Philo of Alexandria and the First Possible Idiomatic Meaning of 1 Timothy 2:12

In the first century AD, the same century that the apostle Paul wrote 1st Timothy, Philo of Alexandria wrote a defense against what scholars refer to as a “false gnosis” (false knowledge) of God that was cropping up within Judaism. Philo referred to this as “false doctrine” that demonstrated “ignorance of real wisdom” (Philo, On the Posterity and Exile of Cain 52-53; as cited in Gnosticism, Judaism and Egyptian Christianity by Birger A. Pearson, p. 25).

Philo wrote against what he referred to as “vain opinions” and “falsehood” (https://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/text/philo/book8.html).

Using similar language, Paul wrote against “vain words” that were “falsely named knowledge” (see 1 Timothy 6:20).

Philo wrote against “plausible myths” that were “contrary to truth” (Philo in Pearson, p. 25).

Similarly, Paul wrote against false teachers that would “devote themselves to myths” (1 Timothy 1:4).

Philo compared the false teachers he was warning against to “Cain,” the man who was guilty of the first murder, as recorded in the book of Genesis. Philo said that someone who embraced a “false doctrine” of God became a “murderer,” responsible for the destruction of his own “soul”:

Directing his warning to everyone “by surname Cain,” Philo asked, “What is this that thou hast done, O wretched man? …it is of yourself that you have become the murderer.”  “The soul…, when it appeared to be destroying the God-loving doctrine, it destroyed itself.”
(https://www.earlychristianwritings.com/yonge/book7.html)

A person compared to Cain embraces a false gnosis of God. Such a person elevates the human mind over and above God. Philo describes some of the symptoms of such a life in the following terms:

If, therefore, you see any one desiring meat or drink at an unseasonable time or repudiating baths or ointments at the proper season, or neglecting the proper clothing for his body, or lying on the ground and sleeping in the open air, and by such conduct as this, pretending to a character for temperance and self-denial, you, pitying his self-deception, should show him the true path of temperance, for all the practices in which he has been indulging are useless and profitless labours, oppressing both his soul and body with hunger and all sorts of other hardships. (That the Worse is Wont to Attack the Better)

What is striking about Philo’s work is that he describes a man who has embraced a false doctrine of God as an “authentes“– a “murderer” of his own soul.

Some complementarians argue that the practice of using “authentes” to refer to a “murderer” was obsolete by the 1st century AD; yet Philo–a first century author–used it in exactly this way. He is not alone. Flavius Josephus–another 1st century Greek-speaking Jewish writer–also used “authentas” and “authenten” to convey this meaning (The Jewish War 2.240.5 & 1.582.1).  Some complementarians also argue that words like “authentes” only carried meanings related to “murder” in Attic Greek, a Classical dialect that generally predates the more common (Koine) Greek found in the New Testament.  In direct contradiction of this false assertion, Appian of Alexandria, “who wrote in a Greek untouched by Atticism”(Wilshire, p. 25), continued to use authentes in this manner with great frequency even into the 2nd century AD (Appian, The Civil Wars, 1.7.61; Appian, The Civil Wars, 1.13.115; Appian, The Civil Wars, 3.2.16; Appian, The Civil Wars, 4.17.134; Appian, Mithridatic Wars, 4.23).  

Those familiar with the Greek language of Paul’s first letter to Timothy will probably recognize that Philo’s “authentes” is very similar to Paul’s use of the word “authentein” in 1 Timothy 2:12. Dr. Leland Wilshire, author of “Insight into Two Biblical Passages,” demonstrates that “authentes” is a noun form of the infinitive verb “authentein.” In other words, it is likely that the two words shared a similar meaning in the 1st century AD.

