1 Timothy 3:11

Ver. 11. There is a difference of opinion among commentators how this verse should be understood: whether of women in the sense of wives the wives of the deacons mentioned immediately before; or of women holding much the same relative position in the church as deacons women called to do active service for the community. Our translators have adopted the former view, rendering, “Even so must their wives be grave,” the wives, namely, of the deacons; and in this they have the support of such men as Bengel, Beza (who, however, would extend the reference to bishops as well as deacons, against the connection), the modern Greek commentator Coray, Conybeare, also Huther, who conceives the wives of deacons to be here mentioned, because in certain parts of their office, especially in ministering to the poor and the sick, their wives would naturally co-operate with them, and often do a considerable part of the work. Whence, quite naturally, the wives of deacons might be noticed with a view to their proper qualifications, while nothing was said of the wives of the bishops or pastors, because the latter could not participate in the official service of their husbands. All this may fairly be alleged in favour of that interpretation, and also the circumstance that, as the apostle returns in the next verse to the deacons, it would seem upon the whole more natural, that what he inserts about women in the middle of his instructions regarding deacons should refer to such women as were in a manner part of themselves, than to others occupying a quite separate position. On the other hand, the mode of expression employed in introducing the women, γυναῖκας ὡσαύτως, apparently marking a transition to another class (as at 1 Timothy 3:8; 1 Timothy 2:9; Titus 2:3; Titus 2:6); also the absence of either the article (τὰς) or the pronoun (αὐτῶν) to connect the women with the men spoken of before; and further, the mention only of such qualifications in respect to the women as might fit them for confidential employment in deacon-work, while nothing is said of those more directly bearing on domestic duties; these considerations seem very much to favour the view adopted already by Chrysostom, adopted as too obvious to require any explanation (γυναῖκας διακόνους φησί), and followed by Theophylact, Grotius, De Wette, Ellicott, Alford, etc.: that not deacons' wives, but female deacons, are meant. It still is somewhat strange, however, that the general term women (γυναῖκας) is employed, and not the specific deaconesses (τὰς διακόνους), which would have excluded all uncertainty as to the meaning. Possibly the matter was so put as intentionally to include women of both classes; at once wives to the deacons who occasionally shared with their husbands in diaconal ministrations, and women who were themselves charged by the church with such ministrations. Anyhow, it ought to be understood of women who, in the one character or the other, were actively engaged in the kind of work which was proper to deacons. And considering the greater separation which then existed between the sexes, and the extreme jealousy which guarded the approaches to female society, it was in a manner indispensable that women, with some sort of delegated authority, should often be entrusted with various kinds of diaconal service. For those so entrusted, the following simple requisites are mentioned: that they be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things; the same substantially as those required of the deacons, only delivered with more brevity.