinity which the Southern Baptist Convention falsely contends has been the only orthodox understanding of the Trinity since the original Biblical texts were penned and a belief always held by theologians.

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Tim Keller on the Meaning of the Sex Act in Marriage: A Virtual Dialogue with Shirley Taylor Part I

Spiritual Sounding Board (SSB) just cross-posted my weekend commentary on Anna Duggar and the scapegoating that "spread your legs theology" doles out to women.    Southern Baptist Convention President Ronnie Floyd swiftly proved my thesis on Sunday.

I read that the Dugggars "identify" with Floyd's church where their daughter Jill married, though I understand that they often choose to worship at home as well.  By the time that the church deleted the online podcast of Floyd's sermon, the lion's share of the material had been reproduced by a host of journalists and bloggers, noting the manner in which their religion blames wives for adulterous husbands.  I guarantee that within the Gothard system specifically, the condemnation proves far more scathing.  The SBC as a whole isn't quite as miserable about such matters.

And as an aside, I was happy to learn that Anna Duggar's brother offered to take Anna and her children with Josh in and would support them, should Anna choose to separate.  Or something to that effect.

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Who put Jesus in a dress? The Insane Theology of the Eternal Subordination of the Son Doctrine

Shirley Taylor is revising her first book, but I wanted to revisit it in the event that this portion changes. 

I still can hardly believe that anyone takes this Subordination doctrine seriously at all, especially the alleged ramifications that it holds for gender relationships.  I wandered into a seminary a number of years ago and challenged doctrines that I could barely believe that anyone took seriously and found out in a most unpleasant way that it was one of the hottest topics within the Southern Baptist Convention.

I've heard rumors that many who claim to embrace gender roles and female subordination actually reject the idea that these roles and relationships find their origins in the Trinity -- a mystery of religion in and of itself.  But who knows.  Follow the money, I say.  When it completely stops bringing in the bucks, they'll abandon the concept and come up with some new kind of spin to make their concept try to work.   I'm still in awe that seminaries full of Christians can sit and listen to this, saying nothing.

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A Brief Overview of the Development of Eternal Subordination of the Son Doctrine: What You Must Believe to Fully Embrace the Danvers Statement

I have stated many times that if the Council on Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW) actually came right out and stated what they believed about basic doctrines, far more people would have challenged and rejected their ideas.  By making statements vague and ambiguous and by relying on linguistic boobytraps, groups like CBMW can entice a person and get them committed to the surface doctrine, and by the time they reveal the unpleasant or questionable aspects of their beliefs, people are too deeply committed to them to just walk away.  The most troubling doctrine that is foundational to CBMWs complementarian ideology is their concept of the Trinity.

But how did this concept come about?

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The Complicated Problem of CBMW: Heterodoxy and Heteropraxy

I find it interesting the various ways I have been characterized online this past week after a mention of isolated comments that I’ve made were recently quoted on the Associated Baptist Press website.  I’ve been called everything across the continuum in terms of gender.  I’ve been called something of a bra-burning egalitarian (I assume in terms of Christians for Biblical Equality’s [CBE] defining statements) and I’ve also been told that I’ve confused the whole issue because I’m a stealth “comp” for using the “code language” of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Biblical Womanhood  (CBMW) and am against mutual submission/functional equality of all believers.  I contend that all of these stereotypes are inaccurate.  (Late Addendum:  I do not think that CBE advocates "bra-burning," but this is a reference to how their critics attribute them to demean them.)

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New Trinity Video Challenges the Doctrine of Eternal Subordination of Christ

When I began digging down to the roots of the modern patriarchy movement (also referred to as patriocentricity to distinguish it as it’s own aberrant religious belief system as opposed to the legitimate use of the term patriarchy), I quickly found a path that lead back to participants with the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. In addition to the overuse of “Biblical” modifiers (not quite as bad as Vision Forum’s use of them) and a very prohibitive view of appropriate standards of conduct for women, I discovered something that shocked me: the Doctrine of the Eternal Subordination of Christ/the Son (ESS).

