Richard Bauckham argues in Gospel Women, “I think we can discern not the roles of Christian women in general, but the role of the specific women who witnessed the empty tomb and the risen Lord. These women, I think we can say, acted as apostolic eyewitness guarantors of the traditions about Jesus, especially his resurrection but no doubt also in other respects.”[1]
This role as witnesses to the death and resurrection of Jesus marks these women off, as it does with the men, as unique in the early Christian community. The women that Luke lists are eyewitnesses to the death and resurrection of Jesus:
When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. (NIV Luke 24:9–10)
The named women are especially important. Luke names them because their word is the authoritative tradition as the first eyewitnesses to Jesus’ resurrection:
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’” 8 Then they remembered his words. (NIV Luke 24:1–8)
It is their special insight, connecting the events they were experiencing with the words of Jesus, which makes their testimony authoritative. This insight is not diminished by the first reactions of the men, “But [the disciples] did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense” (NIV Luke 24:11). Now just because men did not at first believe them does not mean that their testimony was any less valid or authoritative (Luke 24:36). On the contrary, the declaration of the women prepared the men for their own encounter with the risen Jesus and enabled them to believe (Luke 24:37–39).
Now some people want to say that Jesus only wanted men to be apostles. Wayne Grudem argues,
If Jesus had wanted to establish a truly egalitarian church, He could easily have chosen six men and six women to be apostles, and there would be no room for argument. While some people object that it would have been culturally offensive for Him to do this, if it had been Christ’s intention for his church, then he would have done it, for He never hesitated to do culturally unpopular things when they were morally right. But Jesus did not choose six men and six women as apostles. He chose twelve men… These twelve apostles, under Jesus Christ as the head of the church, have positions of highest authority in the church throughout its history.[2]
It is true that Jesus does call twelve men to be his apostles:
One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. 13 When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles (ἀποστόλους): 14 Simon (whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, 15 Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, 16 Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. (NIV Luke 6:12–16)
But as Grudem concedes, calling women to be apostles would be culturally inappropriate. We need to stop and ask what is an apostle anyway? In my research, I found that “an apostle” normally referred to a man who was sent to represent a king.[3] This is demonstrated very clearly in an inscription from the ancient city of Teos.[4] In the inscription, King Eumenes II is arbitrating between a guild and the city of Teos. The guild’s purpose was to unite in one organisation all the specialists required for the holding of a “musical festival.” The guild was independent of the city and friction appears to have arisen which needed the King’s attention. Unfortunately, the inscription is badly broken up, but epigrapher Charles Welles was able to discern some order between the fragments. The sentence that is most important for our discussion is,
“[The agreement?] drawn up by Aristomachus of Pergamum our agent (τοῦ παρ’ ἡμῶν ἀποσταλέντος) and by representatives chosen by you (τῶμ προχειρισθέντων ὑφ’ ὑμῶν) and by the Teans.”
(Welles 53 III C. 5—7, reign of Eumenes II).[5]
What is of interest to us is that King Eumenes describes his agent in this matter as “the one who is sent” (τοῦ…ἀποσταλέντος); that is, his apostle. The king expects that in this negotiation that both the guild and the city would send their own representatives. The representatives of the guild and the city are called “the ones assigned” (τῶμ προχειρισθέντων) (l.6–7). This illustrates nicely that the “apostle” is the king’s own representative.[6] On the other hand, the representatives of the guild and the city are called “the ones who have been assigned.” It is used of those who have been given an official task to represent another or a city (Polybius, Histories 6.58.3, 4; 11.29.6).[7]
Therefore, an apostle is a king’s representative who is sent (the essence of the word) to represent the king; he acts and speaks as if he was the king.[8] To do this role one had to be trained in oratory in order to present an argument and to persuade the other side in a negotiation; just like King Eumenes expected Aristomachus to do on his behalf in negotiating a resolution to the dispute between the Tean town council and the musical guild. In this era, only men were trained in oratory (rhetoric).[9] Thus, when Jesus calls twelve apostles only men would be considered as suitable representatives to speak on his behalf.
However, something happens to turn this around. It was possible for women to be trained in philosophy if it assisted the development of their feminine virtue to enable them to become accomplished wives.[10] It was also possible in Jewish society at this time for women to have some training in the law.[11] Whereas the Jewish philosopher Philo knew of a few select women, under special circumstances, who listened to sermons, Jesus taught women alongside men.[12] Thus the angel expected the women to know about Jesus’ special teaching to his disciples about this death and resurrection (Luke 24:5–7). Jesus did not want this knowledge to be made to the crowds in general, but only to those he had selected to be taught about his true identity (Mark 3:13–15; Luke 8:10; 9:21–27).
