22: UNEDUCATED WOMEN IN EPHESUS? 173educated to be teachers, and that this is why Paul forbade them to teach?
The actual historical evidence shows a much different picture:
(1) Many men and women in the first century had basic literary
skills, and very few men or women had education beyond this level.
Steven Baugh, an expert in the history of ancient Ephesus, writes,
Because women’s education in antiquity usually took place privately,
we get only a glimpse of it here and there. As for women’s literacy,
daughters of the upper classes needed some level of education for
their duties in managing large households. And though they were not
commonly found in fields like philosophy, women did read and write
literature and poetry during this period.^5Baugh mentions that from Ephesus we have several examples of
writing by women, including some poems and prayers.^6
Other sources indicate that in Greek culture, the “Hellenistic
school” form of education “endured with but slight changes to the end
of the ancient world,” and, “girls, too, were educated at all age levels.
In some cases they came under the control of the same officials as the
boys and shared the same teachers.... In other cases separate state offi-
cials were responsible for them.”^7
In Roman society, one of the characteristics of schools was “the
inclusion of girls in the benefits of education.”^8 The Oxford Classical
Dictionary notes that both Plato and Aristotle “believed that men and
women should have the same education and training.”^9 And in ear-
lier Greek society, “Papyri (private letters, etc.) show widespread lit-
eracy among the Greeks of Egypt,” while in Rome, “upper-class
Roman women were influential... many women were educated and
witty.”^10
(^5) S. M. Baugh, “A Foreign World: Ephesus in the First Century,” in Women in the Church: A
Fresh Analysis of 1 Timothy 2:9-15, ed. Andreas Köstenberger, Thomas Schreiner, and H. Scott
Baldwin (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1995), 46, with reference to H. I. Marrou, Education
in Antiquity, trans. George Lamb (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1956), 46.
(^6) Ibid., 47n140; additional evidence from several other sources is given on page 46nn136, 138,
and 139.
(^7) F. A. G. Beck, “Education,” in The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 2nd ed., ed. N. G. L.
Hammond and H. H. Scullard (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), 371.
(^8) Ibid., 372.
(^9) Walter K. Lacey, “Women,” in Oxford Classical Dictionary, 2nd ed., 1139.
(^10) Ibid.