Continuing to Break Down Barriers

Paul wrote to the Galatians, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:27-28) For Paul’s time, and perhaps even for our own, that is a very radical statement.

Paul seems to break down religious barriers between people with “There is no longer Jew or Greek.” Next Paul breaks down class and even ownership barriers between people with “There is no longer slave or free.”

Lastly, Paul breaks down the importance of gender differences with, “There is no longer male and female.” Paul breaking down barriers between Jew and Gentile sounds normal. Paul spent his whole ministry trying to break down barriers that separated non-Jews from hearing the Good News that the salvation offered through the Messiah Jesus is for all people. But no more slave or free, no more male and female, this doesn’t sound like the Paul we know from other letters.

After all, this is the same Paul who wrote, “Wives be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord.” Not exactly the declaration of a radical feminist, is it? He doesn’t sound like the sort of guy who would write, “There is no longer male and female.”

And by the way, what’s up with the word “and?” Why does Paul write, “There is no longer Jew or Gentile. There is no longer slave or free.” But then write, “There is no longer male and female.” You have to go back to the beginning to get that answer. Not the beginning of the Letter to the Galatians, but the beginning as in “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” This is the first distinction between genders. At this point, it reads as if male and female are different from each other but equal to one another.

Later in Genesis 2:18 God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make an help meet for him.” The King James Version’s wonderful translation “meet” was for something appropriate, something corresponding to something else. That’s close to the original Hebrew meaning of “I will make a helper equal and corresponding to him.” The idea in the Hebrew is that the female complements the male. Not that she says nice things to him, but each is strong in areas where the other is weak.

Back in the third chapter of Galatians, particularly beginning in verse 6, Paul offers an extended argument on how any righteousness we have before God comes from faith, not through adherence to the Jewish law. Paul is trying to show that we can all be heirs of God without being literal children of Abraham.

Paul says that anyone can be in Christ, the old distinctions do not matter. Jews or Gentiles can be in Christ. Slaves or freemen can be in Christ and male and female can be in Christ. A woman may have been a gentile, but now she is your sister in Christ. A man may have been a slave, perhaps your own slave, but now he is your brother in Christ.

Paul was not writing a manifesto of equality and he did not take the argument any further. Paul did not say there is no difference between men and women. Paul told the Galatians that they needed to stop putting adherence to law over faith. Paul’s message in this passage is that your ethnic background, class or gender do not determine whether you can be “in Christ.” Those distinctions still exist for Paul, but they have no salvific value. You cannot be more saved than someone else (as if such a thing were possible) because of race, class or gender.

However, it is interesting to note that Paul did set Christianity on a path that we are now much further along. Paul referred to breaking down divisions between Christians of Jewish background and gentile background. No one has disputed that distinction in centuries.

Next Paul wrote of breaking down the division between slave and free. That division took much longer to break down. People owned people in this country well into the nineteenth century and though much less common, slavery still continues in some places today. Nevertheless, Christians now speak in unison against slavery using the Gospel as a basis for speaking out.

Finally, Paul spoke of breaking down the divisions between male and female. The stark division between male and female came through the disobedience of humanity. This division has not easily been healed.

What does “There is no longer male and female” mean to us? If we say it means that there is no difference at all between men and women that we have missed the point biologically as well as theologically. However, if we say these words mean that all of us, male and female, are equal in God’s eyes, then we are hitting at the heart of the theological statement, the understanding of God, that Paul was trying to convey.

Treating someone else as if they are equal to you in God’s eyes may not sound so radical at first, but try living it out and see what you think.

(The Rev. Frank Logue is pastor of King of Peace Episcopal Church in Kingsland.) 

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