Not all evangelicals who embrace patriarchy have professed this new and novel view, but patriocentric groups like Federal Vision profess a version of it. Rather than attributing Christ’s emptying of every aspect of His fully realized deity as a function of the kenosis described in Philippians chapter 2, this theory maintains that Christ never fully realized the authority of God the Father. Jesus becomes something of a “special purpose God” who ranks in hierarchy between His superior Father and above the Holy Spirit. Though all the Divine Persons possess the same nature and attributes, they do not share equal attributes in terms of authority of which role seems to play out as a function of that authority. Finding the initial information about this theory confusing, I began to read more about the theory of ESS.

Having practical experience in the trenches with witnessing to Jehovah’s Witnesses, I found the description offered by many at CBMW to be very similar to the version of Jesus promoted by JW’s. ESS differs in that it does not teach that Jesus was a created being that was not God, defining Jesus as an archangel, but it does claim that Jesus is of the same substance of the Father. In terms of rank, authority and power however, I believed that ESS reduced Christ to something much less than the fullness of the Godhead which is identical to the message of many cults. Many claim that by separating out authority, role and function that were not just “ad hoc” functions or economic functions of the Trinity but were permanent attributes related to ontology, that ESS essentially amounts to semi-Arianism because of the unique ontology attributed to Christ.

Upon first listening to the evangelists of ESS, I could not help but be incredulous, amazed that Baptist seminaries were preaching what amounts to cultic Christology, though there are few if any complaints when this material is presented to the "people of the Book." (Who cares if Jesus is made of the same substance and declared “equal” if He is unable to answer prayer without permission from the Father and does not share the authority that the Father possesses?) It denies the concept of Trinitarian Monotheism that assumes that there must be two ways for the Persons of the Trinity to be divine.) Regardless of how one chooses to describe this theory, be it Arianism or a pitfall of social trinitarianism, I could not escape the fact that I did not feel like I could ever present an apologetic to a JW that would be found adequate. The Christ of ESS and the Jesus of the JW’s (or many other cults) do not differ substantially in terms of ontology (essence related to power and authority).

MM Outreach has finally released their video that discusses the Trinity but also confronts these doctrines with the Word of God to demonstrate the ignorance and avoidance of the doctrine of the Trinity throughout the whole Word. Lorri MacGreggor and Cheryl Schatz present an excellent review of the Scriptures concerning the Trinity. I’m all the more impressed that many who embrace this view lack a substantial understanding of how the Jews understood the Greek language and how certain concepts were understood by the Jews who were addressed in the New Testament. It seems ever more obvious to me after watching the videos that the ESS's presuppositions regarding the nature of God overrides understanding of aspects of both Greek rhetoric and references to concepts well understood in Judaism.

 This video series defines this well and presents a well-rounded defense using examples throughout the whole Bible (sadly reminiscent of how I witness to Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons alike concerning the true identity of Jesus according to the Word of God). Though I enjoy looking at the academic aspects and philosophical writings concerning the Trinity which ESS likes to exploit for the purpose of confusing the average critic, this defense from the Word of God alone was a beautiful thing to watch
.
Please review this collection of clips from the video series:

      LINK HERE for ordering information. I am so excited that this has finally been made available, as this information will help not only to address this teaching of ESS in the evangelical church, but it will also help those in many cults.

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A Brief History of the Doctrine of the Kenosis

The “Kenosis,” a transliteration of the Greek word for “emptying” used in Philippians 2:7 represents a specific doctrine under the general subheading of Christology (the study of Christ) and refers to the mysterious process that the Second Person of the Godhead (the Son) willingly initiated in order to dwell in the flesh as Jesus the Messiah.

In the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Church in Philippi, he states that Jesus was in the “form” of God and “emptied” himself of some of His divine attributes to become fully human in every sense, thus qualifying to serve as the sufficient propitiation for the sins of all mankind for all times. Paul says that, in Colossians 2:9, that the fullness of the Godhead dwelt bodily in Jesus, so Christ mysteriously also never stopped being fully God during His period of incarnation. By faith, Christians believe that Jesus was then both fully God and fully man without any sin, though we are not told more specifically in Scripture how Jesus accomplished this. Any theories that we develop beyond what we are clearly and explicitly told in the Bible are precisely that: they are theories only. We only attempt to explain concepts that are mysteries that are not fully revealed to us.

