Saved through Childbirth? — A Mother’s Day Devotion
Someone who read my article on the quiver-full passage (Psa. 127:3–5) suggested I may also have something to add on another often-abused passage, 1 Tim. 2:15: “Yet she will be saved through childbearing. . . .” It is amazingly accepted by some, perhaps more than you realize, that these words support some alleged demand from God that a woman’s primary created purpose is to deliver unlimited babies, “as many as God allows,” for God’s Kingdom, and that this expectation is somehow linked to her salvation. I will regard it as the greatest Mother’s Day present I could give to disabuse many people of this legalistic notion and try to remove the burden of oppression, guilt, and anxiety it heaps upon the backs of many women.
Let me first say that Motherhood is good, wonderful, beautiful, and godly. Let me also affirm that much of the feminist movement, Planned Parenthood, the sexual revolution, and abortion are godless evils attended by even more evils, and are rightly condemned as abominable. That does not mean it is necessary or even acceptable to swing to an entirely opposite conclusion, which itself is laden with its own pagan ideas.
I must confess that I never delved too deeply into the details of the “Quiverfull” movement, or similar strains of thought in Gothard, Vision Forum, “Open Womb,” or similar ideas. I did not know that some of the use of Scripture was so bad as to lift a verse like this as justification for open-womb teaching, forbidding all forms of birth control, family planning, etc. It came as somewhat of a shock to me that some people actually believe this verse ties women’s salvation to a lifetime of service in serial reproduction.
Lest you think I am creating a straw man here, I need to add quickly that I have not seen anyone so clumsy as to say childbearing is the basis or means of salvation. No good sola fide Protestant is going to make that mistake. But the verse is nevertheless used formally in a way almost as legalistic as this. It is also used informally, casually, as a type of shorthand defense of the open-womb, quiver-full vision that a woman’s role is largely if not almost wholly defined as that of cranking out babies for the Kingdom God—as if merely having them guarantees long-term Kingdom membership and faithfulness.
The formal view can be so legalistic as to say something like this: while not the grounds for her salvation, prolific childbearing is the fruit of true salvation. Any woman who is truly saved will in fact submit to her place and role which includes that of unlimited childbearing. She will prove her salvation through such childbearing.
One of the more prominent authoresses in the movement goes far beyond “includes” childbearing. She teaches that such childbearing duties define womanhood: “Childbearing sums up all our special biological and domestic functions.”
Through such teachings, and even more moderate versions in the same strain, women are led to believe they are staking out the last bastion of the culture war against the forces of feminism. Some even claim there is a slippery slope from merely wanting to limit the number of children to outright abortion itself. It is said to be all of the same selfish, murderous mindset. Limit children at all >>> family planning >>> contraception >>> abortion.
One spokeswoman said, “Family planning is the mother of abortion.” The idea that a woman should consider family finances, position, or circumstances instead of having many children, often very close together, is condemned as selfish behavior, as if it were nothing but a woman saying, “Me, me, me, me,” and placing her “convenience” above everything else, even the life of a child. Once the slightest thought of family planning was accepted, it was only logical that abortion would follow. Of course, we know this sometimes does happen, but the insistence that it is all of one mindset for everyone involved in wise family planning is hyperbole and false witness.
I have seen this argument more than once from proponents and followers of the movement. The same mindset that considers family planning or birth control is the same mindset that will affirm abortion.
This logic is so flawed it can be refuted with the absurdity of a thousand counterexamples. Like this:
Some people work hard because they want more money.
Some people rob banks because they want more money.
The mindset of both is the same. Therefore, there is slippery slope between working hard and robbing a bank.
Or,
Some people work hard to do good.
Some people work hard to do evil.
Therefore, there is no difference in the mindset of doing good versus doing evil.
It takes this level of tortured logic to leverage the “saved through childbirth” passage into a legalistic demand to have many children, or to insist that wise family planning is no different in spirit than abortion.
What the verse means
Let me say bluntly: this is not what the verse means. It is not talking about a prescription for how a woman gets saved, nor is it a prescription for what a saved woman will necessarily do. It is certainly not to be laden with all kinds of extrapolations about prolific childbearing or the extent of how many children or a lifestyle or mindset of bearing and raising children, and then held over the heads of Christian women as the model for true obedience and her “role” in the family and the Kingdom of God.
