F4F | Kris Vallotton Keep Silent?

Welcome to another installment of Fighting for the Faith here on YouTube. If you've ever attended a charismatic church where they have women prophesying and teaching and giving sermons during the sermon time and they think that this is totally legit and totally biblical, go ahead and hit the subscribe button.

You've been deceived by people who are literally disobeying the very clear commands of scripture

Now, case in point, we're going to be heading over to Bethel Church in Redding, California. We're going to be listening to Chris Vallotton and a message he recently posted on his social media titled, keep silent?

Keep silent? Where, no joke, he is going to literally attempt to make 1

Corinthians 14 say and mean the exact opposite of what it actually says, and his argument is deplorable.

Number one, it's obvious, and I'll point this out to you, he doesn't know Greek. And number two, this is a clear example of an overt attempt to overthrow what the clear text says and ignore the cross -references because Bethel lets their women teach and preach.

So yeah, this is going to be fun. So grab some popcorn. We're heading over to Bethel. Let's get to it.

Here's Chris Vallotton. The most restrictive verse in the entire Bible, 1

Corinthians 14, verse 34, the women are to keep silent in the churches for they're not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves just as the law also says.

If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it's improper for a woman to speak in church.

Verse 36, was it from you that the word of God first went forth, or has it come to you only?

Verse 37, if anyone thinks he's a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which

I wrote to you are the Lord's command. But if anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized.

Now, I'm going to point out, he's read the text, and just on its face, it literally contradicts unambiguously, straight up, straight at it, the practices of Bethel Church in Redding, California.

Now, let's take a look at the text first, and we'll look at the cross -reference and the cross -references so that we can see what the

Bible really says in this regard, and then we'll watch his different techniques to try to overthrow this passage in order to basically blunt it, deflect it, or in his case, he's going to try to make it mean the opposite of what it says.

So if you have your Bible, we're going to have it right here on the screen. By the way, the software

I use is Accordance, A -C -C -O -R -D -A -N -C, so you can find it at Accordancebible .com,

and no, they do not pay me to say that. But it's 1 Corinthians chapter 14. We'll start halfway through verse 33, because that's where the context of this portion of the text begins, and we're going to just read it, and then we're going to look at a cross -reference because the cross -references help us, because one of the important understandings of Scripture, in order to rightly get it, you must look at the cross -references because Scripture always interprets

Scripture. So here's what it says. Now I'm translating namas there as Torah rather than law, because there isn't actually a commandment that says, thou shalt not let the women teach in church or in the synagogue.

I'll show you why it's Torah from the cross -reference, but just note that. So they should be in submission as the

Torah also says. In submission as the Torah, we'll talk about that. So if there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home, for it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

Or was it from you that the word of God came, or are you the only ones it has reached?

If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the

Lord. If anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized. So very clear, taken as a whole, as a unit, it very clearly says that women are to be in submission as the

Torah says, that they are not permitted to teach in church, and that it's shameful for a woman to speak in church.

And then Paul even notes, was it from you that the word of God came? Are you the only ones it's reached? So if anyone thinks he's a prophet, they have to acknowledge that this is an actual command from God.

Now, how do we know that's really what the prohibition is? Answer, scripture interprets scripture.

And so here's our cross -reference, 1 Timothy chapter 2 verses 11 through 14.

Here's what he says, Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness, I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man.

Rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then

Eve. Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.

So here we see why the submissiveness of the submission is important, because this is a creation order thing.

Adam was formed first, then Eve, and Adam was not deceived, the woman was. So this is why

I translate namas from 1 Corinthians 14 as Torah, because we learn about Adam and Eve and the order of creation and Eve's being deceived by the serpent from the

Torah. That's what it means. So you're going to note the two cross -references blend together perfectly, and they explicitly say, women are not to teach, women are not to have authority over a man.

Now third set of cross -references then is going to be from other pastoral epistles. You can find these in 1 and 2

Timothy as well, but we're going to take a look at Titus chapter 1, and we're going to note that there is a very interesting thing that goes on, and that is that the

Apostle Paul gives instructions to Titus as far as setting up and establishing pastors in the church and watch the qualifications.

So he says, this is why I left you in Crete, so that you might remain in order and appoint elders in every town as I directed you.

If anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife and his children are believers, not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination.

For an overseer, that's a pastor, as God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick -tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of the good, self -controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined.

He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and to rebuke those who contradict it.

Taken as a whole then, all of these passages are saying and applying the same principle, the same prohibition.

It is only men who are permitted to preach and teach and have authority over men in Christ's church, and this is a command of the

Lord. So again, 1 Corinthians 14, as in all the churches of the saints, the women should keep silent in the churches, they're not permitted to speak.

