Neo-subordinationism: The Alien Argumentation in the Gender Debate

Over the last forty years, the debate over gender roles in the home, church, and society has escalated in an unprecedented way among evangelical Christians due to the introduction of an alien argumentation that grounds the permanent, functional subordination of women to men in the being of God. This argumentation—which is termed “neo-subordinationism” in this article—states that there is a prescriptive hierarchical ordering of the immanent Trinity that is recognizable through the economic Trinity. In this Trinitarian hierarchy, the Son and the Holy Spirit are said to be ontologically equal but eternally subordinated in role and authority to the Father, with the Holy Spirit also functionally subordinated to the Son (for those who accept the filioque). Likewise, women are ontologically equal but permanently subordinated to men in role and authority. As such, they cannot serve in certain leadership capacities in the home, church, or society. This novel argument has shifted the gender debate from discussing anthropology and ecclesiology to theology proper, a shift that has been called the “turn to the Trinity.” This article argues that, while theology proper should inform all other areas of theological studies, reading perceived differences of gender roles into the immanent Trinity has serious systematic consequences. Thus, the equality of the Trinity should be preserved by excluding neo-subordinationism from the debate on gender roles. This is accomplished, first, by briefly reviewing the history of the gender debate with a particular focus on the emergence of modern complementarian and egalitarian perspectives and the entrance of neo-subordinationism into complementarian argumentation among evangelicals generally and Seventh-day Adventists specifically. Second, four significant problems of neo-subordinationism for Christian theology are discussed: (1) its failure to adequately account for all the canonical data, (2) its inherent logical inconsistencies, (3) its inaccurate reporting of church history, and (4) its ramifications for soteriology and the character of God. Finally, the article concludes with some recommendations for how to proceed in the gender debate without injuring intra-Trinitarian ontology

Hierarchy or Mutuality in the Trinity? A Case Study on the Relationship of the Son and the Holy Spirit in the New Testament

Statement of the Problem: Over the last forty years, the Trinity has become a central topic of debate among evangelical theologians in all disciplines due to the popularization of a newer conception of the Trinity—referred to by many as eternal, functional subordination (EFS), but will hereafter be called “neo-subordinationism.” Neo-subordinationism affirms that the three persons of the Trinity—Father, Son and Spirit—are fully equal ontologically, but denies equality in terms of roles, functions, and authority. It asserts that there is a unilateral-hierarchical ordering pattern that is essential to the triune God in which the Son is exclusively subordinated in function and authority to the Father, and the Spirit is exclusively subordinated in function and authority to the Father and the Son (for those who accept the filioque clause) in eternity. Although neo-subordinationism continues to grow in popularity, there are many evangelical theologians, who have heavily criticized this conception of the Trinity, declaring it to be a significant departure from Scripture and traditional Christian orthodoxy. While these scholars join neo-subordinationists in upholding the full ontological equality of the Trinitarian persons, they adamantly disagree with an eternal, essential, unilateral hierarchy in the Trinity. Purpose: This poster seeks to test the theses of these two positions regarding intra-Trinitarian relationships by way of a case study on the relationship between the Son and the Spirit in the New Testament (NT) in order to answer the following research question: does the NT portray the relationship between the Son and the Spirit as a unilateral-hierarchical relationship in which the Spirit is eternally subordinated in role, function, and authority to the Son or as a mutual-reciprocal relationship in which they equally share authority and have overlapping roles and functions? Methodology: This poster seeks to answer this question through an exegetical and canonical-theological analysis of relevant NT textual data by: (1) exploring whether or not there is a consistent, unilateral-hierarchical ordering pattern of the Son and the Spirit, (2) ascertaining whether or not the Son and the Spirit share any economic actions in the plan of redemption, and (3) examining the major historical movements of the Trinity in the NT to determine if there is a unilateral-hierarchical or mutual-reciprocal relationship between the Son and the Spirit

