I was sleeping in the garden when I saw you first He'd put me deep, deep under so that he could work And like the dawn you broke the dark and my whole earth shook I was sleeping in the garden when I saw you
At last, at last Bones of my bones and flesh of my flesh, at last - Like the Dawn by The Oh Hellos.
I can remember listening to the pastor of my childhood home church and the way he spoke of the beauty of the first marriage we get in Scripture. I too was enamored by the vision. I've sat and learned under a number of pastors since then who have echoed the sentiment.
This is not to point a finger at them and what they believe or taught.
The creation of humanity is detailed in the first two chapters of Genesis. In the first chapter of Genesis, we get a more concise narrative:
"Then God said, 'Let us make humanity in our image to resemble us so that they may take charge of the fish of the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the earth, and all the crawling things on earth. God created humanity in God's own image
in the divine image God created them,
male and female God created them." - Genesis 1:26-17 (CEB).
It's in Genesis two we get more detail. This time, God creates the first man, Adam, from the dust of the ground and breathes life into him. God then says that, "It is not good for the man to be alone." Then God parades all the animals before Adam, who names them. Yet we're told that still, "... for Adam no suitable helper was found."
This is when we get the creation of woman. God causes Adam to fall into a deep sleep. God takes on of Adam's ribs to form the woman.
When Adam wakes up and sees his companion, he exclaims:
"This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman', for she was taken out of man." - Genesis 1:23 (NIV).
It is these first two creation accounts that provide the foundation for what is known as complementarian theology. In a nutshell, complementarianism is a theology which holds that while men and women were both created in God's image and are equal in worth, they are different in essence and inhabit different roles in the home, church, and to some extent society.
I grew up in a traditionally complementarian church. I still go to a traditionally complementarian denomination. In the PCA, for example, only qualified men are allowed in church leadership positions (the office of elder).
I grew up being told and believing that a complementarian view was the view you had if you were someone who took Scripture seriously. Anything else would be denying what is plainly seen in Genesis and later echoed by Paul and Peter in their epistles.
However, for a theology that comes by looking at Scripture for guidance, there's a lot of making arguments from nature from proponents of complementarianism.
There seems to be a lot of looking at the nature and inferring that because something is a certain way, then... it should be that way. Or perhaps, we can infer something about the relationship between men and women by looking at biology. We can look at something, see how it is designed, and perhaps infer something then about its purpose and what it ought to do.
Now, I'm not saying you can't learn things by looking at nature. Obviously, you can. I am saying, however, making a moral argument from nature and specifically going from "is" to "ought" is a tricky thing to do without coming to the wrong conclusion. For those who have taken an ethics class, this probably rings some bells.
As I've been mulling these things over in my mind, I've realized that there's a lot of people, including those in the conservative Reformed denominations, who seem to be highly influenced by Aristotelian philosophy - and perhaps more than they'd like to think.
There are striking similarities between arguments made for complementarian theology and what I see as Aristotelian philosophy. In fact, sometimes there's even direct drawing from Aristotle to construct a theological framework. (To see a prime historical example of drawing upon Aristotle to construct a theological framework and argument, look no further than Thomas Aquinas.) Specifically this complementarian (and definitely patriarchal) tendency to reduce things down to biology and looking at "nature" to determine not just purpose but morals is fairly Aristotelian. At the very least, it hearkens back to Aquinas who himself was always drawing on Aristotle's arguments. But we'll get to that later.
Being influenced by Aristotle is not necessarily a bad thing. It's good to draw wisdom from many places. Aristotle was a very influential guy, and much of what he says is still applicable to the present day. However, Aristotle was not a Christian. None of his works, great as they may be, are divinely inspired.
While some of what I investigate and point out may not lead us to conclude that a great many people in the church are more influenced by Aristotle than they are Scripture, I do think a lot of what is put forward and argued from proponents of complementarianism is less something we read in Scripture and more drawing upon some philosophical framework.
We all use philosophical frameworks, so that's not a bad thing. I myself am more Platonist. However, it's good to understand when we're drawing upon philosophical frameworks, especially when we're using them to make moral assertions. Doing that will also help us determine the validity of the arguments we're making.