That's literally what the prohibition is and says, and anybody who says otherwise is engaging in deception.

But watch what Chris Vallotton does. His first move now is going to be to do what a lot of evangelicals do when they read a biblical text that contradicts their doctrine or their practices, and that is that they go to kind of this blurring of distinctions where they'll say, well, some people think that it means this, another group thinks that it means this, and another group might think that it means this, and so you have all these contradictory ideas, and they basically say all of them are valid even if they contradict each other, and that is no way of determining what a text says or means, and that's his first go -to obfuscation method.

Watch this. Two schools of thought, and I'm going to tell you about the first one. You've probably heard it if you've been in church for very long, and if they let women talk when they come through the doors, they have a reason for that.

They think this is contextual, and here's what they think the context is. Men sat on one side of the room.

Notice he's not looking at any of the cross -references. One school of thought thinks this is contextual.

Check the cross -references. They all agree. Women are not permitted to teach in Christ's church. And women sat on the other side, and they thought, you know, during the teaching that women would actually shout questions to their husband on the other side of the room, and there was this chaos, and therefore

Paul said, women, you're the ones causing the trouble, so in church be quiet.

Don't talk at all. And so that's one way to solve the issue. Now it is true that women sat on one side and men sat on the other.

We know that. Yeah, that is true. That was a practice for many, many, many centuries, more than a millennia in Christianity.

It's only within the past few centuries that that practice stopped. Through tradition, that that is traditionally true, that men and women did not sit on the same side of the church, on the same side of the room.

Here's the struggle with that. First of all, we're not talking to the Hebrews who would have understood

Old Testament law. Are you with me? In other words, if we were talking to Jews, it would make sense that men knew things that women didn't because men were taught the

Torah and the women weren't. Yeah, a little bit of a note here. We're going to take a look at something that he seems to have overlooked, and that is in Acts chapter 18.

In Acts chapter 18, we learn this about the church of Corinth. Let me read it out.

Acts 18 .1. After this, Paul left Athens and he went to Corinth, and he found a

Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because Claudius had commanded all the

Jews to leave Rome, and he went to see them. Where did he see these Jews, by the way? In Corinth.

And because he was of the same trade, he stayed with them and worked, for they were tentmakers by trade, and he reasoned in the synagogue every

Sabbath and tried to persuade the Jews and the Greeks, which, by the way, was

Paul's normal modus operandi, and that was that he literally would preach the gospel in the synagogues to the

Jews first. Aquila and Priscilla are Jewish believers in Corinth.

So already we've got some Jews in the church at Corinth where Chris Vallotton is trying to paint the church at Corinth as completely filled with only converted pagans, but that's not exactly true.

Now it is true that they ended up reviling Paul and Paul ended up teaching to other people, but there was already a mixture of Jews, converted

Jews to Christianity and pagans who were converted to Christianity there in the church at Corinth.

So what he's saying is not historically or biblically accurate.

We're talking to the Corinthians who were polytheists, they all came out.

Not all of them. Not all of them. Greek mythology. So the men don't know any more than the women do.

Yeah, what about Aquila and Priscilla? They were Jews in Corinth. Just saying.

Secondly, if this verse, if Paul was saying to them, you have to ask, listen, wives, ask your husbands at home, what do you do with the fact that Paul said it's better to not marry so all the women who have no husbands have no one to ask?

Yeah, this is no way of doing exegesis. So what do you do with all the women who were not married? They have nobody to ask, so it can't mean that.

That's not how you do this. And it goes on.

Now you're listening, I can tell. Or you're totally bored. And I'll just take that you're listening.

The other way to answer this question is with this, would you put that shot on the screen up, please?

Now this is the fun part. This is where he shows that he doesn't even know basic Greek.

He doesn't even know the letters of the Greek alphabet. Alpha, beta, gamma, delta, zeta, eta, theta, iota, kappa, lambda, mu, nu, he doesn't know any of that.

No, not at all. Watch this. The other way to read this question, the other way to read this is as a question.

In other words, women are to keep silent in the churches. This is a way that some theologians believe this should be read.

Women are to be silent in the church. Now some theologians, I gotta point this out, there are no

Greek scholars who are New Testament Greek scholars who buy into what he's saying.

I found one person who put this forward as a possible alternative translation, and the woman was like an

SJW feminist liberal lady who thinks that white patriarchy is the bane of all humanity.

For they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the law says. If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it's improper for a woman to speak in church.

Okay, after that verse, there's this little thing. That, that, that explicit of disassociation.

Do you see that? Okay, that little thing is called the letter

Ada. It's pronounced A, A, and no, it's not

Canadian. Expletive of disassociation. Oh my goodness.