Dynamics of superconducting nanowires shunted with an external resistor

We present the first study of superconducting nanowires shunted with an external resistor, geared towards understanding and controlling coherence and dissipation in nanowires. The dynamics is probed by measuring the evolution of the V-I characteristics and the distributions of switching and retrapping currents upon varying the shunt resistor and temperature. Theoretical analysis of the experiments indicates that as the value of the shunt resistance is decreased, the dynamics turns more coherent presumably due to stabilization of phase-slip centers in the wire and furthermore the switching current approaches the Bardeen's prediction for equilibrium depairing current. By a detailed comparison between theory and experimental, we make headway into identifying regimes in which the quasi-one-dimensional wire can effectively be described by a zero-dimensional circuit model analogous to the RCSJ (resistively and capacitively shunted Josephson junction) model of Stewart and McCumber. Besides its fundamental significance, our study has implications for a range of promising technological applications.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figure

Detecting fractions of electrons in the high-TcT_c cuprates

We propose several tests of the idea that the electron is fractionalized in the underdoped and undoped cuprates. These include the ac Josephson effect, and tunneling into small superconducting grains in the Coulomb blockade regime. In both cases, we argue that the results are qualitatively modified from the conventional ones if the insulating tunnel barrier is fractionalized. These experiments directly detect the possible existence of the chargon - a charge $e$ spinless boson - in the insulator. The effects described in this paper provide a means to probing whether the undoped cuprate (despite it's magnetism) is fractionalized. Thus, the experiments discussed here are complementary to the flux-trapping experiment we proposed in our earlier work(cond-mat/0006481).Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure

Characteristics of First-Order Vortex Lattice Melting: Jumps in Entropy and Magnetization

We derive expressions for the jumps in entropy and magnetization characterizing the first-order melting transition of a flux line lattice. In our analysis we account for the temperature dependence of the Landau parameters and make use of the proper shape of the melting line as determined by the relative importance of electromagnetic and Josephson interactions. The results agree well with experiments on anisotropic Y$_1$Ba$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{7-\delta}$ and layered Bi$_2$Sr$_2$Ca$_1$Cu$_2$O$_8$ materials and reaffirm the validity of the London model.Comment: 4 pages. We have restructured the paper to emphasize that in the London scaling regime (appropriate for YBCO) our results are essentially exact. We have also emphasized that a major controversy over the relevance of the London model to describe VL melting has been settled by this wor

Vortex Collisions: Crossing or Recombination?

We investigate the collision of two vortex lines moving with viscous dynamics and driven towards each other by an applied current. Using London theory in the approach phase we observe a non-trivial vortex conformation producing anti-parallel segments; their attractive interaction triggers a violent collision. The collision region is analyzed using the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equation. While we find vortices will always recombine through exchange of segments, a crossing channel appears naturally through a double collision process.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Vortex Chains in Anisotropic Superconductors

High-T_c superconductors in small magnetic fields directed away from the crystal symmetry axes have been found to exhibit inhomogeneous chains of flux lines (vortices), in contrast to the usual regular triangular flux-line lattice. We review the experimental observations of these chains, and summarize the theoretical background that explains their appearance. We treat separately two classes of chains: those that appear in superconductors with moderate anisotropy due to an attractive part of the interaction between tilted flux lines, and those with high anisotropy where the tilted magnetic flux is created by two independent and perpendicular crossing lattices. In the second case it is the indirect attraction between a flux line along the layers (Josephson vortex) and a flux line perpendicular to the layers (pancake vortex stack) that leads to the formation of chains of the pancake vortex stacks. This complex system contains a rich variety of phenomena, with several different equilibrium phases, and an extraordinary dynamic interplay between the two sets of crossing vortices. We compare the theoretical predictions of these phenomena with the experimental observations made to date. We also contrast the different techniques used to make these observations. While it is clear that this system forms a wonderful playground for probing the formation of structures with competing interactions, we conclude that there are important practical implications of the vortex chains that appear in highly anisotropic superconductors.Comment: Topical review for Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter; large pdf file 1.9M