Theological Trends Column
This article was published exclusively online in the Christian Research Journal, Volume 48, number 04 (2025).
When you support the Journal, you join the team and help provide the resources at equip.org that minister to people worldwide. These resources include our ever-growing database of more than 2,500 articles and Bible Answers, as well as our free Postmodern Realities podcast.
Another way you can support our online articles is by leaving us a tip. A tip is just a small amount, like $3, $5, or $10, which is the cost of a latte, lunch out, or coffee drink. To leave a tip, click here.
Gregg R. Allison
Complementarity: Dignity, Difference, and Interdependence
B&H Academic, 2025
Elyse M. Fitzpatrick and Eric Schumacher
Jesus and Gender: Living as Sisters and Brothers in Christ
Kirkdale Press, 2022
If, when I was young, I had been admonished to choose only one issue that would preoccupy my intellectual life until my certain death, I might have landed on something like the Christian’s relationship to technology, or the veracity of the Holy Scriptures, or church architecture. I probably would not have fixed on something like “the role of women in the church and the home” or “the relationship between men and women.” I can’t imagine that I am alone in my surprise. As the twentieth century has given way to the one in which I — and my children, and my children’s children — will live unless Christ returns, it is most discouraging to discover that something so essential is still so divisive, so up for debate, and the cause of continual strife.
Over the last forty years, evangelicals have divided themselves into two camps — complementarian and egalitarian. Though the disagreement, for many churches, does not pertain to first order doctrines of salvation, the nature of Christ, or the Trinity, yet because arguments are made from Scripture, and because it has to do with the very intimate details of how Christians relate to each other, it often feels like, if we can’t agree on this issue, perhaps we should not live and worship together.
In my own denomination, the “question” is not officially settled. We are trying our best — and perhaps failing — to arrange our ecclesiastical space across what feels like an insuperable divide. I, therefore, am grateful to be able to recommend Gregg Allison’s monumental work, Complementarity: Dignity, Difference, and Interdependence (B&H Academic, 2025). What he calls “complementarity” is the basic declaration of the truth that men and women are designed by God “to fill out and mutually support one another relationally, familially, vocationally, and ecclesially for their individual and corporate flourishing” (p. 1).
I would like, first, to briefly outline Allison’s work; second, to engage with his claim that we in the West are “saddled” with a “tragic view” of men and women that “continues to haunt our best efforts and to devastate our resolve” (125); and finally, to compare Allison’s tone and project with a similar effort by Elyse M. Fitzpatrick and Eric Schumacher who attempt a third “Christic” way.
Are Women Even Human? Allison’s work, for me, is exceptional in that he is painstakingly organized, logical, and balanced. Taking Sister Prudence Allen’s monumental effort to describe the condition of and attitudes toward women in the West from around 500 BC through to the early modern period, Allison constructs a dialogue between the two prevailing camps — egalitarian and complementarian. “Egalitarianism,” he says, “is the position that men and women are equal to one another in essence, relationships, and roles” (23). “Complementarianism,” by contrast, “is the view that men and women are complementary or correspond to one another, being equal to one another in essence and different from one another in certain relationships and roles” (22). By contrast, complementarity, for Allison, is “a broader framework” (23) within which both complementarianism and egalitarianism “eventually separate and distinguish themselves from one another” (24).
Allison leans on Allen’s analysis of the philosophical implications of major thinkers through history, whom she sorts into five categories. Did they hold a position of sex unity: as human beings, women and men both possess souls and are thus equal with respect to their immaterial nature while devaluing embodiment (30)? Did they believe in sex neutrality, a derivative of sex unity, such that “women and men are equal and not significantly different” by virtue of ignoring sex differences (30)? Did they claim traditional sex polarity: “women and men are significantly different, and men are superior to women” (30)? Were they of the reverse sex polarity position, that “women and men are significantly different, and women are superior to men” (31)? Or, finally, did they incline toward sex complementarity: “women and men are significantly different, and they are equal” (31)? If complementarity, did they believe in fractional sex complementarity, that “through their complementarity they as fractional (i.e., incomplete, partial) beings constitute one being” (32), or claim integral sex complementarity, that men and women “‘are two whole beings who, together, synergetically generate more than just the sum of themselves’ through interdependence” (32)?
This journey through the past, with a brief overview of first- through fourth-wave feminism and modern-day definitions of egalitarianism and complementarianism, sets the stage for Allison’s meticulous examination of the relevant Scriptures pertaining to the debate over men and women. What we find is, first, that the disagreement is over a narrow sliver of exegetical terrain — a handful of well-litigated passages — and second, that the Bible unrelentingly shows a complementarity between men and women, that when two whole beings come together interdependently, they generate something more than the sum of themselves.
