Question:
Does 1 Timothy 2:12 mean a woman should not teach a Sunday school class?

 

Answer:
1 Timothy 2:12 says: “But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.” This instruction was to be carried out when God’s people are gathered unto Christ’ Name as an assembly.

1 Timothy 2:12 talks about usurping authority over a “man” and only children (no men) are in a Sunday school class taught by a woman. Titus 2:4 shows us that older women are responsible to teach younger women. But she shouldn’t teach a boy publicly in a Sunday school class when he becomes a man.
“Does this apply to women teaching ungodly men how to be saved?” To “usurp authority over the man,” would be to take the position as head of the man by speaking to a group of men publicly, whether saved or not. But she can teach men privately, as Priscilla instructed Apollos with her husband Aquila in the privacy of their home, for “they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly” (Acts 18:26).