This passage has historically been troublesome for all commentators. It has given rise to multiple discussions and possibilities as to what it means. The noun used for “childbearing” here is only used here in all of Scripture, though the verbal form also appears in 1 Tim. 5:14. It is used very scantily in Ancient Greek, so we have very little to go on as to what its nuances and applications may be.
Likewise, we know “saved” here cannot mean the salvation of the soul, because that would be salvation by works and would violate so much of the rest of Scripture. But then to what does it refer? Salvation of her body? That is not born out historically, as many women, including Christian women, have died in childbirth, and many others have lived very healthy lives having never had children. Physical health is not referred to here in any way.
The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood suggests that since being deceived by Satan is mentioned in the preceding verse, as well as in the context of 1 Timothy 5:14, then the verse really means that through childbirth, she will be saved from being deceived by Satan. Their point is cultural: if women will only stay at home and busy themselves with bearing and raising children like they are supposed to, then they will be spared from being deceived and turned away by Satan.
This is possible, but it suggests too much in my opinion. Is it really the case that stay-at-home moms are, through motherhood, spared from temptations and do not fall into sins? My deepest love, respect, and admiration for all such mothers out there, but it will only take one in history to fall into gossip, complaining, laziness, rebellion, alcohol or drugs, adultery for whatever reason, or any other sin and this theory is shot. Someone may respond that by sticking only with her godly, motherly duties and avoiding such things, then she will not fall into such sins. But I think the reader can see that this is a tautology: if you merely avoid sin, you will avoid sin. I do not think Paul is playing Captain Obvious here.
John Piper discusses the verse in a video and stresses the word through as meaning “despite.” He notes that Eve was cursed with pain in childbirth. He thinks Paul is referring to this curse and is saying to women, nevertheless, you will be saved despite going through the pain of childbirth. Again, this is possible, but it does not really resonate with the context as well as I would like.
The Childbirth
Piper goes on to dismiss a point that I think is the most theologically interesting, and which has been noted by some prominent commentators in the past. It is the fact that in the Greek, “childbearing” has a definite article, “the,” before it. This article is almost universally left out of the English translations.
I checked many of the thousands of uses of the Greek preposition dia for instances where it is followed by a noun with a definite article. I find only one other instance where the article is supplied and not translated, and there it made sense. In every other instance I checked, the article is translated. Even in many instances where there is no definite article, one is sometimes supplied. This strongly suggests we should go ahead and translated it if it makes sense.
Since Paul is here talking about the narrative of Eve and her role in the fall with the serpent, it is by no means a stretch to realize he is also referring to the childbirth as well. It is the childbirth of all childbirths, the seed of the woman, promised in that very same narrative in Genesis 3:15:
I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.
The verse is universally understood and the first promise of the Messiah to come and save us all from the curse and the power of the devil. Yes, she was deceived, but nevertheless she shall also be saved through the promise made in that same event.
In other words, I think the Greek word should be translated like it is nearly everywhere else in Scripture. The verse should then read, “Yet she will be saved through the childbearing. . . .” To what specific childbearing is this referring? It is the promised childbirth of the Messiah. Paul is affirming a spiritual and theological promise, now a reality, through which women (and men) are saved, over against pagan ideas in Ephesus (as we shall see) on the one hand and family-lineage ideas of certain Jews on the other. It is about Christ, not your own baby makings.
Piper rejects this view, saying, “That seems so remote, that Paul would refer to the glorious incarnation of the Son of God as mere childbearing.” Also, he adds that because the verb form of the same word describes regular, wifely childbearing in 1 Timothy 5:14, that it should mean the same here.
But it is hardly “remote” to refer to the “glorious Incarnation of the Son of God” as “mere” childbearing. That is the way it is described in the gospels and even by Paul himself in Galatians 4:4: “God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law.” That is about as “mere” and mere can be.
Further, in Galatians 4:21–31, Paul applies the “mere” childbirth of Sarah to the spiritual motherhood of the church. This is about as lofty and spiritual as one can get, and yet in the narrative it is mere childbirth.
In short, such a word can be used to refer to other things than common childbirth, and it can be used to refer to things of a heightened, spiritual nature. We need not try to make a contrast in such things by putting “mere childbirth” on the one hand and then using lofty, pious, religious language to describe the “Oh, great and might One, savior Incarnate Son of Holy Deity etc. etc.” on the other. Scripture does not necessarily operate that way, and theologians should not necessarily, either.