Based upon the exegesis of several New Testament Scriptures, the Person of the Son (the best analogy that God chose for us to understand the relationship between the Divine Persons) was “face-to-face” with the Father but freely surrendered that status in order to suffer incarnation on our behalf. Note that Saint Augustine argued against the use of the term “person” to describe the Divine Three because of the tendency towards anthropomorphization (anthropos, the Greek word for man), a sinful remaking and perceiving of God in man’s likeness rather than by analogy. Tertullian first coined the term “Trinity” (coinage traditionally attributed to him) to describe the unity of three describing the Godhead in Scripture in his writings during the early Third Century.

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Wade Burleson's Smoking Hot Blog Posts

Southern Baptist Pastor Wade Burleson of Enid, Oklahoma (who formerly served on the International Missions Board for the SBC) took a sabbatical from blogging, but he's back at it and going strong. I've enjoyed nearly every one of them lately. Though I am not a Baptist, the same concerns I bear for the Church now currently also challenge (plague?!) the Southern Baptist Convention.

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What is a cult?

From "Rise of the Cults" a sermon by Dr. Walter Martin, Lee College Chapel, January 1979 (hosted by the Spiritwatch Ministries website) What is a cult?

• A group of people polarized arounds somebodies’s interpretation of the Bible.

• They always claim to be harmonious with the Christian faith.

• And they always deny the central doctrine of the Christian faith: That Jesus Christ is nothing less than God himself in human flesh...

78% of people that are in the cults today came out of the Church.

