SOURCE: “Clement of Alexandria: Conflicting Views on Women,” in The Second Century: A Journal of Early Christian Studies, Vol. 7, No. 4, Winter 1989-90, pp. 213-20.

In the following essay, Kinder contends that Clement believed that while women should be subservient to men in daily life, they could ultimately be equal before God.

In his introduction to the Library of Christian Classics translation of Stromata III, Henry Chadwick pronounced Clement of Alexandria's views on marriage as “curiously confused.”¹ One might also regard Clement's views on women as equally so. Clement grants to women equal capacity with men for attaining virtue and perfection.² He even acknowledges for them the possibility of training in the Christian philosophy.³ However, all that Clement grants to women he appears to take away when he asserts that women succumb more easily to temptation,⁴ that their place is in the home, waiting on their husbands,⁵ and that...