“Wouldn’t this be a failure of God’s to explicitly delegate authority so that we have to guess this is what he intended? It is my contention that God said what he meant and meant what he said”

Exactly. So much has to be read into it and assumed. They are speaking for God when they say that creation ‘order’ implies authority. But God tells us exactly why He waited when He brings the animals to Adam to name. If I use their interpretation tactics, I could make a good case that being created last means Eve is more important! (Not to mention that animals were created before Eve…wonder how they justify that one…is she lower than a cow to them?)

There are so many things they read into the account: Ezer means subordinate…when it doesn’t because God is an ‘ezer’ all over the OT.

The bottom line is this…If Adam was in charge of Eve then why wasn’t he held responsible for HER actions in Gen 3?

BTW: Cheryl, something I keep hearing from the CBMW crowd is that we must allow church history to teach us when we do not understand or agree upon scripture. If most theologians over time agree then it must be correct. This sounds so good but it really does lead us down a dangerous path. Studying church history and what theologians agreed upon for a thousand years leads us to infant baptism, sacraments, magistrates, state church, slavery, burning heretics, etc. They use this same argument on the issue of subordination of women. It really is dangerous and leads us away from sola scriptura.

I think of all the resources we have for free now at our fingertips to study scripture in depth..Greek, Hebrew….it really is changing things and they do not like it.

Let’s look at option one: In order for it to hold true, the components of male headship have to be “choppered in” to the Genesis account and constructed on site. The problem with this approach is that it leads to other components having to be “ferried in” to other sites. It is a problem of systematic reconciliation and rationalization of Biblical texts which appear to be at odds with the concept of a pre-fall gender-based hierarchy. In the OT there is the problem of Deborah. Dr. Wayne Grudem in his book Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth , makes the claim that God only used Deborah in a limited figurehead capacity, because there were no good men available at the time, and that she did not really exercise governing authority over Israel (p131-136). The Biblical text says no such thing. Either Deborah was a judge over Israel, or she was not.

The New Testament book of Acts poses a similar difficulty for a divinely mandated gender-based hierarchy. In chap. 15 we see that there are only four things enumerated in verses 19 & 20, and then repeated in verses 28 & 29; that the church is to observe. Not a hint of a gender-based hierarchy is to be found anywhere in the chapter.

Option two is a simpler solution. It requires no on-site construction and lets both texts (1 Tim. & Genesis) speak for themselves on the basis of historical and grammatical perspective. This option also allows 1 Tim. to be seen in its common sense form. When a Godly woman teaches the Bible in a corporate setting, where does the “authority” reside, in her, or in God’s word? And if the over-arching context in 1 Tim. is false teaching, how can orthodox Christian teaching to men be off limits to women?

My opinion is that if the accounts given of the creation can be looked at as different focuses of the one creative time period and they can be put together in one time line without contradiction, then the historical account given in Genesis and referred to by Jesus is indeed a real historical account and should be looked on as history first and then what we can learn from that history, second.  I believe there is no contradictions at all in the time lines set up by Genesis 1 & 2.  I also believe that there have been apparent contradictions only because we have changed the inspired grammar of Genesis 2 and this change that some felt was necessary to “resolve” a contradiction didn’t actually resolve the contradiction at all but took away from our understanding of Paul in 1 Timothy 2.  While I can appreciate those who do not see Genesis as history, my view is that the foundation is eroded and contradictions and misunderstanding created when we don’t take the account at face value.  Unless I am forced to see that Genesis isn’t what it says it is (it is written as history), I will continue to believe that God inspired it to say what me meant and not for us to take it as a parable and put into the account a meaning that would be different for all of us.  I believe that the foundation of our faith from the foundation of creation is solid.

And others can see it differently, but that is how I see it.

You have a point to a certain extent, but God also told them both what they could eat in chapter one but Adam alone in chapter two.  It would be understandable for Adam to have been told that he was to rule the animals before Eve was created and God told them both what they could eat and that they were to rule over the animals.  Repetition does seem to be something that God is good at doing

So whether Adam’s naming the animals was “ruling” them or not, I think we still can agree that it wouldn’t have been something that would have been held back from Eve had she been there.  Their mandate was the same.

I have a thought.

‘The naming of the animals was not a special act of authority to Adam. It was merely the acting out of the command to exercise domain over the animals. Eve, of course could not act out her domain over the animals at the time since she had not yet been created.’

I disagree one something here. I disagree that Adam’s naming of the animals was an acting out of the command to exercise domain over them. I say this because, Adam was not given a command to exercise dominion over the animals intel after the woman was created, Gen 1:28. When God gave that command regarding the animals it was only to the both of them after they both were created. But, God did intend to give them both dominion over the animals before both of them were created, 1:26. Therefore Adam’s naming of the animals was an acting out of God’s original intention (vs. a command) that they, made in his image, have dominion over the animals.