08 — The Reception and the Critique

Behr-Sigel’s work has been received in three incompatible ways: as the pioneering theology of a “grandmother of Western Orthodoxy,” as a personal opinion of no ecclesial weight, and as the entry point by which alien assumptions have been introduced into Orthodox theology. This section states the criticism at full strength with its proponents named, and then examines the separate problem of how her positions have been over-claimed by others — including, in her lifetime, by an ecumenical official whose paraphrase went well beyond anything she published.

Tradition: Orthodox (France — Russian emigration milieu); §4.2 both-sides section — the collection adjudicates nothing here

Files in This Section

• The Orthodox Criticism — the objections, at strength, with names: the exegetical charge, the personalist charge, the Protestant-residue charge, the ecumenical charge, and the “no ecclesial weight” response.
• The Over-Claiming and the Record — how her position has been amplified past what she wrote, by advocates and by opponents alike, and what the record actually supports.

Why Two Files

Because two different things are going on, and running them together produces the confusion that surrounds her.

The first is a genuine theological dispute among Orthodox about whether her arguments are sound. That dispute is live, the objections are principled, and METHODOLOGY §4.2 requires that they be stated at full strength, with their proponents named, and left unadjudicated.

The second is a documentary problem: a great deal of what circulates as “Behr-Sigel’s position” is not traceable to her published text. Some of the amplification is friendly — advocacy organizations claiming her as an authorization — and some of it is hostile, treating the most extreme available reading as the real one. In at least one documented case an ecumenical officer publicly attributed to her and to Bishop Kallistos Ware a conclusion stronger than either had published. Sorting the record from the reception is a matter of accuracy, not of defense.

The Method Here

The repository’s model for handling a contested modern figure is St. Maria of Paris §07, which states the case for and the case against each at full strength, names the parties, and does not adjudicate — precisely because the dispute is live, the reservations are principled rather than frivolous, and a verdict handed to the reader would be less true than the weighing. The same discipline governs here. The reader who has felt the force of both sides is closer to the truth of a contested modern theologian than one who has been given a conclusion.

See Also

• 07 — The Ordination Question — the position under criticism
• 09 — Legacy and Assessment — the provisional weighing
• St. Maria of Paris: Methodology — the repository’s model
• Fr. Kallistos Ware: The Contested Questions — the parallel case
• Women in Orthodoxy — the doctrinal frame

References

• Hopko, Thomas, ed. Women and the Priesthood. Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1983; rev. ed. 1999.
• Farley, Lawrence, Fr. “Women, Lived Orthodoxy, and Ordination.” orthochristian.com.
• Hinlicky Wilson, Sarah. Woman, Women, and the Priesthood in the Trinitarian Theology of Elisabeth Behr-Sigel. London: T&T Clark, 2013.
• METHODOLOGY.md §4.2, this repository.