Jesus said in Matthew 24 that the end times would be hallmarked by the rise of many false teachers. He also mentions earthquakes and wars, etc., but he emphasizes false teachers and prophets who look will look, sound and act just like the genuine article.

~~~~~

I would like to hear all of the patriarchy in churches and all of those who ascribe to hierarchalism explain all of their beliefs about the Trinity specifically. But considering that the concept of eternal hierarchalism in the Godhead has been published in one of the most popular, contemporary Systematic Theology texts used today, I guess that we can expect as much.

And people wonder why I am so personally concerned about why notable professors in the SBC preach that Jesus -- God -- has less authority than God????? Well, let me rephrase that. Supposedly that means something different than saying that the Father has ultimate or supreme authority over the Son (a quality that the Son does not have, to the point of not being able to hear and answer prayer without a special dispensation from the Father). Gotta support that gender hierarchy!

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Drawing Lines in the Sand Regarding Trinity and Gender

I’ve received all kinds of email today from a variety of people alerting me to two Dallas newspapers that have written about my patriarchy workshop and the unnamed apologetics organization’s disclaimer.

I find it ironic because I solicited none of this attention. I’m not sure if this article appeared in print or not, but the Dallas Observer published a web article by Julie Lyons entitled “Baptist Seminary President Says Women Shouldn’t Teach Men.” (Please visit and note a clarification that I make in the comments section. I am attributed with stating that contraception is never prohibited, but I have only ever stated that it is the official and formal position of Vision Forum Ministries that birth control is “strongly discouraged.” Please refer to the video presentation for clarification as well.)

Just this morning, Jeffrey Weiss of The Dallas Morning News posted a religion blog article entitled “Is Jesus subordinate to God and if so, how, and if so, does that mean that women are subordinate to men?”

Approximately thirty minutes later, Denny Burk of the CBMW posted this response:

I am the editor for the Journal of Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, so I follow these discussions pretty closely. The issue of women's roles is inextricably bound up with how we view the Trinity because the Apostle Paul likens male headship to God's headship over Christ (1 Corinthians 11:3). Thus when you read evangelical literature on the "women's issue," debates about the nature of the Trinity abound. 

There are two views that prevail among evangelicals: Complementarianism and Egalitarianism. Both of these group believe in biblical inspiration (and in some cases inerrancy), but they differ dramatically over what the Bible teaches on this question.
For an overview of the two viewpoints, you can get oriented here: http://www.cbmw.org/Resources/Articles/Summaries-of-the-Egalitarian-and-Complementarian-Positions. 

Thanks,
Denny Burk

I wonder why Denny Burk didn’t mention the more specific points of his belief system in this comment? As was once available on the CBMW website, Denny Burk gave an address to the Evangelical Theological Society in 2003 where he argues that though found in the form of God, Jesus was not equal with God: From Denny Burk’s address

to the Evangelical Theological Society, 2003:

Clip One "I would like to propose an interpretation that allows for equality with God to be a reality that is distinct from the form of God. What I mean is that although Jesus existed in the form of God, He did not want to grasp after being equal with God. That is, although He was in His essence, God, he did not want to become equal with God in every respect…" 

Clip Two “The form of God is something that Jesus possesses by virtue of His deity while the equality with God is not.” 

Clip Three “In His pre-existent, Trinitarian fellowship with the Father, Jesus decided not to go after equality, but to go after incarnation.”

Denny Burk and other speakers and contributors to CBMW do not just maintain that gender roles are inextricably bound to the Trinity, but many of their contributors believe that Jesus is of lesser authority than the Father. Denny Burk takes this further actually state that Jesus is not equal to the Father, and that Jesus was essentially “growing” into His Deity through time. Equality with God and the incarnation are mutually exclusive attributes that required a permanent choice on the part of Jesus.

Thanks to Cheryl Schatz for providing these audio clips of the pertinent statements from an ETS lecture that CBMW removed from their downloadable resources.

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"Eve the Destroyer"

I was recently contacted by Ethics Daily who asked me to comment on my response regarding the request of the unnamed apologetics organization to take my presentation about patriarchy offline. I commented about my thoughts and reaction to the whole matter. Feel free to read more about it at Ethics Daily.com.


Apparently more than a few people have read about this issue before I was asked by the unnamed apologetics organization to remove their name and the name of the unnamed seminary that hosted the conference. I agreed to take down these names from my writings, but unfortunately for those who would "like to pretend as though the workshop never occurred," I did not agree to remain silent about the greater issue and what one has called the "jackbooted thuggery" to which I've been subjected. (The disclaimer offered by the unnamed apologetics organization deemed me "misinformed," a statement that others and I myself believe lacked Christian charity and integrity given the context of the situation.)

But Why Not Concern over John MacArthur?There has been much concern over my citing of Bruce Ware's beliefs about the Trinity and how the ETERNAL Subordination of Jesus relates to women (versus the functional/economic subordination as was necessary for the unfolding of the kenosis of Christ). But.


Here are some examples of John MacArthur's statements about women and sin entering the world through Eve:


High Calling of Women, pt 4

“The weakness of a woman is that she needs a head.”
“No daughter of Eve should follow the path of Eve and lead to tragedy by entering into the forbidden territory of rulership that was intended for man.”

“And the intent of what the Word is saying here is that a woman needs protection, that she has a certain vulnerability. She was designed with the need for a head. She was designed for the need for a leader. She was designed with the need for a protector and a savior.”


The Creation of Woman

“So that the male was given the dominion and authority over God’s created world, and by that fact is the reflected glory of God. In other words, he bears the role of ruler in this world. The fall didn’t change any of that. The man still bears the authority after the fall.”


The Subordination and Equality of Women