Now Grudem’s argument would be convincing if the only apostles were those that Jesus called in Luke 6:12–16. However, with the calling of Paul, we discover that the category of “apostle” could expand. In Galatians Paul defines what it means to be an apostle, “Paul, an apostle (ἀπόστολος) (not sentfrom men nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead)” (NIV Galatians 1:1). Paul defended his apostleship and his gospel message by insisting that he had a vision of the risen Lord Jesus as he says 1 Corinthians 15:
Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
9 For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. (NIV 1 Cor 15:1–9)
So those who saw the Lord after his resurrection have a special role in the Christian church as guarantors of the truth of the gospel (verse 6). Jesus appeared to those Paul says are apostles (verse 7), but they are not the only ones who have authority in the church to teach, preach, and lead. James is identified as a prominent leader who saw the risen Jesus (verse 7). Grudem’s argument makes it sound as if no one who was not on the list of the twelve could not be an apostle. However, we know that others could also be apostles (Romans 16:7), and this could include a woman, Junia! Arguments that Junia was a man or that this verse isn’t referring to her or Andronicus as apostles are very weak.[13] If we take Paul’s argument that he was an apostle, then you have three criteria to be an apostle:
1. The person had to have seen the risen Lord Jesus,
2. The person was called by Jesus to be sent as his representative (Gal 1:1).
3. Paul says his apostleship is “by the will of God” (1 Cor 1:1, 2 Cor 1:1) and in 1 Timothy 1:1 it was “by the command of God and Christ Jesus.” In other words, God and Christ Jesus could command whoever they wish to be their representative.
Using these criteria, it is easy to see how the category of “apostle” could expand to include others aside from the original twelve. Those original twelve selected by Jesus are always designated as “the twelve” to distinguish them from the other witnesses (Luke 18:31; John 6: 67,70, 71; 20:24; Acts 6:2; 1 Cor 15:5; Rev 21:14).[14] There is no question that the twelve had a special role in the early church, but they were able to add a replacement when Judas died (Acts 1:15–26). In fact, two men could meet the criterion as a member of the “twelve”: Joseph called Barsabbas and Matthias (Acts 1:23). Matthias was selected by lot (as priests were chosen for duty).[15] The twelve were not Jesus’ only apostles, but had a special role as they had been with Jesus for all of his earthly ministry “beginning from John’s baptism” (Acts 1:22). To be included in “the twelve” it was important that the person also saw the resurrection (Acts 1:22). It may be that gender was an issue as Grudem is arguing, but by the same token none of Jesus’ female disciples were at “the beginning from John’s baptism” (Acts 1:22; cf Mark 1:7–11; John 1: 29 –51). If not being among “the twelve” ruled a person out from being an apostle then Paul could not have been called. But Paul insists that he was called as an apostle (1 Cor 1:1, 2 Cor 1:1). Therefore, not being among the twelve does not rule out the possibility that Jesus could call a woman to be his apostle.
Paul’s sequence of appearances in 1 Corinthians 15: 3–9 makes it clear that there are apostles aside from “the twelve.” Let’s lay out the list of those Jesus appeared to,
- Cephas,
- the twelve,
- Five hundred brothers and sisters,
- James,
- All the apostles,
- Paul.
In this list “all the apostles” must be a different group of people to “the twelve.” This makes sense of a number of mysteries. The first mystery is the sudden appearance of Joseph and Matthias in Acts 1 as candidates to replace Judas in Acts 1. It would seem that they were “apostles” in some way but met the criterion of being with Jesus at the beginning. So there were others who met some sort of criteria to be distinguished as “apostles” aside from being with Jesus at the beginning of his baptism. Whatever this criterion is its existence resolves the second mystery of how Andronicus and Junia could be “among the apostles” (Romans 16:7). If we look at the criteria that Paul gives for his own apostleship we can propose that Andronicus and Junia were apostles because they saw the risen Jesus and they were called by Jesus to be sent out as his representatives. We should note that an important dimension is that they knew Jesus, which is the reason why Paul calls himself “one abnormally born” because he did not (1 Cor 15:8). As Yii-Jan Lin describes, Paul coordinates the timing of his call in comparison with Andronicus and Junia:
Andronicus and Junia are prominent apostles in the manner Paul himself is—and Paul ends the greeting by temporalizing their faith in relation to his own, as the last apostle: “and they were in Christ before I was.”
