Brethren in Christ Studies and Writing on Women in the Ministry, 1887-1987

by Janet M. Peifer
Peifer, Janet. Brethren in Christ Studies and Writing on Women in Ministry, 1887-1987, Brethren In Christ HISTORY and LIFE XIII, no. 1 (April 1990): 3-25.

In mid-1984 when I began my search on what was being written about women in ministry, I was aided by two excellent books written in the late 1970s and 1980s. ⁽¹⁾ Although thirty-nine years old, I read for the first time interpretations of Scripture affirming the public ministry of women. Surely, I mused, this must be the result of the refined contemporary research of today's theologians. My research, however, quickly revealed theologians and authors who for centuries had been writing and doing scriptural exegesis that sought to free women from the bondage that traditionally kept them from actively responding to a call to ministry. The most prolific period prior to the decade of the 1970s and 1980s was the latter years of the nineteenth century. As Janette Hassey has written in No Time for Silence: ". . . Rich literature circulated at the turn of the century, written from an Evangelical perspective (with its high view of Scripture), that exegeted texts and found the Bible to support, rather than forbid, women's public ministry." ⁽²⁾

This paper examines what Brethren in Christ have been studying and writing about the public ministry of women from 1887-1987. I am indebted to the well-ordered Archives of the Brethren in Christ Church that made my hours of research a distinct delight and permanently fueled my love for church history.

The Period from 1887-1899

Discussion on the role of women in the church is reflected in the Evangelical Visitor. Two months after it began publication in 1887, Henry N. Engle wrote an article entitled "Prophecy." His purpose in writing, he said, was to call the church back to the importance of prophecy (not only foretelling but unfolding mysteries that have been hidden), and to allow all members in the church to participate in prophesying, whether men or women. ⁽³⁾

Less than two years later, S. E. Graybill wrote of his conviction that "the prophesying of women was predicted by the Prophet Joel and had there not been such gifts bestowed on women, the prophecy could not have had its fulfillment." He believed that misinterpretation of the Apostle Paul's admonition to the women at the church in Corinth accounted for the large number of late nineteenth-century churches that imposed "silence on the Lord's handmaidens in the public assemblies." ⁽⁴⁾

Numerous articles in the Evangelical Visitor by both Brethren in Christ and selected non-Brethren in Christ authors advocated the importance of encouraging women to testify in public meetings. Not all agreed; although encouraging women to "testify," the author of an article printed by request from the Church Advocate stated strongly that preaching and public teaching were out of bounds for women because "their modest, retiring natures do not fit them for this kind of work, and it would also interfere with there [sic] more important one of making a home of purity, sweetness, and beauty." ⁽⁵⁾

However, John Fohl later in the same year submitted an article that revealed his disagreement with such assumptions about the female nature.

… And all are ready to admit that the male portion of the church are [sic] more experienced and better adapted to attend to the finance, and govermental [sic] portion of the church than females, who are generally busied with their family cares and household duties: but in Christ Jesus "there is neither male nor female." Gal. 3:28. Therefore in the service of God they are upon an equality with their brethren, to sing, pray, exhort and preach: and for scholarship, piety and zeal they frequently excel the brotherhood.

The main part of Fohl's article dealt with significant women in the Old and New Testaments who contributed their gifts through leadership roles. In concluding his article, he had this word of admonition:

For some time the writer has been impressed to write an article in vindication of the sisterhood of the church, thousands of whom, in many churches, with their brilliant talents and zeal for God, are held in bondage by their so-called leaders, and not suffered to pray in the congregation, neither to speak of what Jesus has done for their souls, neither to exhort or preach. Of such we would inquire, in the language of the apostle, "Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto men more than unto God." Acts 4:19. The position we have taken in this communication is, in our opinion, so clearly set forth in the bible as to convince the most skeptical men and women, that God approves of women declaring the story of the cross, as well as men, so that he that readeth may understand. ⁽⁶⁾

