Several egalitarians on this blog have repeatedly accused complementarian spokesman Bruce Ware of arguing that women are not fully created in the image of God. As a complementarian, the idea that Ware would argue such a thing is indeed disturbing, since the Bible is unmistakably clear that both male and female are completely and equally the image of God. So I dutifully went to the CBMW web-site and found an article by Ware entitled Male and Female Complementarity and the Image of God.
Does Ware teach that women are not created in the image of God, or that they are somehow less fully the image of God than men? Here are a few statements from that article:
both male and female exhibit full and equal humanness as the image of God
all men, both male and female, are fully the image of God
Man and woman, then, both are fully the image of God and together share the responsibility to steward the earthly creation God has made.
the creation of male and female as the image of God indicates the equal value of women with men as being fully human, with equal dignity, worth and importance
As is often observed, since this was written in a patriarchal cultural context, it is remarkable that the biblical writer chose to identify the female along with the male as of the exact same name and nature as “man.” Male and female are equal in essence and so equal in dignity, worth, and importance.
Another clear biblical testimony to this equality is seen in the position of redeemed men and women in Christ . . . These New Testament passages reflect the Bible’s clear teaching that as male and female are equal in their humanity (Gen. 1:26-27), so they are equal in their participation of the fullness of Christ in their redemption (Gal. 3:28)
Scripture clearly teaches the full human and essential equality of man and woman as created in the image of God
the full essential and human equality of male and female in the image of God means there can never rightly be a disparaging of women by men or men by women. Concepts of inferiority or superiority have no place in the God-ordained nature of male and female in the image of God
Nowhere in Scripture is the differentiation between male and female a basis for the male’s supposed superiority in value or importance, or for female exploitation. All such attitudes and actions are sinful violations of the very nature of our common humanity as males and females fully and equally created in the image of God
From all this, it seems clear that Ware affirms that women are no less the image of God than men. In fact, he repeats that affirmation at every possible opportunity.
Yet Ware also wants to emphasize the distinction between male and female, and it is his effort to do that in connection with the image of God which leads to statements which seem to undercut his assertion of full ontological equality.
while God did intend to create male and female as equal in their essential nature as human, he also intended to make them different expressions of that essential nature, as male and female reflect different ways, as it were, of being human. Now, the question before us is whether any of these male/female differences relate to the question of what it means for men and women to be created in the image of God.
I will here propose that it may be best to understand the original creation of male and female as one in which the male was made image of God first, in an unmediated fashion, as God formed him from the dust of the ground, while the female was made image of God second, in a mediated fashion, as God chose, not more earth, but the very rib of Adam by which he would create the woman fully and equally the image of God. So, while both are fully image of God, and both are equally the image of God, it may be the case that both are not constituted as the image of God in the identical way. Scripture gives some clues that there is a God-intended temporal priority bestowed upon the man as the original image of God, through whom the woman, as image of God formed from the male, comes to be.
Much of what follows is relatively standard complementarian fare. Ware points to passages which speak of man’s temporal priority in creation and the fact that Eve was taken out of the man (1 Timothy 2:13 and 1 Corinthians 11:8). He makes much of the fact that both male and female are called adam, a word which is grammatically masculine (a weak argument, but one which many complementarians still insist on using). He wrestles with the statement in 1 Corinthians 11:7 that man is the “image and glory of God” while woman is the “glory of man.” In essence, Ware’s arguments in this section boil down to this: the order of creation points to a God-ordained male headship. Not something most egalitarians will agree with, but a fairly typical complementarian view.
Ware then discusses the fact that Genesis 5:3 speaks of Adam having a son in his own image and likeness, pointing out the obvious connection to the creation of mankind in the image of God in Genesis 5:1-2. Ware makes much of the fact that Adam only is mentioned here rather than Eve, and essentially argues that the image of God is passed to children through the fatherhood of the man.
This argument is, in my opinion, clearly a stretch. Why is Seth mentioned as having been born in the likeness and image of Adam only rather than Adam and Eve together? The most obvious answer is that Seth was male as Adam was male, and so more closely resembled Adam than Eve. There is no need to postulate some notion that the image of God is transferred via the fatherhood of the man rather than the parenthood of man and woman together.
Ware then connects Genesis 5:3 and 1 Corinthians 11:7 to make the point that both women and children are made the image of God through the prior existence of the man as image of God. He then draws the following conclusion:
What this suggests, then, is that the concept of male-headship is relevant not only to the question of how men and women are to relate and work together, but it seems also true that male-headship is a part of the very constitution of the woman being created in the image of God. Man is a human being made in the image of God first; woman becomes a human being bearing the image of God only through the man. While both are fully and equally the image of God, there is a built-in priority given to the male that reflects God’s design of male-headship in the created order.
In a footnote, Ware again asserts that by pointing to this “built-in priority” he does not intend “to communicate any sense of greater value, dignity, worth, human personhood, or sharing in the image of God that the male possesses over the female.”
In all this, Ware seeks to establish the notion that male headship is part of the created order and a fundamental aspect of our nature as male and female. That, again, is a fairly typical complementarian assertion. Yet his linkage of this assertion to the image of God is disturbing, in spite of the fact that he repeatedly asserts that men and women are fully and equally image of God. Ware wants to say that while we are both image of God, we express the image of God differently as male and female. But by using terms like “mediated” and “derivative” to describe how woman reflects the image of God, he sounds too much like earlier theologians who asserted that “the woman herself alone is not the image of God” (Augustine) or that “as regards the individual nature, the woman is defective and misbegotten” (Aquinas).
Once again, Ware clearly and repeatedly repudiates such notions of female inferiority, but he still wants to affirm some measure of male priority in the image of God. In essence, he is coming dangerously close to making an ontological distinction between male and female.
Yet even as I write that, I’m not sure Ware would see the distinction he is making as an ontological one. After all, he might protest, we affirm the full ontological equality of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; yet we also affirm that the Son is “begotten” of the Father and that the Spirit “proceeds” from the Father and the Son (or just the Father in the Eastern tradition). If these distinctions do not negate equality of essence, then perhaps it does not follow that Ware’s emphasis on Adam and Eve’s distinct origins necessarily negates the essential equality of the sexes.
At one level, Ware is doing what theologians often do: namely, affirming two seemingly paradoxical notions without necessarily resolving the paradox in detail. Just as we affirm that God is completely sovereign, yet in such a way that he is not the author of sin or one who does violence to the will of his creatures, so Ware is trying to affirm that man and woman are both fully and equally the image of God, while nevertheless asserting that the distinction between men and women is somehow rooted in our very nature and the way we bear the image of God.
The challenge for me is that I can accept that Ware means what he says about the full ontological equality of women, but I’m not sure what to make of his distinction. Saying that man and woman bear the image of God in different ways certainly goes beyond “functional subordination,” and it’s hard to see how it is anything less than an ontological distinction. Is there some middle category between ontology and function? Or is this a working out of Ware’s assertion that “function always and only follows essence”?
The first half of Ware’s article is a long and somewhat abstruse discussion of different views of what the image of God is. Ware begins with “structural views,” which identified the image of God as some attribute which was unique to humanity (such as reason or the possession of a soul). He then moves on to “relational views,” which saw the image of God being reflected in the nature of our relationship to God and to each other. Ware then discusses and promotes a view he calls “functional holism,” which sees the image of God as expressing the totality of what humanity is, what we do, and how we relate to one another. Ware summarizes this view as follows:
The image of God in man as functional holism means that God made human beings, both male and female, to be created and finite representations (images of God) of God’s own nature, that in relationship with him and each other, they might be his representatives (imaging God) in carrying out the responsibilities he has given to them. In this sense, we are images of God in order to image God and his purposes in the ordering of our lives and carrying out of our God-given responsibilities.
I think this notion is the key to understanding the distinction Ware is trying to make. He is essentially trying to affirm that men and women are both fully human and fully image of God (ontological equality), but that we cannot accurately represent God (“image” God) unless we are rightly related to him and to each other. Thus, Ware’s emphasis on the distinction in the way men and women have been created is meant to show that “functional subordination” is just as much a part of what it means to be made in the image of God as is “ontological equality.” This view also relates to his view of the Trinity, which I haven’t even begun to examine yet.
So where does that leave us?
First, I think we can safely say that Ware does not, in fact, teach that women are any less created in the image of God than men. When he uses terms like “mediated” and “derivative,” he does not mean “diminished.”
Second, I think we can all agree that Ware is arguing that gender distinctions go beyond mere differences in role, and are rooted in the created order. Most complementarians believe that to some degree or other, and most egalitarians view that notion as incompatible with ontological equality. Ware’s view is that ontological equality and functional subordination are both fundamental to the nature of the Trinity, and that being created in the image of God means that they are both fundamental to the nature of humanity.
Third, Ware seems to have a knack for saying things in a way that is sure to offend the sensibilities of most egalitarians. When Ware uses “mediated” and “derivative” to describe how women bear the image of God, does he not see how most egalitarians (and many comps for that matter) will naturally hear “diminished”? Is Mr. Ware so obtuse that he does not understand how inflammatory such terms will be to his theological opponents? Or does he simply not care? Whenever I read Ware, I do not come away convinced that egalitarians are reading him accurately; but I do come away feeling like Ware has framed things in a way which is sure to infuriate them. If Ware wants to communicate with egalitarians, he needs to stop trampling over their hot-buttons.
In the end, Ware’s teaching about the image of God is a highly nuanced theological argument which, frankly, is easily misunderstood. To me, this is the greatest area of concern. It is too easy to assume Ware’s language of derivation implies some kind of diminishment, and few people will really take the time to analyze all of Ware’s caveats and qualifications. As a theologian, Ware crafts his arguments carefully, and clearly repudiates what most egalitarians accuse him of affirming. Unfortunately, Ware seems to be a poor popularizer of his own theological views, and much gets lost when he tries to communicate with non-specialists. He does not seem able to anticipate how some of his arguments will be understood by the average pastor or layperson, much less by the average egalitarian. The end result is that some comps may misunderstand his teaching on the image of God as implying that men are inherently superior to women; while some egalitarians will use it to prove that comps in general and CBMW in particular do indeed teach that women are less “image of God” than men.
In this post, I’ve tried to interact with Bruce Ware’s teaching on men and women in the image of God carefully and critically. Ware has become such a polarizing figure for some egalitarians that I don’t expect them to be very satisfied with my critique. Some will no doubt think me too sympathetic or naive to see the clear implications of Ware’s teaching. But reading between the lines is not the same thing as reading critically. Judging from what Ware has actually written, egals and comps should be able to agree with Ware’s affirmation that women are fully the “image of God.” Where all egals, and some comps, will disagree with Ware is in his affirmation that male headship is an important aspect of what it means to be created in the image of God.
David, You are using the same argument most comps use about Ware, that those who disagree with him just do not understand him. We have heard it over and over.
It seems that Ware needs lots of people to interpret his writings and sermons for him. You have gone to a lot of trouble to explain that Ware does not say what he says.
) But then, you are not described as a ‘derivative’, so it is probably not as insulting to you.
But, I have a question. Do we receive our Image of God from the creation materials God used or the process of Creation? If so, then does that mean that man receives his Image of God from dirt?
)
And does Ware explain how Genesis 1 fits into his view?
This paper represents Ware’s views in 2002. In 2008 his views are found in
https://www.cbmw.org/Conferences/Denton-Bible-Church-June-2008/Complementarian-Vision-of-Creation
which is an audio of his presentation at Denton Bible church that caused such an uproar.
Even in the 2002 paper, one can see Ware’s persistent masculinism.
The name of the pair in the garden was Adam, not man. One does not translate a name into its meaning, the meaning is given in a footnote, the name is whatever it is. And in any case, the term Adam means human, both genders, and Ware knows this, yet tries to influence the reader by using the obsolescent “man” for both genders.
Here is a 2002 Ware quote: “The female’s becoming the image of God
through the male indicates a God-intended sense of her reliance
upon him, as particularly manifest in the home and community of faith.” This is simply not true in any explicit one-way sense, it is a conclusion of the non-egal way of understanding some text. Egals simply say time priority for the man means time priority for the man, it does not imply anything else. The woman being formed from the Adam indicates the man and the woman are made from the same stuff, their one-flesh unity.
Where does the Bible say priority indicates hierarchy? It does not.
Where does the Bible say one-flesh indicates hierarchy? It does not.
Yes, if you wear “blue” colored glasses, one may see “blue” tints to many texts in the Bible, the solution is to take those “blue” glasses off.
David,
Thank you for such an exhaustive study of Ware’s teaching.