Some complementarians allege that while nouns like authentes may have carried a meaning related to murder, similar verbs (like authentein) did not. In making this argument, they overlook the work of egalitarian scholars Leland Wilshire and Philip B. Payne, who provide examples of other verbs in Koine Greek literature that carried this meaning. The first verb, discussed by Wilshire, is “euthentekota” (Insight into Two Biblical Passages, pp. 18-21). It is used in a commentary on a famous Greek tragedy (The Oresteia) by a writer named Aeschylus, in which a man “murdered” his mother. In the same tragedy, the related noun “authentes” is also used in reference to murder (Eumenides 210, Chorus).  The second verb, discussed by Payne, is “authentesonta.” It is used to highlight that a king (named Mithridates) was responsible for the killing of Roman citizens carried out by his soldiers. Even though the king did not do the killing himself, he was still responsible for the deaths (see Payne’s discussion of 1st Timothy 2:12 in “Man and Woman: One in Christ,” p. 362, note 8). One of the men who actually carried out the murder of Romans during the Mithridatic Wars is referred to by Appian of Alexandria (a writer in the 2nd century AD) as an “authenten.” So in the case of Aeschylus’ tragedy and the Mithridatic Wars, we see both noun and verb forms of “authentein” used to refer to those who are–either directly or indirectly–responsible for death.  Directly refuting the complementarian argument that nouns and verbs such as authentes and authentein are unrelated, New Testament Scholar Dr. Cynthia Long Westfall has said, “Modern lexicographers do not support a methodology that excludes the cognates in determining the meaning of a word” (The Meaning of αὐθεντέω in 1 Timothy 2:12).

The significance of the parallel between Philo’s use of authentes and Paul’s use of authentein becomes especially apparent when we remember that both authors were 1st century AD Greek-speaking Jews, writing to warn people about a false “doctrine” or “knowledge” of God.

Paul’s description of those who embrace such a false knowledge is also similar to Philo’s. Here are Paul’s comments from 1 Timothy 4:1-4:

But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron, men who forbid marriage and advocate abstaining from foods which God has created to be gratefully shared in by those who believe and know the truth.

Both authors highlight an ascetic form of the false teaching they were concerned about.

In Philo, false doctrine is responsible for a man’s spiritual death. Such a man would be an “authentes.”  In 1 Timothy 2:12, Paul may very well be prohibiting a woman from a form of teaching (didaskein) that would similarly be responsible for the spiritual death of a man (authentein andros).

Some complementarians object to this thinking on the grounds that it is absurd to think Paul was forbidding a woman from “murdering” a man. They believe the Ten Commandments would suffice to prohibit such an act, and that Paul would not need to write an additional prohibition in 1st Timothy 2:12.  This is a straw man argument: no one is claiming that Paul was prohibiting women from literally murdering men.  What he may have been doing, however, is prohibiting a false teaching that encouraged a man to embrace a false knowledge of God, and thereby become a “murderer” of himself.  In this manner, a woman’s false teaching may have been responsible for the spiritual death of a man.

Again, some complementarians refer to this kind of thinking as “mental gymnastics.” It isn’t. In reality, it’s simply good anthropological linguistics–a field of study that examines the cultural meaning assigned to words in their original context. Instead of reading ancient literature through a modern mindset, we must learn to recognize first century idioms.  In 1st century Greek literature, written by the Jewish author Philo, “authentes” idiomatically referred to a man who “murdered” himself–brought about his own spiritual death–by embracing a false doctrine of God.  Philo compared such a man to Cain, the Bible’s first “murderer.”

Philo was not the only ancient writer to compare false teachers to Cain.  We see similar language in the book of Jude, “Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain” (verse 11).  Jesus’ disciple named John had his own disciple named Polycarp.  Polycarp referred to an early Gnostic named Marcion as “the first-born of Satan.”  At the time, this expression was another way of comparing someone to Cain.  Cain earned this title by being a “heretic” and a “murderer,” like his father, the serpent.  In Rabbinical warnings against false teaching, those regarded as “heretics” were idiomatically referred to as “Cainites”:  

Thus by the first century at the latest, there is an established Jewish tradition that assigns to Cain the role of the first heretic.  All subsequent heretics are of his (spiritual) lineage, his genos.  They are, in other words, “Cainites.” (Gnosticism, Judaism and Egyptian Christianity by Pearson, p. 104)

In a similar vein, Jesus described Satan (the serpent from the Garden of Eden) as both a liar and a murderer from the beginning (John 8:44).  It was through a lie that Satan brought death to the human race.  He lied to humanity about God, and tempted them to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

The manner in which a “false teacher” can also be a “murderer” is succinctly stated in the Greek Septuagint’s Wisdom of Solomon 1:11: “στόμα δὲ καταψευδόμενον ἀναιρεῖ ψυχήν,” “The mouth that lies kills the soul.”  Though the specific term “authentes” is not used here, the idea of falsehood causing spiritual death is clearly presented. 