In an article several years later, Fohl reminded his readers that redemption elevated women to noble rank. He called the women of the church to assume their rights that "by your influence and labors a great work may be accomplished in these latter days of degeneracy, as the harvest is great but also true and faithful laborers are few." ⁽⁷⁾

Other support for such views may be found in the denominational papers. For example, several news items appeared during the mid-1880s in praise of contemporary women who were in evangelistic and preaching missions." ⁽⁸⁾

Charles Baker of Nottawa, Ontario, provided the traditionalist voice during the 1890s on the role of women. ⁽⁹⁾ Through his articles in the Evangelical Visitor, he declared his opposition to the advances of women in schools, factories, offices and the clergy, predicting disastrous results because of women's "onward march." He believed that the Scripture gave no allowance for women to preach in either the Old or New Testaments. Furthermore, "The only true and allowable sphere of feminine work which the Scripture warrants is in the thrones of the hearth." ⁽¹⁰⁾

Several articles by A. J. Gordon were printed in the Evangelical Visitor around the turn of the century. Gordon, a Baptist minister, was a premillennial dispensationalist who interpreted women in the pulpit as a sign of the end times. In his view women preachers were not the exception but the rule of the current dispensation. ⁽¹¹⁾ His article, "Let Them Be Heard," filled six and one-half pages of two consecutive issues of the paper. After a scholarly treatment of the Apostle Paul's writings and utilization of the gifts of women, he stated, near the end of the article:

It cannot be denied that in every great spiritual awakening in the history of Protestantism the impulse for Christian women to pray and witness for Christ in the public assembly has been found irrepressible . . . . To many it has been both a relief and a surprise to discover how little authority there is in the Word for repressing the witness of woman in the public assembly, or for forbidding her to herald the gospel to the unsaved. If this be so, it may be well for the plaintiffs in this case to beware lest, in silencing the voice of consecrated women they may be resisting the Holy Ghost. ⁽¹²⁾

Asa Bearss, a minister in the Bertie Brethren in Christ Church in Ontario, Canada, held a similar position. In "Women's Rights," he noted with dismay, men have taken advantage of the physical weakness of women to oppress them and to keep them in a secondary position. The body of the article showed his knowledge of history as he quoted Aristotle, told of the plight of women in Roman and Greek history, as well as in the New Testament era and the centuries after Christ. Bearss believed that Saint Paul was giving his own sentiments when he silenced women in 1 Corinthians 14:34,35. Of those verses, Bearss had this interesting commentary:

Now if good old Paul was a good Methodist, or a superintendent in any Sunday School in the present century, he would be mortally ashamed of the above. Indeed, all that was written derogatory to the true position of women by the apostle may be directly traced to the popular and all pervading sentiment of the times in which they lived. Yet it is astonishing to know that in these modern times right among us, are those that construe the above language of Paul to mean that our women in the Church must keep their mouths shut as regards praying and prophesying in religious exercise.

One cannot help but wonder how this article was received, especially his poignant closing paragraph:

It is a popular delusion that American women have as many, if not the same privileges as men. The conservative man exclaims, "We worship them as angels," and thoughtless women of affluence, and less favored women in humbler position bidding for masculine applause, respond, "We have all the rights we want." I tell you we men have no rights to give woman, she possesses naturally the same rights that we do, [and] if she does not enjoy them some one [sic] is in the wrong. ⁽¹³⁾

When I first learned of Rhoda E. Lee's opportunity to read papers at the 1894 and 1895 Brethren in Christ General Conferences, ⁽¹⁴⁾ I was puzzled as to the circumstances that made such an event possible, but no longer. For even if only a small number of our leaders were sympathetic with articles such as Gordon's, Bearss's, Fohl's and Graybill's, her request may not have been as foreign as it may seem to be today.