Aristotle: "The Philosopher" and Ancient Biologist
Despite the fact that Plato came before Aristotle and Aristotle himself was a student of Plato, for much of history, Plato's works were mostly lost in the West. It wasn't until much later on in history that the works of Plato were recovered. For a long time, certainly throughout much of the Middle Ages (c. 400 AD -1440 AD), Aristotle was the most influential philosopher. After Augustine (c. 354 AD - 430 AD), we see more and more church fathers influenced by him.
In fact, in the Middle Ages, when people referred to Aristotle they would sometimes just call him "The Philosopher."
The Philosopher.
A lot of formative church history occurred in the Middle Ages as well. Of course, gradually throughout this time, bit by bit, some of Plato's works were recovered. Still, it wasn't until about the time of Aquinas (1225- 1274) we had people taking firm stances on whether they were more Aristotelian or Platonist.
Aristotle was much more than just a philosopher as well. During Aristotle's time, philosophy and science were not distinct subjects. He spent a good deal of time being fascinated by and studying nature and biology. Aristotle was no doubt influenced by his father who was a physician.
This would in turn influence his philosophical framework and his idea of the forms not being these abstract realities as asserted by Plato, but as being an integral part of the thing or object itself, more akin to its structure.
Aristotle wrote some works that are very focused on observing and explaining the natural world, such as his Physics and Meteorology and notably his Biological Treatises where he writes many of his observations of animals which are surprisingly detailed. He identifies 495 different species of animals and organizes all his information with considerable care.
He was more than just a philosopher. He was a very influential ancient scientist as well.
This context and background about him will come in handy as we start looking at some of his philosophical ideas.
Forms, Nature, and "Telos"
I'll focus on highlighting some of the basics of Aristotle's philosophy that I see people using particularly in conjunction with complementarian theology.
We've already identified that an important part of Aristotelian philosophy is the difference between Plato's Forms and Aristotle's ideas of forms. I already mentioned this, but for Aristotle, forms are not independent of things; rather, they're part of the thing itself.
The important take away I want to highlight here is how for Aristotle, looking at the thing itself gives us clues about its nature and how it differs from other things.
Another important thing to note is the idea of telos, or the "end", "goal", or "purpose" of something.
Telos is an important idea that we find all over the various works of Aristotle, but I want to highlight how in his Nicomachean Ethics where he fleshes out his ethical framework, telos plays an important role. Not only that, but what he says ties neatly with his ideas of forms and on nature.
He starts out his work by saying:
"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim."
Every activity has an end. For humans in particular due to our rational nature and how this separates us from animals, our ultimate end is happiness. "Happiness" means living according to reason.
It's here we see how he differentiates the "ultimate end" of humanity from that of animals by looking at our nature - in this case pointing out our rationality.
Do you notice what happened here? Here we see this re-occurring theme of looking at something's nature to determine the "telos" or end of that thing.
This isn't just in his Nicomachean Ethics. This features in many of his other works as well.
Aristotle is constantly referring to the nature of things. This is not to be mixed up with "nature" as in trees and grass and whatnot (although he does also speak of the natural world). When he is speaking of the nature of things, he is looking at the innate characteristics present in those things.
There is so much more to Aristotle's philosophy than these things, but these are the basic main ideas I wanted to introduce that I will be referring back to throughout this post. To read more on these ideas, I recommend giving Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, and Politics a look. Sparknotes does a great job of assisting in wading through all of the heady stuff.
Nature and Hierarchy
Aristotle applies many of his philosophical ideas in his work Politics. Aristotle identifies humans as being political animals. He asserts that for people, living in the context of the city-state is necessary to achieving happiness. He goes on to talk about different kinds of states.
We still get a lot of referring to nature and ends throughout.
"Hence it is evident that the state is a creation of nature, and that man is by nature a political animal. And he who by nature and not by mere accident is without a state, is either a bad man or above humanity; he is like the 'tribeless, lawless hearthless one,' whom Homer denounces... Now that man is more of a political animal than bees or any other gregarious animals is evident. Nature, as we often say, makes nothing in vain, and man is the only animal whom she has endowed with the gift of speech." - Book 1, 1253a.
