Kvinnelige ledere i kirken

Abstract

Female Leadership in the Church. A Pentecostal Perspective This study discusses the question of whether women may lead on every level in a Christian church, from a Pentecostal hermeneutical perspective. It offers a short historical introduction to how female leadership has been understood and practiced in the Pentecostal movement, with a particular focus on the Norwegian context. The study argues that a theological debate regarding female leadership is still both necessary and fruitful for both sociological and theological reasons. The authors suggest that in general, a Pentecostal hermeneutic should not only accentuate propositional theology but also give weight to narrative theology, including paradigmatic experiences that may be identified in the biblical stories. Through an examination of female leaders in the biblical narratives, it is demonstrated that female leadership is both described and encouraged. The study also discusses objections to female leadership based on certain Pauline texts and concludes that these texts do not represent a general rejection of female leadership in the church.

Keywords

• Gender
• Female leadership,
• The Pentecostal movement
• Thomas Ball Barratt
• Pentecostal hermeneutics
• Systematic theology