Paul’s description of Andronicus and Junia as before him in Christ is not an afterthought, tacked on merely as further praise. Paul adds this clause because he has named other apostles, and in doing so he never fails to return to his own role as the last and the “least.” In fact, the only other time Paul uses πρὸ ἐμοῦ is in Gal 1:17, in reference to other apostles: “nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were already apostles before me, but I went away at once into Arabia, and afterwards I returned to Damascus.” In mentioning other apostles, Paul claims last, and thereby first, place.[16]
Paul was the last to see the risen Jesus and be commissioned to be sent as his representative. However, compared Andronicus and Junia, who “were in Christ before I was” (Rom 16:7), Paul was abnormally born. Since the difference between Paul and the other apostles is that he did not know Jesus before his crucifixion, Paul’s designation that Andronicus and Junia were “in Christ” before he was implies that they did know Jesus and were called by him to be his representatives either before his death or after his resurrection.
This has some significant implications for how we understand the role of the women who were at the crucifixion and who discovered the empty tomb. Luke names “Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others” who made up this group. In Luke, this group are not sent to tell the apostles, but they do go to tell the apostles about their discovery (Luke 24:6–9). In Matthew and Mark the women are sent. In Mark the women (including a woman named Salome; 16:1) are instructed by an angel to tell the disciples and Peter to go to Galilee:
As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. 6 “Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. 7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’” (NIV, Mark 16:5 –7)
In Matthew, Jesus sends them to tell “my brothers to go to Galilee,”
So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. 9 Suddenly Jesus met them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”
In John 20, Mary Magdelene is singled out as a particular representative of Jesus,
Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12 and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. 13 They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?” “They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.
15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.”
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”).17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
18 Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her.
Mary Magdalene meets the criteria to be an apostle as she:
- Knew Jesus before his crucifixion,
- Saw the risen Jesus,
- Was sent by Jesus with a special revelatory message to his brothers.
In all three insistences, the women are told to “go” by either an angel or by Jesus himself. Being sent is an important criterion for being an apostle. Even though Mark has the women being sent by an angel, this does not necessarily discount the women meeting the criteria to be an apostle because, as Paul says, it is by the will and command of God that one is an apostle. But aside from this, it is clear that both Matthew and John believed that the women saw the risen Jesus and were specially commissioned by him to give a message. This message forms the heart of the gospel: Jesus died and rose again on the third day (1 Cor 15:3–4). Mary Magdalene in particular meets the criteria to be an apostle. “All the apostles” that Paul lists in 1 Corinthians 15:1–9 must include her. The special mention by Luke of Mary Magdalene strongly suggests that he also understood Joanna and Mary the mother of James to be apostles too. We should also include in this list of women Salome, who is mentioned by Mark (15:40; 16:1). Certainly, Paul understood Junia to be an apostle so like these other women, she must have known Jesus before his crucifixion, saw him in his resurrected state, and was commissioned by him to go with a special revelatory message.
I think it is safe to conclude that those named women, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, Salome, and Junia were all considered by the early church to be apostles.
© Lyn M. Kidson April 2023
Image: Annibale Carracci, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
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Further Reading
[1] Richard Bauckham, Gospel Women: Studies of the Named Women in the Gospels (Grand Rapids; Cambridge, UK: Eerdmans, 2002), 295.
[2] Wayne Grudem, Evanglical Feminism and Biblical Truth (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 2004), 81.
[3] Lyn M. Kidson, Persuading Shipwrecked Men: Rhetorical Strategies of 1 Timothy 1, WUNT 526 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 83–89.
[4] Charles Bradford Welles, Royal Correspondence in the Hellenistic Period: A Study in Greek Epigraphy (New Haven; Prague: Yale University Press; Kondakov Institute, 1934): inscription 53 III, p.219–237.
[5] Ibid., 226.
[6] Kidson, Persuading Shipwrecked Men, 85–86.
[7] Ibid., 99.
[8] Ibid., 86.
[9] Only boys were trained in paideia and rhetoric, Pseudo-Plutarch, On Education; Lauren Caldwell, Roman Girlhood and the Fashioning of Femininity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 17.
[10] Plutarch, Advice to the Bride and Groom; Cardwell, Roman Girlhood, 43; Annette Bourland Huizenga, Moral Education for Women in the Pastoral and Pythagorean Letters: Philosophers of the Household (Boston: Brill, 2013), passim.
[11] Dorothy Sly, Philo’s Perception of Women, Brown Judaic Studies (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990), 209–211.