“The woman is the submissive one by creation and by virtue of her weakness in the fall that she confirms her submissive role.”

“It’s because of creation. It is the way God intended it from the beginning.”


The Role of the Godly Woman

“The origin of woman and her need for being is God’s clear statement that man is in authority and she is in submission.”


The Curse on Man: Part 1

MacArthur says that God blamed Adam for sin entering the world because he was the head, although the source of sin came from Eve. (this contradicts ! Tim 2:14)


Confrontation in Eden

“Eve was created to be led by Adam”

“She was created by God for a wonderful purpose, to be his true helper.
She became his destroyer. She was created to be lead by Adam.
She became Adam’s leader with disastrous results,”

God’s Pattern for Wives, Part 2

“A woman is saved from the stigma of having lead the race into sin as Eve did.”

Who exactly is it that I am misrepresenting? Exactly how have I misrepresented them? For citing a book author and another seminary professor's estimation of these teachings? For saying that "I have a problem" with these teachings? It appears that I am not the only one who finds some inconsistencies in the manner in which this matter has been addressed.

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Contemplating the Trinity

[Revised February 2019]

Please visit the new Under Much Grace companion site which presents an apologetic for the Trinity, demonstrating that I am not misinformed and have not made unwarranted statements against Bruce Ware and other notable subordinationists.  Such was the opinion of Evangelical Ministries to New Religions when the Southern Baptists decided that they didn't like what I had to say when I delivered the peer reviewed presentation in March of 2008.

I would think that with a simple reading of Bruce Ware and others who are affiliated with the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood would build my case for me, but I am apparently mistaken. I expect Biblically literate Christians to quickly identify the problems with these teachings that claim that Jesus has less power and authority by stating that God the Father has supreme authority which supersedes that of the Son.

I have listed some recent Blog Articles and have begun to work on refuting problematic passages from Bruce Ware's work, but this will take some time for me to get through due to time constraints and due to the frustrating nature of the topic. It is very emotionally disturbing and makes for much grief as I go through these things. Currently, in the section pertaining to Bruce Ware's book, I only display the passages that are problematic for me in terms of sound Bible doctrine. I hope to revisit this and add my observations and refutations. It seems that Augustine has done all my work for me, but it is just a matter of typing these things out and evaluating them. But it is quite frustrating and will take some time.

There is a new web directory at the very bottom of the archive site called "Against Subordinationism" which contains several single pages in that subdirectory addressing different aspects of this debate. Most are still in development but have some information.

Please review the index here and follow embedded links to the archive site:

Introduction

When I last spoke to the President of the ENMR apologetics organization in April of 2008, I was told that I should consider posting information online that corroborates my information concerning my citing of Bruce Ware's teachings on the Trinty within a Workshop I presented at MBTS in March of 2008 concerning the Patriarchy Movement.

At the time of this writing (Mar 09), Dr. Ware serves as a theology professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY and is an avid advocate for the Theory of the Trinity NOW known as the Eternal Subordination of the Son (ESS). Ware argues that the Father has a supreme position within the Trinity, the logical conclusion or understanding of which suggests that Christ the Son would by necessity have a non-supreme position within the Trinity. Ware also teaches that the Father has supreme authority within the Trinity, and as a consequence, the Son is constrained by virtue of the Father's greater will, therefore because of the hierarchical structure perceived within the Trinity, Christ must always do the will of the Father.

Ware maintains that this relationship was not a function of the kenosis and Christ's incarnation, but was the Son's ETERNAL state from before time and for all eternity: the Father commands and the Son obeys, and thus there is a template for human relationships found within the very Trinity itself. Notably, Dr. Ware mantains that only the Father hears and has the authority to answer prayer, so it is a point ambiguity and of some error if we pray directly to the Son who only has authority to deliver prayers to the Father. Subsequently, the Holy Spirit follows hierarchically and is subordinate to the will and authority of the Father and the Son.

An author, Kevin Giles, an Anglican Vicar and Bible Professor in Australia has written two books critiquing Bruce Ware's teachings, arguing that by requiring a lesser authority than God the Father with the related constraints as specified in the theory, Ware has inadvertently fallen into a type of Arian heresy. Giles argues that the subordinate role that Ware assigns to Christ defines the Son as ontologically subordinate, of lesser essence, than the Father. Christ then becomes something of a lesser God which is inconsistent with Biblical orthodoxy.

The issue became an interest of my own related to the patriocentricity and the patriarchy movement because the advocates of this movement appeal to the this hierarchical view of the Trinity in order to support their hierarchical view of gender. As God the Father rules and reigns over the Son within the Trinity, so human fathers and husbands should likewise reign over and care for their familes, particularly over their wives. Women are to likewise look to Christ as an example, submitting unto their husbands in a manner like unto the Son's submission to the Father. Women are also defined as ontologically subordinate to men, because the advocates of this belief system maintain that woman is only the "indirect" or "derivative" image of God, because the substance from which she was created came from man and not from the earth. From this foundational belief, many aberrant beliefs spring including "militant fecundity" (a type of "spiritual eugenics" by which Christianity advances through demographics), physical discipline of wives, and other rigid limitations on vocations, occupations and roles for women.

During the 2008 counter-cult apologetics workshop I presented, I cited the ESS theory and Bruce Ware as the individual I identified as the most vocal advocate of the theory, very briefly mentioning Giles general argument as a matter of record. I also spoke critically about the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood as the other most active vehicle for advancing the concept of the ontological subordination of women and an hierarchical view of genders as opposed to mutual submission within marriage. Dr. Ware is also quite active within the CBMW organization. The Southern Baptist Seminary community reacted quite intensely and negatively to my citing of these teachings as contributing factors to the abuses within the patriarchy movement, intensely offended that I found their teachings to be remotely related to the patriarchy movement, something a member of the press related that Ware and Dr. Russell Moore (Dean of Theology and SBTS) described as a "fringe" group.

