2 Timothy 3:6-7

Paul evidently had the false teachers in Ephesus in view in these verses, though what he wrote here applies to all false teachers. Teachers manifesting some of the characteristics he just enumerated made a practice of gaining entrance into households in which the wives were spiritually weak (lit. little). He described these women further as dominated by various sins, responsive to their sinful desires, and seemingly ever learning but never really able to comprehend the truth of God. They cannot learn the truth because what they are learning is falsehood. The false teachers captivated such women with their teaching. Women were probably more susceptible to the influence of false teachers than men because in Paul’s culture women occupied a lower status in society. [Note: Wiersbe, 2:250.] Furthermore, they did not usually have as much education as their husbands. Another explanation is that they had more time on their hands with which they could dabble in various things.

"It is the immaturity and thus the weakness of these ’childish women’ that make them susceptible to the false teachers. Paul does not use the term to derogate women but to describe a situation involving particular women. That he uses a diminutive form shows that he is not intending to describe women in general." [Note: Knight, p. 433.]