Q&A Home > W > Women/Women in the Church Could you please explain St. Paul’s verse, "Let a woman learn in silence" (1 Tim 2:11-15).
Secondly, what happens to women who can't bear children, are virgins, or widows before having children? Where is this addressed in the Holy Bible? The woman, Eve, had been deceived by the serpent and therefore sinned, then she persuaded man to sin. St. John Chrysostom writes, "For the woman taught the man once, and made him guilty of disobedience, and wrought our ruin. Therefore because she made a bad use of her power over the man, or rather her equality with him, God made her subject to her husband. "Thy desire shall be to thy husband?" (Gen 3:16). This had not been said to her before. "The woman taught once, and ruined all. On this account therefore he (St. Paul) saith, let her not teach." Therefore women should be submissive and should not have authority over men. They should not teach in the church or have any priestly function. They might teach, but not in public (Acts 18:26).
St. John Chrysostom explains that although the woman was to be blamed, her gender should not be looked down upon, because God has granted women another opportunity for salvation through the bringing up of children. This does not mean that virgins, barren, or widows who have lost their husbands, before having had children will not have part in the salvation, but that just as through Eve transgressing all her race suffered, in the same manner in her childbearing, she and all her race will be saved.
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