He doesn't even know it's an Ada. He's not, he can't even pronounce it. Watch what he says. That little

N, that thing that looks like an N? It's called an

Ada. That little thing that looks like an N? He doesn't know Greek. He's never studied it.

At the end of this verse, the closest, there is no, there is. No, no, no. It's not at the end of that verse.

It's at the beginning of the next verse. Perfect translation for it in English, which is why a whole, but no translator translates it.

Okay, I want you to hear that again. He literally claims no translator translates this, this occurrence of the, of the, of the word

A. Yeah, okay, which by the way, this is silly. If you were to take like Greek, first year

Greek, you're going to learn your, your, your alphabet. You're going to learn about nouns.

You're going to learn about nominative and dative and genitive and accusative. You're going to learn a little bit about verbs and stuff, but you're also going to learn about conjunctions or, or Chi and, and, and dad, which is, but you're going to learn all this in first year

Greek. A here is literally, I'm not making this up. It's, it's the conjunction or, and every first year

Greek student knows this. He calls it that little N thingy. He ain't studied

Greek before, but I want you to hear this again. He literally is going to claim nobody translates it.

We'll show you some people who do, but hang on. At the end of this verse, the, the closest, there is no, there is no perfect translation for it in English, which is why a whole, but no, too mysterious to translate.

Oh man, there's no perfect translation for it. Later translates it, but it means, yeah, no translator translates it.

Listen again. End of this verse, the closest, there is no, there is no perfect translation for it in English, which is why a whole, but no translator translates it, but it means what?

No translator translated it, but he's going to translate it, that, that, that N thingy.

No translator translates it, but he's going to translate that N looking thingy as what?

Okay. Let's take a look at the text real quick.

Again, 1 Corinthians 14, 1 Corinthians 14, it's verses 35 and 36 that are in question.

If there is anything they, the women, desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home for it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

Now that the word in question is right here. It's the beginning of verse 36, a, and it's literally translated as, are you ready?

Or yeah, in fact, look at that. The ESV translates it as or wow, that's impressive.

So the ESV translated, he says, nobody translates it yet. The ESV translates it as or, and the reason for it is quite simple because it's or here's

BDAG, which is the, the number one New Testament Greek lexicon out there.

And here's your particle, a, a marker of an alternative, or it's a disjunctive particle.

You know, you can talk about to give or not to give either, or yeah, this is how you translate this particle here and it's just unbelievable.

So yeah, or was it from you that the word of God came? See yeah, the

ESV has no problem translating it, NIV translates it also, and he said nobody translates it.

And here's the NIV, did the word of God originate with you or, look at that, the

NIV translates or, you know, a as or, or did, are you the only people it has reached?

Now they, they changed the order in the sentence in order to make it more readable in English, but it's, they translated as or, and yet Chris Vallatin says, no, no, no, but oh, and yeah, it's really tough, tough to translate that N looking thingy.

He doesn't even know what he's talking about. He's not taken Greek. No way, nonsense, it can't be.

So he, he's now translated as not or, which is what it is. It means what?

It can't be that. This is crazy. It's at the end of this.

Are you with me? No, it's not. So it would read like this. It's the beginning of verse 36.

The women are to keep silent in the churches. They're not permitted to speak, they're subject to themselves, just as the law says.

If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it's improper for a woman to speak in church. What? No way.

No, that is, see, he's literally, that little N thingy, it's called aneda.

It means or, or either, yeah. And he, by translating this, what may it never be?

He's now mistranslating this in order to make the text say the opposite of what it says.

This is obfuscation of the highest order by a man who demonstrably does not know

Greek. No way. And then Paul answers with this. Was it from you the word of God first came forth or has it come forth to you only?

And he goes on to say, I'm sorry, it goes on to say, if anyone thinks he's a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which

I write to you are the Lord's command. But if anyone does not recognize this, he's not recognized. Verse 36, the previous verse, was it from you the word of God came first, came forth, or has it come only to you?

In other words, in between verse 35 and 36, there's that little line that goes, what?

No, there isn't. That's the first word of verse 36, and it literally means or.

It doesn't mean what? This guy is totally deceiving.

He has to overturn this text because Bethel's practices are contrary to what this text actually says and means.

And how do we know it means this? Not only does Paul say that once, he says it twice, and all of the qualifications for a pastor are that they are men.

This guy is deceiving people, and what he is doing is absolutely demonic in its deception.

And he clearly doesn't know what he's talking about, hasn't studied Greek, it's obvious, and yet he thinks he's, he's, he's solved the problem.

No, all he's done is avoid what the real problem is. The problem is that Bethel is in direct rebellion against the clear prohibitions of the

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So until next time, may God richly bless you in the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ and His vicarious death on the cross for all of your sins.