False teachers–those who tell lies about God–were idiomatically likened to “murderers,” they were referred to as the descendants of Cain.

How might all of this historical information about false teachers being compared to Cain relate to Timothy, who was serving as a young pastor in the church of Ephesus?  According to Birger A. Pearson (p. 96) and church historian Adolf von Harnack, the false teachers known as “Nicolaitans” mentioned in Revelation’s letter to the church in Ephesus were also called “Cainites” (The Sect of the Nicolaitans and Nicolaus, the Deacon in Jerusalem, The Journal of Religion, Vol. 3, No. 4, Jul., 1923, pp. 413-422).  Von Harnack also explains that the first generation of Nicolaitans were ascetics.  Furthermore, in yet another remarkable similarity to Paul’s description of false teachers, who devoted themselves “to myths and endless genealogies,” a prominent theologian of the 2nd century AD named Irenaeus, commented that the Cainites were preoccupied with genealogies, tracing their lineage back to the Bible’s Esau and Korah (see 1 Timothy 1:4 and Against Heresies, Book I, Chapter 31).

All of this historical context strongly suggests that Philo was not the only first century Jewish writer who used Greek language like “authentes” to warn against a form of early Gnostic asceticism leading to death.  It may well be that Paul used “authentein” in his first letter to Timothy, in Ephesus, in a similar way.

If this interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:12 is accurate, Paul’s reference to the story of Adam and Eve in 1 Timothy 2:13-14 is very enlightening. Gnostics referred to the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil as “divine gnosis.” They viewed the serpent as a messenger of God that was passing this knowledge on to Eve, who would then transmit it to Adam.  In this context, Eve was referred to as the “Instructor” (i.e. teacher) of Adam (Gnosticism, Judaism, and Egyptian Christianity, p. 45).  In 1 Timothy 2:13-14, Paul may be addressing this type of Gnostic heresy by reminding Timothy that Eve did not receive “divine knowledge” from the serpent; rather, she was deceived, and when she gave the fruit to Adam, he ate it and consequently died, spiritually.  In this idiomatic sense, a teacher of false gnosis would also to be a “murderer”; such a person would be responsible for the death of another person’s soul.  (See “The Equality Workbook: Freedom in Christ From the Oppression of Patriarchy” for further details and documentation on early Gnostic thought.)

Even the passage about being “saved through childbearing” begins to make sense in this context.  Giving birth to a child, in the eyes of some Gnostics, was an act that imprisoned another soul in a corrupt body (The Gnostics and Their Remains). Salvation was associated with liberating the soul from the bonds of matter, by embracing an ascetic life.  

A woman teaching an ascetic form of Gnosticism (bodily self-denial) in Timothy’s church might have encouraged a man to embrace a false knowledge of God that required celibacy, perhaps even within marriage (Paul confronted a similar problem in 1 Corinthians 7:1.).  Celibacy and asceticism may have been viewed as necessary to safeguard women from the possible consequences of childbearing: physical and spiritual death.  Death in childbirth was common, and trapping another soul in a body was viewed as an act requiring spiritual redemption.

Paul’s response to this Gnostic teaching may then have been to remind Timothy that women will be “saved through childbearing” simply by having faith in Christ that shows itself in holiness (1 Timothy 2:15).  This does not mean, as St. Jerome wrongly suggested, that a woman will be saved “by” bearing children; but rather that she will be saved by faith in Christ, and need not worry about losing her soul “through” the act of giving birth.