We see here just how important looking to the "nature" of something is for determining how that thing should live, and for what end it ought to strive. He even speaks of people who "by nature" (as in, innately a part of them) are without a state, and concludes that they must either be bad or else entirely unlike a human because their nature is contrary to what a human's nature is.
He goes on to speak of how he must talk about household management since the state is made up of households. A sentiment that no doubt resonates with people to this present day.
It is here that Aristotle starts talking about slaves. He defends the institution of slavery, as slaves in his eyes are part of what makes a complete household.
Then the interesting bit, however:
He differentiates between slaves by law and slaves by nature.
"But is there any one thus intended by nature to be a slave, and for whom such a condition is expedient and right, or rather is not all slavery a violation of nature?
There is no difficulty in answering this question, on the grounds of both reason and of fact. For that some should rule and others be ruled is a thing not only necessary, but expedient; for from the hour of their birth, some are marked out for subjection, others for rule." - Book I, 1254a.
To Aristotle, some people due to their nature are better off to be ruled, and that this is in fact good for them and society as a whole. Others, he says, are better off doing the ruling, and this is both good for them and society. He identifies two classes of people, "...the one, practicing obedience, the others exercising the authority and lordship which nature intended them to have (book I, 1255a)."
He applies this principle not just to slaves, but to others as well.
"But we must look for the intentions of nature in things which retain their nature...
... The same holds good of animals in relation to men; for tame animals have a better nature than wild, and all tame animals are better off when they are ruled by man; for then they are preserved. Again, the male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled; this principle, of necessity, extends to all mankind." - Book I, 1254a, 1254b.
He even points to biological reasons behind why some are made by nature one way and others not:
"Nature would like to distinguish between the bodies of freemen and slaves, making the one strong for servile labour, the upright, and although useless for such services, useful for political life in the arts both of war and peace." - Book I, 1254b.
Therefore he concludes:
"It is clear, then, that some men are by nature free, and others slaves, and that for these latter slavery is both expedient and right." - Book I, 1255a.
These slaves "by nature" he distinguishes between slaves "by law" who may have been taken in war and made to belong to the victors.
He asserts that those made slaves by law unjustly are no reason to abolish slavery altogether, as clearly slaves are not only necessary for a complete household, but those who are slaves by nature are in fact better off when ruled, and this in turn is good for society.
It sounds so nice and a bit uncomfortably familiar, doesn't it? Slip into the spheres nature has given you, and everyone will be better off. Only then do we have a flourishing society.
Here we see this idea of living with the grain of nature, if you will, as opposed to going "against" it.
He applies this idea to men ruling over women, too.
He wants to squash the idea that women somehow aren't entirely equal to men in that they are both clearly rational creatures who should strive to be virtuous. He states that a "noble nature" is equally required in both. However, he seems to think that the "share of virtue" men and women must have varies "as natural subjects vary among themselves" (Book I, 1260a).
He goes on to explain how that while almost all things rule in some sense, the kind of rule differs.
"... the freeman rules over the slave after another manner from that in which the male rules over the female, or the man over the child; although the parts of the soul are present in all of them, they are present in different degrees. For the slave has no deliberative faculty at all; the woman has, but it is without authority; and the child has, but it is immature." - Book I, 1260a.
If all of these things remind you uncomfortably of patriarchal and complementarian theology, that is because many ideas are shared. Some of the philosophical framework we see at work here is at work in complementarian theology.
Before moving on though, I can't continue without giving a mention to Aquinas.
Thomas Aquinas, an influential church father from the Middle Ages, was highly influenced by Aristotle. His work the Summa Theologica is quite the feat in that he so painstakingly argued for the existence of God and a bunch of other theological points - all while utilizing Aristotelian arguments.