I’m no theologian, so my understanding of Ware’s writings are, at best, very limited.
I don’t think we are supposed to be looking at the Trinity to figure out how we should relate as human beings. God never tells women to be as Christ, and men to be as God the Father, so to assume that we are imaging God in that way, is, to me, going a bit too far.
As you already expected, I read words like “mediated” and “priority of the man” and so on, as clear statements of what I consider to be Ware’s true intention: to explain the reason why men should have authority over women, something I don’t agree with.
He uses the word “priority” which can be defined as
” A preceding or coming earlier in time.”
or
” An established right to precedence.”
(there are more meanings, but these two seem more in context with what “headship” could mean)
Adam indeed was created first. Does that mean that he has the right to precedence? Authority over the woman? The last word?
I agree that he is stretching it a bit when he states that the image of God is passed on from the father.
I don’t agree with him that we only accurately image God if we are relating to each other within some given “roles”. God doesn’t say that, so why should we? I thought we most accurately reflect God’s nature as we allow Christ to live in us and his Spirit to bring forth fruit in us.
To me, Bruce Ware is reading too much into the Bible, and using it too much like a textbook. It reads like he’s coming to the text to find proof for his preconceived ideas. He believes men are to have authority over their wives (and pretty much in general), and he is reading the texts from that perspective.
I may sound a bit simplistic today. I’m finding it hard to accurately express my thoughts. Maybe it’s because I have little time, maybe I have to think it over a bit more.
Sorry if I’m not very coherent.
Thanks for this interesting discussion.
Your aside about “Ware’s assertion that “function always and only follows essence”" caught my eye. This seems to contradict your conclusion, for it seems to imply that the functional difference between men and women “follows” a difference in their essence, which I suppose is the same as an ontological difference. Now I would agree with this argument and turn it round, at least if the functional difference is permanent and without exceptions: if there is no ontological difference between men and women, there can be no permanent functional subordination.
Surely also if “we express the image of God differently as male and female” that is an ontological difference, not just one of function.
Thus I am forced to read Ware’s apparent denials of ontological differences as some kind of special pleading, an attempt to disguise a fundamental inconsistency in his thinking.
But then I have trouble seeing how the Son can be permanently submitted to the Father (a debatable notion) or even eternally begotten of him (the orthodox Trinitarian doctrine) without there being an ontological difference, while they are still of the same essence (again orthodox Trinitarian doctrine). Perhaps first we need to define “ontological” more carefully.
Only have time for a quick response: David, I agree with your excellent analysis but disagree with your conclusion. It seems that Ware wants to affirm the equal dignity, worth, imago dei, et al, of man and woman, but this does not mean that he actually does with his further statements and exegesis. What this suggests to me is intellectual dishonesty.
I also want to comment on the “function follows essence” idea but it’ll have to wait!
Thanks for posting this, btw!
In 2002, Ware wrote: “I will here propose that it may be best to understand the original creation of male and female as one in which the male was made image of God first, in an unmediated fashion, as God formed him from the dust of the ground, while the female was made image of God second, in a mediated fashion, as God chose, not more earth, but the very rib of Adam by which he would create the woman fully and equally the image of God. So, while both are fully image of God, and both are equally the image of God, it may be the case that both are not constituted as the image of God in the identical way. Scripture gives some clues that there is a God-intended temporal priority bestowed upon the man as the original image of God, through whom the woman, as image of God formed from the male, comes to be.”
Does anyone else see the ADDITIONS to Scripture that Ware makes, such as the concept of mediated and unmediated fashion?
The obvious solution is to REJECT Ware’s spurious additions to Scripture.
Man and woman are in the image of God not because of where they came from, but because God made them that way.
Here is where Ware disagrees with himself about the full equality of women in the image of God.
“will here propose that it may be best to understand the original creation of male and female as one in which the male was made image of God first, in an unmediated fashion, as God formed him from the dust of the ground, while the female was made image of God second, in a mediated fashion, as God chose, not more earth, but the very rib of Adam by which he would create the woman fully and equally the image of God. So, while both are fully image of God, and both are equally the image of God, it may be the case that both are not constituted as the image of God in the identical way. Scripture gives some clues that there is a God-intended temporal priority bestowed upon the man as the original image of God, through whom the woman, as image of God formed from the male, comes to be.”
Oder of creation does not make the man primary or more like God than the woman. Yes, there was a purpose in this action by God but not to determine who was to be considered primary. Rather it was to teach the man what aloneness was and that it was ‘not good’ for humans to be alone. When that lesson was learned by the man, then is when God fashioned the woman out of the same substance of the man so that he could clearly see that she was like him and equal to him able to fulfill his need of companionship.
Much more can be said about Ware’s misunderstanding of the meaning of ‘adham’. It was a generic term for humanity and used throughout the OT in that way. Sometimes a generic term ends up being used both generically and specifically, but that does not change it’s primary meaning. The word adham was not ‘purposefully masculine’ as Ware thinks. Perhaps, Sue can address this misunderstanding.
David,
I am a new poster here…have been following a couple of threads, and appreciate what is beeing attempted here. Thanks to all on both sides who are trying to work out Christian unity in the midst of theological disagreement.
I’m an egalitarian whose primary fellowship has been in staunchly complementarian circles. Prior to moving 3 years ago, I attended a church whose former senior pastor was mentored by John Piper, whose current senior pastor has indicated his honor at having Wayne Grudem’s brother as his dentist (I kid not
),and where I had the honor of listening to Bruce Ware preach on Job during a recent visit back to the area. This church is wonderful in many ways, and I can affirm that the leadership there has no desire other than to serve God. I also believe the same to be true of Piper, Grudem, Ware, etc. – the “big guns” in the complementarian movement. These men have contributed in significant ways to the cause of Christ, and deserve respect for it.
That is why I am so grieved at the substance of their teaching regarding gender.
Ware is a genuine, compelling speaker, who gives every indication of wanting to serve God and His people, including women. I’m pretty sure he knows the effect his words have; but I think he and others often mentioned believe they are standing for truth in the face of heresy (not just error), and that they must draw the line clearly. In doing so, they have radicalized in areas such as Trinitarian doctrine, Biblical translation and authority, and the “derivative” image of God discussions. They have committed to a premise and follow it to the end – and have submitted those things which should judge that premise to its interpretation.
I believe that Dr. Ware is sincere in his desire that women be treated well and the Scripturally undeniable fact of their status as image-bearers be honored. Unfortunately, I also believe he has built an interpretive edifice that leaves no option but to try to harmonize ontological difference sufficient enough to explain functional inequality with ontological equality. This isn’t paradox; it’s contradiction.
From what I’ve seen, most thoughtful egalitarians understand where he’s coming from; they are responding to what they percieve as an invalid argument. I don’t think his position is that of most moderate complementarians either.
The Denton Bible Church debacle is another example; he really believes that what he said will help women in abusive situations – based on his absolute faith in his interpretation – even though a mass of evidence exists that shows his conclusions not only to be incorrect, but potentially harmful.
For the record, I wandered through my old church’s web site a few days ago. It looks like they’ve removed their link to CBMW. Hmmmm….
MM Outreach Inc has just completed a DVD on the Trinity called "The Trinity: Eternity Past to Eternity Future, Explaining Truth & Exposing Error" and the last two parts in the 3 section (2 DVD) set revolves around the refutation of Bruce Ware's teaching on the subordination of Christ. The DVD set will be available in mid October.
In my research on this subject for the script, I had the opportunity to dialog with Bruce Ware on the subject of subordination. What I found is that Bruce Ware makes clear statements that sound very orthodox affirming both the Deity of Jesus Christ and the equality of women. However after affirming these things, he turns around and makes clear statements that appear to go against his prior affirmations. Why does he do this? I think only Bruce Ware can tell us for sure, but it seems to me that the second set of statements that Ware makes are out of the realm of "normal" and he is concerned that he not be called a heretic so he repeats orthodox doctrine first of all to try to lay aside any concern about his teaching. The problem is that his other statements cannot be logically and fully held at the same time as his original affirmations of equality. I pointed that out to him and he didn't appreciate it.
For example, if one says that Jesus is full Deity, equal with the Father, but then one turns around and says that the Father is the one who has ultimate authority, ultimate praise must go to the Father and the works of God belong to the Father not the Son, as the Son had to be given works that rightfully belong to the Father, then these statements do not go hand-in-hand with the statements about Jesus' full Deity.
Also Ware's insistence that Jesus is not to be prayed to as the Father alone has ultimate authority is very problematic. I personally discussed this issue with him and Ware admitted to me that his view does have some problems. In answer to my showing him scriptures where people prayed to Jesus, Ware said he believes that only the apostles had a relationship with Christ where they could talk to him in prayer because they had a face-to-face relationship with Jesus before he died – something that Christians since then do not have. When I showed him that all are to call on the name of Jesus and Stephen did that as he was being stoned to death, he could not answer my questions and chose to cut short our discussion. I find this very troubling. I think others will also find his second set of views very troubling as these views contradict the historic view of the full Deity of Jesus Christ.
If I had to put a name to what Bruce Ware teaches about Jesus as God the Son in the Trinity, I would call it "derivative authority". The second person of the Trinity, in Ware's view, does not have his own works, nor his own authority but he has to have these things granted him by the Father for all of eternity. So, in essence, the Word of God was not Creator on his own authority but he had to be given the "right" to create. This view of placing Jesus under the rule of the Father is extremely troubling to me and I think that Christians who are willing to think this issue through to its logical conclusion will also be troubled.
‘Ware’s view is that ontological equality and functional subordination are both fundamental to the nature of the Trinity, and that being created in the image of God means that they are both fundamental to the nature of humanity.’
Ware does not believe that Jesus has all authority and power, and he also believes that we cannot pray to him because of this, yet Jesus IS Almighty God. Ware’s so-called ‘distinctions’ put him on dangerous ground.
http://strivetoenter.com/wim/2008/04/20/hierarchical-teaching-influences-the-doctrine-of-the-trinity/
‘Surely also if “we express the image of God differently as male and female” that is an ontological difference, not just one of function.’
I would like to add:
Sure and so now we know why Genesis 1 describes humanity made in God’s image, and also ‘he made them male and female’ that is, humanity was made male and female, NOT that male and female were made in God’s image. (The Hebrew terms in Gen 1 on humanity differientated for ‘male and female’ are used of the animal kingdom). So like the animals we are male and female, but in God’s image we are human.
Leaving aside for the moment that I disagree with the basic comp reading of Genesis (which I still believe is fundamentally eisegetical), I am floored by the notion that, as a woman, my possession of the image of God is “derivative”. Since when did my godliness and full hiumanity (biblically to be fully human means to be in the image of God) depend upon my marriage? If my husband were to die, disappear, desert me or some such thing (and these things happen to real Christian women) would I cease to be in the image of God? Was I less in the image of God before I married? Is my single adult daughter less in the image of God without a man in her life? I don’t want to read into this man’s statements something he didn’t say, but aren’t the implications of this that i am spiritually ehanced (or whatever the right word would be) by being in an appropriate sexual relationship (ie marriage)? does anyone actually think that?
Mediaeval theologians said some dreadful things about the inferiority of women, but ironically they believed that the best way for a woman to atone for her femininity was to remain celibate, bypassing relationship to the male altogether. (shakes head)
David,
Thank you for a judicious review. I think you do a far better job than Bruce Ware at adhering to the Bible’s clear teachings and avoiding pulling rabbits out of the exegetical hat. I don’t exegetical magic even when someone does it in the name of the framework I feel most comfortable with (egalitarianism).
Believer333, one smart cookie I’ve noticed, nails it in saying that Ware disagrees with himself too often. It’s always possible to cite Ware against Ware when he goes out on a limb. But it gets old after a while.
It isn’t that hard to have a fully supported version of complementarianism in harmony with the entire witness of Scripture. Evangelicals might learn a few things about how to do it from the Orthodox (including John Chrysostom) and the Catholics.
But a fully supported version would have to be more flexible than many versions of compism are (including what has become Tradition in the Orthodoxy and Catholicism), which can’t seem to accommodate “for such a time is this” examples of leadership on the part of women in most every sector within the biblical witness. Not to mention the eschatological hope of passages like that of Joel quoted by Peter. Why anyone would want to minimize the scope of such passages is not clear to me.
I also appreciate the comment that Piper and company are fully committed to the Gospel as they understand it, no less than the next Christian. I would not deny them the hand of fellowship, even if they might for some reason deny the hand of fellowship to me or think of me as a heretic.