The emphasis on the promise of the Messiah in Genesis not only jives with Paul’s theological context, but it makes sense in the context of Ephesus, where Timothy was pastoring, as well. The city was almost completely consumed with Cult of Artemis (or “Diana” to the Romans). Her massive temple was there. It was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, and it dominated the economy. Her dominance over the culture can be seen in Acts 19:23–41. When the preaching of the Gospel came to Ephesus, those who profited from the cult of Artemis turned the whole city in an uproar and riot against Paul. Then this happened:
Some of the crowd prompted Alexander, whom the Jews had put forward. And Alexander, motioning with his hand, wanted to make a defense to the crowd. But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours they all cried out with one voice, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”
This gives you some idea how impassioned the whole culture was about their goddess. Now learn about her: she was a goddess of fertility and a . . . a protector of women in childbirth. Artemis worship was female-dominated. She was served by women who dedicated themselves in both virginity and others in prostitution. Her priests were castrated males. While notably a virgin herself, she was by myth murderously protective of her own chastity, punishing men with death who even by accident saw her bathing.
Now imagine what happens when Paul and Timothy plant the first church in Ephesus and the people in this Artemis-impassioned culture start getting saved. They are definitely going to be bringing their cultural beliefs and practices as baggage with them into the church. The church was naturally filed with some who were naturally radical pagan feminists who expected to control the show from the beginning. Do you think that may have caused problems in terms of women trying to dominate and suppress men?
It has been widely noted by commentators, especially since the ancient culture has been better understood and considered, that this was the social backdrop of Paul’s correctives here. Artemis worship was behind women naturally assuming and usurping the teaching by men. Artemis worship was behind the idea that women were pristine, virginal, and undefiled while men are lustful threats, the source of corruption. Artemis worship was behind the idea that Artemis protected women in childbirth.
As Paul so often did, he merely returned to the basics of the Bible in order both to instruct the Jewish diaspora converts from their perspectives and correct pagan notions that may creep in from their perspective. It only makes further sense that the ultimate correction of all views is to return to the Word of God and to the very Christ who is the savior of all.
The Mother of All Living
In our own time, we need to clear away both legalistic and pagan notions just as much as they did then. Being saved through childbirth is referring to the coming of Christ and our relationship to him. Motherhood is a blessing, but it can also be made a curse, an idol, and a burden that suppresses women. Motherhood is not a means of salvation, and it is not even a necessary fruit of salvation. It is not necessary to salvation in any way. Likewise, having children is not necessarily expanding the kingdom. Children of God are only made by faith.
Producing lots of children does not guarantee their faith. Nothing you can do will guarantee their election and faith. Perfectly training them in doctrine, outward behavior, and catechisms may in fact be doing nothing but creating expert hypocrites. Given the amount of division, backbiting, racism, legalism, fear, oppression, power trips, corruption, self-worship, incest, and other sexual immoralities in so much of the homeschool, Quiverfull, Recon, and Reformed and/or fundamentalist worlds, we may have accomplished not much more than that. The broader view should at least give us pause.
Many a faithful Christian woman has been ruined in body, mind, soul, and even faith through the unnecessary burdens of having many, many children, often very close together, and often to live up to an ideology not taught in Scripture. This is legalism. While some survive it happily, many others do so only damaged and limping, and yet others are destroyed—children, marriages, and mothers alike.
Eve was so named by Adam because she was the “mother of all living” (Gen 3:20). Anyone who understands what Paul is teaching about “the mother of us all”—that is, all Christians, or all the truly “living”—in Galatians 4:21–31 will realize in hindsight that “Eve” is a spiritual type of the church, the mother of us all. Our job as Christians is to expand the Kingdom through making disciples. This can be accomplished through making babies and then making them disciples, but the mere making of babies is no guarantee of expanding the Kingdom. It was guaranteed through the childbearing of Jesus Christ himself. It is through this that we, and everyone else who is saved, are saved.
Your primary role as a woman is first and foremost to find your rest in Christ, and to have a relationship with him. The fruit of that relationship are listed in Galatians 5:22–23. Childbearing is not listed among them. Motherhood can be a delightful blessing. It can also be sanctifying. But those who make it a mark or demand of salvation are adding their own ideas to the New Testament doctrine of salvation, the church, and the family alike.