In the Summa Theologica he talks quite a bit about nature and natural law. He states natural law is "appointed by reason" (II, I, 94, article 1). He, like Aristotle, states that man is a rational being. He too subscribes to Aristotle's idea of "telos" and states, ".... for every agent acts for an end, which has the aspect of good (II, I, 94, article 2)." He also speaks a lot about nature:
"...For it has been stated that to the natural law belongs everything to which a man is inclined according to his nature. Now each thing is inclined naturally to an operation that is suitable to it according to its form; thus fire is inclined to give heat." - (II, I, 94, article 3).
Unsurprisingly, being a man of his time, Aquinas follows in Aristotle's footsteps when talking about women, although he continues to reference Scripture. You can read about this in the section of the Summa Theologica entitled "The Production of Women". Here he speaks of the subjection of women before the Fall:
"There is another kind of subjection, which is called economic or civil, whereby the superior makes use of his subjects for their own benefit and good; and this kind of subjection existed even before sin. For good order would have been wanting in the human family if some were not governed by others wiser than themselves. So by such a kind of subjection woman is naturally subject to man, because in man the discretion of reason predominates." (I, 92, article 1).
Again we see this idea of people taking their place as either rulers or those ruled as made fit by nature for the flourishing of society.
Aquinas was neither the first nor last church father to be highly influenced by Aristotle.
Let's fast forward to today and see how many of these ideas dovetail nicely with complementarian theology - or at least in the things that proponents of complementarianism like to say.
Nature and Complementarian Theology
Here I want to highlight a few quotes from some proponents of complementarianism that I think are hearkening back to Aristotelian philosophy or ideas.
Quote(s) #1:
My first quote here is from Kevin DeYoung and a semi-recent article he wrote for The Gospel Coalition. I'll be sure to link the blog posts and various articles I get these from at the end of my post.
Kevin DeYoung is a solid self-professed complementarian. I also greatly respect him, despite what theological differences we may have. This quote is a fantastic example of Aristotelian philosophy.
Our brother here is talking about men and women, but he is using a basketball and an American football as an analogy. He is saying, look. Men and women are similar and have a similar telos, or end. However, they have differences in their telos rooted in their very forms.
Like Aristotle, he is talking about forms not in some abstract Platonic way, but is assuming we can look at nature itself to see these forms.
Let's look at another quote from his same article.
We can see here that when our brother says "nature", he is at least in part pointing to the physical differences between men and women. These distinctions which nature itself teaches point to men and women having a different end in responsibilities, rights, duties, work, marriage, and a whole host of things listed here.
There is a philosophical framework at work here. Now, I know our brother Kevin DeYoung is a well-read and educated man, so he himself might be self-aware that he's using an Aristotelian argument here. It is such a great example, though, that I wanted to include it.
Quote #2:
This is a quote from Tim Bayly's book, The Grace of Shame. Tim Bayly was the first executive director at the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW). He broke ties with the CBMW some years ago because he felt they were not taking firm enough stances on gender. He leans more on the patriarchal side of things.
Still notice how he is pointing to nature, looking at the thing itself - in this case, the penis - to assert that men have a moral obligation take initiative and bear responsibility in a way someone born with a vagina does not have to. They have a God-given role, and one way we can know this is to look at male sexual genitalia.
Quote #3
This is from an article on the CBMW site written by our brother, Denny Burke, another self-professed complementarian. He is the current president of the CBMW.
Here he is connecting a phrase in Scripture which is the modern day equivalent of "man up!" to a truth he says we can realize by looking at God's design - nature. See how he points to, once again, the biological differences between men and women.
This leads him to assert that men are"fit" for feats of courage and bravery - fit in a way presumably women are not. Courage is a virtue named by Aristotle, and I imagine Aristotle would agree with our brother here, as he too thought men and women have varying shares of virtue rooted in nature. He too would likely conclude that men should work on cultivating courage, perhaps more than is important for the woman or perhaps for a different purpose, and this is fitting to his nature.
Quote #4
This is a statement issued by the CBMW as a whole against female conscription.