It’s them, not me, who will have to face the music someday if they sin against the Holy Spirit by declaring that something the Holy Spirit is doing is actually of the devil. Spiritual discernment remains a gift of God, not something one can learn from a book. It’s something I continue to pray for, not something I think I or anyone else “possesses.”
Well written post, David. I appreciate your fairness. The way you wrote is a model of what my dream for this blog has been, meaty, thoughtful, irenic.
According to Ware, a woman cannot be in the image of God unless she lives out male headship. There are no corollary requirements for men. I consider I escaped from a cult.
Gender parity and the subordination of women should not have an equal place at the table. If that were so, then we are saying that there is preference for freedom and equality.
Second rate status on the basis of race, class, or gender would be no problem if we all lived according to 1 Cor. 13. Indeed.
Why have laws? Because humans are sinful.
If a marriage is to include two sinful human beings, then women ought to have the same rights within marriage as men. Otherwise it is an abomination.
And this isn’t against anyone posting here. This is because some women are victims of the vicious and despicable anti woman rhetoric of ideologues who preach this stuff and do not offer a safe house for the victims.
As long as people are suffering, that should take first place, and the egotistical aspirations of males should be put on the back burner.
I refuse to talk nice, just because there is game being played here that this doesn’t hurt people. It does.
Just like smoking and drunk driving. We don’t pussy foot around other wrongs. Why this one?
David,
I really appreciate you taking the time (and your post demonstrates that you took some careful time) to share your views. Thank you.
Cheryl’s comments were extremely interesting. If this is true, that Ware feels it is wrong to pray to Jesus, then it sheds a lot of light on what Ware is actually saying about women (since he believes women reflect the submissive role in the same way that Jesus is submissive to His Father).
I don’t understand how such views *can’t* be ontological. I am a big fan of the concept of paradox, but not when the word paradox is used to prevent onlookers from questioning flaws in an argument.
Wow, great comments. Still don’t have time to comment on the function/ontology question, but want to underscore something Molly said:
I am a big fan of the concept of paradox, but not when the word paradox is used to prevent onlookers from questioning flaws in an argument.
Whenever someone reacts with anger, deflection, avoidance, or challenge of the integrity of the questioner when his/her views are challenged, a red flag should go up. These things are indicative of questionable motive on the part of the view-holder.
Such reaction may or may not reflect upon the validity of the actual views, but at least shows the level of integrity with which those views are held.
I have a dear friend, whom I love. She considers herself a “Biblical Unitarian”. She and I have had many, many conversations about this in the past decade or so. They are not always happy conversations.
The first time I listened to Bruce Ware speak about gender roles he talked about the relationship between the trinity and marriage. In all honesty, except for his frequent blanket statements to affirm the deity of Jesus, he sounded very much like my friend. I want to affirm Cheryl’s remarks on this thread. She is the first person I have encountered on the internet that seems to have picked up on the same thing I did, and I am glad to see that she is working on a response to this. Thanks, Cheryl.
I have read that Ware believes that the Godhead does not have one unified will, but has three wills. I think this helps to explain his laser-like focus on “authority/submission structures”.
Thanks for this post, David. I think that posts such as this provide a wonderful ground for discussion and understanding.
I think Suzanne touches on important topics. I don’t have an antinomian bone in my body, so whenever I hear the word “law” used positively, I perk up.
Accountability structures (AKA hierarchy) are very important. So are provisions for people who sin and/or who are victims of sin. It is useless to pretend otherwise.
It is also important that comps and egals speak out against unbiblical applications of a complementarian configuration of authority. One unbiblical application is, without a doubt, physical and/or verbal abuse by one spouse against another. Another unbiblical application: when it becomes an excuse for one of the spouses to remain a spiritual infant.
Egals need to speak out against these things no less than comps because egal arrangements, if they are healthy, involve domain-based authority configurations which, because they work on the basis of a hierarchy of authority, are also subject to forms of abuse connatural to hierarchy.
For example, there are an increasing number of two-career egal marriages that fall apart these days, or at least become very ugly, because the kitchen and child-rearing is delegated to the wife by mutual consent but she is unable to give those things sufficient attention.
Instead of a traditional dinner table and a restful, relaxed time with one’s mother or one’s mother and father, you have trips to McDonald’s and Taco Bell and kids left to organize their after-school hours on their own.
A spiral of blame and self-blame follows, avoidable NOT by sharing responsibility in those domains (an impracticality in many cases), but by biting the bullet and putting one career on hold.
Thus we have stay-at-home Dads, not just Moms, like Scott Palin. I myself did this for a period when my first two children were young.I know what it’s like to be the only father with kids at the neighborhood playground.
To be honest, what I remember most about those years is learning an awful lot about the hopes and fears of mothers vis-a-vis their children. As a father, I have my own hopes and fears, but they often seem to be of a different kind.
But I disagree completely with the notion that the (neo-)traditional arrangement in which the husband has over-all authority, the wife domain-based authority in central areas, and the principle of mutual consent (1 Corinthians 7:5) is given wide though not unlimited scope, is per se an abomination.
I have seen and continue to see many excellent marriages which work along these lines. No amount of overheated rhetoric will convince that such arrangements are abominable by definition. It is demeaning to suggest that they are.
Provisions for offenders and victims of offenders is very important. My goodness, even non-Christians know this. In my hometown, which has a high density of gays, there is a safe house for victims of gay abuse. Furthermore, the offenders are now facing jail time where they will enjoy the company of like-minded individuals.
There are evangelical ministries that involve safe houses for victims of abuse. The number of congregations getting involved in transitional housing ministries in the Midwest is mushrooming. The prime beneficiaries are victims of alcohol, substance, and spousal abuse, forms of sexual predation, and/or mental illness. I took a bunch of teenagers this summer to an inner-city situation in which an evangelical United Methodist congregation is buying up and fixing up one house after another for this purpose. Kids from the some of the families they are helping worked alongside of us on the fixing-up projects.
All I wanted to do is spend time with these kids because they were so love-deprived. Most of them apparently have never had a male give them their full attention w/o a stomachful of booze in their gut, and violence/sex on their minds.
It was also a hopeless situation. How can a week of respectful interaction undo years and years of abusive interactions, which the victims themselves fall into, on a default basis? Congregations who do this kind of ministry deserve the full support of the entire body of Christ.
The language of equal rights applied to this discussion solves nothing at all. In my marriage, which is egal, by mutual consent my wife has overall authority in the kitchen. I take orders from her, not the other way around. It doesn’t mean I am without rights whatsoever, but I don’t have equal rights. It is a hierarchical arrangement in which the notion of equal rights is meaningless. Just like in an employer-employee relationship and in a parent-child relationship.
then we are saying that there is preference for freedom and equality.
I meant to write “NO preference for freedom and equality.”
Thanks to all who said they appreciated my efforts in writing this critique. It took more time than I wanted to invest, and if John Hobbins hadn’t repeatedly expressed a desire for its completion I might well have just dropped it.
I’ve been encouraged that most of the commenters here have responded by interacting with specific arguments by Ware, instead of just making the sweeping generalizations of his views which have become commonplace.
As I see it, there is certainly much to question about Ware’s teachings. He does seem to “disagree with himself” at various points, and it does indeed get tiring trying to understand how he integrates apparently opposing ideas. Whether this is an example of intricate theologizing or theological sleight-of-hand is certainly open to question.
As a complementarian, I have no problem with people questioning Ware’s views or criticizing weaknesses in his arguments. Contrary to Lin’s assumptions, I am not trying to defend Ware or to “explain that Ware does not say what he says.” Neither am I using the concept of paradox “to prevent onlookers from questioning flaws in an argument,” as Molly has asserted. I’m merely trying to understand and critique what Ware does and does not say.
The point the more “invested” egalitarians here seem to miss, and the point which John Hobbins seems to be working so hard to get across to his fellow egals, is that egals gain nothing by distorting the arguments or impugning the motives of various comp teachers. There is much in Ware which will make the average comp squirm or at the very least leave him scratching his head. Yet when egals say, “Ware says women aren’t fully the image of God,” and the average comp goes and reads twenty statements by Ware affirming that women are fully image of God, he or she naturally concludes that the egals are distorting Ware’s views because they have an axe to grind. By all means, argue that Ware is inconsistent and assert that while he affirms full ontological equality, he says some things which nevertheless seem to undercut it; but caricature his views, and you’ll merely engender sympathy for Ware and other comp spokesmen.
The same of course, can be said of comps who distort the teachings of egalitarians. Many of the moderate egals here moved in that direction precisely because of comp teachers who have overreacted to egalitarianism.
It’s not about being “nice,” it’s about being accurate in our criticisms and strategic in the way we communicate with each other.
“There is much in Ware which will make the average comp squirm or at the very least leave him scratching his head.”
David, we seem to have reached the point where we are just picking on each other and for that I am very sorry. it all goes back to my shock over your post about your wife. I do want to apologize because what you deem is normal is not what I deem as normal.
)
However, I think you are very smart but are downplaying the obvious contradictions in Ware’s teaching. Motivations don’t matter. The teaching does. That is why I said what I did about Ware always needing interpreters for his teaching. I really should have said ‘apologists’ for his teaching because about the only people really questioning Ware are soft comps and egals until this post.
But you are quite wrong about the ‘average’ comp squirming and scratching their heads. It may be the case for a few soft comps who are studying on their own but it is not the case for most. I can say this because I was heavily involved in this for 20 years, know the players and the audience.
Ware is a very respected seminary professor with wide influence. Yet, we do not see many educated men in the compworld questioning his teaching. What we see is that no only are they going along, they are filling up his speaking schedule.
“Average” comps in the pews will not see the contradictions in his teachng and that is why CBMW focuses on ‘roles’, rules and formulas to ‘apply’ the teaching. They never question the premise so they do not see the contradictions.
Ware is mainstream whether you, John or anyone else disagrees. I know this for a fact. And, while I can dismiss his teaching on women, I simply cannot dismiss his teaching on the Trinity. That is messing with the deity of our Lord, Jesus Christ.
As my friend Cindy Kunsman has pointed out on her blog about cults, most religious cults mess with the Trinity to gain power and control over others. We see this in Mormonism, JW’s, etc. That is where we are headed with their teaching on the Trinity and contrary to what some here think
Ware, Grudem, Moore and Mohler are very mainstream and are making quite a few alliances with many denominations (Not John’s because his it too liberal) and other evangelical type churches.
“It doesn’t mean I am without rights whatsoever, but I don’t have equal rights. It is a hierarchical arrangement in which the notion of equal rights is meaningless.”
I think Sue has made it clear she had no rights at all in her hierarchical situation. That would mean that hierarchal teaching in a comp church would be very damaging to her and others in her situation. And, Sue is right…we have laws because we are sinners.
The problem with comp teaching is that the unregenerate who take advantage of the teaching actually look like they are good ‘leaders’ who rule their home to their comp peers/leaders when in fact they are bullies and some abusers. If Sue seeks help there, she is told to submit more.
Neither am I using the concept of paradox “to prevent onlookers from questioning flaws in an argument,” as Molly has asserted.
Quick clarification, David: I wasn’t asserting that *you* were saying that and in no way meant to imply such. I’ve just heard the “paradox” argument used FOR Ware’s teachings over and over again—-that even though it doesn’t make sense, it’s a paradox (so we have to accept it and/or cannot critique it). To me, that’s a really lame defense of an argument.
I truly wasn’t intending to point a finger your way. If anything, I meant to stand up and applaud you. Your post here is tremendously written. Wayne and I must have been posting at the same time last night, but I was thinking the same thing he ended up saying (only I didn’t say it, because I’m not the head cheese around here-ha): THIS is the spirit of what this blog is supposed to be about. Well done.
Quick clarification, David: I wasn’t asserting that *you* were saying that and in no way meant to imply such. I’ve just heard the “paradox” argument used FOR Ware’s teachings over and over again—-that even though it doesn’t make sense, it’s a paradox (so we have to accept it and/or cannot critique it). To me, that’s a really lame defense of an argument.
Thanks for the clarification, Molly. Sorry for misunderstanding you.
By the way, I would agree that simply claiming a paradox is a lame defense of an argument.
Who has caricatured Ware’s views? Who has even distorted these views?
How can you distort or caricature something liek this?
“The son always submits and the father never submits and marriage is to imitate this.”
How can any man be so deprived of normal human feelings that he would do something like this to another human being? How much easier if it is taught to him as something that glorifies God.
David, we seem to have reached the point where we are just picking on each other and for that I am very sorry. it all goes back to my shock over your post about your wife. I do want to apologize because what you deem is normal is not what I deem as normal.
Lin, I truly appreciate your apology, but I’m not sure what to make of it. What, exactly, do you assume I consider to be “normal”?
