Our Women

“To be man’s tender mate was woman horn — Andy in obeying nature, she best serves The purposes of Heaven.”

Schiller,

“The drying up a single tear has more Of honest fame than shedding seas of gore.”

Byroji.

“Nature made thee To temper man; we had been brutes without thee.”

Otway.

“Your sons and your daughters
shall prophesy.” Acts 2: 17.

“The head of every man is Christ;
a?td the head of the woman is the
man.” i Corinthians 11 :j.

‘■^ I permit not a womaft to teach,
nor to have dominion over a man.”
I Timothy 2: 12.

“Let the women keep silence in the
churches; for it is not permitted unto
them to speak.” i Corinthians 14 :J4.
“And coming up at that very hour
she gave thanks unto God, and spake
of hitn to all theni that tvere looking
for the redemption of ferusalem”
Luke 2 :j8.

“These all with one accord continued stedfastly in prayer, with the
women, * * * and they were all
filled with the Holy Spirit, and
began to speak with other tongues,
as the Spirit gave them utterance.”
Acts 1: 14 and 2: 4.

The words of the prophet Joel quoted by

Peter at Pentecost” Your sons and daughters

169 shall prophesy,” are the emancipation proclamation for women. It is her charter of liberty. Woman in her proper place is always a light; out of place she is a shadow. The important question, therefore, is what is her proper place?

Certainly she is in place as a wife in the home. Marriage is the normal state. For certain reasons one may remain unmarried. In the emergencies of his time Paul advised it, but it is not good that man or woman should be alone. God made her a helpmeet for man, and as such she should ever remain. In the home man is the head, and the wife is the helper. In i Corinthians 11:3 we read: “The head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God.” The wife bears the relation to the husband that the church bears to Christ, and as Christ bears to God. Four or five times Paul exhorts the wives to be in subjection to their own husbands, and he tells husbands to “love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it.” This subjection in point of authority does not imply inferiority. The home must have a head, and it is appropriate that man should be that head. God does not believe in two-headed monsters; they are freaks, and he does not believe in two sources of authority. The husband is to give “honor unto the wife as unto the weaker vessel,” and they are to subject themselves one to another in the love of God,” but in matters of authority the man is the normal head of the home. The law said to the wife, “thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” And Paul said, “I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man.” This may not be palatable to some modern thinkers, but it is the teaching of God’s word, and for one I believe that God knows more than even modern thinkers. Paul at least intimates that woman fell in Eden because she did not observe this law. “The woman being deceived was in the transgression,” and she led the man astray because she acted independently of him.

Woman is apt to go right by intuition and wrong by impulse. Man is apt to go right by reason. If Eve, recognizing the headship of Adam, had consulted with him, his reason might have saved her impulse from the fall and all its direful consequences, and from that day to this, when the wife proclaims independence of her husband, she is apt to go wrong. Her intuition needs his reason, and his reason needs her intuition. The one is mentally and morally incomplete without the other. The husband should make great sacrifices for his wife. “A man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife,” but he should never sacrifice the position of headship. Charles Wesley gives us the right relation of husband and wife in the words:

“Not from his head was woman took.
As made her husband to overlook,
Not from his feet as one designed,
The footstool of the stronger kind,
But fashioned for himself a bride,
An equal taken from his side,
Her place intended to maintain.
The mate and glory of the man.
To rest as still beneath his arm,
Protected by her lord from harm,
And never from his heart removed,
And only less than God beloved.”

From this you see that woman is the heart, while man is the head. The heart is not inferior to the head, it is just as important a part of the body. Nevertheless the heart is not to be the head, and if the heart by any abnormal power should get out of its place and get into the position of the head, while the head is pushed into the place of the heart, the result would be a monster. And so when woman, the heart and helper, would displace man from his headship, she is striving to make a social monstrosity.

But some one asks, What if the husband be a blockhead and too weak to rule? Well, when the head of the body is diseased, the hands and the other members must get along the best they can, but it is a failure; it is not normal.

As in the home, so in the church, woman’s proper place, whether married or unmarried, is as a helpmeet to man. The headship is in him! the helpship is in her. She can pray and prophesy, but both the praying and the prophesying must be done in such away as to recognize the headship of man. Paul urged the Christian women at Corinth to pray and prophesy with their heads covered. He evidently referred to the smaller meeting in which only Christians were apt to be present. For a Grecian woman to appear in public with uncovered head was a badge of bad character. The head of the woman was sometimes shaven as a punishment for nameless sins, and Paul insists that her appearing even in a small assembly with her head uncovered was about equal to her being shorn. It was a shame. In the Grecian city the wives and sisters who rushed out of their homes to meet their husbands and brothers on their return from battle were disgraced by the act, and it was proclaimed as a shame to the city where they lived.