I commend Allison’s thoughtful work through Genesis 1–3 and all of the relevant Pauline passages. Rather than summarizing the arguments, I would like to offer one example of his method of setting two opposing views in dialogue and letting the believer judge for herself.
Among other points of contention, both sides of the debate over women in the church appeal to the posture of Jesus toward women and men. No reader of the Gospels can help but notice that Jesus pays special attention to women and includes them in His ministry. He heals them, invites them to join Him on His way to Jerusalem, and they are the last to stand by His cross, grief-stricken. While acknowledging Jesus’s special care for women, complementarians nevertheless observe that Jesus chose twelve male disciples, and that though women were the first to witness His resurrection, He did not set them apart for the preaching or teaching office in the same way He did the Twelve.
Egalitarians, for their part, will observe that Mary Magdalen was the first to speak to Jesus in His risen body and then to proclaim that good news. They will draw attention to the ease with which Jesus breaks taboos about speaking with women and including them in His mission alongside their male peers.
Who is right? Rather than answering that question directly, Allison attempts to cut through what feels like evangelicalism’s Gordian knot with careful logic. He writes that, for some, the narratives in the Gospels reinforce the stereotypical concept of women and their roles that was pervasive in the Greco-Roman world of Jesus and his followers” (306). Others build on that point. For them, “These narratives underscore who Jesus is and what Jesus does: he is compassionate toward women in desperate, life-threatening situations; tender with respect to women in their brokenness; and sharply aware of women’s vulnerabilities and deep needs” (306). Still others push the implications further. They “consider these narratives as portraying both Christological truths and female models of faith and discipleship — models that are instructive for all followers of Jesus, both male and female” (307). Finally, some believe that Jesus’s interaction with and elevation of women means that “Jesus included them in all aspects of his ministry, despite the cost to him in terms of challenging contemporary cultural norms and breaking taboos.” Therefore, “the church today should include women in all aspects of its ministry, not only to and for other women, but even in the highest positions of leadership, whether those are the pastorate/eldership, priesthood, bishopric, and/or diaconate” (307).
To illustrate the logical leap from the third claim to the fourth, he lays out the argument thusly:
premise: according to narratives in the Gospels, Jesus fully included women in his life and ministry;
conclusion: the contemporary church should include women in all aspects/highest levels of its leadership. (307)
One then sees that there are some steps missing, and so Allison fleshes them out:
step 1: a justification for moving from Gospel narratives, which highlight the exemplary faith and discipleship of Jesus’s followers (both women and men), not only to a conclusion about women as consummate believers but especially to their inclusion in ministry in general;
step 1a: certainly, women were significantly involved in Jesus’s ministry, but their involvement was never at the level of engagement by the Twelve, who were specifically chosen and being prepared to minister in and exercise leadership for the post-Pentecost church;
step 1b: moreover, the nature of Jesus’s ministry changed significantly from his earthly work to that of his post-Pentecost church, so an explanation is needed for how this significant transition affects women and their engagement in this altered, ongoing ministry;
step 1c: given that the emphasis in the Gospels is the person and work of Jesus Christ, warrant is needed for the move from this prevalent Christology to ecclesiology, which directly addresses the matter of women in ministry. (307–308)
Allison fills out the second step in this way:
step 2a: certainly, the ministries of these Gospel women focused on hospitality, financial support, and other forms of service, and the women were exemplary followers of Jesus for these very activities, but warrant is needed for transposing these commendable ministries in general into ministry in all aspects/the highest levels of church leadership;
step 2b: certainly, women were the first recipients of Jesus’s post-resurrection appearances, preceding even those to the Twelve, but justification is needed for how such a phenomenon translates into women serving in all aspects/highest levels of church leadership. (308)
I have found, through the years, that such justification is often lacking. And thus, neither side moves toward the other.