Lin, I truly appreciate your apology, but I’m not sure what to make of it. What, exactly, do you assume I consider to be “normal”?
September 24, 2008 12:14 PM
If I explain, it might offend you so I am walking on eggshells here. On your original post about your verion of a man submitting to his wife, you said your wife told you she was overwhelmed (about having so many young children right after the other) and you explained to us that you had to seek God’s permission whether or not to have any more for a while. I thought her letting you know she was overwhelmed would be your cue from the Holy Spirit to cease for a while in pursuing that course but you did not think that.
I realize that later you explained that your wife went along with how you handled it. I thought it not normal that you were the only one who had to seek the permission from God to stop having children for a while.
I know we have hashed this over and over and you have clarified some things about your wife’s involvement that were not in the original post. I just did not think it was normal that she did not have decision making priority over her own body when overwhelmed with her situation. She had to let you seek God’s permission instead of her seeking it and then gaining your support as well.
You are free to live anyway you want so please do not take offense. I just did not see it as an example of your submission to your wife at all. I saw it as a perfect example of a benevolent dictatorship.
)
I have heard the kitchen story now several times. Ware does not mention the wife having domain-based authority at all. It was the shock of my life when I realized that I would not have ANY domain-based authority in my own home.
I can’t describe the difficulty of living without ANY authority. It is a crime to make anyone live like that and it is a crime that such a thing be taught in the pulpit and in the church. It is a total crime. To deprive someone of authority either by brainwashing or violence is a crime.
I am not accusing any here of this, whatever my private thoughts might be.
Yesterday my daughter said to me, “Mom you are pretty mild in comparison to M*****. You should hear her talk.”
M*** is the wife of a complementarian seminary professor. She gave up attending church with her husband a few years ago. She is at the point that she can’t talk about these sermons without using very strong language.
There are a bunch of us who would rather be told that we are going to hell than be bound to slavery and a second rate existence.
I am not unique in my feelings. I get emails all the time. I am just someone who has little to lose, and I am willing to be outspoken.
David,
People can and should investigate for themselves what Dr. Ware writes and preaches regardless of what anyone else says about him. If someone concludes that egals are distorting his views because they have an axe to grind, so be it, although I doubt this would happen with the types of statements that have been made on this blog. It is not misrepresenting or caricaturing Ware to only state one of his views and not another when those two views are contradictory; pointing out the contradiction is actually more incriminating than pointing out the incorrect teaching.
I do think that motive – intellectual or spiritual, anyway – plays into any debate about doctrine because these doctrines come from men, and because of the matter of trust and credibility. Jesus not only rebuked the teachings of the Pharisees but also exposed the attitudes of their hearts. “But in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.” “But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man.” “And if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.” Yes, it was Jesus saying these things and not a mere mortal, yet we mortals must also possess this type of discernment.
I am not speaking of personal attack (or defense), but of noting the fallacies in teachings, as well as reactions to challenge of these teachings, that are indicative of some type of spiritual error, or dishonesty. Such error and dishonesty isn’t always conscious on the part of the author; we all have great capacity to deceive ourselves.
But we are talking about spiritual realities, spiritual truth. This is no minor issue. I don’t think we should be interested in preserving a person’s image (as opposed to their dignity and respect for them as persons) if they are a public representative of God’s truth; they are accountable. Luke 17:1-3:
He said to His disciples, “It is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble. Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.”
People often have a “sense” about something being wrong with a teaching or statement though they may not be able to put their finger on it, but they may pick up on contradictions and inconsistencies. We are all subject to this, not just prominent individuals like Bruce Ware.
If two principles praised in the Bible are not allowed considerable application, any marriage, comp or egal, will be undermined.
Those principles are (1) domain-based hierarchy and authority; and (2) mutual consent.
The virtuous wife in Proverbs 31 is the one who “oversees the affairs of her household” (v. 27). Or, as Titus 2:5 has it, wives are to be encouraged to be “good managers of the household.”
In a variety of circumstances, this particular configuration of domain-base authority may not be the appropriate one, but it remains, for good reasons, a standard set-up.
As far as I can see, if either an egal or comp denies this, they need to explain why. In denying the principle of domain-based authority, they implicitly challenge clear biblical models, not to mention traditional mores extending back thousands of years.
The principle of mutual consent ["symphonos" in Greek] is applied by Paul to the realm of sexual intimacy in 1 Cor 7:4-5. The application is wise and traditional according to Jewish teaching, which coincides for Paul with Christian teaching in this instance.
I think it’s obvious that the principle of mutual consent is applicable in a variety of spheres. If either a comp or an egal denies this, they need to explain why.
In the specific case touched on by Paul, the “comp in denial” needs to explain why a husband is permitted to refuse to have sex with his wife if that is what his wife desires. Of course, what Paul has in mind here is not refusal on a case-by-case basis, but in terms of a pattern. Paul explains why the husband is not permitted to refuse in very clear language in 1 Cor 7:4.
The “egal in denial” will have to explain why a wife is permitted to refuse to have sex with his husband, once again, not on a case-by-case basis, but in terms of a pattern.
I do not live in a predominantly comp environment, so I can’t speak as easily of comp excesses on the above points from first-hand experience. I assume there are plenty of examples. I can speak about egal excesses from personal experience.
When my wife Paola became pregnant with our oldest son Giovanni, we were both pastors in Italy. The Waldensian Church in which we are both ordained is a very egal church. We asked permission of the Tavola (the national governing board of the church) that one of us be allowed to go half-time. Permission was denied. We hadn’t even decided who was going half-time yet, but our feminist colleagues were intransigent on the point and did not want a precedent set. The ideology (according to Italian labor law, often ignored in practice) is that family and two full time jobs can and must go together, period.
Unfortunately, and I admit our own stubbornness in the matter, no compromise was reached. We flew to the United States for a week, arranged for a meeting with the bishop of the United Methodist Church of the Wisconsin Annual Conference, who told us without blinking an eye that she would arrange for us to be pastors in Wisconsin according to whatever time configuration we thought appropriate for our family situation. Freedom at last.
I remember how encouraged Paola was when a pastor from Germany serving in Italy told her she was doing the right thing. It was a time of strain for us because many of our (strongly feminist) friends from seminary viewed us as traitors to the cause.
I would encourage comps and egals, not to stop being one or the other, but to give wide play to the above principles within the context of faithfulness to 1 Cor 13.
John,
Forced equality is not any kind of Biblical egalism I have ever even heard of. That is simply wrong thinking and you were right to RUN!
To me, as a BE, this just means there are some who claim to be egal but are not, as they start from a flawed premise.
On Ware, I am overjoyed to see that people are not agreeing with him hook, line, and sinker on this blog. My concerns are with those who do not know of any alternative to his type of teaching and simply do not know enough of the Bible to see where he makes up stuff.
”The Waldensian Church in which we are both ordained is a very egal church. We asked permission of the Tavola (the national governing board of the church) that one of us be allowed to go half-time. Permission was denied. We hadn’t even decided who was going half-time yet, but our feminist colleagues were intransigent on the point and did not want a precedent set.”
That was their particular problem. Such is not an ideology of those who believe in mutuality. Please do not tout it as such. Sorry you had to go through that. It must have been very stressful.
”If two principles praised in the Bible are not allowed considerable application, any marriage, comp or egal, will be undermined. Those principles are (1) domain-based hierarchy and authority; and (2) mutual consent.”
Good points. The only problems I see is where some think they can decide for others what their “domain based authority structures” should be and the duration of them. People change and marriages should be like living organisms whose form changes as they mature.
“Such is not an ideology of those who believe in mutuality.”
I agree, but believe me, that is not what my friends think. They consider themselves to be arch-defenders of mutuality.
“My concerns are with those who do not know of any alternative [and] do not know enough of the Bible to see where he makes up stuff.”
Perhaps the only place that you may not be able to find an alternative to this kind of teaching is in a Lifeway bookstore and congregations that strictly adhere to their product.
But even in that case, it is still possible to pick up any Bible and refute excesses directly from the Word of God. Even in that case, it’s possible to turn to more moderate comp authors Crossway publishes.
Since the issue came up on this blog, I have not yet, in talking with fellow evangelicals in Wisconsin mega-churches, found a single one in which the Ware approach predominates.
Moderate forms of complementarianism are popular in this neck of the woods.
If I actually had to deal with the Ware approach to compism on a daily basis, I would be tempted to write a tract entitled “How to be a biblically faithful Christian and a complementarian without adopting the views of Bruce Ware on marriage and the Trinity.” It would be irenic in tone but firm in substance. I would also be tempted to reuse with attribution a number of things David Lang said in the original post.
I think I've seen a "hardening" of comp. positions among many evangelicals, and not just the
players in the debate. Most pastors and lay Christians rely on scholars to interpret the issues for them. In a world without moorings, Ware and other names often mentioned as comp. leaders are seen as heroes standing against those who would deny the core truths of the faith. It could be argued that in some ways, their reputation is well earned.
Unfortunately, when these same scholars identify egal.ism (or anything else, for that matter) as a threat to orthodoxy and produce a mountain of writing making their case, it takes a lot for Christians who have come to trust these leaders and have learned at their feet to seriously analyze their claims (or to even recognize that there's anything to analyze). It takes even more to get those Christians to take seriously the protestations of those thus targeted.
This isn't meant disrespectfully; it's just that a pastor who is trying to deal with the day-to-day life of a church or a lay member with a job and family to worry about usually doesn't have the time or resources to untangle the arguments and evidences presented. And if the problematic teaching is presented as integral to the Biblical whole that these folks value with all their hearts, by teachers they look up to, there's very little inclination to do so.
Re: John & Paola's experience – all I can say is that I find it unbelievable that ANY church organization would be so inflexible when families are involved, though Christian history is full of examples of truths (and people) sacrificed on the altar of misguided idealism.
John, I don't claim exhaustive knowledge of evangelical egal. opinion, but I've read quite a bit, and I have never heard of any scholar or leader advocating a tit-for-tat, rigid 50-50 structure, or demeaning family life; they have dirctly repudiated these ideas. I've never seen them promote the two-career household as an ideal, either. What I have seen are calls for increased appreciation of traditional "women's work" and the home sphere, flexible delegation of responsibilities based on gifts AND needs (that whole "love" thing), and freedom for all Christians to serve God as their gifts and situations lead – not according to any arbitrary framework. And conflict within two-job households isn't just an egal. problem; comp.s also wrestle with the stresses of overloaded schedules and conflicting priorities.
You mentioned limited experience in heavily comp. circles; it seems that some of your experiences may have muddied the picture of what Biblical mutuality is about as well. Not that the egal. side is all sunshine and light – but there are differences between what you describe and where Biblically based egal.s are coming from, as opposed to secular feminism, etc.
Glad you landed in a good place.
QUOTE:I will here propose that it may be best to understand the original creation of male and female as one in which the male was made image of God first, in an unmediated fashion, as God formed him from the dust of the ground, while the female was made image of God second, in a mediated fashion, as God chose, not more earth, but the very rib of Adam by which he would create the woman fully and equally the image of God.ENDQUOTE
Ware is mistaken. In Genesis 1 we have the account of God creating the human which included the future woman, she was within the “one flesh” union (quite literally).
Then, in Genesis 2 we see that God fashioned the woman from the human’s side. God divided the original “human” into male and female.
The Hebrew words for “CREATED” and “FASHIONED/FORMED” are different. Here is a quote from Bushnell
QUOTE:the first chapter of Genesis describes the original creation of “Adam,”–mankind. (We must bear in mind the fact that the word “Adam” is applied sometimes to mankind, and sometimes to the individual being who was husband of Eve). The second chapter describes the elaboration of the first Adam into two sexes. The second chapter nowhere uses the word “create,” of Adam, but a totally different word,–”formed.” Please look up this same word, “formed,” in Isaiah 44:2, 24 and 49:5, and convince yourself that it is used there exclusively of all idea of creation. Then turn to Isaiah 43:1, 7; 45:18, and see how it is used of a process additional to creation. This is what St. Paul refers to, where he says, “Adam was first formed then Eve,”—1 Timothy 2:13. He is speaking of development, not of original creation. Adam and Eve (so far as their primal state is concerned) were created simultaneously; but Adam was “formed,” elaborated, first.ENDQUOTE
I would just write something on how Ware is wrong, as that would be simpler.
Also, it MAY look suspect if you claim to be egal but justify non-egalism; by holders of either.
On marriages, there are a few types discussed in the Bible, including the free husband and slave wife and where both are slaves and NONE are inherently sinful; but that does not mean these specific examples are God’s ideal.
