Understanding the Cultural Context of Paul’s Writing on Widows in 1 Timothy 5:3-16

Paul’s first letter to Timothy serves as a looking glass into issues within the churches in Ephesus. This letter provides instruction, guidance, and clarity needed in today’s era as churches are plagued with cultural assimilation. Paul’s clear guidance to Timothy is required today to ensure that the church operates and worships God as He has directed and that the leaders of the church steward and shepherd the people of God according to the biblical standard.

In the fifth chapter of Paul’s first letter to Timothy, we come across a unique prescription that Paul provides to Timothy regarding how the church handles the financial support of widows. When reading this, one item stands out: the church's responsibility to provide for widows, so long as the woman meets specific criteria. Paul’s guidance is not a blanket statement that the church is to resource and provide for all widows, but only certain types of widows. This may raise the question of many of us wondering, “Why is this necessary to address?” The necessity of addressing this is to provide Timothy with guidance on how to properly steward the church's resources, ensuring they are used appropriately to distribute them to the proper widow.

To understand the significance of this issue, we must understand the cultural context of widows in antiquity. We cannot assume that widows are what we might expect today within the age range of senior citizens. Within the First-Century, it has been estimated that forty percent of women between the ages of forty and fifty were widows and that, as a group, they comprised some thirty percent of women in the ancient world.[1] These numbers come from a significant collection of Latin inscriptions in Rome. In 1 Timothy, we are presented with two types of widows: those over the age of 60 (5:9) and young widows (5:11). The age qualification that warrants church support is specified at 60, and for the woman to meet the spiritual and character qualifications in 1 Tim.5:5;10.

These qualifications were given for two reasons:

1.     The church did not have adequate resources to support them all

2.     Many widows did not have a proven track record of faithfulness making them eligible for the support of the Christian community.

Paul addresses this issue in 5:6, describing the type of widow not worthy of receiving the church's resources by describing the widow as living in “self-indulgence.” Additionally, 5:11-12 dictates that a young widow should not be placed on the resourcing list due to their sexual desires. What Paul addresses as a problem with the young widows is not a desire for remarriage, but what would often take place within the city of Ephesus amongst young widows in the community that was affecting the young widows within the Christian community. The problem was the promiscuous lifestyle many of the young widows would fall into when they felt sensual impulses that alienated them from Christ.

            Roman law did not address the sexual abstinence of young widows. After their husbands deceased, the sexual desires drove the women who were still able to bear children (under the age of 60) to adopt a lifestyle of promiscuity. Roman society endorsed the expectation that men would be promiscuous in their youth and not sexually monogamous in their marriage. Therefore, the young widow may replicate the conduct of the single and married males in their lifestyle now that they are a “new woman” as they are now widows. This comes down to the customary ages of marriage for young women.

            In Roman society, men of senatorial status married in their early twenties, and the lower ranks married in their late twenties and early thirties.[2] Aristocratic women (women of high society) typically marry in their mid-teens, and others in the Roman West in their later teens.[3] This disparity in age accounts for the large amount of widows in this era. The issue was that the young widows believed they had the choice not to enter into marriage again. Yet, while maintaining an active sexual lifestyle as, they were being led by their passions, which drew them away from Christ, and as a result, they had ‘strayed after Satan’ (5:11,15). This is why Paul includes the additional description of this type of widow in 5:6 as living in “self-indulgence is dead even while she lives.”

            Additionally, some widows (both old and young) in Roman society would receive financial security with their dowry upon the husband's passing. Additionally, the eldest son was legally obligated to care for the widow. He would become ‘the lord of the dowry’ by accepting financial and physical responsibility to take care of the woman, and failure to do so rendered them liable to prosecution.[4] Therefore, if the widow had a family, they were the primary agents responsible for their well-being, not the church, so the church's resources would be free to support the widow who genuinely needed it. However, this was often abused by many in taking advantage of both means of support to live a lavish lifestyle and engage in promiscuity (5:6).

            Another instruction Paul provides to Timothy is encouraging the younger women not to be “idle.” Timothy is to promote the women in marriage and, if they become widows, to be industrious and not idle. A highly valued woman in antiquity was considered (mores maiorum) values on ancients, is an industrious woman who idealized the domesticity of spinning and weaving. Idleness among rich women was considered a vice and not a virtue; however, men of status could boast that their hands had never known work.[5] Paul addresses in 5:13 that not only were the young widow's idlers going about the houses, but also gossips and busybodies speaking that which was not becoming and should not be mentioned.

            Due to these temptations and the influence of the pagan society on young Christian widows, Paul encourages the younger women to “get married, bear children, keep house, and give the enemy no opportunity for reviling.” (1 Timothy 5:14). Not only would this prevent them from sinning and tarnishing the household of God, but there were also legal, financial, and social incentives to ‘marry and have children.’ The Augustan laws would penalize unmarried men from the ages of twenty-five to sixty and unmarried women from twenty to fifty who did not have children and did not marry if they were divorced or widowed.

            Paul’s instruction to Timothy on how to deal with and handle the class of Christian women who were widows was a vital part of pastoral ministry during the First-Century. Understanding this surrounding cultural context as one reads Paul’s first letter to Timothy helps the reader understand the significance of what is being read and the weight under which Timothy was as he was the apostolic delegate ordaining elders, training men for ministry, and shepherding the church in what authentic Christian community is meant to be.

[1] Krause, Witwen und Waisen im Römischen Reich, I, p.73.

[2] R.P. Saller, “Men’s Age at Marriage and Its Consequences for the Roman Family,” CP 82 (1987): 29-30

[3]  B.D. Shaw, “The Age of Roman Girls at Marriage: Some Considerations,” JRS 77 (1987): 43-44.

[4] W.K. Lacey, “The Family in Classical Greece,” (London: Thames and Hudson, 1968), pp.116-118

[5]  Philo, Det., 34.