In Syria to-day some women would die rather than allow a physician to see their faces, and among the Greeks it was a shame for a woman to let her voice be heard in the public assembly. Only those like Aspasia, the infamous mistress of Pericles, ever appeared as public speakers or singers. This act caused Paul to write to the Corinthian Church, “Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn anything let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.” This evidently does not refer to the business meeting, for the context shows that it was a meeting for worship and instruction. And to draw a distinction between the prayer-meeting and the public assembly, contending that the woman must keep silence in the prayer-meeting, while she is permitted to speak in the public assembly, is ludicrously wide of the mark. This 14th chapter of ist Corinthians describes the kind of meeting which the early Christians held. One man never did all the preaching. They came together, “one with a psalm, a doctrine, a tongue, a revelation, or an interpretation.” It describes the most public sort of meeting, when believers and unbelievers were expected to be present. In such a meeting as this the woman must not only be veiled, but she must not be heard, for the moment she speaks she is branded as infamous. It is better that her reputation for virtue and obedience should be preserved than that she should prophesy, because her testimony would be worse than negatived by the bad reputation which she would make by speaking. Paul covers the whole subject when he says in the last verse: “Let all things be done decently.”

Mr. Love, in his little book entitled “St. Paul and Woman,” has given us the true interpretation: The principle is always the same while customs change. The principle is that woman must maintain her modesty, her virtue, and if married, her loyal subjection to her husband. When custom sets aside either of these, let the custom be sacrificed. Take another example. The command is “Be courteous,” and a Christian ought to be polite everywhere. If, however, he goes to China, he will find that when a man wishes to be cordial with another, instead of shaking his hand he shakes his own hand. When a pupil in school desires to be respectful to the teacher, instead of facing the teacher as he would in America, he turns his face to the wall with his back to the teacher. In this country you take off your hat in the presence of ladies to show your respect. In the Orient you would be expected to put on your hat. In this country when a man of eminence enters the room you rise to honor him; in the Orient you would sit down, and if he be a high official, his subjects would be expected to ;prostrate themselves. Here we show respect to ladies by allowing them to enter before us. In the Orient you show the same respect by entering before them. Now, if I were to go to China and should meet Li Hung Chang, I should shake my own hand, if I wished to show him respect. And if I were to send my children to a Chinese school, I should insist on their standing with their faces to the wall while reciting their lessons, and I would certainly keep on my hat as a sign of respect in the presence of dignitaries. Not a particle of principle would I sacrifice, while changing the outward custom.

So with feet-washing. Christ washed his disciples’ feet, and urged them to do the same. He meant to teach a lesson of deep humility and humble service. But when a friend on a dusty day comes to my house in Brooklyn, I never suggest to him that I would like to wash his feet. That would be an insult rather than a sign of respect. I might, however, suggest that I would black his boots, or do him a service however menial as a token of my esteem. The principle remains, while the custom changes. And if there be a place on earth to-day where the speaking or singing of a woman in public would mark her as bad, and disloyal to her husband, let her remain silent. It would be a shame for her to speak. Better not even ask questions in public meetings, asking her husband or guardian at home, rather than disgrace the cause which she loves.

Among the Jews the case was very different. Women went unveiled. Certainly Hannah was not veiled in the Temple, for Eli saw her lips moving. Anna, after she had seen the infant Saviour in the Temple, went out and “spake of him to all that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.” The woman may have worn some sort of covering over the head as a badge of loyal subjection to her husband, but the oriental veil covering all the head and obstructing speech was not common.

On the day of Pentecost the prophecy of

the text was certainly fulfilled. We are told

in the first chapter of the Acts that” they

were all with one accord in one place,” and

“they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and

spake with other tongues, as the Spirit gave

them utterance.” All of them, men and women,

were public preachers. Peter’s short sermon

was doubtless only the introduction to many

sermons like it. In this revival man was the

leader and woman the helper; and all through

the New Testament this relation continues.

The four daughters of Philip were evangelists.

Paul speaks of those” women which labored

with me in the gospel.” It was the women

who first proclaimed the resurrection. Both

Priscilla and Aquila were Paul’s helpers in 12

Christ Jesus, and the woman seems to have had the pre-eminence. The woman of Samaria, after she had accepted Christ as a prophet, went into the town and told all the men, and as a result many were brought to Christ.

