“through the Childbearing … of the divine Child”
(1 Tim 2:15, Ampl)
The previous teaching could be termed an intermezzo – a pressing point of conversation which does not directly apply to the main argument, but which presents itself nonetheless. Let’s then get back to the verse which has brought about great theological unrest – “Nevertheless she shall be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love and holiness, with self-control.”
The verse begins with the word nevertheless, which clearly points to the fact that this statement should not be read in isolation, but should be seen as a counter to the statement made in the previous verse. In Greek this entails the statement being “adversative or continuative”. It is a word which simultaneously links and juxtaposes two statements.
The previous statement is clear – “And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.” Paul thus makes it clear that it was Eve who had been seduced by the snake, not Adam. (Which does however not acquit him – in the end God held him responsible for the Fall – Gen 3:9.) The fact of the matter remains – the woman ALLOWED HERSELF TO BE DECEIVED (“being beguiled” – ASV; “being tricked”- BBE; “being seduced” – DRB), something which would later also become true of the entire human race – “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is fullgrown, brings forth death.” (James 1:13-15).
Eve as the prototypical woman created the opportunity to be seduced by desiring something which was not hers to have – she wanted to rule through secret, mystic knowledge. Please note – Paul is here still busy supporting his argument against the influence of Gnosticism. And in this lies a very important pointer – Adam’s weak spot (and thus the example of the collective male weak spot), is that he was absent when he was supposed to be with Eve, when she was negotiating with the snake. Therefore the first question God asks of him is, Where are you? – Gen 3:9, an accusation which has wider application than just him hiding after the Fall.
Eve (and thus an example of the collective female weak spot) desired what she did not have, thus creating an imagined construct in which she could exercise power and authority. To counter this tendency God makes a ruling when it comes to women – “To the woman He said, ‘I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception; in pain you shall bring forth children; your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.'” (Gen 3:16). To bring this curse of womanhood into perspective, let us briefly look at the curse of manhood. In Gen 3:17 – “Then to Adam He said, ‘Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you. And you shall eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return.'” From this stems various implications.
The curse which men are afflicted with, their primary responsibility, is to toil on the land (for dust you are, and to dust you shall return) from which he was taken. Man’s biggest battle is against the pressures of the flesh; the thorns and thistles point to the enduring nature of his struggle. Added to this is the fact that thorns and thistles are sown in him throughout. Matt 13:22 explains why this is the case – “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.” If a man does not take control over the carnal forces INSIDE of HIM which are trying to seduce him, he will have an eternal struggle in becoming a spiritual person – “But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell.” (Num 33:55, also see Isa 5:6; 7:23-25; 34:13; Hos 10:8.) The only way man can follow is the way of the crown of thorns: (“Jesus therefore came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold, the man!” – John 19:5) Remember: God had made man “a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet.” (Ps 8:5-6). Therefore the thorn bush (Ex 3:4) needs to burn (Heb 12;19) – “So the Light of Israel will be for a fire, and his Holy One for a flame; it will burn and devour His thorns and his briers in one day.” (Isa 10:17). Heb 6:4-8 clearly shows that this ancient punishment becomes a spiritual principle in the New Covenant.
(An important side note – the curse which God had spoken over the earth had already been reversed by Noah’s obedience, Gen 8:21 teaches us. In its place God had instated a different spiritual principle – the law of seed and season – verse 21. We will return to this at a later stage.)
With this mouthful we return to the woman as the “mother of all living” (Gen 3:20), whose primary task is to be painfully responsible for all that needs to be birthed – “I will greatly multiply thy pain and thy conception; in pain thou shalt bring forth …” (ASV). It is not only the physical children which she needs to give birth to – it is concerned with everything she needs to bring to life. In this powerful position (as she is also superior to man) God establishes that “your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you”, to in this way establish them being “heirs together of the grace of life” (1 Pet 3:7). The one cannot function without the other.
To return to the verse under discussion. In 1 Tim 2:15 it is clearly Eve who is “saved” (a better translation for this would be the phrase “to preserve”), because to her the maternal promise (Gen 3:15) was made, namely that the Messiah/anointing would become manifest through her. She and the rest of her kin become THE LAST EVE (1 Cor 15:45), who become the origin of all that lives, gets a new lease on life from God, if they were to “continue in faith and love and sanctification with sobriety”, in other words be aware that their spiritual walk is aimed at becoming like the Bridegroom. Therefore the Amplified Bible ‘s contextual translation is perhaps not faithful to the letter of the original text, but manages to illuminate this very problematic piece of Scripture, when it correctly speaks of women who get back their honour and glory by bringing forth “the birth of the divine Child”, and not their own Gnostic inner knowledge.
And this is obviously also true for men who are part of the collective last Eve, as Paul rightly attests in Gal 4:19 – “my little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you”.
- Sela: Pray that God will remove any misconceptions regarding gender from your spiritual framework.
- Read: Num 22-27
- Examine how this has been fulfilled: Num 26:61 (Tip: Ezek 28:18; Amos 5:21-23 ).
