Are you a weak woman, or are you a weak woman?

The Bible says some women are weak, and it is meant in a bad way. The Bible also says Christians are to be weak, but it's meant in a good way. Let's look at the two ways.

Weak in a bad way

Silly, weak woman!

For among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions (2 Timothy 3:6)

The Greek word for weak here is gunaikarion, a contemptuous term meaning a silly, foolish, little woman.

Jamieson, Fausset, & Brown Commentary says,

laden with sins—(Is 1:4); applying to the “silly women” whose consciences are burdened with sins, and so are a ready prey to the false teachers who promise ease of conscience if they will follow them. A bad conscience leads easily to shipwreck of faith (1 Ti 1:19).

Matthew Henry's Whole Commentary on the Bible says of these women:

A foolish head and a filthy heart make persons, especially women, an easy prey to seducers.

John MacArthur Commentary says,

 Weak in virtue and knowledge of the truth. and weighed down with spiritual and emotional guilt over their sins, these women were easy prey for the deceitful false teachers.

Weak in a good way

Weak woman is strong. She prays and relies on Jesus.

For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:10).

Gill's Explains it this way:

for when I am weak, then am I strong; when he was attended with all the above mentioned infirmities, when laden with reproaches, surrounded with necessities, followed with persecutions, and brought into the utmost straits and difficulties, and was most sensible of his weakness in himself to bear and go through all these things; then was he upheld by the divine arm, and strengthened by the power of Christ; so that he was not only able to sustain the conflict, but became more than a conqueror, and even to triumph in the midst of these adversities;

The difference is that silly weak women are loaded down with unrepented-of sin, which clouds their mind and they fall prey to untruth. Weak women who rely on the glorious Divine Arm to lift them are wise, strong, and in His power. They know the truth and see Him clearly. They possess virtue and radiate calm wisdom.

So. Are you a weak woman or are you a weak woman?