1 Timothy 2:15

Ver. 15. But she shall he saved through the child-bearing, if they abide in faith, and love, and holiness, with discretion. It is clear from the structure of the passage, that while Eve was formally before the eye of the apostle, it was she as the representative of her sex, womankind: hence, she shall be, not she has been saved; and to render still more plain how the general was contemplated in the particular, it is added, if they abide. Viewing womankind as personated in Eve, the apostle had shown how, through one grievous mistake, leading to a departure from her proper place and calling, not a rise, as had been imagined, but a fall, had taken place, a fall involving in its consequences her partner, along with herself, in present ruin, which also, but for the interposition of divine mercy, would have been irremediable. By reason of this interposition, however, a way of escape was opened to her, in connection, too, with that part of her destination which was in an especial manner to bear the impress of the fatal step which she had taken. She was still, in pursuance of her original appointment, to give birth to offspring to be the mother, indeed, of all living; but trouble was henceforth to weigh heavily upon this portion of her lot: in travail she was to bring forth children; yet at the same time in hope, for it was precisely through the seed thus to be given her that the lost ground was to be recovered, that the doom of evil should be reversed, and the serpent's head, in relation to humanity, should be bruised. It is this complex destination as to child-bearing pronounced over woman at the fall mournful enough in one respect, but fraught with consolation and hope in another to which the apostle here briefly alludes. Salvation lay for her through this one channel; and if it was her condemnation to have been so directly concerned in the guilt which required its appointment, and the pains and perils through which it must be made good, it should also be her peculiar honour, even through such a troubled experience, to be the more immediate instrument of accomplishing for herself and others the destined good. Do we, then, say that the child-bearing here spoken of has direct respect to the birth of Christ, through whom the work of salvation was really secured? We are certainly not inclined, with some commentators (Hammond, for instance), to fix the meaning down simply and exclusively to that. Undoubtedly it is the prime and essential thing, that without which the woman's child-bearing could have wrought no deliverance, and the prospect of which was like the hidden germ which from the first lay enfolded in the promise of a seed of blessing, yet not without regard, at the same time, to the collective seed associated in the divine purpose with the One. The apostle, in his brief allusion, abstains from details; he merely points to the original word, and the prominent place assigned to woman in connection with its fulfilment, as indicating her proper glory in relation to the plan of salvation. Let her be content, he virtually says, with this, that through her as the mother of a seed, given by the God of grace and blessing, she herself, as well as others, are to find salvation. But lest women should imagine that, by their participation in the simply natural part of the process, they should attain also to the higher good in question, he couples certain spiritual qualifications as indispensable to the result: if they abide in faith, and love, and holiness, with discretion (or sober-mindedness). In short; they must fall in here (as Eve should have done in Paradise, but did not) with the spiritual provisions and requirements of the plan of God: in faith, implicitly resting upon God's word of promise; in love, yielding themselves heartily to the duties of their special calling, as well as consenting to live and act within its appointed limits; in holiness, wakeful, and striving against occasions of sin; and all tempered and controlled by that spirit of meek and wise discretion which instinctively shrinks from whatever is unbecoming, heady, or high-minded.

The view now given, it is scarcely necessary to add, implies that women, as a rule, though admitting of occasional exceptions, should keep within their proper sphere, and give themselves to the family and domestic affairs especially connected with it which is all that some would find in the passage; but it includes also a great deal more. Alford, who appears to think he had discovered the only tenable interpretation, represents the τεκνογονία as that in which the curse finds its operation (an extravagant statement to begin with, since death was plainly set forth as for both man and woman the proper embodiment of the curse), then that she was to be exempted from this curse m its worst and heaviest effects (of which, however, nothing is said in the original word), and that, besides, she should be saved through that is, passing through the curse of her child-bearing trials saved, notwithstanding the danger and distress connected with these! Surely a most unnatural and forced explanation, and ending in a very lame and impotent conclusion! The peculiar passage of 1 Corinthians 3:16, where the apostle speaks of certain parties being saved, yet so as through fire, which is chiefly leant upon, cannot be fairly applied here: for fire is there figuratively represented as the saving element, since it is that which tests every one; and the parties in question, who had along with the sterling gold at bottom many combustible materials about them, were just saved, and nothing more escaped, as it were, only with their lives. There is no proper parallel between such a style of representation and the one before us. Ellicott, though very brief, and adhering perhaps somewhat too closely to Hammond, comes nearer the point, and justly lays stress on “the high probability that the apostle, in speaking of woman's transgression, would not fail to specify the sustaining prophecy which even preceded her sentence,” also “the satisfactory meaning which the preposition (διὰ) thus bears,” “the uncircumscribed reference of the σωθήσεται, and the force of the article [τῆς τεκνογ., the child-bearing, that, namely, so prominently exhibited from the first].” Indeed, it seems only necessary to present the view which takes all these into account in a judicious manner, not pressing it too much in one direction or another, to commend it to general acceptance.