Editor’s Note: From Genesis to Junia’s author, Preston Sprinkle, was also recently a guest on the Mutuality Matters Podcast. Listen to President Mimi Haddad’s interview with Preston Sprinkle here.
Approachable and captivating, From Genesis to Junia: An Honest Search for What the Bible Really Says About Women in Leadership brings Preston Sprinkle’s curious, pastoral tenor to the question of women in leadership. As the subtitle suggests, the book is a thoughtful exposition of key biblical texts that reference women as leaders, including passages like 1 Corinthians 11 and 1 Timothy 2 that have been used to preclude women from leading.
Sprinkle’s methodology, he says, is “strictly exegetical” (17). By this, he means that he attempts to interpret texts on their own terms by cross-referencing, contrasting, and contextualizing relevant passages, rather than surveying their historical interpretations. The strength of this approach is its tenability for Protestant evangelicals who value reading and interpreting the Bible for themselves. Of course, it is these evangelicals who are most curious about women in leadership right now. Recent events like the SBC ousting women-led churches, Beth Moore leaving the Baptist denomination, and Beth Allison Barr documenting the misogyny of certain U.S. evangelical councils[1] have understandably stoked an appetite in hermeneutically eager Christians to draw their own conclusions on the topic.
I highlight our particular cultural moment because Sprinkle’s research uncovers nothing new: the Bible clearly celebrates women leaders. What is new is the way he offers his humble exploration as an honest inquirer, inviting his readers along for the journey, which ultimately leads to an egalitarian conclusion. His prose reads casually, as if it were his first time examining these texts. (For the first several chapters, I even forgot that Sprinkle holds a PhD in New Testament from Aberdeen!) In fact, Sprinkle expressly states in the introduction that he came to this study not knowing where he would land. A potential weakness in this is that, by situating himself as a non-biased novice rather than an expert, his personal convictions lose some merit. For instance, he often surveys a complementarian reading of a text, then announces his disagreement with it before going on to explain why. In these cases, his humble posture is liable to obscure his well-deserved distinction as a biblical scholar.
Of course, Sprinkle is absolutely a biblical scholar in his own right, and he demonstrates this throughout in his careful handling of Scripture’s most contentious gender passages. Starting with the creation narrative, Sprinkle shows that Adam’s primogeniture can’t connote authority because Scripture trends toward subverting firstborn status, that Eve’s label, “helper,” is a Hebrew word that rarely implies submission, and that Adam’s “rule” over Eve only appears as part of the curse. He then considers a series of the OT’s powerful women: Miriam, Zipporah, Rahab, Ruth, Abigail, and Esther, all of whom the Bible portrays as heroes. Furthermore, several women held official leadership roles: Miriam, Deborah, Huldah, Noadiah, Hannah, and Abigail all display prophetic leadership and wield unapologetic authority. He concludes his appraisal of OT texts with his findings that “women played key roles in God’s story of redemption and are memorialized in the Old Testament—the Bible of first-century Christians” (64).
He then turns his focus to the NT, which he marks with an important hermeneutical turn. Sprinkle observes that Jesus depicts true leaders as “servants who wash grungy feet” (99). Through this lens, the followers of Jesus who display the most leadership attributes are actually the women—often “in contrast to the faithlessness of men” (67). Unnamed women like the hemorrhaging woman, the Syrophoenician mother, the widow giving two coins, and the woman who anointed Jesus with perfume are all praised by Jesus as exemplars. Similarly, the named women, including Mary and Elizabeth, the prophet Anna, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, and sisters Mary and Martha, all portray true, servant-style leadership.
Looking beyond the Gospels, the women of the early church led, taught, and prophesied, which Sprinkle demonstrates through an insightful look at Priscilla, Phoebe, and Junia. Female prophets continue to figure prominently and unremarkably in the NT, just as they do in the OT. For instance, the fact that Anna is a woman “appears unexceptional to Luke, just as Deborah and Huldah’s sex does to the Old Testament writers” (152). Sprinkle’s exposition of NT prophecy shows how prophecy connotes authority (1 Cor. 14:3), refuting Grudem’s view of prophecy as somehow subordinate. In fact, Sprinkle suggests that the only way to conclude that the NT women were not leaders is to interpret their descriptions through the lens of select Pauline passages.
Finally, Sprinkle explores these hotly debated Pauline passages: Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians 11 and 14, and 1 Timothy 2–3. He carefully contextualizes each letter, repeatedly insisting that we “let Paul be Paul” (200, 220). He explains controversial Greek terms such as exousia, sigaō, and authentein in his own accessible way, while charitably representing opposing views. Ultimately, he shows how Paul’s words about women submitting, staying silent, or not having authority over men must be read in context of Paul’s determination to replace household hierarchy with mutuality (Eph. 5), to acknowledge women’s gifts of prophecy (1 Cor. 11), and to call all church leaders to standards of integrity (1 Tim. 2–3). Sprinkle concludes, “In the end, I think the best interpretation of all the Bible’s evidence shows us that both women and men can be equally qualified and gifted for all forms of church leadership” (291).
As a student of feminist theology, I was already friendly toward Sprinkle’s arguments. However, getting to witness his journey as he discovered the biblical case for equality was so endearing that it’s likely to disarm even the most hostile of critics. As Sprinkle admits in the introduction, he came to this study with no agenda, and yet the portrait he offers is clear and compelling; his agenda-less style only authenticates his conclusion. Overall, From Genesis to Junia triumphs as the perfect primer to biblical equality, and will undoubtedly guide countless seekers to a balanced, believable understanding of women’s call to leadership.
Notes
[1] Beth Allison Barr, The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth (Brazos Press, a division of Baker Publishing Group, 2021), Chapter 8.
Related Resources
Book Review: Complementarity: Dignity, Difference, and Interdependence
Book Review: The Quest for Biblical Servant Leadership: Insights from the Global Church
Book Review: Breaking the Silence on Women Leaders in the Early Church A Review of Excavating Women: The Archaeology of Leaders in Early Christianity
Book Review: Eve, Where are You? Confronting Toxic Practices Against the Advancement of Women
Book Review: Tools for Ministry Leaders to Help Victims of Abuse