It is also probably not the case that Paul is saying Ephesian women will be saved “by the birth of the Child,” meaning Christ.  Though there is theological truth to this statement, this interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:15 is based on the assumption that the use of the definite article in Greek—the childbearing—must be a reference to a specific birth: the birth of Jesus.  Unfortunately, this interpretation assumes that Koine Greek and English share the same rules regarding the use of the definite article.  In reality, they do not.  “The” childbearing was used in Greek for the act of childbearing in general, as we see in Aristotle’s Historia Animalium 9.7.25: “After thrice seven years, the woman having reached a favourable state for childbearing…”. Though it is not supplied in English, Aristotle’s Greek includes the definite article: “tas teknogonias,” which is simply rendered “childbearing.”  Ephesian goddess mythology was preoccupied with saving women “through” the act of bearing children.  In other words, their patron goddess protected women in childbirth: “When racked with labour pangs, and sore distressed the sex invoke thee, as the soul’s sure rest” (Orphic Hymn #2).  Dr. James Rietveld also highlights the ancient belief that the patron goddess of Ephesus might kill women who chose to leave behind a life of chastity by embracing marriage and childbearing (Artemis of The Ephesians, p. 113).

Paul’s meaning in 1 Timothy 2:15, then, would have been to tell women in Ephesus that they need not encourage their husbands to embrace the false teaching of ascetic gnosis, to protect them from the dangers of childbirth.  While “a woman” was evidently engaged in this false teaching (1 Timothy 2:12)–possibly out of concern for her own salvation –it was women (plural, see 1 Timothy 2:15b) who were encouraged to rely on simple faith that expressed itself in holiness for salvation, rather than looking to ascetic gnosis that was rooted in Ephesian goddess myths.

Roman Law and the Second Possible Idiomatic Meaning of 1 Timothy 2:12

It’s interesting to note that both Philo and Paul appear to address Gnostic heresy that was formed by combining Judaism and/or Christianity with “myths.” (For more information on goddess myths and their influence on early Gnostic beliefs, see Philippe Borgeaud’s “Mother of the Gods: From Cybele to the Virgin Mary.”)

Paul makes reference to the influence of “myths” in 1 Timothy 1:4. As mentioned, Ephesian mythology was particularly focused on “saving women in childbearing.” One way the Ephesian goddess could be supplicated was by male priests permanently renouncing their masculinity through the ritual act of self-castration. Historically, native Ephesians called this goddess Cybele. Greeks who immigrated to this region conflated her with one of their own goddesses, named Artemis. (Extensive evidence on the conflation of Artemis and Cybele in 1st century Ephesus can be found in the book “Artemis of the Ephesians” by James Rietveld.)  Though Greco-Roman worship practices eventually dispensed with castration in favour of temporary celibacy for Artemis’ male priests, Anatolian men continued to honor their goddess (Cybele) through ritual self-castration. This practice continued in Ephesus through Roman times, and was even imitated by some Christians who embraced extreme asceticism, notably in 1st century Ephesus. (See Borgeaud p. 96; and Daniel F. Caner’s “The Practice and Prohibition of Ritual Self-castration in Early Christianity.”)

The practice of self-castration so alarmed Roman law-makers that Roman citizens were forbidden to participate in the rite. According to a “Senatus Consultum” (written decree of the Senate), those who violated this prohibition were prosecuted under the law “against murderers and poisoners” (the Lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficis):

This legally-binding statement of unspecified date tightened the laws against castration by charging that anyone who had carried out such an operation should be punished under the Lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficis.  The crime was to count as murder. (Ra’anan Ausch, in Schafer, 2003, p. 76, The Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered: New Perspectives on the Second Jewish Revolt Against Rome, emphasis mine)

Though the exact date of the Consultum equating castration with murder is unknown, we do know the historical period in which it must have been published.  It references the Lex Cornelia de sicariis et venficis, which was enacted in 81 BC, and is then cited under the rule of the Emperor Hadrian, who reigned from 117 to 138 AD.  In other words, castration was viewed as a form of murder under Roman law between the 1^st century BC and the 2^nd century AD (Ausch in Schafer, p. 76).  This places this specific prohibition in the period associated with the writing of the New Testament. During this period, there can be no doubt that depriving a Roman man of his masculinity—and depriving both him and the Empire of his offspring—was viewed under Roman law as a form of murder.  This reality is further affirmed in the following sources: “The Covenant of Circumcision: New Perspectives on an Ancient Jewish Rite,” edited by Elizabeth Wyner Mark, and “Becoming Male in the Middle Ages,” edited by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen and Bonnie Wheeler.