Are Men Even Human? Allison, I believe, is correct that we are “saddled” with a “tragic view” of women (125), though I would add, increasingly also of men. For more than two thousand years, as Prudence Allen demonstrates, the prevailing opinion of those who shaped theology and philosophy was that of traditional sex polarity, that men and women are different, and that men are superior. Allison’s very brief treatment of feminism reflects the sort of blip, in terms of human history, that feminism represents. For a brief period, women have attempted to shift the narrative towards greater equality. Allison sums up all their efforts in a single paragraph:
Four waves of feminism have resulted in three types of developments: (1) Positive developments through the championing of sex complementarity leading to substantial gains for the unity of men and women; (2) Negative developments through the triumph of reverse sex polarity that substitutes women for men in Prudence Allen’s four arenas (opposites, generation, wisdom, and virtue), thus continuing the millennia-old superiority-inferiority framework that pathetically divides men and women; (3) Mixed developments through the overturning of traditional sex polarity to some degree and in some areas for the promotion of women’s freedom and identity, with still a long way to go. (138–39)
It is chastening to see an entire century of interpersonal battle distilled into such a neat conclusion. Most of us, living in the last half of the last century, wrongly assumed that the ills of the past had been dealt with and that, with a proper interpretation of the Bible, and plenty of respect for the dignity of others, the gender wars would finally cease, and everyone would go home happily in greater unity and common purpose. That, of course, has not been the case. Instead, disagreements continue ferociously not only in the church (where, honestly, they are fairly muted) but more so online where TikToks and X posts are lobbed back and forth as we become, corporately, angrier and angrier.
Yet embedded in Allison’s treatment of Allen’s work, Allison drew out a profound insight that I often find true today. Whatever each of us believes about superiority and inferiority, about equality or submission, men and women generally quietly sort it out. That is, “seemingly irreconcilable perspectives” are able to live in tension in the course of normal life. Allison, “rather than trying to resolve that tension,” “accept[s] them as functioning together” (56).
Some of these tensions, especially in the Greco-Roman period, arose from the fact that, although women were not considered to be ontologically equal to men, they nevertheless “participated in community life, including in leadership roles” (56). They were able to manage households, to do business with clients, to attend religious festivals, to act as beneficent patrons (55).
Much later, while Aquinas was working through the philosophy of Aristotle which led to his belief “that the birth of a woman is a mistake of nature” (66),1 Dante’s appreciation for women caused him to include “female characters fully engaged in public dialogue,” “who are the superior partner in friendships with men” (84).
In the last few years, there has been, for me, the unexpected rejection of the moral claims of the Sexual Revolution2 by women intellectuals like Mary Harrington3 and Louise Perry, the latter who reverse-engineered a Christian view of complementarity simply by honestly evaluating the data as she sees it.4 Interestingly, both Harrington and Perry exist entirely outside of the evangelical sphere and talk very little, if at all, about the Bible. “Equality” between the sexes, they often observe, has done women a great deal of harm, for it has taught men and women, both, to disregard biological reality, and has thrown away the life of the spirit altogether.
Some might say that believers who do not live according to their professed values are hypocrites, and that is certainly often the case. But I prefer the ambiguity of “seemingly irreconcilable perspectives” because it gets closer to those paradoxes that are at the heart of the Christian faith. Whatever a married couple believes to be true about God’s design for marriage, at the end of the day they will sit down to dinner together, will have to earn money to put the food on the table, and hopefully will manage to kneel next to each other in the pew to worship God. The angular nature of human relationships means that a man might talk a tough game to his buddies at work, but he will perhaps not relate those conversations to his wife as they are getting ready for bed. And she might feel like the two should equally share the household chores but will still insist that it is his job to get up and investigate an unexpected noise in the middle of the night.
This, perhaps, is the energy at the heart of Paul’s instruction to the church in Corinth, when he reminds them that Eve was taken from Adam, but after that, every man was born of a woman. Allison, after painstakingly working through both views of 1 Corinthians 11:3–16, offers “lessons for complementarity”:
God has designed his female and male image bearers to be interdependent. Sharing equal dignity and being significantly differentiated from one another, they interdependently fill out and mutually support one another relationally, familially, vocationally, and ecclesially. Such interdependence was and is forged out of mutual dependence: Eve was dependent on Adam for her existence, and from that point on every man is dependent on a woman for his existence, and this divinely designed reality underscores the organic unity of women and men. (393)
It is the mutual support of a child being grateful to his parents for their sacrifices to raise him up. It is the interdependence of women lifting each other up in prayer. It is the hard work of the whole Body of Christ reaching out to a lost and perishing world.
Be More Like Jesus. Allison insists that he is not attempting to find a “third way” between complementarians and egalitarians. Other reviewers believe he is doing just that. Todd Pruitt, for example, wonders if he is attempting to sidestep essential issues, like women deacons, and does not find his effort persuasive.5 In an interview with Preston Sprinkle, Allison joked that everyone might be disappointed.6 And certainly, if the reader expects to be told which way is best, Allison indicates his own view where appropriate, but doesn’t litigate between the two sides. Rather, he shows the strengths and weaknesses of the ways that complementarians and egalitarians — both — read the Bible. He is attempting to ask a more basic question: What do the Scriptures show about the way God relates to His creatures, and, therefore, how should we relate to each other? Questions of role distinctions might be easier to answer if believers agree on those more basic points.
