I spent months researching the topic of women in ministry so that I could present you with this exhaustive analysis of everything the Bible says about it.
Was Mary Magdalene "an apostle to the apostles" as NT Wright claims?
Was Junia an apostle, as a consensus of NT scholars believe?
If so, what kind of apostle was she and does that mean that women can be elders, too?
The basic view of the egalitarians (who see no role differences for men and women regarding leadership in the church) is that women were in the highest possible realm of leadership in the NT since some of them were apostles. They conclude that this means women can be in any leadership role, including pastor or elder.
The basic view of the complementarians (who say that the role of elder is preserved for men) is that women were either not apostles at all or that they only were in the sense of being missionaries. Some say this means that in a period of church planting a woman can have a transitory role of authority and teaching over men but that the permanent role of elder is reserved for men. Others say that even though they were missionaries it is reasonable to think that they had different roles than male missionaries in their work.
As always, we will be going deep.
Here are my notes from this study. If you’re looking to check my references, here’s where you will find them:
https://biblethinker.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/5-Women-apostles-2.docx
CLICK HERE for Burer and Wallace's paper from 2001 on why Junia is not an apostle.
Richard Bauckham's response is on pages 192-200 (Kindle edition) of Gospel Women: Studies of Named Women in the Gospels.
CLICK HERE for Burer's response to critics. He gives a ton more evidence for his position that Junia was well known to the apostles but not one of them. I really hope more scholars will interact with this paper.
CLICK HERE for the playlist of ALL the videos in this series (more will be added as I make them).
You can also find more videos freely available on my website:
www.biblethinker.org