So, just as the false teaching of ascetic gnosis was referred to by Philo as a kind of spiritual death (i.e. murdering the soul), so too was the associated practice of ritual self-castration referred to, under Roman law, as a form of murder.  Greek words like “authentes” (noun) and “authentein” (verb) could very well be used in this context.

This begs the question, “Why did Roman law-makers view ritual self-castration as a form of murder?”  The answer can be found in a book entitled, “The Origins of European Thought,” by R.B. Onians.  By sharing a wealth of information from ancient Greek and Roman literature, Onians demonstrates that Romans believed the life and “soul” of a father was transmitted to his offspring through his reproductive “seed”:

In Ancient Greek thought, “it was natural and logical to think that the ‘life’ or psuche [Greek for soul] issuing from a man must come from the ‘life’ or psuche in him, from his head therefore, and helping that location, to see in the seed which carries the new life and which must have seemed the very stuff of life.” (p. 109)

The Roman conception of the conscious self was virtually identical with that of the Greeks. It has a slightly different emphasis in surviving literature, but the genius [Latin for soul] was, I suggest, in origin the Roman analogue to the psuche as here explained, the life-spirit active in procreation. (p. 129)

More specifically, Onians highlights that the Roman view that a man’s reproductive seed contained the soul of his offspring was borrowed from the Greek philosopher named Aristotle: “Aristotle taught that the psuche (soul) is contributed by the seed of the male” (Onians, p. 111).

Onians continues by explaining how the self-castration of Cybele’s male priests, which continued in 1^st century Ephesus, was understood through the lens of a Roman worldview.  The priest was viewed as “bestowing upon the goddess a portion of the seed, and abandoning mortal propagation” (p. 110).

It is essential that this historical information be understood through the lens of a 1^st century Roman mindset.  Ritual self-castration, under Roman law, was viewed as the sacrifice of the life and soul of a man’s offspring.

This begs another question: “Was language like ‘authentein’ ever used in ancient Greek literature to refer to the sacrifice of one’s offspring?”  The answer to this question is unequivocal: “Yes!”

In the Greek tragedy Iphigenia in Aulis, by Euripides, Agamemnon and his wife Clytemnestra became the “authentaisin” of their daughter Iphigenia by sacrificing her to the goddess Artemis.  This event played a pivotal role in the famous story of the Trojan war. 

Another example was well-known to the New Testament authors, including the Apostle Paul.  It is found in the Greek Septuagint. This is the Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures, translated in the 2^nd and 3^rd centuries BC by 70 Jewish scholars.  In the Septuagint’s Wisdom of Solomon 12:6 we find the following reference: “καὶ αὐθέντας γονεῖς ψυχῶν ἀβοηθήτων, ἐβουλήθης ἀπολέσαι διὰ χειρῶν πατέρων ἡμῶν.”  An English translation reads, “and the parents, that killed with their own hands souls destitute of help.”  The “souls” (ψυχῶν, psuchon) that were killed were the parents’ offspring, offered in ritual sacrifice to false gods.  These parents are referred to as “authentas.” The apostle Paul quoted from the Septuagint in his letters a total of 51 times (The Septuagint in Context: Introduction to the Greek Version of the Bible, Marcos, N. Fernández, pp. 328-329).  He would have been familiar with this reference.

