Ministry for Women? Gender and Authority in the 'Apostolic Church Order'

TheApostolic Church Order, c. 215 C.E., contains a scene in which the apostle Andrew asks to establish a ministry for women beyond the role of the widows in its community. The apostles Peter and John refuse, invoking a memory of the Last Supper in which Jesus did not permit women to stand in prayer with the men at that meal. Martha and Mary's voices interject, as Martha claims that Mary's mirth caused Jesus to exclude the women. The ACO's dialogue is cited in a few recent studies of women in the early church and New Testament traditions, but it has yet to be explored in context. This dissertation examines the place of the ACO's dialogue on ministry for women from within the text itself, and listens to the ACO's conclusions about gender and authority as an expression of its particular concerns about demons, community discipline, celibacy, bodies, and the social boundaries of both men and women. Historical-critical method is used to identify the likely date and provenance of the ACO's sources and redaction. Redaction criticism is engaged in examining the ACO's use of sources as it builds a defense against perceived threats to its community. Since the ACO is constructed as an apostolic dialogue, this literary technique is examined through literary-rhetorical analysis. The group/grid model of cultural anthropologist Mary Douglas is employed as an interpretive lens through which to map the ACO's textual clues of a community in internal disarray, believed to be under demonic influence. The ACO is plotted in a strong group/weak grid location, illustrating that it emerges from a community that strives for more control over the bodies and ritual roles of its male and female members. As the ACO's use of its sources, concern for demons and discipline, and choice of apostolic voices are explored, its dialogue regarding women's ministries is heard not in the abstract, but as a particular expression of one early Christian community's attempt to delineate the gender roles and authority of both its male and female members.