There has been a “hardening” in some circles, and it is important to understand why. It is helpful to take a dispassionate look at these things, as would a sociologist, and seek to understand what is going on without recourse to moral broadsides, as some do, or the excuse of a “lack of time” to investigate, as we now hear.
The principles of domain-based authority and mutual consent are staring right at us in Scripture. To be sure, it requires wisdom to apply the principles in a healthy way, regardless of framework.
So long as it is suspect, as it apparently is for Don, that an egal considers not just egalism but also compism compatible with scripture so long as 1 Cor 13 is regarded as the ultimate touchstone, there will continue to be a hardening on both sides, a polarization in which the “radical middle” is deserted for ideological extremes.
Protestantism has a terrible history of being a house divided against itself and dividing over secondary issues. There is, I’m convinced, a better way.
John,
If two principles praised in the Bible are not allowed considerable application, any marriage, comp or egal, will be undermined.
Those principles are (1) domain-based hierarchy and authority; and (2) mutual consent.
We are on the same page here. It is my claim that the male authority teaching which I have protested from the beginning denies domain-based authority and hierarchy; and mutual consent outside of the bedroom. That is, the husband can make unilateral decisions on any number of other things without the wife’s consent. The husband does not submit to the wife anyway so he does not need to get her consent.
Where we differ is here. You write,
How to be a biblically faithful Christian and a complementarian without adopting the views of Bruce Ware on marriage and the Trinity.
Bruce Ware writes the defining statements for CBMW. Ware was invited to my howmetown to educate the local ministers. Sermons which duplicate his theology in exact detail are preached in the very large mainline church I left.
Ware is mainstream already. It is only to be regretted that he has ruined a perfectly good word like complementarian.
However, this is why I have been very careful to label the view I have criticized as the “male only authority” paradigm. I have done this for several months now to make my intent clear.
I believe that removing mutual consent and domain-based authority from marriage and teaching male only authority and female only submission should be critiqued severely. It is no way to live.
Glenn, it is my policy, following what I believe is the Bible’s teaching on first handling disputes privately, not to discuss details of a disapproved comment in public. My offer remains open to you, already stated, to discuss this privately. That, I believe, is what Jesus asks us to do, according to what he said in the Gospels. You can email me at:
wayne dot leman at gmail dot com
John…looks like you posted as I was writing another comment. I’m not sure there are too many Wisconsin mega-churches outside of the Milwaukee-Kenosha corridor.
I hope you have not construed what I’ve said as a “moral broadside.” My reference to time (and resources) was sympathetic and refers to the reason why so many evangelicals in so many churches ally themselves with CBMW. I’ve spent a long time in the trenches with these folks (not against them). Further, I’ve known a sociologist or two (and a few other scientists to boot.) Reports of their dispassionate, objective analyses have been exaggerated.
For the last three years I’ve lived in a small town a half hour’s drive from LaCrosse. My first year here I worked at a non-denominational Christian school with students, staff, and supporters from several local churches. We currently attend a UMC church; my son also attends an Evangelical Free youth group.
Prior to moving here, I lived in a WI college town considered to be a suburb of Minneapolis/St. Paul MN. During the decade I lived in the area, I connected with several churches, including ELCA, Covenant, Assemblies of God, and Baptist General Conference (BGC). I was also involved in university campus ministry and volunteered with several para-church ministries, ranging from a mom-and-pop cable talk show to worldview ministries featuring top-notch scholars from around the world.
I was born and raised in the land of jack pine savages and muskie hunters* (there’s Wisconsin cred for you!
). As a young adult, my first Christian experience was in a BGC church (I’m still a member of this church) and a non-denominational Charismatic church, both of which taught comp. theology.
I admit I was disappointed when this came up, but I was committed to Biblical truth and trusted the God who made me. I chalked up my misgivings to fleshly rebellion and started down the road to becoming a Godly Christian woman.
I was led to Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, where I spent a brief but extremely important semester. It was at this small, influential, and openly complementarian school that I first encountered egalitarian scholarship (in the library, not the classroom), and, with the support and guidance of my moderate complementarian pastor back home (hours at the pay phone, sitting on the floor with handfuls of change and papers), I waded through the info he and I gathered…and emerged egalitarian. My pastor didn’t share my conclusions, but he treated me and the writers we discussed with respect, and honored our common ground in Christ.
At Moody, I got to know Christians from around the world. I have been in urban, suburban, small town, and rural churches from various evangelical traditions. I have seen the disconnect between scholarship and pew (or folding chair, or discussion with a friend over coffee).
I have been involved with the evangelical Christian community for the last 20 years. By default, the vast majority of my fellowship has been with complementarians. My early pastor was a rare blessing. Even though I seldom discuss my views with those around me (there are friends I’ve known for years who have no idea where I stand) I have been accused of rebellion and lack of integrity. I’ve had my observations, opinions, and skills overlooked or even dismissed based on my gender. I have seen men brush aside sound advice from their wives (the classic: a youth pastor “shooshing” his young wife’s protests, explaining his position as leader and decision maker; she, holding her peace in earnest obedience, watching with concern – as he throws a bucket of water on the GREASE FIRE in front of us), and a thriving women’s ministry dismantled because a well-meaning new pastor felt that the women’s initiative and organized management was unscriptural, and that their activity was discouraging the men from taking the lead. Funny how the men failed to bloom into vital prominence after the “obstacle” was removed.
When my husband descended into destructive behavior I was told to submit; and, being egalitarian, I did – his failure to submit did not release me from my obligation. There was no support or healthy confrontation until the very end (this by an egalitarian – or extremely soft comp – pastor who was peripherally connected to us). When, after countless hours spent in tearful prayer, scouring the Bible and repeatedly reaching out to a man who had left our home ten months earlier, I filed for divorce, I had one angry Christian friend chastise me for my lack of commitment to the Bible; he also told me I had no right to set any limits on my husband’s behavior whatsoever. This “friend” went on to train future pastors in a Bible college. Hopefully he has moderated his views.
The above account is far from exhaustive. I have had wonderful experiences with Christians over the years with whom I don’t see eye to eye, and rejoice in how Christ works through his people despite our failings. However, there is an undercurrent in evangelical culture that has an unhappy habit of revealing itself in harmful ways over…and over….and over…..
Note that my church experience has not primarily been in fundamentalist circles.
Please excuse my rambling post. You have shared where some of your concerns have come from. This might clear up some of mine.
*For those unfamiliar with Wisconsinese, the “muskie” in “muskie hunter” is a noun, the object of the hunt. Given the nature of muskies, the hunter may become the hunted if he is not careful.
I chose this spelling over the equally valid “musky” in order to avoid confusion with the abundant Wisconsin “musky hunter,” where the “musky” is an adjective. Musky hunter populations peak throughout rural Wisconsin in late November, when their brilliant orange plumage brightens the landscape. Their arrival is heralded by bangs and booms and a wide variety of vocalizations echoing through the woods. Common calls include “Meet me by the truck after this drive,” “Where’s the beer?” and “HEYYY!!! HellOOO??? Hey, it’s c-c-cold out here…where’s the truck??? HellOOOOOO!!! C’mon … it’s getting dark…”
Musky hunters have few natural enemies. Potential threats include game wardens, backwoods taverns, the persistent belief that watching television for 51 weeks out of the year is sufficient cardiac conditioning for a week of rigorous trekking (with gear) in rough terrain, and the occasional unlucky shot.
I agree, Suzanne, if you are saying that a “male only authority” paradigm is to be carefully distinguished from most traditional and neo-traditional understandings of marriage which include a commitment to “over-all” male authority. The latter commitment is not toxic if combined with other principles praised in the Bible, in particular: (1) domain-based authority and hierarchy, (2) mutual consent, and (3) the new commandment, Romans 12, and 1 Cor 13.
If that is the case, the debate needs to be reframed. It is not complementarianism vs. egalitarianism. It is one or the other so long as (1) – (3) are given sufficient scope, versus all forms of ideological compism and egalism which view the framework of choice as some sort of passe-partout that opens all doors. Phoney baloney.
People are bound to differ somewhat about exactly what “sufficient” means.
Excluding definitions that are primarily determined by sin and/or sickness, we should be able to live with those differences without accusing one another of high crimes and misdemeanors.
In my workplace the administration is very resistant to teachers working part time. The admin is seen as an old school heartless hierarchy. The teachers, modern non-Christian women, egalitarian in decision-making, generally seek a family and half time work.
The true egal woman of today in my workplace is a motherly, half time worker who wants a regular guy and some gender complementarity within a basically egal relationship. This seems normal.
Administration always resists treating women differently from men and accommodating part time workers. I suppose that there has been a feminist ethic of women working full time alongside men, the two career family. I even know some very successful two career families. But I don’t think this is the norm today.
I do not see any rigid attitudes today about women needing to work full time, or be like men, in the egal culture of today. I see true gender complementarity and flexible attitudes to who works when and how much.
Among those who hire, I see more rigidity.
I would argue that modernization has brought many essential improvements and some new difficulties. I would not attribute these difficulties to the average egal Christian framework but to shifting economic and social realities.
No one promises us the perfect relationship or a life without difficulties and ambiguities.
The fact remains that the teaching that wives are entirely dependent on their husbands for every decision in life, has created a lot of damage in people’s lives. It is wrong and needs to be spoken against. If we know something is wrong, if we hear it preached and see the damage it does, then we sin if we do not speak against it.
I think this is why most egals here are speaking out.
Lin, I appreciate your willingness to explain yet again your objections to my earlier post, and there’s no need to walk on eggshells. I’m not so easily offended as all that. My point in asking the question is that I realize you’ve made numerous assumptions about the way Lisa and I order our lives from a misreading of that earlier post. You’ve framed a mutual decision as some hierarchical process in which Lisa came to me to ask my permission, and then I, like some high priest, went to God to get his permission. I’ve explained repeatedly that it was nothing like that, but every bit of new information you receive seems to get processed in light of that initial impression. You don’t appreciate it when comps cram you into the “man-hating feminist” box, but you’ve apparently crammed me into the I-speak-for-God-benevolent-dictator box (thanks, at least, for seeing me as “benevolent”!), while presumably cramming Lisa into the trained-not-to-think-for-herself-little-woman box (believe me, she’s no wilting violet!).
It’s always comforting to pigeonhole the people with whom we disagree, because it enables us to avoid taking them seriously. The problem is that when we get it wrong, we make it easy for them not to take us seriously. If someone calls you a man-hating feminist, you laugh and dismiss them with a shrug. Likewise, if I know you’re misreading Lisa and I, I’m naturally doubtful that you’re reading other comps correctly. Don’t make it that easy for me!
Now I’m going to hang a picture for my wife before I get into trouble! What could be more “normal” than that?
David, From your original post:
“Physically exhausted, stressed out, worried about the future, and probably more than a little Post-Partum, Lisa began asking me about the possibility of using birth-control. At first, I tried to give her perspective and reassure her, I made it clear that I still believed this was God’s will for our family, I pointed out the need to follow God’s will even when it proves personally costly, and I generally tried to get her to see things my way. I also prayed repeatedly that if this was truly God’s will for our family, he would change Lisa’s heart. Conversely, I prayed that if I had gotten it wrong all these years, God would change mine.
As time went by, I saw my wife become more and more desperate. It was clear she was feeling trapped by my convictions and frustrated by my stubbornness. So I went for a long walk, during which I prayed, “Lord, I can cling to my convictions and destroy my wife, or I can show her that she means more to me than my convictions.” When I returned home, I told Lisa that we could begin using birth control, and we did so for the next nine months.”
Notice that YOU told her what could happen after YOU prayed over your convictions. It was NOT her decision even though she had input. You were ‘considering’ her wishes by going to the Lord in prayer. It is not described here as mutual at all until later when you say that she came around to your thinking. Perhaps it was mutual in the fact that she goes along with you being the ultimate decision maker. I think a case can be made for that but not a mutual submission case. It is the final tie breaker vote we see in comp teaching.
It was all your decision, your going to the Lord to get the answer, in effect. That is what I am talking about and I really do believe that you have softened up on that aspect when giving subsequent explanations and more detail.
I do not see mutuality in this at all. Perhaps I am blind and cannot see it. That is a real possibility. But to say I put you in a box because of my egal beliefs is just not true. I am basing it on what you originally wrote.
I was a comp for a very long time, too. Most of my friends and family are but even they are more ‘mutual’ than this. The reason I bring this up is because I see this as authoritarian where you see it as submitting. (And it is fine if that is how your wife likes it) But, perhaps that is a microcosm for why it is so hard for communication on this issue.