[12] Ibid.
[13] For this argument see Margaret Mowczko, Junia in Romans 16:7 (2010); Yii-Jan Lin, “Junia: An Apostle before Paul,” JBL 139, no. 1 (2020): 191-209.
[14] Also Mark 3:16; 4:10; 6:7; 9:35; 10:32; 11:11; 14:10,17, 20, 43; Matthew 10:2; 20:17; 26:14, 20,47.
[15] As John the Baptist’s father Zechariah was chosen to burn incense in the temple as part of his priestly duty (Luke 1:9).
[16] Lin, “Junia: An Apostle before Paul,” 208.
engendered ideas 
If Grudem’s logic were correct, then Gentiles could not be in leadership positions in the church either.
Jesus did not select both Jews and Gentiles to be the Twelve.
Grudem assumes that Jesus formed a permanent, unchanging template when He chose the Twelve. It is a false assumption.
Jesus began with the Jews, in fulfillment of God’s covenant promises and because they had received the words of God. The Jews were best equipped and prepared to share the Gospel initially.
But also in keeping with God’s promise to bless the nations of the world by Abraham, the Gospel did not stop with the Jews.
Similarly, men possessed the positions necessary to share the Gospel initially, but not exclusively. Before His crucifixion, Jesus prepared women to minister. They were ready to go forth when the time was right.
When Jesus died, the veil was torn. Along with it, the separation between us. We believers are all one in Christ, all anointed to go forth in His calling and in His gifts.
It is a mistake to assume that when God does one thing one way, He always wants it to be done that way.
Thanks Brenda for commenting. I gather that you are agreeing with my argument. Yes, there are lots of inconsistencies with Grudem’s views, partly because he’s so highly focused on gender he’s lost sight of the bigger Gospel concerns as you point out.
I suppose there was more segregation between the sexes than there is in the societies of most readers of this blog. It is merely a truism to say that there were no women among the 12 male apostles. There were no men among the women apostles either.
It is not just that it would have been culturally offensive for Jesus to send women apostles. It would also have been ineffective, since it would have scandalized the very people to whom they were sent. More importantly, I think, it would have been dangerous for the women. Consider Thecla, who suffered sexual harassment when she travelled without the company of male relatives. From what I have read, it was only in the densely populated Nile delta that it was safe for women to travel the open road without male escort. Practical security considerations are often overlooked by NT scholars, who live in cultures that are safe from bandits and persecutors.
I agree. It’s hard for us, who live in Westernised countries, to imagine what it was like to live in a highly hierarchical and patriarchal society. As I point out in the article women weren’t trained to deliver speeches or to teach. And as you say it was not safe for women to travel alone. The typical attitude of a lot of men in the Greco-Roman world was that if a woman was present without a chaperone then he could have her. I mention this in these articles “You can do Anything” Donald Trump 2005 https://engenderedideas.wordpress.com/2016/11/04/you-can-do-anything-donald-trump-2005/
and Bill Hybels, sexual predatory behaviour, and Paul’s warning in 1 Thessalonians 4 https://engenderedideas.wordpress.com/2018/08/12/bill-hybels-sexual-predatory-behaviour-and-pauls-warning-in-1-thessalonians-4/
More important is the symbolic nature of the twelve- they are symbolic of the twelve sons of Jacob and so the 12 tribes of Israel. They were specifically selected by Jesus as a symbol of a renewed kingdom of God, but they weren’t the only ones trained. So the 12 lead the mission but aren’t the only ones prepared. It seems pretty obvious that Jesus is teaching and training women because he expected them to be participants in the renewed kingdom. So I would be very comfortable with the suggestion that the 72 sent out (Luke 10) included the women from the discipleship group. By then they would be as trained as the men who had become disciples after the 12. We know that many of the women were accompanying their male relatives like Mary the mother of James and Mary wife of Clopas. If Jesus expected women to be living in a renewed relationship with God, then it seems logical that he expected women to teach other women because men couldn’t normally make disciples of women. It’s a patriarchal society. But by doing this women became heirs and transmitters to Jesus’ tradition just as much as the men. This overturns a lot of expected norms in the patriarchal society of the time, which is itself symbolic of the coming kingdom. Jesus wasn’t reinforcing the norms of the society but reforming them by the values of the kingdom. Because of these values, Jesus treated women as autonomous humans who could fully participate in that kingdom. This was a view not shared by the rabbis at the time. Hallelujah women are set free!
Thanks, Lyn.