The board of the apologetics organization, despite much ongoing requests for guidance from the president and the Board's approval which included the material addressing both CBMW, Ware, and what is now commonly referenced as ESS (it was not an accepted term at that time), they would no longer stand behind those aspects of my presentation or work. The Board declined to review any of Ware's abundant materials regarding the teaching, and I was advised to post a defense of my beliefs online.

So I am in the ongoing process of doing just that, though I originally planned only to present the sources, but I fear that people will just read them and have no change of heart. I also plan to add additional information concerning the implications of ESS, as I was cited for criticizing Ware later in 2008 for a June presentation he made in Denton, TX wherein he argued that men resort to domestic violence because of lack of submission on behalf of wives so that men have little other recourse.

I will continue to post additional information here pertaining to both the ontological subordination of women as well as ESS. I’m not doing so because I believe that I must “prove” myself in the wake of being unjustly maligned regarding the apologetics workshop, but because I wish to expose these teachings for what they are. I would have done so prior to the lecture that I delivered in March of 2008, but I never anticipated that the powers that be would have taken any issue with what I presented as it is factual, true and abundantly clear from the material!

 

~  CMK
updated 28Mar09

SECTION B:

Eternal Procession Does Not Equate To Eternal Priority

(A critique of Bruce Ware’s CBMW audio mp3 entitled “Tampering with the Trinity: How the Trinity Relates to Gender Roles,” a good overview of the problems with the view)

SECTION C:

Bruce Ware's "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" Book

(Long review of 2 chapters in Ware’s book on the topic with my own responses and quotes from several sources that conflict or contrast with Ware including James White, Calvin, Cary of CBE, Giles of CBE, and Augustine)

SECTION D:

Thoughts on the Theories of the Trinity

(Very thorough review of the theories of the Trinity from sources like Moreland and Craig’s “Philosophical Basis for a Christian Worldview,” an examination of the differences between Social and Antisocial Trinitarianism, A review of Leftow’s Trinity Taxonomy, and some correspondence with Robert K McGreggor Wright)

SECTION E:

Critique of the Concept of Divided Power and Authority Within the Trinity

(An article by Kevin Giles, hosted on the CBE website)

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Eternal Procession Does Not Equate to Eternal Priority

From Bruce A. Ware’s

Tampering with the Trinity:

How the Trinity Relates to Gender Roles

An Mp3 audio download from CBMW

(Quotes from the audio are 

displayed below in blue text)

Speaker Bruce Ware:

"But is it not obvious that Jesus said over and again throughout His ministry that He was sent to do the will of the Father -- over thirty times in John’s Gospel, this is the case… " "Clearly a central part of the notion of Father is that of Fatherly authority. Certainly, this is not all there is to being the Father, but while there is more, there certainly is not less or other. 

[Blog Host says “????”] The masculine terminology used of God throughout Scripture portrayed in masculine ways had authority over His people. 

"While the early church clearly embraced the full, essential equality of the three Trinitarian Persons, nonetheless, the church has always affirmed likewise the priority of the Father over the Son and the Spirit.

[Blog Host says “????” This is a logical leap of presupposition and an all inclusive statement that the speaker’s own definition is not even true of the “egalitarian feminist church.”] 

"Since this priority cannot be rightly understood in terms of essence or nature, -- Why? – Why does the Father not have priority in terms of essence or nature to the Son or the Spirit? Whose nature does the Son possess? The identically same nature as the Father. Whose nature does the Spirit possess? The identically same nature as the Father and Son. So this priority cannot be in terms of essence, because they are equal in essence more than my wife and I are equal in essence."

[Blog Host says: Certainly if, by the speaker’s own profession elsewhere, women are the indirect image of God!]. 

My wife and I are both image of God – we are both equal in essence but we’re equal as “same kind of things.” We’re both human beings, image of God. The Father, Son and Spirit are equal in essence because of identity. They have an identically same essence. Not just same kind – Same. Same essence. Okay?" 
"So. The early church fathers could not speak of priority in terms of essence, so it must be in terms of relationship. Not essence, but relationship. As Augustine affirmed that the distinction of persons is constituted precisely by differing relations among them, in part manifest by the inherent authority of the Father and inherent submission of the Son. This is most clearly seen in the eternal Father-Son relationship in which the Father is eternally the Father of the Son and the Son is eternally the Son of the Father."

[Blog Host says: But this is not assumptive or inextricably bound to hierarchy or an eternal command/submission paradigm but is a description of relationship that might not be characteristic of a father and son at all ages. Is Christ eternally a young, innocent who lacks wisdom and the shrewdness of experience? This statement neither supports nor denies an eternal, vertical hierarchy of authority. This is a logical leap of presupposition.]. 

But some might wonder, does this convey and eternal authority of Father and the eternal submission of the Son?" "Hear how Augustine discusses both essential equality of the Father and Son and the “eternal-functional” subordination of the Son. This is Augustine’s words now, quote:"  

"'If the reason why the Son is said to have been sent by the Father, is simply that the one who is the Father and the other is the Son, then there is nothing at all to stop us from believing that the Son is equal to the Father and con-substantial and co-eternal.' So they are both equal in essence and yet that the Son is sent by the Father not because one is greater and the other less but because one is Father and the other is Son. So it’s the relational difference between them not their essential difference.” 

[Blog Host says: But their essential difference is not limited to nor need it be defined by an eternal hierarchy. This is a logical leap of presupposition.]