Sarah wrote:
It was at this small, influential, and openly complementarian school that I first encountered egalitarian scholarship (in the library, not the classroom)
Wow, Sarah. That leaped (lept?) off the page at me. It was in that very same library (not the classrooms) that I discovered one or two periodicals (I’m surprised the librarian subscribed to them) which began opening my mind to another world that I did not know, Christian peacekeeping, collegial relationships rather than ones of domineering hierarchy, etc. Unfortunately, it took me many more years before I heard about any way to interpret the Bible other than the comp. teaching of my church background. But I can say that Stan Gundry was there briefly when I was. His wife (I later learned) was teaching women in Bible studies that they could exercise their spiritual gifts equally with men. He was released from teaching due to her teaching. In the past few years I’ve gotten re-connected with them by email. Stan has shared his testimony about how he was slowly converted from what he thought was the truth to a belief that God gifts men and women equally and does not wish to prevent either from exercising their gifts in any context (I might not have stated that quite right).
Anyway, I warmly remember my mind opening up in that very same library.
I don’t speak Wisconsonese, but I can often identify it when I hear it. Figuring out where people are from is one of the fun things I enjoy about language. And I can slip into Wisconsonese or Minnesotaese fairly easily when I’m around people who speak it. Both my wife and I are dialect sponges.
Thanks for sharing so much of your story here. I’m guessing that most of us here have been through some kind of pain that helps motivate us to want to think about comp/egal issues.
Sarah,
Thank you for posting your experiences. I found them very compelling and I am so glad you took the time to share your testimony about your journey with us!
David,
I appreciate a lot of what you have said in the post and comments especially about Bruce Ware. It is encouraging to me to see that not every comp is enamored with Ware and that people can actually think for themselves. Good job!
Also, I read through what Lin copied from an original post. I do not recall seeing that post but, honestly, without speaking from prejudice at all, your comments about what you went through with your wife made me shudder. The way you wrote it, it did not come across as mutual at all. I felt for your wife because in some ways I could relate. In my own marriage we were both deceived by what we truly believed was God’s way for marriage.
My husband dearly loved me and it was his love and his own wisdom that caused him to make the decisions for me. But it wasn’t helpful for me. It kept me from maturing and making my own decisions and my own mistakes. It took away who I was as a person and I was absorbed into another person. It was the grace of God that caused a significant emotional event to change all of that for us several years ago and I am so grateful.
Now I have been allowed to mature and be a full person. I still submit much of the time because that is my nature, but my submission is power under control as it is a choice I make, not a choice that is made for me. Neither one of us would ever go back to what we had. It was not healthy and the benevolence of one person was not meant to make the decisions for another adult as if that adult was in their care. Two mature adults working together with both of their wills working for unity and not merely conforming to one of their wills, is God’s way.
The harm that was done to me for so many years was not my husband’s fault. It was the fault of the ideology. I am grateful that my husband came through this and learned. He still struggles but both of us would not have the old way back if you gave us a million dollars. My husband has my genuine respect, honor and love. He also has my independent will that is exercised in maturity. Together we are truly one flesh now and not “one person” that we used to be. When we were “one person” I didn’t exist.
Sarah,
Thank you for describing your journey. I am of course overjoyed that you now attend a UMC church and I trust and pray you bring into it a passion for evangelism, Bible study, and personal prayer such as are typical of all evangelicals. Too bad the UMC you attend does not have an on-fire youth group. This is often a weakness of oldline Protestant congregations.
As far as sociologists are concerned, yes, it’s true, many are no less ideological than anyone else and allow that to contaminate their research. But I have found a few authors that are well-worth reading: Rodney Stark for the sociology of religion in general, and Don Browning and Mary Stewart van Leeuwen on questions of marriage and family. Just examples, of course.
I want to emphasize how much I agree with you about the uselessness of most pastors when it comes to these questions. As an egal, I would like to think that egal pastors are better on average, but I have no reason or experience that suggests that that is the case.
Most pastors, let’s face it, are ding-dongs and dorks when it comes to counseling and so on prior to, during, and after a divorce or its opposite, a renewed beginning. It’s either “I’m ok and you’re ok” liberal nonsense or “I’m ok and you’re an idiot” conservative nonsense.
Rarely do you find a pastor who takes a more biblical point of departure, such as “I’m not ok, you’re not ok, God loves us anyway, and I’m going to be here for you no matter what how things go.”
As far as evangelical megachurches are concerned, they are found on the corridor going all the way up to Green Bay. Just was talking to a surgeon (a former Catholic, typical) who is very active with his family at Christ the Rock in Appleton. It is Stuart and Jill Briscoe of the Elmbrook church that that church relates to. So far as I can see, that is moderate compism at its best. Furthermore, my hometown, Madison, has five or six, and I have friends in all of them. I have yet to come across a megachurch in WI that has adopted a “male-only authority” paradigm.
It would be a lousy fit. Here, as we all know, all the women are strong and the men are good-looking.
“[N]ot every comp is enamored with Ware and [comps] can actually think for themselves.”
I’ve noticed that, too. Indeed, I think comps are hard to find who follow Ware down the line. Comps like Letitia, Marilyn, and Gem who inhabit these threads, not just David, disagree with some of the things Ware says or is taken to say, but are comps just the same.
I’ve also noticed that egals are not necessarily man-hating feminists who think subjectively, on the basis of their personal experiences alone. Far from it.
It’s about time comps and egals alike abandon stereotypes.
Most comps pray to Jesus whenever they feel like it. Most comps integrate domain-based hierarchies and the principle of mutual consent into their marriages. Compism today is precisely that range of theory and practice that self-identifying comps today subscribe to. No more. No less.
To define what compism is on the basis of a relatively extreme point of view plays right into the hands of extremists.
I am also very uncomfortable with what passes here for egal parsing of comp descriptions of comp decision-making.
I was taught a different approach in seminary. Our pastoral theology professor, Jorg Kleeman, a Lutheran, taught us that every situation – EVERY situation – is conditioned by sin, especially self-righteousness. God’s grace therefore is a tremendous judgment on our self-righteousness.
When I parse my own actions, I notice a lot of sin in the mix, including my own. In better cases, I also notice God’s grace at work, sometimes through my actions, sometimes in spite of them.
I am uncomfortable when anyone parses the actions of someone else and a strong and consistent attempt is not made to identify the narrative of God’s grace therein.
John wrote:
It is Stuart and Jill Briscoe of the Elmbrook church that that church relates to. So far as I can see, that is moderate compism at its best.
John, I’m not sure your “moderate compism” here refers to Briscoes or not. In any case, both Jill and Stuart are egalitarians and minister in that way. We’ve had them both speak of one of our mission conferences.
They are not allowed to speak in many complementarian contexts. In contexts where complementarians would be offended by Jill speaking to a mixed audience they present themselves as Jill speaking under the spiritual umbrella of Stuart. If that is unacceptable to the complementarians in the group, then Jill will speak separately to a women’s only group. In other words, while they are egalitarians, they will adjust their ministry to what the context requires.
If you need confirmation of their status, they are almost within spitting distance of you (do you spit when you preach?!), and, of course, just a phone call away.
Wayne,
Are you saying that Stuart and Jill Briscoe self-identify as egals? I would be happy if they did, but I don’t think that that is the case.
If they support the concept of a “solo” woman pastor like my wife is, who is new church planter (the “solo” business is garbage anyway, in a hierarchical setup like the UMC, in which we respond to circuit, district, and episcopal leadership that is both male and female), then I would gladly refer to them as egal.
If not, they are non-egal, and could not, for example, serve in an egal church like the Presbyterian Church – USA. In that church, if you do not subscribe to the ordination of women on equal terms, you yourself cannot be ordained in the system.
But I’ll look into it more. I used to have friends on staff at the Briscoes’ church. They were grads of TEDS, which relates to a church, the EV Free, which does not in the US ordain women last time I checked.
John asked:
Are you saying that Stuart and Jill Briscoe self-identify as egals?
Yes. Click here to see what they believe as egalitarians. Note Stuart’s signature at the bottom. I’m sure that Jill is also a member. I know that Jill agrees with Stuart and believes that she can have a teaching ministry to men as well as women. We’ve had this discussion with them. Jill is publicly known as an egalitarian.
Of course, you can get the answer directly from the horses’ mouth with a phone call (800.889.5388) to their ministry headquarters.
Wayne,
Thanks for pointing that out.
I also like the way Stuart writes to encourage others to be more egal. He takes whatever a person’s point of departure is on the question seriously, not once disparaging it, and seeks to build on that. Here’s a quote:
“When the subject arises in church circles it usually centers around “what women can’t do.” I am convinced that whatever label we wear in the debate, we can all agree that there are some things that women can, should, and must do for the glory of God and the well being of mankind. Before we get into a debate about what they can’t do, we should be identifying the areas in which we believe they can and should legitimately be actively involved. Having identified these areas, we should then be carefully crafting ways in which the women can be trained, mobilized, supported, and encouraged in their ministries.”
Another:
“I am not advocating that anyone should encourage women to do what deep down they believe they have no business doing. [But I believe that we all should] ensur[e] that women are as fully occupied in the church as God intended them to be.”
No wonder Stuart and Jill have had a vital ministry in moderate comp and moderate egal churches throughout the world. They are looked on with suspicion by many clergy in my denomination, but that says more about the closemindedness of a Christian egalism taken to an extreme than it does about the Briscoes.
What in the world is a “moderate egal” church?
It’s possible to understand in what sense a moderately egal church is moderate by comparing it with a very egal church.
If we understand “church” in the sense of denomination, very egal churches include the United Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church – USA. A moderately egal denomination by comparison would be, for example, the Christian Reformed Church, or the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod.
In a very egal church like the UMC, we have rules that require gender diversity, whereas moderately egal church have rules that permit gender diversity, and not necessarily in all areas.
For example, a UMC rule is that at least 2 of the Trustees (those responsible for the physical plant of the church, the parsonage, cemeteries, and so on) be women. The rule has actually produced a lot of good fruit. Generally speaking, women turn out to be sensitive to some building issues more than, generally speaking, men do.
Among Lutherans, you have the Wisconsin Synod that does not allow women to vote in assembly. You have the Missouri Synod that allows the vote and women in many (but I don’t think all) positions of leadership. Then you have the ELCA which is very egal, with women bishops and the whole nine yards.
If we understand “church” in the sense of congregation, a moderately egal congregation is one in which, for example, there are women on the pastoral staff but the lead pastor is and has always been a male and it would cause tension if it were otherwise. LOTS of congregations like this among Baptists and Pentecostals.
It’s not always easy to figure out whether a congregation is moderately comp or moderately egal, nor, in my opinion, does it necessarily matter much. Is Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church comp or egal? I’m happy to let Lin or some other sweet Southern B answer the question.
A lot of congregations and pastors carefully avoid the comp-egal debate insofar as possible, and are careful to steer a middle course. As these very threads sometimes demonstrate, it can be a subject that generates more heat than light.
Lin,
By pulling that quote out of context yet again, you essentially confirm my supposition that “every bit of new information you receive seems to get processed in light of that initial impression.” I wrote that original post about my personal struggle with the situation, so yes I certainly framed it in terms of my responses, my prayers, and the point I came to. You’ve read that as unilateral authoritarianism, and once that opinion was formed, any claim on my part that it wasn’t authoritarian is merely dismissed as an attempt to soft-pedal that authoritarianism.
But all that aside, perhaps you and I have different understandings of mutuality in decision making. I see mutuality as Lisa and I making decisions together, pursuing unanimity if possible and making provisional compromises when such unanimity is not possible. You seem to suggest that mutuality in this case would have been Lisa making a unilateral decision and me accepting it without question. I guess I don’t see how that really qualifies as “mutual.”
Cheryl,
If all you’ve read of this is the quote Lin pulled out of context, and given your own personal experience with unilateral decision-making, I can certainly see why you would shudder. I have never seen it as my job to make unilateral decisions for Lisa. Rather, we make decisions together, and both of us are loathe to make any major decision without first consulting the other.
In short, I would absolutely agree that “Two mature adults working together with both of their wills working for unity and not merely conforming to one of their wills, is God’s way.” That’s precisely the dynamic I hope you’ll see by reading the following posts in full:
Can a Complementarian Man Submit to His Wife?
Revisiting My Personal Spaghetti Jar Incident
David,
I read the first article and frankly it didn’t change my view at all. Here is why. If you felt it was God’s will for you to not use birth control, then you should not use birth control. If your wife wanted to use birth control, she should have used birth control. That is the position it should have been until you both reached a consensus. Here is what you said:
“I concluded that whatever God’s will for others, his will for me did not include the use of contraception.”