Note how this snippet here is in no way a biblical argument. This is a secular argument and it is yet again an argument from nature being leveraged to make a moral assertion. We are solely looking at the physiological differences as a way of pointing to "differently-suited purposes" or ends - again, we're talking about telos which we determine from looking at forms. In this article, it is used to argue against female conscription.
It's pretty simply laid out and there's not much to explain with this one.
Analysis
I know I only included four quotes. In reality, I have quite a bit more saved, and I could keep going easily. These arguments from nature are extremely common.
I couldn't help but notice that for the most part, these assertions were made often in conjunction with Scripture or were used to make a theological point, but instead of pointing to Scripture, we were pointed to nature.
Not just to observe something we see in nature and learn about what we see there, but to then infer something's purpose or telos in the most Aristotelian sense of the term. Sometimes, to make it seem more Christian, nature is referred to as"God's creation" or "created order" or "divine design".
I find it problematic that instead of pointing to God or Christ or Scripture, we double-down on nature not just to observe it and learn from it that way but to tell us what our end, our telos, should be. More than that, to make moral assertions.
Men and women, on the whole, are different biologically. That's not a bad use of looking at nature to tell us something. But proponents of complementarianism often look to nature to tell us why and to tell us that the purpose of men and women are different. More than that, we start to make moral assertions.
It's not just good for the woman to do X, but it is bad if she doesn't because that goes against her unique telos as a woman.
All this and without much Scriptural backing. The Aristotelian philosophical framework does much of the leg work.
How many times must I hear, "Men and women are both made in the image of God. They are equal in worth. Yet they differ in their telos. They therefore have different roles."
We tie ourselves in knots trying to divine the spheres or roles men and women ought to inhabit in the world, and one of the first places we go is to point to biology.
But nature itself cannot tell us what we ought to do. We cannot look at nature to determine our morals. What is good for us to do in a moral sense.
Often these biological differences are used to prove that women are better off when their husbands possess authority in marriage and when men possess authority in the church. Stepping into these divinely ordained spheres is going with the grain of "created order" (ie. nature).
More than just not being backed by Scripture, though. Oftentimes these arguments from nature aren't logically valid.
Logical Validity of Arguments from Nature
This entire section is courtesy of my husband, who loves logic. I myself studied logic in high school, but he has a passion for it.
Consider this example:
1) Barbecue chicken wings are a causal end of BBQ sauce.
2) Thus, buying BBQ sauce without making chicken wings is bad.
This is clearly invalid. The assumed premise, that causal ends are morally obligated, is obviously not true in general. Consider another example:
1) Barbecue chicken wings are the telos of BBQ sauce, that is, God made BBQ sauce intending it to be used in production of chicken wings. 2) Living against God's design is immoral.
3) Thus, buying BBQ sauce without making chicken wings is bad. This also has an assumed but unstated premise: If God intended BBQ sauce to be used in chicken wings, he doesn't want it to be used in other ways.
This is not true in general: when God, in his perfect knowledge ordained BBQ sauce, he knew all the uses people would have for it, and all of them were part of his providence. It is not enough to know that one use is good, we must know that other uses are bad, or that the good use is morally indispensable.
How might we gain this additional knowledge?
1) The Bible: God has decreed that buying BBQ sauce without making chicken wings is sinful.
2) We see from examples and reasoning that BBQ sauce without making chicken wings results in an outcome God tells us to avoid.
Without one of these additional claims, the argument is invalid. But with one of these claims, our argument can stand without reference to telos at all. We are arguing that God condemns BBQ sauce without chicken wings, either directly or through its effects.
Thus an argument from nature is invalid. Only an argument from God's will revealed in the Bible can support the conclusion that sauce without wings is immoral. (Or alternatively, an argument from God's will revealed in conscience; less convincing because it is subjective.) We need one of the following:
1) God condemns X explicitly.
in which case no further argument is necessary; or:
1) God condemns X explicitly,
2) Sauce without wings leads to X (in a way that preserves the moral responsibility of the agent)
3) Thus, sauce without wings is bad.
To Be Continued...
In my next post, I hope to look at the bare bones of the theological assertions of complementarianism and question whether or not they really make sense looking at Scripture.