Commentary from two of the Rabbis who contributed to the Talmud even reveals that Jewish thought paralleled that of the Romans, in viewing the discarding of a man’s reproductive seed as a form of murder:

Rabbi Yitzḥak and Rabbi Ami say: One who emits semen for naught is considered as though he sheds blood, as it is stated: “But draw near here, you sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the harlot…Are you not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood, you that inflame yourselves among the terebinths, under every leafy tree, that slay [shoḥatei] the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?” (Isaiah 57:3–5)  Do not read this word as shoḥatei; rather, read it as soḥatei, i.e., one who squeezes out [soḥet] semen is considered to have shed the blood of the children who could have been born from that seed. (Niddah.13a.17-18)

In other words, those who discarded reproductive seed were directly compared to the parents who sacrificed their children to false gods.  In the Greek Septuagint, as we have seen, such parents are referred to as “authentas.”

Just as parents sacrificing their children to false gods are described in the Septuagint as offering “souls destitute of help,” 1^st century Roman men who practiced ritual self-castration were viewed as sacrificing the souls of their offspring.  Some Talmudic Rabbis held a similar belief.  In 1 Timothy 2:12, Paul could have been referring to a false teaching in the Ephesian church that encouraged self-castration as an extreme form of ascetic self-mortification.  If this was his intended meaning, once again, “authentein” would be a fitting choice of words.    

So, while being an authentes (murderer) could refer to the act of teaching falsehoods about God that led to the death of the soul (as in the case of Philo’s use of the word), it could also refer to specific practices associated with the nature of the false teaching Paul was concerned about; namely, a form of asceticism that encouraged ritual self-castration.  In his book entitled “Mother of the Gods: From Cybele to the Virgin Mary,” Philippe Borgeaud does an excellent job of highlighting how the castration of Cybele’s priests in Ephesus informed the beliefs and practices of ascetics in the region.  Borgeaud even provides one example from extrabiblical literature of a young man who blamed his body for the sins of adultery and murder.  Having set his affections on a married woman, this man killed his own father for opposing his adulterous plans.  The man then castrated himself in a fit of remorse, blaming his body for his sinful behavior.  In response, Jesus’ disciple named John is reported to have said the following:

Young man, the one who gave you the idea to kill your father and become the lover of another man’s wife is the same one who portrayed your cutting off your member as a just act.  Alas, you should have eliminated, not your bodily parts, but rather the thought that through their intermediary showed itself to be harmful.  For the organs are not what does harm to man, but rather the invisible sources according to which all shameful impulses get started and manifest themselves. (Borgeaud, p. 96, citing “The Acts of John”)

This event reportedly took place in 1^st century Ephesus, the destination of Paul’s first letter to Timothy.  If true, Paul was not the only first century follower of Jesus to oppose the rise of extreme asceticism in the region.  The same false teaching was opposed by the Apostle John.

Borgeaud goes on to explain, in “Mother of the Gods,” that John’s encounter was not an isolated event.  He demonstrates that Gnostics in the region borrowed directly from Cybele’s cult mythology to inform their theology.  They demonized the body, and encouraged their adherents to live “as though castrated.”  While some ascetics took the path of imitating Cybele’s castrated priesthood metaphorically, others favoured a more literal interpretation.  In his article entitled “The Practice and Prohibition of Ritual Self-castration in Early Christianity,” Daniel F. Caner explains just how widespread this practice eventually became.  He further demonstrates that ascetics who literally castrated themselves were imitating the priesthood of Cybele. 

Roman Law and the Third Possible Idiomatic Meaning of 1 Timothy 2:12

The Lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficis not only prohibited ritual castration for Roman men, it also prohibited religious practices that could lead to the death of the participants.  Some of these practices were notably ascetic; they attempted to “quell sexual passion” (James B. Rives, Magic, Religion and Law, p. 59, in Religion and Law in Classical and Christian Rome, Ando, C. and Rupke, J. Editors). One such practice involved the administration of hemlock to suppress sexual desire.  As hemlock is a poison, an incorrect dose could lead to death.  Ascetic spiritual practices leading to death, even accidentally, would result in a criminal charge under Rome’s law “against murderers and poisoners” (Rives, p. 52).

It’s important to recognize that although Latin sources like the Lex Cornelia do not help us better understand the syntax of the Greek New Testament, they do provide invaluable information about the culture of the period in which the New Testament was written.  Multilingual cultures (like 1^st century Rome) often used more than one language to express the same idea.  We see a well-known example of this in the sign that Pilate hung on Jesus’ cross.  It read, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews,” in Hebrew, Latin and Greek (John 19:19).

