The more you write and develop this study, Anna, the more and more it makes sense, and the more I’m baffled by how the Spirit/city/woman typology has been missed for so long and by so many. Your first paragraph also reminds me of Dwelling in the Household of God by Mary Coloe. I can’t remember if you’ve read that (or her other book on temple typology in John), but this paragraph especially resonates with what you wrote:
“The household model [of the church] as imaged in the language of the Fourth Gospel essentially deconstructs the patriarchal household model of antiquity, since it takes as its point of reference the divine communion [between Father and Son]. The Fourth Gospel, while using “father-son” terminology, reconstitutes the relationship as a dynamism of mutual self-giving love…We do not have within this household a hierarchy of leadership other than the leadership of faith and love.”
In addition to the explicit sibling language in 20:17, Coloe points out the implication of 19:26-27 re the joining of Jesus’ mother and the beloved disciple. If the mother of Jesus becomes the mother of the BD, then logically the BD is now the brother of Jesus. The new family of God is a family of siblings who share a Father (God the Father, through union with the Son) and a Mother (the church/household through the indwelling Spirit).
"The new family of God is a family of siblings who share a Father (God the Father, through union with the Son) and a Mother (the church/household through the indwelling Spirit)".
Another way to look at this is Mat 12:50-For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven (God the Father, through union with the Son) , the same is my brother, and sister, and mother .(the church/household through the indwelling Spirit City).
Anna, your deep, Biblical thinking is so refreshing! Like Aaron says, the more I interact with what you're writing and have begun thinking about other aspects of theology in light of it, the more I am shocked (and grieved) that we've missed this for so long. It is so clear - and harmonizes so many fragmented shards of our theology that, to this point, have served only to injure rather than edify the church.
Your pointing out that our understanding of gender directly correlates to our understanding of our eschatology is profound - and truly, our vision of heaven is just as fragmented and murky as our vision of women is! It suddenly occurred to me that as we begin seeing women (and men!) more clearly, we may perhaps also begin to see heaven more clearly as well.
I have wrestled with these theological shards for my entire life, and have never been able to even consider talking with church leaders about them until recently. I couldn't exactly just go and say, "You're wrong!" with no coherent alternative to present and say "Is not this a better way to understand it?"
I currently am reading How God Sees Women: The End of Patriarchy by Terran Williams. His work, together with yours here, is giving me hope that I can begin to articulate a rigorous defense of this better way to understand and apply the theological lessons our gender is designed by God to teach us. Though to be honest, the thought of engaging my pastor and session on this is terrifying (my pastor is quite literally the smartest, most biblically astute person I know). For my children, and others though, I don't think I can in good conscience continue to kick the can further down the road for them to deal with. Reading, thinking, praying, and planning to do something - I'm just not quite sure what.
Until I figure out what that something is, I will continue to look forward to each of your posts. Thank you!
Excellent as always Anna! I recently reread Paradise Lost, and it's striking how Milton leaves the text behind with the fall of Eve. He has her fall alone, with Adam "nobly" choosing to join her fallen state as almost an act of love and compassion.
Basically Adam is Christ and Eve is the church in Milton, and for a large portion of complementarian theology the same is true.
For them, men are heaven and women are earth; totally backwards!
The failure to imagine that gender has a Trinitarian origin, and the insertion of the Christ/church paradigm for gender motifs, is the key to the theological failure of much of the current landscape it seems.
I have so many thoughts on Milton. At the time Milton wrote, he was in a heated written debate with an “Anonymous” theologian, who was a member of the Westminster Assembly, on the subject of divorce. Their debate was over reasons to permit divorce. It was published as the “Divorce Tracts.” Milton thought you could divorce a wife who was not a suitable conversation partner. Milton’s “anonymous” detractor did not think you could divorce a wife because she couldn’t engage you intellectually. What emerged in their correspondence is that Milton had a higher regard for women because he expected they *could and should be a conversation partners. * His anonymous detractor thought it was unreasonable to expect that a wife would provide that sort of stimulation. But of course his view of the fall of Eve has been widely adopted, that Adam’s fall was a noble sacrifice.