I can fully agree with you on this. But for you to ask your wife to not use birth control when she was desperate and physically exhausted was going beyond your own will. It was taking over her will if even for a brief period of time. You then made a decision for both of you even if it was for a brief period of time. It was an important period of time for her.
Think of it another way. What if your wife wanted to have children and you did not? She would not use birth control, but you would. When you finally came to an agreement, then both of you may either abstain from birth control or both of you would make a decision on which one uses the birth control. That is two wills coming together through a process of working out one will. But I don’t hear that from the words you have written.
It isn’t that I don’t think you love your wife. I believe you truly love her dearly. I believe that you even sacrifice for her. You sacrificed your will for hers when you realized that you may lose her or part of her if you continue to push her. The fact that she did not use birth control during the time that she was desperate says to me that she was being forced into your will.
I think that it is very hard for a man to relate to a woman’s dilemma. What your wife needed was from the get-go was to have the freedom to use her own will while you two were working out the us-will. You could have still been following what you believed God’s will was if you personally did not use birth control. This is the roadblock that does it for me:
“At first, I tried to give her perspective and reassure her, I made it clear that I still believed this was God’s will for our family, I pointed out the need to follow God’s will even when it proves personally costly, and I generally tried to get her to see things my way.”
“God’s will for us” is not mutuality if God has not made the same thing known to the other person. If you had said that you believed it was God’s will for you, then that would have made all the difference for me. Then you would have had to make a decision. Either you see not using birth control personally as a fulfillment of that conviction even though she is using it, or you punish your wife by withdrawing from her. That would fulfill God’s will for you (well sort of).
But God’s will for a family can never be spoken through one person especially in such intimate personal areas. In my marriage, if we do not walk together, we do not go. When I submit to go his way, which is quite often, I do so willingly out of my own free will. My husband can passionately encourage me to go his way, but he does not say that his way is God’s way for me because that isn’t for him to say.
Do you see the difference?
As someone who has been overtaken and lost my personhood for an extended period of time when I read your words I recognized something that you probably didn’t. If you had walked in my shoes for a time, you would have recognized it right away too.
Think of it one more way that might help you. What if your parents right now told you that they had made plans to do something and you and your family would be doing it too because it was God’s will for the family. It was their decision even if you weren’t fully in favor. Would you feel a wee bit disregarded? Maybe in the end you would make the decision to do what they wanted you to do, but when someone else says that this is the will for the family and your will is not included in that, something precious inside us that is created by God himself is in danger of dying.
I am not being difficult. I have just walked a path that you have not. One flesh is not making the decision for the family and then waiting and waiting for the other person to come on board. It is freely giving the other person the right and authority and freedom to not follow you while you work out the one-flesh will. Then when she does follow you, you know you have her whole heart without coercion.
For me I cannot go back to the place where my husband makes decisions for me. My pastor cannot make decisions for me. God has given me choices. I can freely choose to submit but no matter what, I am responsible to one master for my choices and that Master is Jesus. I do not have another master between Jesus and me.
David wrote to Lin:
You seem to suggest that mutuality in this case would have been Lisa making a unilateral decision and me accepting it without question.
Just a suggestion, since I’m not trying to speak for Lin. My wife (Elena) and I seldom make unilateral decisions. We try to talk things over until we come to a consensus. To my mind, that’s what mutual decision-making would be. And you’ve already stated, David, that that’s what you and Lisa try to practice as well.
Now there was at least one situation I can remember where we had a clear difference of opinion. And, interestingly, it also had to do with having babies. Our first baby turned out to be twins, two girls. I was delighted since I grew up with two younger brothers. My sister, a year older than me, lived only a day, and I missed her, just as my parents did.
After a couple of years my wife told me she would like us to try again, hoping to get a son. I told her I was content having two daughters and didn’t feel a need for a third child. She brought it up, graciously, a few times. Finally she said, “OK, I’ll just pray about it.” I think she was willing in prayer to go along with my preference. She never mentioned her praying about the matter again that I can recall. But several months later I told her would be happy to try for a son. (I even bought books about how to increase the odds of having a son instead of a daughter.)
It didn’t take long and my wife was pregnant again. It was a very difficult pregnancy. She was in the hospital much of the time. One time the doctor sent us to a larger hospital 40 miles away where they had a new technology called an ultrasound (I’m dating myself, eh?!) to see if my wife might have a molar pregnancy causing her problems. The ultrasound technicians started his work. Then he turned around to look at my wife’s information sheet again. Then he asked, “Do you already have a set of twins?” My wife answered, “Yes.” He said, “Well, there’s nothing wrong with the fetus; you’re going to have twins again.”
Wow. At delivery time the first one came out. Another beautiful, healthy, active daughter. And then her brother came out. He had some difficulties breathing and had to be rushed by ambulance to the bigger hospital 40 miles away.
I got a total of 4 children, more than I had ever anticipated. My wife got her son, our son, who has made us so proud of him. He’s an assistant pastor now.
And every one of our daughters is walking with Christ, with godly husbands.
If I had insisted on my preference, we would not have gotten our third daughter who is so special–she’s an artist and so very loving. And we got the son we worked for.
It was a mutual decision, eventually, that started out with a difference of opinion.
I don’t think I’m a wimp. And I know my wife loves and respects me even more for somehow listening to God’s voice over the months that my wife prayed. Maybe we should do more praying when there are differences of opinion. But I realize that many decisions need to be made faster. I do recommend, however, that couples pray together, if both are at a level of spiritual maturity for that. Of course, in many cases at least one member of the union is not.
Thank you Cheryl and Wayne, I was very touched and encouraged by your personal testimonies of “working things out”.
Wayne, My grandmother had two sets of twins, too. One of which was my mother. It is really neat for them growing up in such a family configuration.
What a double blessing!
As someone who has been overtaken and lost my personhood for an extended period of time when I read your words I recognized something that you probably didn’t. If you had walked in my shoes for a time, you would have recognized it right away too.
Cheryl, you mention the first post, but seem to ignore the second. As I mentioned in the second post, there is a world of context I did not include in that first post. I find it amazing that someone who knows so little about Lisa and I could confidently assert that she “recognizes” a dynamic in our marriage to which we are blind. It’s certainly possible for a third party to see a dynamic in a marriage to which the husband and wife are blind. But is it not equally possible that you’re reading your own situation into ours?
I am not being difficult. I have just walked a path that you have not. One flesh is not making the decision for the family and then waiting and waiting for the other person to come on board. It is freely giving the other person the right and authority and freedom to not follow you while you work out the one-flesh will. Then when she does follow you, you know you have her whole heart without coercion.
You’re right. You have walked a path that we have not, and you seem to be assuming that your experience is normative. Again, you are assuming that I made the decision for the family and then waited for Lisa to come on board. The reality is that I came to a personal conviction before marriage, and Lisa came to share that conviction until a period of high stress. When she expressed a desire to do something different, we discussed it and prayed about it. If ours was a marriage based on the kind of unilateral decision-making you imagine, I would have just said, “Look, we already settled this before we got married.” Instead, we both began to pray that God would reveal his will to both of us.
You’re also assuming that while we were discussing this, I was somehow holding a gun to Lisa’s head and forcing her to have “unprotected” sex. The truth is that this discussion took place during a period of abstinence after the birth of our third child. Had it taken place during a period of sexual activity, we would simply have abstained while she was fertile.
You wrote that “one flesh” is “freely giving the other person the right and authority and freedom to not follow you while you work out the one-flesh will.” How is that not precisely what I did in this case? As I wrote in that first post: “I set my own vision aside and trusted God to lead both my wife and myself in the direction he saw fit.”
You also wrote that giving Lisa that freedom would have resulted in me knowing that I have her whole heart without coercion. This is precisely the point I made at the conclusion of that first post:
“In the end, Lisa had the opportunity to make sure that this was a calling she had received from God, rather than one which had merely been dictated by me.”
While I cringe at your apparent ethic of each spouse acting independently until unanimity can be reached, Lisa and I likewise affirm that “if we do not walk together, we do not go.” If we have to make a decision, we will reach a provisional compromise until unanimity can be reached. And no, the compromises do not always go my way.
Cheryl, I understand that if you’ve been wounded by a false ideology, it’s easy to see that same dynamic in other marriages. But I would encourage you to draw such conclusions tentatively, knowing that you might well be mistaken. When judging other people’s marriages from the outside, it’s easy to assume we know what’s really going on, and both comps and egals do this with impunity. The problem is that when we are mistaken, we lose credibility with those we have misjudged.
David,
Perhaps I missed it, but I don’t see that you addressed this:
“At first, I tried to give her perspective and reassure her, I made it clear that I still believed this was God’s will for our family, I pointed out the need to follow God’s will even when it proves personally costly, and I generally tried to get her to see things my way.”
The issue that I was trying to address was your view that you knew what God’s will was for another person. Could you please address this?
I do not understand the dynamics of your marriage or all the unspoken details that you didn’t share. I do know that how you communicated your view came across that you, a man, knows God’s will for another human being. If I misunderstood you, I apologize. Perhaps you could explain.
David wrote: “While I cringe at your apparent ethic of each spouse acting independently until unanimity can be reached, Lisa and I likewise affirm that “if we do not walk together, we do not go.” If we have to make a decision, we will reach a provisional compromise until unanimity can be reached. And no, the compromises do not always go my way.
”
This is a difference between egals and David. Of course, egals would seek a provisional compromise, but this does not mean one is always possible. Sometimes each needs to act/not act on their own convictions. This is one thing it means to be an adult.
The issue that I was trying to address was your view that you knew what God’s will was for another person. Could you please address this? . . . I do know that how you communicated your view came across that you, a man, knows God’s will for another human being. If I misunderstood you, I apologize. Perhaps you could explain.
Cheryl,
Here is what I wrote about discerning God’s will for our lives in those two posts:
“I made it clear that I still believed this was God’s will for our family.” (Note I did not say I “knew with certainty”)
“I also prayed repeatedly that if this was truly God’s will for our family, he would change Lisa’s heart. Conversely, I prayed that if I had gotten it wrong all these years, God would change mine.”
“just as I believed it was God’s will for our family not to rely on birth control, I also believed that my marriage to Lisa was God’s will. If he truly gave me this woman to be my wife, then I had to take seriously my call to take care of her. If she was truly my “co-heir of the grace of life” (1 Peter 3:7), I had to take seriously her sense of what God’s will might be. And if I truly believed that God is there and that he is not silent (to borrow a phrase from Francis Schaeffer), then I had to trust that he would ultimately make his will known to both of us.”
And from the second post:
“My point in giving this very personal story was to offer a positive example of how to work through times when husband and wife do not see eye to eye. Though convinced of what I believed was God’s will for us, I took my wife’s perspective as an indication that I might have gotten that wrong. When it became clear that she needed to see that I cared more for her than for any conviction, I yielded and trusted God to work things out. Thankfully, he did.”
“This is the key lesson. I believe God is ultimately the head of my family. He is the one with absolute authority. It is his will, not mine, which is paramount. If I believe all that, then I can trust him to make sure that his will is followed.”
“Another key lesson is that neither Lisa nor I acted unilaterally. Extreme complementarians might say that I was wrong not to stand firm on an issue I believed to be God’s will, that I should have just drawn a line in the sand and demanded submission. I know, however, that it would have been foolish to do that. First, it would have shown my wife that I think I am infallible when it comes to discerning God’s will . . .”
At what point in all of this do you see that I believed I was the infallible arbiter of God’s will for Lisa’s life? Quite the contrary, her questioning led me to question my sense of God’s will all over again. I sought God’s will for our lives, and encouraged Lisa to do the same.
Perhaps you think it presumptuous of me to seek to know God’s will for our lives. From your previous comment I got the impression that you think I should worry about God’s will for my life and let Lisa worry about God’s will for hers. Is that degree of independence really what egalitarians envision as mutuality? Frankly, Lisa and I prefer a vision of “one flesh” unity in which we seek God’s will together.
In my understanding, a husband seeks God’s will for his life, a wife seeks God’s will for her life and both seek God’s will for the marriage.
Sometimes, I suspect that the hierarchalist view is confused regarding marital decision making. In one way hierarchalists seem to think that the husband should be the leader of the family and thus both seek for and make the final decisions for wife and children (having final say in disagreements) in what they believe is God’s will for their family. But on the other hand they want the wife to agree with them so that they can say they have agreed together on what God’s will is for the family. Yet, that view may not actually be a mutually agreed upon view. Perhaps sometimes it is. However, it appears to still hinge upon accepting or rejecting what only the husband puts forth. I’m inclined to think that a true mutuality in decision making is where either the husband or the wife can be the initiator on a direction to be considered, and that there is no pressure to have to comply to either options. Often, God is able to help us see a totally different possibility, if we give Him the freedom. Sometimes, what we believe is “God’s Will” is just our earnest desire. We cannot always tell immediately.
