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<\/a>I usually never read comments on my blogs, much less respond to them. But one recently caught my eye. It was posted on a twitter thread<\/a> following a tweet by Katelyn Beaty about my last AB article posted by Scot McKnight on Jesus Creed (sorry, the social media world can be a confusing place\u2026).<\/p>\nThis is what it says:<\/p>\n
\u201cWomen need to learn theology. Way way way too much eisigetic \u201cteaching\u201d today. Elizabeth Elliot witnessed and survived so, so much in her lifetime. I wouldn\u2019t dismiss anything she wrote. On the other hand, Beth Moore, I dunno. Not so much.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Interesting, isn\u2019t it? It suggests Beth Moore is potentially suspect as a teacher because (1) she hasn\u2019t learned theology and (2) her life experiences haven\u2019t been sufficient to overcome her theology deficit. As the comment states, \u201cBeth Moore, I dunno. Not so much.\u201d<\/p>\n
There is so much I could write about this comment. Kate Bowler, for example, suggested in her plenary session for the 2016 Conference on Faith and History that evangelical women today need<\/em> a traumatic life event on which to build their speaking platform (or at least megaministry women). This comment, \u201cElizabeth Elliot witnessed and survived so, so much in her lifetime. I wouldn\u2019t dismiss anything she wrote,\u201d seems to affirm that.<\/p>\n
For today, however, I just want to focus on the first part of the comment: \u201cWomen need to learn theology. Way way way too much eisigetic \u2018teaching\u2019 today.\u201d For those of you unfamiliar with the word eisegetic (I think this is what the author meant), it means interpreting a text through the lens of your own ideas. Or, specifically to the point, reading into<\/em> the Bible.<\/p>\n
In other words: Beth Moore isn\u2019t a trained theologian, so maybe she shouldn\u2019t be teaching the Bible\u2026<\/strong>.<\/p>\n
On the one hand, the statement is correct about Beth\u00a0 Moore\u2019s education. Beth Moore does not have a degree in theology, biblical studies, nor any official seminary degree (although she does have a college degree and an honorary doctorate). On the other hand, however, the reason Beth Moore does not have formal biblical training is really interesting. Listen to what she says in her \u201cAn Open Letter to My Brothers.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been talked down to by male seminary students and held my tongue when I wanted to say, \u2018Brother, I was getting up before dawn to pray and to pour over the Scriptures when you were still in your pull ups.\u2019 Some will inevitably argue that the disrespect was not over gender but over my lack of formal education but that, too, largely goes back to issues of gender. Where was a woman in my generation and denomination to get seminary training to actually teach the Scriptures? I hoped it would be an avenue for me and applied and was accepted to Southwestern Seminary in 1988. After a short time of making the trek across Houston while my kids were in school, of reading the environment and coming to the realization of what my opportunities would and would not be, I took a different route. I turned to doctrine classes and tutors, read stacks of books and did my best to learn how to use commentaries and other Bible research tools. My road was messy but it was the only reasonable avenue open to me.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Beth Moore, as a woman, faced gendered challenges to get a formal education. So she found another way. She bypassed traditional routes and became an educated and well-respected Bible teacher. She was the first woman<\/a> to publish a Bible study book with LifeWay. Her books<\/a> have \u201creached more than 21 million women worldwide,\u201d and she has written \u201c17 Bible studies translated into 17 languages.\u201d<\/p>\n
Beth Moore grew up in a world that denied her access to education like her male peers and denied her the titles of her male peers. But patriarchal limits did not limit God. Beth Moore may not fit modern notions of a trained theologian, but does that mean she isn\u2019t a trained theologian?<\/p>\n
Beth Moore reminds me so strongly of another woman who I teach about often in my medieval history and women\u2019s history courses\u2013Catherine of Siena.<\/p>\n
For those of you who need to brush up on your medieval women\u2019s history, I strongly recommend starting with Catherine of Siena. Born in 1347<\/a>, right at the beginning of the onset of the Black Death in Europe, Catherine was the 25th child born in her family (although half of her brothers and sisters died in childhood). From a very young age she felt called by God to reject marriage, despite pressure from her family, and embrace a life of ascetism.\u00a0 At a relatively young age she already was corresponding with major religious and political figures who often sought her advice and spiritual counsel. Her influence was so substantial, including on the papacy itself, that\u00a0Catherine of Sien<\/a>a is remembered today as a \u201cpapal counselor, politician, Doctor of the Church, preacher, spiritual advisor, and theologian.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like Beth Moore, Catherine of Siena did not receive formal training. She too had to bypass traditional routes. Instead of getting tutors, though, Catherine of Siena was taught by God. Her confessor, Raymond of Capua<\/a>, records how God taught her to read. \u201cThus through her prayers did she learn miraculously how to read.\u201d Catherine tells us that God also taught her to write<\/a>.\u00a0 \u201cHe [God] fixed this aptitude in my mind in a marvelous manner, the way a teacher does when he gives his [male] pupil a model. As soon as you [God] had departed from me, with the glorious evangelist John and Thomas Aquinas, I began learning while still asleep. Forgive me for so much writing, since my hands and my tongue seek to be in harmony with my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite her impeccable informal training, as Carolyn Muessig<\/a> reminds us, the medieval church (or at least dominant voices) taught that women should not preach. \u201cPublic preaching must be done by men because they are superior to women whereas women are inferior due to their sex.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet, despite these limitations, Catherine of Siena did preach. Katherine Jansen<\/a> describes her as a \u201crenowned preacher\u201d who was \u201cacclaimed as such.\u201d For example, Catherine\u2019s confessor described how<\/a> \u201canother friar proclaimed that [Catherine] \u2018preached\u2019 herself and had no need of his sermon.\u201d When Catherine doubted her calling, asking God how she could be used in a world of men. God called her to be brave<\/a> and not forsake him. God spoke these words to her:<\/p>\n
\u201cYou must know that in these latter days there has been such an upsurge of pride, especially in the case of men who image themselves to be learned or wise, that my justice cannot endure them any longer, without delivering a just chastisement upon them that will bring them to confusion..To confound their arrogance, I will raise up women ignorant and frail by nature but endowed with strength and divine wisdom\u2026Therefore, be bravely obedient when in the future I send you out amongst people. Wherever you may find yourself I shall not forsake you, or fail to visit you, as is my custom, and direct you in all that you are to do.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Some may not have formally recognized Catherine of Siena\u2019s calling to preach, but God certainly did. And so did at least one man\u2013her confessor Raymond of Capua.<\/p>\n