The more you write and develop this study, Anna, the more and more it makes sense, and the more I’m baffled by how the Spirit/city/woman typology has been missed for so long and by so many. Your first paragraph also reminds me of Dwelling in the Household of God by Mary Coloe. I can’t remember if you’ve read that (or her other book on temple typology in John), but this paragraph especially resonates with what you wrote:
“The household model [of the church] as imaged in the language of the Fourth Gospel essentially deconstructs the patriarchal household model of antiquity, since it takes as its point of reference the divine communion [between Father and Son]. The Fourth Gospel, while using “father-son” terminology, reconstitutes the relationship as a dynamism of mutual self-giving love…We do not have within this household a hierarchy of leadership other than the leadership of faith and love.”
In addition to the explicit sibling language in 20:17, Coloe points out the implication of 19:26-27 re the joining of Jesus’ mother and the beloved disciple. If the mother of Jesus becomes the mother of the BD, then logically the BD is now the brother of Jesus. The new family of God is a family of siblings who share a Father (God the Father, through union with the Son) and a Mother (the church/household through the indwelling Spirit).
"The new family of God is a family of siblings who share a Father (God the Father, through union with the Son) and a Mother (the church/household through the indwelling Spirit)".
Another way to look at this is Mat 12:50-For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven (God the Father, through union with the Son) , the same is my brother, and sister, and mother .(the church/household through the indwelling Spirit City).
Anna, your deep, Biblical thinking is so refreshing! Like Aaron says, the more I interact with what you're writing and have begun thinking about other aspects of theology in light of it, the more I am shocked (and grieved) that we've missed this for so long. It is so clear - and harmonizes so many fragmented shards of our theology that, to this point, have served only to injure rather than edify the church.
Your pointing out that our understanding of gender directly correlates to our understanding of our eschatology is profound - and truly, our vision of heaven is just as fragmented and murky as our vision of women is! It suddenly occurred to me that as we begin seeing women (and men!) more clearly, we may perhaps also begin to see heaven more clearly as well.
I have wrestled with these theological shards for my entire life, and have never been able to even consider talking with church leaders about them until recently. I couldn't exactly just go and say, "You're wrong!" with no coherent alternative to present and say "Is not this a better way to understand it?"
I currently am reading How God Sees Women: The End of Patriarchy by Terran Williams. His work, together with yours here, is giving me hope that I can begin to articulate a rigorous defense of this better way to understand and apply the theological lessons our gender is designed by God to teach us. Though to be honest, the thought of engaging my pastor and session on this is terrifying (my pastor is quite literally the smartest, most biblically astute person I know). For my children, and others though, I don't think I can in good conscience continue to kick the can further down the road for them to deal with. Reading, thinking, praying, and planning to do something - I'm just not quite sure what.
Until I figure out what that something is, I will continue to look forward to each of your posts. Thank you!
Excellent as always Anna! I recently reread Paradise Lost, and it's striking how Milton leaves the text behind with the fall of Eve. He has her fall alone, with Adam "nobly" choosing to join her fallen state as almost an act of love and compassion.
Basically Adam is Christ and Eve is the church in Milton, and for a large portion of complementarian theology the same is true.
For them, men are heaven and women are earth; totally backwards!
The failure to imagine that gender has a Trinitarian origin, and the insertion of the Christ/church paradigm for gender motifs, is the key to the theological failure of much of the current landscape it seems.
Keep up the good work!
I have so many thoughts on Milton. At the time Milton wrote, he was in a heated written debate with an “Anonymous” theologian, who was a member of the Westminster Assembly, on the subject of divorce. Their debate was over reasons to permit divorce. It was published as the “Divorce Tracts.” Milton thought you could divorce a wife who was not a suitable conversation partner. Milton’s “anonymous” detractor did not think you could divorce a wife because she couldn’t engage you intellectually. What emerged in their correspondence is that Milton had a higher regard for women because he expected they *could and should be a conversation partners. * His anonymous detractor thought it was unreasonable to expect that a wife would provide that sort of stimulation. But of course his view of the fall of Eve has been widely adopted, that Adam’s fall was a noble sacrifice.