In all church work, however, the principle of man’s headship and woman’s helpship should be strictly observed. Woman had no ofificial position in the tabernacle and temple services of the Old Testament, and she has no ofificial position in the New Testament church. She ought not to be ordained to the pastorate. When Paul said: “I suffer not a woman to teach,” he evidently meant to teach in ofificial capacity, thus usurping authority over the man. Such is the meaning of the word translated teach. But as man’s helper she can prophesy “speaking unto men to edification, and exhortation, and comfort.” (l Corinthians, 14, 3.) Physically, she is not fitted to bear the continual strain and burden of ofcial position. Let it be repeated that this does not imply inferiority on the part of woman. There may have been a thousand men in the Union Army superior to General Grant in many ways, but he was the head and they were the helpers. So there may be women in the church vastly superior to men, but that docs not change the order that man should be the official head, and woman in every way possible, public and private, the helper.

As in the home and the church, so in the state, man should be the official head, and woman, married or unmarried, the helper. Deborah recognized the headship of Barak when she accepted his invitation to come and lead the army to battle. The plea that it is immodest for a woman to vote is simply senseless. The one who makes that plea should never cross the Brooklyn Bridge at six o’clock in the evening. Walking in line up to the ballot box, and casting in a little piece of paper, is a very modest and womanly proceeding. My prejudices are all against woman suffrage; my reasons are all for it. I feel against it, while I am compelled to think for it. The prejudice arises from the surroundings of early life, for I was raised where woman was indeed more highly esteemed than she is in other parts. The chivalry that almost worshiped her had not died out. Even to-day, in that section, a man in a street car is compelled by public sentiment to rise and give his seat to a lady when she enters. For him to remain seated while she stands, would raise a protest of indignation from every other man in the car. This state of affairs has in it much to the advantage of woman.

The new woman in striving to be a man, in the estimation of men, forfeited her right to the consideration which they once gave to her. While she appealed to him for protection he would die for her, now that she has undertaken to protect herself he simply lets her do so without interference. By the ballot woman may be the true helpmeet of man and justice demands that she should have it. Taxation without representation made a revolution in this country over one hundred years ago, and yet we submit to this injustice in the treatment of women without a protest. “What makes you women meddle with politics?” asked Napoleon Bonaparte of Madame De Stael. “Ah, sire,” she replied, “so long as you will hang us, we must ask the reason.” “Who will take care of the children while you go to the polls?” was asked of a Christian woman. “The same one who takes care of them,” she replied, “when I go to pay my taxes.” No one will deny that physically, mentally and morally, woman deserves the ballot.

I am aware that 5,200 women in New England, many of them wives of eminent men, have formed an organization whose object is to protest against giving the ballot to women. They claim that the home is the unit of society, and is large enough as woman’s sphere. They contend that woman, if she has the ballot, must be prepared to bear arms in defense of it.

They forget, however, that woman with the ballot may still be in the home sphere, for she can protect her home by voting. They forget again that as man’s helper woman is able to defend the ballot. What he does with his musket on the battlefield, she does among the wounded in the hospital. Woman’s work in helping is as important as man’s in fighting. But in the state she should not be an official, any more than in the home or the church. As president, governor, judge, she would be out of place. Think of a woman policeman!

As in the home, the church, and the state, so in great world movements, man should be the head, while woman is the helper. When she declares independence of man, and exults in leadership, she is apt to make wreck. When she goes with man as his helpmeet, she is a great power in the world.

Women who love the Bible and worship Jesus Christ cannot think with pleasure of Spiritualism, Christian Science, and Theosophy, three of the greatest apostacies of modern times led by women.

The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union has done great good, and yet if I had the power, I would to-day rub out the “W,” and write in great golden letters, “Christian Temperance Union,” opening the doors to men as well as women. There should be no great separate missionary societies among women. There maybe women’s societies in churches provided they are willing to be under the guidance of the pastor and officers, but the moment they declare their independence they forfeit their right to live.

Woman’s sphere is just as large as man’s. Wherever he goes into merchandise, law, medicine, journalism, preaching, indeed anywhere, she may go, married or unmarried, without revolting against the official headship of man. But no husband should join an organization that refuses to admit his wife, and no wife should join a society that excludes her husband. No husband should enter a business into which his wife cannot conscientiously go as a helper. “What God hath joined together let not man put asunder.”

But what every man and woman on earth needs is the Lord Jesus Christ. There is in him all that is womanly and manly. We need no woman to introduce us to him, for he has a heart tenderer than a mother’s. Take him into the home, the church, and the state. Let him be the Umpire as to what you should be, as to how you should work and vote, if you would be happy and successful for time and eternity.