Let women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted them to speak, but to be subject, as also the law saith.
Somehow, this is not as much a regular part of the liturgy as the great Chapter 13, with its
And now there remain faith, hope, and charity [love], these three: but the greatest of these is charity [love].
Women (and one priest) keeping silent, but, er...
Here are a couple of possible interpretations of what St Paul had in mind:
1. There should be no women priests or deacons; no women reading the lessons; maybe no women in the choir?
2. There should be no women chattering during the service.
Of these, (2) is probably more sexist than (1). There are other theological arguments against the ordination of women, but (2) - which was offered to me by a woman - seems unfair. Is the female sex the "chattering" sex?
Today at Mass, it definitely was. Two elderly ladies (60ish) were sitting next to me, and they spent the entire sermon conversing in loud whispers. I glanced over at one point, and one of them was showing the other a train ticket.
The next morning Andrew told his brother "We have found a train ticket."
So I decided to focus on Fr H's sermon, which was all to do with being called by the Lord. At least, until a flash of light from my left distracted me. Yes, one of the ladies was consulting her mobile phone, and showing her neighbour a text she had received.
I suspect that the text was something like "Come home at once, the parrot has caught fire," for, the moment the sermon was over, the two ladies crept out - pushing past me with a glare. Evidently, that was enough spiritual nourishment for one week.
Still, it's not only women... men chatter as well. Occasionally, I hear comments drifting over: "Excellent blog by Eccles this week. I learnt a lot from it. Really spiritually nourishing." And that was just the priest talking to his deacon while the altar servers were doing their stuff.
Of course another text from St Paul that is not often read out is where he condemns homosexual acts. Stephen Fry's assertion that he and his young friend have become "one person" by signing a book probably can't be justified on Biblical grounds.
Fry and friend. Two persons, or maybe one. Whatever.
Here in Finestrat (Diocese of Orihuela-Alicante) where I am sometimes the only man - and indeed the only rabit - assisting at Mass, the usual Sunday congregation consists of nine or ten ladies between 65 and 80 and I have never heard them once discussing train tickets. They do discuss many other things while talking their way through the Mass, including during the canon, but never about train tickets. The conversation is in Valenciano not Spanish and the subjects range from who has died recently to who is going to die next; who we would prefer to die next; the scandalous rise in the cost of subsidised lunches at the social centre; and why is that Englishman still coming here to Mass after 5 years when we don't talk to him? Never, during the peace, do I give away the fact that I understand Valenciano.
ReplyDeleteOn what basis can a rabbit assist at Mass? just because you can knock your front teeth against a keyboard to produce coherence sentences doesn't mean you have an immortal soul !!
DeleteFree rabbit souls when you assist at Mass!
DeleteI've checked every instance of this advice against the original Greek, and the advice from St Paul is that if the law prohibits women from speaking in public gatherings (not "in church"), then women should be silent there. And by "the law", he means the CIVIL Law ; not the Law of Moses.
ReplyDeleteBut of course we should ALL of us be silent and reverent in church, and let's not forget it.
Meanwhile, St Paul elsewhere strongly defends radical equality for all of us, free or slave, wealthy or poor, man or woman.
Plus he gives some good advice to Christian women for a workaround to the letter of any civil law forcing them into public silence, get their husbands to do their talking in their place.
Pursuant to JabbaPapa's scholarly note above, may I also add that the verb "lalew", usually translated, as here, as "speak", means, according to my Liddell & Scott, first "to prate, chatter or babble, to make an inarticulate sound" and secondly, used of birds, "to chirrup", and only thirdly "to talk, talk of". For the expression "to speak formally", one would rather expect the verb "legw".
ReplyDeleteSo sexist it may be, but I'm afraid your lady friend was in the right.
I read somewhere that probably the men were more likely to be first approached to join the Church, and they hauled their women along, who given the status of women in Greece and the Middle East at the time (so very different to our enlightened times!) were probably totally uneducated and bewildered by the whole thing.
Actually the problem of women chatting during Mass could be solved if priests would take a leaf out of the book of a Baptist Minister I once encountered at a funeral service. He just stopped dead, and waited. The two lady offenders eventually realised from the silence that something was up. The minister said very politely, "Sorry to interrupt you", the congregation sniggered, the ladies went bright scarlet. But then I suppose many PPs are too afraid of offending parishioners because they no longer have that many.
You are right about the general tenor of laleo, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't mean "prate, chatter or babble, to make an inarticulate sound" at John 12.41 (which I've just come across in my daily reading).
DeleteInteresting, that verse has both legw (eipen) and lalew (elaleesen) in it. I wonder what the Apostle was trying to convey by distinguishing them?
DeleteIt is interesting that FrereRabit can understand Valenciano. I think that I could pick it up very quickly since I have been to Santiago de Compostela and I was quite surprised by the similarity of the Spanish spoken there, to a language which I can understand viz Portuguese. I remember being told by a rude, unpleasant man, on a train in Spain, that I spoke Spanish very badly. He was right of course, because I don't really speak Spanish, I just mess up my Portuguese. I didn't reply to him in English, I just smiled politely!
ReplyDeleteLanguages don't always follow national boundaries. It's only the route of the border that makes the language spoken in Galicia 'Spanish' rather than what it more accurately is, a divergent dialect of Portuguese.
DeleteYou're glossing over Gallego's similarity to Castellano too ...
DeleteI suppose it could be thought of as a dialect of both Spanish and Portuguese simultaneously -- except that it has official status as a Language, not a dialect, which fact is strongly supported by the existence of TV and newspaper media using it.
Bruvver Eccles, have I got this correct? In your picture at the top of this post, the bird in the middle is sitting on the priest's lap. What part of the liturgy is this?
ReplyDeleteI think she's just sitting on something in front of him, but I can't find anything about it in the missal.
DeleteBruvver Eccles & johnf, it is the Pslamchat of course.
DeleteI object! 60ish is not elderly! But they weren't senile so should have known better! I once got a call from a Catholic! Friend during Mass. No I didn't answer!
ReplyDelete