~~~~~~~~~~~~

ETERNAL PROCESSION DOES NOT EQUATE

TO ETERNAL PRIORITY

This was my thesis before I found the writing of Giles and the cry of my heart. I offer it here for those who call me misinformed. Bruce Ware is making three Gods of the One by shoving God into his own finite ability to understand and comprehend the infinite wonder of God – He who is so beyond the capacity of the creature who can only see in terms of human relationship. We know in part and see through the glass darkly, yet we rest in faith – that faith which God imparts through the miracle of spiritual discernment. 

We understand the relationship of Father to Son and Son to Father, and through the limitations of the analogy of being. We can only comprehend that which we know, for that which is greater than us is beyond our comprehension. James Sire discusses this at length in “Habits of the Mind: Intellectual Life as a Christian Calling.” 

We can only describe what we know and have already comprehended, like A Square in Flatland. In finite terms, like a small child describing the wisdom of his parent concerning the most complex tasks of the human understanding of the adult, we come to the Persons of the Godhead with the limitations of our being, like Job when God asked him “Were you there?” I place my hand over my mouth before Him. (I am not willing to do so before those who subordinate my Savior, however.) 

It seems that Dr. Ware cannot comprehend God beyond a relationship of hierarchy and a vertical order of succession, but love, compassion, empathy and sacrifice can easily replace these hierarchy and roles. He offers the example of roles and relationships as the distinctions, and the distinctions are in such human terms that they demean the Lord Jesus, making Him much like a human child of a “supreme” Father. Yet he claims also that the Divine Persons are equal in all respects while in terms of authority and primacy he describes them as not equal at all. 

I assert that these anthropomorphic limitations confine the infinite, bound by the limits hierarchy. They are the Three in One, they cannot be Three apart from the one --neither in authority nor in essence. Our Brother Ware offers arguments and paragraphs of many sentences and builds an argument, but always, there is a sentence that leaps back into the presupposition of a hierarchy, that which is unrelated to the arguments. In my reading, these topics all begin with the a priori assumption of hierarchy and they end with it. There are some lovely prose and rhetoric in between. 

The Divine Three are not in fellowship and harmony of fluid dance in his view but are only in a performance-oriented perception in very human terms. He quotes absolutely sound statements of Augustine that acknowledge the con-substantial and co-eternal relationship of the Father and the Son and repeats their relationship to one another, but this neither supports nor disproves an hierarchy authority of performance-focused and role-focused value. 