If finding a third way is what Allison is doing, he is not the first. Elyse M. Fitzpatrick and Eric Schumacher, in their book, Jesus and Gender: Living as Sisters and Brothers in Christ (Kirkdale Press, 2022), desire to help the reader see how their “paradigm-shattering perspective transforms the understanding and relationships we have with each other as sisters and brothers in Christ” (27).
What paradigm might they be referring to? Being more like Jesus. It is to be “Christic”:
Christic men and women? Hmm…What might that mean? Since this might be the first time you’ve heard that phrase, here’s what we mean by it: First, the word “Christic” probably means what you think it means: “relating to or resembling Christ.” So, it follows then that a Christic model would be a way of defining and speaking about gender that is built around and secured to what we know about how Jesus and his followers thought and taught. (25–26, emphasis and ellipsis in original)
At the outset, explaining their movement away from traditional complementarianism (3–7), Fitzpatrick and Schumacher take Philippians 2:5–8 as their guiding text. Christ emptied Himself on the cross, eschewing the exercise of power and authority, taking on the role of a slave. This should be our model. They distill that message into the following formulation: “In Christ, believing men and women are to glorify God by cooperating for the advance of the gospel and imitating Christ in voluntary humiliation, reciprocal benevolence, and mutual flourishing” (70).
They warn believers to be careful of wielding power (107). They speak forthrightly about what happens to Christ’s body when sexual immorality is allowed to go on undisciplined (178). They discuss how to raise Christian children (153–71). In the final reckoning, they refuse to answer the question of whether or not women should be ordained (190).
As the reader, I kept thinking of people I know personally on both sides of the subject who believe themselves to be living Christic lives. How might they hear Fitzpatrick and Schumacher? Certainly, these authors write authoritatively about questions of authority. They explicitly tell other Christians both what to believe and what to do. In contrast, what I appreciated so much about Gregg Allison’s book was how simply and plainly he placed his considerable knowledge and expertise in the hands of me, the reader, and trusted my intelligence and good faith to be able to think through the issues. Ultimately, each Christian is accountable to God alone and therefore must be convinced in his or her own mind about what kind of life God is most pleased with. It is the Holy Spirit Himself who arranges believers into Christ’s Body, to serve each other and display His glory.
Mutual Joy, Help, and Comfort. Corporately, the only way to achieve unity in the bond of peace, which every believer professes to desire, is to hold together God’s Word with the call to take up one’s cross, die, and follow Him. For me, as I’ve tried to wend my way through a divided church, to relate to men and women without inadvertently placing stumbling blocks in front of those who so desperately need the grace of God, I have learned the hard way that, if something is “non-essential,” the person who holds it most dear is the one called to give it up. Equality, as Jesus demonstrated on the cross, isn’t something to be grasped, but is a barrier to the communion through which the universe is held together.
Emptying the self into the hands of Jesus is not a pain-free exercise, but it is lifegiving. It produces the fruit of love that Adam and Eve let go of, so long ago. It is something that God Himself can accomplish if we put ourselves in His hands.
Anne Kennedy, MDiv, is the author of Nailed It: 365 Readings for Angry or Worn-Out People, rev. ed. (Square Halo Books, 2020). She blogs about current events and theological trends on her Substack, Demotivations with Anne.
NOTES
- Aquinas: “The active principle in the male seed [sperm] always tends towards the generation of a male offspring, which is more perfect than the female. From this it follows that conception of a female offspring is something of an accident in the order of nature” (66).
- Louise Perry’s The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century (Polity Press, 2022) is a must read.
- I highly recommend Mary Harrington’s seminal work, Feminism Against Progress (Regnery, 2023), for those interested in the subject.
- Bari Weiss and Louise Perry, “How to Find Love in 2025,” The Free Press, February 14, 2025, https://www.thefp.com/p/watch-how-to-find-love-in-2025?hide_intro_popup=true.
- Todd Pruitt, “Dignity, Differences, and Gender Roles,” byFaith, August 8, 2025, https://byfaithonline.com/dignity-differences-and-gender-roles/.
- Preston Sprinkle, “The Beauty of Complementarity: Dr. Gregg Allison,” YouTube video, 56:32, posted January 16, 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqUNCnLO0gU; Allison’s comment is at 18:26.