The Period from 1900-1969

The index of the Evangelical Visitor reveals a significant drop in numbers of articles printed on the subject of women and public ministry after 1911. Between 1921 and 1940 one piece was printed--a news item explaining the rationale for allowing two Presbyterian women to be charged as elders to minister in a leper asylum. Although the articles after 1940 have not been individually catalogued, I looked up the few articles listed under the role of women in the church and found none that spoke directly to the issue until 1970. This period of silence was not unlike what was happening in most Evangelical denominations. Janette Hassey says in No Time For Silence that as material containing biblical exegesis that opened the way for women in public ministry went out of print, little or no effort was made to replace it. Furthermore,

. . . women found declining opportunities for leadership in Evangelical churches, schools, and agencies as institutionalization squelched earlier charismatic forms. In worship as well as in education, this routinization set in. In this shift toward regulated, more formalized church services, prayers and speaking were no longer left to chance. Structured rather than spontaneous, Spirit-led worship tended to exclude women from public participation in worship. ⁽¹⁵⁾

Records show that in the early 1900s, women were recognized as evangelists in the Brethren in Christ Church. In the 1907 General Conference minutes, four women are listed with their husbands, who also were evangelists. At another location in the minutes, Alma LaGrange is listed as an assistant in evangelistic work. ⁽¹⁶⁾ In the July 12, 1909, issue of the Evangelical Visitor, Mary J. Long, wife of Avery T. Long, wrote in letter form of her ministry of speaking and preaching with her husband. She noted that some people had trouble seeing a woman in the pulpit beside her husband. But she affirmed a personal, specific call from God through words of Scripture in Jonah. Editor George Detwiler added at the end of the letter that he printed it with timidity because it could be misunderstood and seen as "airing private grievances." ⁽¹⁷⁾

Janet M. Peifer is on the pastoral staff of the Refton Brethren in Christ Church and is in a Master of Divinity program at Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary. A shorter edition of this article was written in 1987 and published in the December 1989 and January 1990 issues of the Evangelical Visitor.

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Notes

^1. E. Margaret Howe, Women and Church Leadership (Grand Rapids, Mich.: The Zondervan Corporation, 1982) and Don Williams, The Apostle Paul and Women in the Church (Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, 1977).

^2. Janette Hassey, No Time For Silence (Grand Rapids, Mich.: The Academie Books, 1986), p. 120.

^3. Henry N. Engle, "Prophesy," Evangelical Visitor, October 1, 1887, p. 23.

^4. S. E. Graybill, "Prophesying," Evangelical Visitor, February 1, 1899, p. 1.

^5. "Women in the New Testament," Evangelical Visitor, February 15, 1893, p. 54.

^6. John Fohl, "Let Your Women Keep Silence in the Churches," Evangelical Visitor, September 15, 1893, pp. 278, 279.

^7. John Fohl, "Rights of Women," Evangelical Visitor, August 15, 1899, p. 302.

^8. Evangelical Visitor, July 15, 1895, p. 215; January 9, 1895, p. 270; January 2, 1897, p. 34.

^9. Charles Baker, "Teaching," Evangelical Visitor, February 15, 1895, pp. 54, 55, and "Women's Sphere," October 1, 1896, pp. 297-300.

^10. Ibid., p. 300.

^11. Hassey, No Time for Silence, p. 110.

^12. A. J. Gordon, "Let Them Be Heard," Evangelical Visitor, April 15, 1895, pp. 121-124, and May 5, 1895, pp. 130-133.

^13. A. Bearss, "Women's Rights," Evangelical Visitor, December 1, 1895, pp. 354-357.

^14. For Lee's activity at General Conference, se Carlton O. Wittlinger, Quest for Piety and Obedience (Nappanee, Ind.: Evangel Press, 1978), pp. 179-181.

^15. Hassey, No Time for Silence, pp. 140-142.

^16. General Conference Minutes (1907), pp. 23, 70.

^17.Mary J. Long, "From Sister Long," Evangelical Visitor, July 12, 1909, pp. 12-13.