Were Greek words like “authentein” used to describe death by poison in a 1^st century AD context?  Yes, Greek-speaking Jewish author Flavius Josephus refers to the person responsible for the death of Pheroras (Herod Antipater’s son) by poison as an “αὐθέντην.”  The poison came from “a woman out of Arabia that was skillful in mixing such drugs” (De bello Judaico libri vii, 1.582).

In the Lex Cornelia, women who mix potions and poisons are referred to as a “venificas.”  The English translation is “sorceresses”:

The word veneficium was also applied to potions, incantations, &c. (Cic. Brut. 60, 217; Petron. 118); whence we find veneficus and venefica used in the sense of a sorcerer and sorceress in general. (A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), William Smith, LLD, William Wayte, G. E. Marindin, Eds.)

Comparable Greek language used to describe such practices is found twice in the New Testament in reference to Ephesus.  First, it is found in Acts 19:1 & 19:

Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus…. A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to fifty thousand drachmas. (emphasis mine)

The Greek word translated “sorcery” is περίεργα (perierga).  We find similar language used to describe some of the women in 1 Timothy.  They are referred to as περίεργοι (periergoi) in the following passage: “At the same time they will also learn to be idle, going from house to house and being not only idle, but also gossips and busybodies, discussing things they should not mention” (1 Timothy 5:13, BSB).  Though the Greek periorgoi is often translated here as “busybodies,” it should be noted, once again, that this translation may not accurately represent 1^st century idioms.  In a first century context, this word was also used to refer to those who practiced “curious arts” or “magic.”  In Plutarch’s “Alexander,” for instance, “periergoi” practiced “enchantments,” and participated in “superstitious ceremonies” (2.4-5). A branch of perierga called “pharmakeia” was noted for mixing potions (c.f. “Your explanation of pharmakeia is poor” – La Vista Church of Christ).

The accompanying Greek word in 1 Timothy 5:13, φλύαροι/phluaroi (often translated gossips), also carried an alternate meaning (Codex Sinaiticus – 4 Maccabees).  In the Greek text of 4th Maccabees 5:11, an adjective form is used to refer to “foolish” philosophy:

Will you not awaken from your foolish (phluarou) philosophy, dispel your futile reasoning, adopt a mind appropriate to your years, philosophize according to the truth of what is beneficial? (4 Maccabees 5:11 NRSVA – Bible Gateway)

Understood in the context of false teaching, it is less likely that Paul was simply concerned with “gossips and busybodies” in 1 Timothy 5:13; and more likely that he was concerned about those who were teaching foolish doctrines and the magical arts.

Strengthening the notion that Paul may have been referring to “curious arts/magic” in 1 Timothy 5:13 is the fact that he compares the false teachers of Ephesus to “Jannes and Jambres,” two of the “sorcerers” who opposed Moses in the book of Exodus (see Exodus 7:11 and 2 Timothy 3:8).

So, just as Roman law prohibited ritual castration for Roman men, calling it a form of murder, it also prohibited spiritual practices associated with asceticism that could result in the death of the participants.  As one commentator succinctly put it, extreme asceticism is a form of religion “that sometimes leads to death” (c.f. Suicide and Euthanasia Historical and Contemporary Themes, edited by B.A. Brody).

Towards an Accurate Idiomatic Translation

As we look at numerous examples of how nouns like “authentes” and verbs like “authentein” were used throughout ancient Greek literature (Classical and Koine), certain themes begin to emerge.  In many instances, an authentes was a person who was responsible for somebody’s death. 

From classical Greek, we find examples not just of intentional homicide (Antiphon, On the Murder of Herodes), but also of accidental death (Antiphon, 2nd Tetralogy). 

In Koine, we find death by poison (Flavius Josephus, Jewish Wars 1.582.1), sacrificial death (Septuagint, Wisdom of Solomon 12:6), and even spiritual death attributed to “false doctrine” (Philo, The Worse Attacks the Better XXI 78). 