It as if, to me, he says “The sun is warm and the day is clear therefore this proves that the sun is golden and the sky is blue.” Post hoc ergo propter hoc. 

Each separate morsel of evidence offered is lovely and true unto itself, but they neither proceed to nor support his thesis in my reading or hearing. Ware offers Augustine to validate his thesis of human hierarchy, and I would use this very same statement of Augustine’s to support the relationships of the Father and Son in their fluid, mutual submission dance out of love and honor and respect within the very heart of God (Themselves) as the very nature of the Divine Three. 

It is, oh, so subtle, but this is man’s sophistry to me. Dr. Ware’s arguments contain many Scriptural principles and many true statements, but he cannot escape the presupposition of hierarchy that weaves these things together to support his initial presumption. He has not proven anything with Biblical evidence but has built an argument that, for me, is full of holes of eisegesis. He might well say the same of my view, but I am not risking the Deity of Christ Jesus in the process. Augustine wrote at the end of his preface as he endeavored to understand the Trinity:

“Let us hold fast to this rule, that what has not yet become clear to our intellect may still be preserved by the firmness of our faith.”

I do not have all the answers and only finite boxes into which to put them. But I have sufficient grace through the Word that God has written in my heart and mind by the Spirit and through the study of my Love, the Word. As Augustine’s own motto declares, I have “faith that seeks understanding.” I do not have understanding that then seeks to find faith which is the dilemma of the Christian existentialist, so prevalent in the church today. 

This human analogy is certainly lesser than the full realization of the mind and perspective of God, and I am like a small child on the lap of my Abba, the Mind of the Ages. I will not, as I believe Van Til once described, dare to presume to crawl up on His lap and proceed to slap Him in the face. 

I offer here another quote of Augustine that transcends the anthropomorphic concept that Jesus is one with no authority to hear prayer, who by role and relationship is like a mere “special purpose God,” powerless to do anything other than that which He is hierarchy-bound to do. I fall prostrate and undone before the Holy, Holy, Holy Throne, in awe of Him, of That which is joyfully beyond my finiteness but yet still my substance and evidence through faith.

From Augustine's preface to Book 8 , De Trinitate

Thus the Father is God, The Son is God, The Holy Spirit is God;
The Father is good, The Son is good, The Holy Spirit is good,
And the Father is omnipotent, The son is omnipotent, and the Holy Spirit is omnipotent; But yet there are not three Gods,
nor are there three goods,
nor are there three omnipotents,

But one God, one good and one omnipotent,

the Trinity itself.

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Patriarchy Lecture Part II of VII

“The Development and Practice for Patriarchy:

Cure for Cultural Decline or
New Gnostic Disease”

presented by Cynthia Kunsman, RN, BSN, MMin, ND

Part II of VII

Video by Raphael Martinez of Spiritwatch Ministries

Note: Bibliography now posted at UnderMuchGrace.com

Please note clarifications below.



Trinity:
Concerning the Trinity, the Persons of the Godhead certainly do have different “personalities” but the same character and nature.

Neologism:
Within clinical settings, the term “neologism” often refers to creation of new words as well as the use of common words and terms in a unique way that is not consistent with their proper use or definition, such as seen in schizophrenia. Though it did not occur to me at the time, I realized at a later time that this definition and usage may not be consistent with theological or more common definitions.

“Welcome to Normativity”
http://persevero.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html

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Patriarchy Lecture Part III of VII

“The Development and Practice for Patriarchy:
Cure for Cultural Decline or
New Gnostic Disease”
presented by Cynthia Kunsman, RN, BSN, MMin, ND
Part III of VII of the

Video by Raphael Martinez of Spiritwatch Ministries

Note: Bibliography now online at UnderMuchGrace.com

Please note clarifications below.

“Welcome to Normativity”
http://persevero.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html


Turretin’s Systematic Theology was used at Princeton in the 1800s and not the 1900s. I corrected a similar mistake shortly thereafter, but I did not specify that I had also misstated this about Turretin as well.

Russell Moore is Dean of Theology at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminiary and not the “Southwestern” Baptist Theological Seminary as I incorrectly stated. (The slide was correct, however.)
.
.

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