Ordaining Women: New Edition with an Introduction and Notes

B. T. Roberts saw the exclusion of women from ordination as analogous to racism. His ability to see the new community made possible by Christ offers Christians today a prophetic vision of the difference Christ makes. Roberts's 1891 Ordaining Women takes seriously the scriptural promise that Christ has unmasked the false distinctions and repaired the damaged social arrangements of this world. Like the abolition of slavery, the ordination of women becomes yet another obvious sign of the world made new in Christ. With careful attention to biblical interpretation, church tradition, and empirical evidence, Roberts exposes the biases that have long held captive the Christian imagination. In this new edition, Benjamin Wayman offers an updated and fully annotated version of Roberts's original work and demonstrates the breadth and depth of his analysis. Roberts's vision of the gospel challenges the traditional and still-dominant view of the global church, and invites Christians to reimagine the inclusion of women in ordained ministry. If Christians had for so long been wrong about race, might we today be wrong about gender?

Benjamin D. Wayman is the James F. and Leona N. Andrews Chair in Christian Unity at Greenville University and a pastor at St. Paul's Free Methodist Church. He is the author of Make the Words Your Own: An Early Christian Guide to the Psalms (2014) and Diodore the Theologian: [Providence] in his Commentary on Psalms 1-50 (2014), and his articles have appeared in journals such as Horizons in Biblical Theology, Political Theology, and Women's Studies.

Benjamin D. Wayman is the James F. and Leona N. Andrews Chair in Christian Unity at Greenville University and a pastor at St. Paul's Free Methodist Church. He is the author of Make the Words Your Own: An Early Christian Guide to the Psalms (2014) and Diodore the Theologian: [Providence] in his Commentary on Psalms 1-50 (2014), and his articles have appeared in journals such as Horizons in Biblical Theology, Political Theology, and Women's Studies.

Howard A. Snyder is Visiting Director of the Manchester Wesley Research Centre in Manchester, England. He has served as a pastor and as a professor at Asbury Theological Seminary (1996-2006), Tyndale Seminary in Toronto (2007-12), and elsewhere. His books include The Problem of Wineskins, The Radical Wesley, Models of the Kingdom, and Salvation Means Creation Healed (with Joel Scandrett).