Is subordination within the Trinity really heresy?
In recent years some evangelicals on different sides of the gender roles controversy have questioned the Christological orthodoxy of their opponents, charging them with “tampering with the Trinity” or even with “heresy.” While I have great respect for some of these figures on both sides of the controversy who are issuing such charges, “tampering with the Trinity” and “heresy” is strong language, stronger, I think, than the evidence warrants.1 Nor, in fact, do Christological views coincide as closely with views on gender roles as some of the advocates of either position claim. Thus, for example, I frequently talk with Christians who espouse a complementarian view of gender roles while expressing surprise that anyone would deny the full equality in all respects of the Father and the Son. By contrast, I and some other scholars I know who support a very broad range of women’s ministry affirm the Son’s subordination to the Father. To be sure, that subordination may be voluntary, and we do n