We find this with nouns like authentes, authenten, authentas, and (as highlighted earlier) with verbs like euthentekota (Wilshire) and authentesonta (Payne). 

Nouns like authentas also carried a related meaning.  Such a person was not always directly responsible for another person’s death, they may simply have “sponsored” or “instigated” it in some way.  Such is the case in a famous historical incident recorded by Diodorus Siculus, when those who supported a violent attack on the Roman Senate, which resulted in the murder of a Senate guard, were called “authentas”: “Gracchus…had in these men no longer mere supporters but rather sponsors of his own daring plans.” Some English translations substitute “instigators” for “sponsors” (Diodorus: Books 34+35 – alternate translation).  Authentas, then, can refer to those who sponsor or instigate violence.

With all of the historical, idiomatic and linguistic information available to us, how might we better translate 1 Timothy 2:12?  Here are two possibilities:

1) “I do not permit a woman to teach or to be responsible for the death of a man.” 
A) This could refer to spiritual death.  This interpretation is informed by Philo, who viewed “false doctrine” as causing the death of the soul.  A similar idea is found in the Greek Septuagint: “The mouth that lies kills the soul” (Wisdom of Solomon 1:11). 

B) It could also refer to physical death.  This interpretation is informed by the Lex Cornelia’s prohibition against ascetic practices that might result in the death of the participants.  The use of hemlock to quell the passions is specifically mentioned in the Law, though other forms of ascetic self-abuse and deprivation could also lead to death.

2) “I do not permit a woman to teach or to instigate violence concerning a man.” This violence could have entailed ritual self-castration, instigated by the false teaching of ascetic gnosis.  Self-castration for Roman men was referred to as a form of “self-murder” under the Lex Cornelia: “The Law Against Murderers and Poisoners.” Removing a man’s genitals was viewed by Roman Law as a form of sacrificing the souls of his offspring to a foreign deity.  Cognates of authentein (words in the same family) were used with a similar meaning in the ancient Greek tragedy, “Iphigenia in Aulis,” and in the Greek Septuagint’s “Wisdom of Solomon.”

Each of these interpretations better reflects how words like “authentein” were used by other Greek authors in contexts that resemble Paul’s expressed concerns in his first letter to Timothy in Ephesus.  Each of these interpretations requires an understanding of idiomatic meanings assigned to words like “authentein” in first century Greco-Roman thought.

It should be noted that 1 Timothy 2:12 prohibits “a woman” from teaching, in a letter that highlights concerns about “false” teaching from start to finish.  Priscilla, another woman, was commended by the Apostle Paul for teaching a man “the way of God more accurately” (Acts 18:26), and she did this in Ephesus, the destination of the letter we know as “1st Timothy.”  Furthermore, some of the false teachers mentioned by name in 1st Timothy were men: “Among them are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan to be taught not to blaspheme” (1:20).

In the New American Standard version of the New Testament, the word “authority” is represented by the Greek noun exousia, or the related verbs exousiazo and katexousiazo, a total of 70 times.  Paul’s singular use of the word “authentein” in 1 Timothy 2:12 strongly suggests he had an alternate meaning in mind.  In the second century AD, after the New Testament had been written, a Greek grammarian named Phrynicus Arabius complained that words like “authentes” were being used as a synonym for “despotes” (despot, master).  He disagreed with this emerging usage, stating his belief that “authentes” should only be used in reference to murder (Payne, 2009, Man and Woman: One in Christ, p. 364). 

The information presented here has suggested possible translations of 1 Timothy 2:12, based on idiomatic uses of words like “authentein,” in relation to “responsibility for death” or “instigating violence.”  As Leland Wilshire has indicated, when studying the use of words like “authentein” around the time the New Testament was written (between the second century BC and the second century AD), “The preponderant number of citations from this compilation have to do with self-willed violence, criminal action, or murder, or reference to the person who does these actions” (Insight into Two Biblical Passages, pp. 28-29, emphasis mine). Whichever specific translation is preferred, Paul’s concern does not appear to be “women” in leadership.  Rather, his concern appears to be the false teaching of ascetic gnosis in a first century Ephesian context.