Also, sometimes decisions, especially personal ones, are not a matter of God’s will for the family but rather are decsions that God gives us freedom in. God does not dictate life styles to us although He will certainly help us work out what will be beneficial to both husband and wife or family as a whole.
Healthy egal marriages, no less than healthy comp marriages, are characterized by domain-based hierarchies.
The issues Believer333 raises have to be faced in any marriage.
Thus, I gladly defer to my wife in the kitchen (I actually enjoy cooking; but she enjoys it more, and is more gifted than I). I expect her to be “the leader” in this area “and thus both seek for and make the final decisions for” the rest of us. “On the other hand [she] want[s] the [rest of us] to agree with [her] so that [she] can say [we] have agreed together.” True, “that view may not actually be a mutually agreed upon view. Perhaps sometimes it is. However, it appears to still hinge upon accepting or rejecting what only [she] puts forth.”
It does so hinge, and it is good that it does.
My wife gladly defers to me in terms of the financial management of the household. She expects me to be the leader, yada yada, and she wants her input to consist, when necessary, of accepting or rejecting proposals I make, not the other way around.
I don’t disagree with Believer333’s other statement:
“I’m inclined to think that a true mutuality in decision making is where either the husband or the wife can be the initiator on a direction to be considered, and that there is no pressure to have to comply to either options. Often, God is able to help us see a totally different possibility, if we give Him the freedom. Sometimes, what we believe is “God’s Will” is just our earnest desire. We cannot always tell immediately.”
Indeed, that’s beautifully put. However, in practice, decision-making will routinize along domain-based boundaries, with one or the other person taking the lead.
Since my marriage is egal, when it comes to life-changing decisions, like location (Italy or the US, number of children; accepting a life-changing job offer), neither I nor my wife knows beforehand who will have the determinative say in case of disagreement. Sometimes she has deferred to me; sometimes I have deferred to her.
But I’ve noticed that it works the same way in healthy comp marriages. That’s because the principle of “over-all” authority is far from an absolute one if the new commandment is adhered to by the husband and not just the wife.
My point should be clear: the differences between a comp and an egal marriage are truly miniscule so long as, on the one hand, a marriage is not run like a dictatorship (unbiblical based on 1 Cor 13 and many other passages), and, on the other hand, is not run like a democracy which gums to a halt because it’s one referendum after another ending up in a 1-1 vote with no possibility of a tie-breaker.
This latter arrangement, which leads to two people living together like ships passing in the night, is not as uncommon, even among Christians, as some people think. Among both self-identifying comps and self-identifying egals.
David,
In the post you, Lin, and Cheryl have been discussing, you said this:
As time went by, I saw my wife become more and more desperate. It was clear she was feeling trapped by my convictions and frustrated by my stubbornness. So I went for a long walk…
I think this is what alarmed some, that your wife was allowed to become more and more desperate, feeling trapped by your convictions and stubbornness. Would this have happened whether or not you had complementarian convictions? Perhaps. But I think many are wondering whether or not your comp. convictions contributed to your initial unwillingness to appreciate what your wife was going through.
(Although I have to say, and please pardon me gentlemen, that I think it is common for fathers to not really “get” what their wives are going through with bearing and caring for very young children…regardless of their marital philosophy!)
I am responsible to one master for my choices and that Master is Jesus. I do not have another master between Jesus and me.
Well put, Cheryl.
I think this factor is overlooked by those who would have the husband be the ultimate, or final, authority. I’m willing to admit that there’s something I might be missing, but I cannot reconcile what you’ve said above, which I believe to be true (of all women and men), with any sort of preference for male authority or leadership simply by virtue of their being male, or even husband.
This is not to say that there are not situations in which a man, or a husband, should have overriding authority, but there are also times when a woman, or wife, should have overriding authority. It has to do with following Christ alone in any given situation, not with following what someone else thinks following Christ is.
We are all accountable for ourselves, as Cheryl says.
I realize some may object by saying that there are many instances of earthly masters (bosses, coaches, teachers, etc., even parents) in which there is a hierarchical relationship yet all persons involved are still accountable to Jesus. But in each of these cases the authority is limited to a certain function or context, plus the husband-wife relationship is not analogous to parent-child, teacher-student, boss-employee, or coach-team member relationships, none of which are one-flesh unions.
I’m inclined to think that a true mutuality in decision making is where either the husband or the wife can be the initiator on a direction to be considered, and that there is no pressure to have to comply to either options.
So do I.
I know that when my marriage was hierarchal, I certainly felt pressured to agree with my husband’s will, even if I didn’t like it—–and to agree with a smile. Most of that pressure came from my own internal beliefs of submission. Many of my real thoughts and feelings were pressed down, that I might be obedient to what I thought was God’s command for wifely submission.
Don’t get me wrong. Usually, I would give my opinion. But generally only one time, and then if my husband disagreed with my opinion, I tended to trust that his opinion was God’s will (or, rather, that his opinion was God’s will for me, since God told me to submit to it). Hey, he was the leader, and so I went with his will. If I brought up my own opinion more than once, I was usually reprimanded for my rebelliousness.
My husband had a lot of opinions, many of them very strong ones. I subdued my own will and followed his. That’s what a good wife does, right?
For example, my husband felt convicted about not using birth control, just as David did, and I agreed with him 100% (easy to do, before you’ve had kids). In my husband’s case, unlike David, he didn’t prayerfully consider his wife’s concerns when she later said she needed a break (I’d had three babies within the space of three years).
So I had two more babies without a break until he, himself, got so overwhelmed that he, himself, decided we needed to take a break. God wasn’t allowing us to take a break when the exhaustion was mine. But that mysteriously changed when the exhaustion was felt by my husband.
Multiply that situation by a thousand and you get the feel for what life is like living under the authority of someone who believes you are there to further their will, and who can’t hear your cries for help.
It’s a lot worse when you *yourself* believe you aren’t allowed to cry for help—when you are allowed one “appeal” and then must “cheerfully submit” or you are in rebellion.
So I, too, kind of cringe when I’m told that complementarian wives believe they have full and complete rights to disagree or to voice their opinion or to demand that their side be heard. My experience, and not just in my difficult marriage but also in many of the more softer-comp marriages I’m surrounded with, is that wives don’t really believe that at all. We can speak, yeah. But if we get too loud or disagree too strongly, God isn’t happy with us. So, in the long run, we really can’t speak. At least, not like the men can.
Perhaps, what I found confusing David is your statement that you felt you needed to pray for direction for the family. Why not your wife and you praying together discussing things as you go. How do you agree with what i said and yet think its up to the husband to pray for the direction of the family. ???
Perhaps, what I found confusing David is your statement that you felt you needed to pray for direction for the family. Why not your wife and you praying together discussing things as you go. How do you agree with what i said and yet think its up to the husband to pray for the direction of the family. ???
A wise professor of mine once said, “You can’t say everything every time you say anything. Otherwise you’re so busy saying everything you never actually say anything.”
In my first post I talked primarily about my perspective and my involvement. Yet even then I spoke of encouraging Lisa to pray that God would change my heart if her sense of God’s will was correct. In other words, she was encouraged to pray for the direction of the family as well.
I did not mention praying together with Lisa, but we did that too. We certainly pray together when seeking God’s will. As I have now said ad nauseam, we sought God’s will together.
Nevertheless, I do also frequently go for walks to pray alone. And I do sometimes seek God’s will for my family during those walks. Is that really so paternalistic and oppressive?
David wrote: “Nevertheless, I do also frequently go for walks to pray alone. And I do sometimes seek God’s will for my family during those walks. Is that really so paternalistic and oppressive?”
I think both are to seek God’s will for the family, asking together and asking separately. The question is how is it confirmed for the family?
In my understanding, a husband seeks God’s will for his life, a wife seeks God’s will for her life and both seek God’s will for the marriage.
Don, that’s an interesting distinction, but since in a marriage the spouses’ lives are intimately linked, I’m not sure I understand how such a distinction would play out in real life. Let’s say the husband decides that God’s will for his life is to take a new job across the country. His wife decides that God’s will for her life is to stay where she is so she can be close to her family. At that point, what does seeking “God’s will for the marriage” really mean? Deciding whether to stay married or to separate?
At some point, if this hypothetical couple is serious about staying married, they’re going to have to seek God’s will for both of their lives together.
I think this is what alarmed some, that your wife was allowed to become more and more desperate, feeling trapped by your convictions and stubbornness. Would this have happened whether or not you had complementarian convictions? Perhaps. But I think many are wondering whether or not your comp. convictions contributed to your initial unwillingness to appreciate what your wife was going through.
Bonnie,
I wrote the bit about Lisa becoming desperate as a kind of confession of my own slowness to understand the depth of what she was feeling. I’m beginning to suspect from these discussions that I cannot confess my own failures without those being used against me. Would it really be better if I pretended I have the perfect marriage and am the perfect husband?
I did actually address this question of Lisa’s desperation in my second post, when I wrote:
“As we continued to discuss the question of contraception, it became clear to me that Lisa was feeling “desperate,” “trapped,” and “frustrated.” Again, some have read my description of Lisa’s feelings at that point as a sign of my callousness, as if my wife has to become “desperate” before I will really listen to her. On the contrary, I was trying to listen to her and see her perspective throughout our discussions, but it is often the case that I just don’t “get” how deeply she is feeling something until her pain becomes painfully clear. I’m afraid that despite my best intentions, I can be as clueless as the next guy.”
I also made it clear in that second post that these discussions actually went on for no more than a few weeks. The desperation was therefore not allowed to go on for very long.
So did my “comp. convictions contribute to [my] initial unwillingness to appreciate what [my] wife was going through”? I would argue the opposite. My understanding of Scripture is that I am to live with my wife “according to knowledge” or “with understanding” (1 Peter 3:7), so I did my best to try to understand why Lisa was suddenly wanting to change course. Was I slow to get it? Sure. But that wasn’t a product of my “comp. convictions” so much as my being a man learning to understand a woman. You and I both seem to agree that such understanding does not always come easily.
I think both are to seek God’s will for the family, asking together and asking separately. The question is how is it confirmed for the family?
How is God’s will confirmed? By a variety of means. You look at whether a direction is consistent with God’s Word, whether the consequences are likely to be good or bad, at whether both spouses are in agreement, at how the children feel about it, at whether one of the spouses has a clear “check” or lack of peace about it, etc. If you’re looking for a clear “all things being equal, it’s what the husband thinks,” you won’t get that from me. Neither, I think, will you get it from most comps.
“Nevertheless, I do also frequently go for walks to pray alone. And I do sometimes seek God’s will for my family during those walks. Is that really so paternalistic and oppressive?
Not at all. Sounds perfect.
So, how does that figure in with the concept that comp husbands are supposed to have final say whenever there are disagreements, or don’t you hold to that?
I find that text only communication is really difficult to get the gist of what a person means in a few sentences. It’s easy to go off with the wrong idea, though I’m sure we all try not to do that.
First of all, a confession. The only book I know at all well is the Bible. In particular, the Hebrew Bible. I sometimes read it in translation, and when I do, I tend to get very upset. So much has been translated poorly.
I don’t know what your translation of Proverbs 31:10-11 has, but this is what the Hebrew says:
What a find is a woman of strength!
Her worth is far beyond that of rubies.
Her husband trusts her instinctively,
and he will have no lack of gain.
One of my teachers, Michael Fox, points out, “Heb. “‘eshet chayil,’ is commonly translated “woman of valor.” “Woman of strength” would be a better translation. Heb. “chayil” refers to strength of all sorts, whether in physical or military prowess, in social influence, in wealth, or in personal ethical and intellectual powers, as here. Beneath all this woman’s virtues and talents lies a deep and solid strength of character.”
Guess what the highest compliment a man can be given in Hebrew? The SAME: ‘ish chayil, a man of strength. A man of strong character. A valiant, chivalrous man.
That’s what Boaz is called in Ruth 2:1: a prodigious man, “a man of strong and noble character.” The same phrase with the same meaning, ‘ish chayil, is found in Gen 47:6; Ex 19:21, and 1 Kg 1:42.
But of course, the main character in the book of Ruth is Ruth. She models the biblical ideal of womanhood. She is an independent thinker, assertive, even aggressive. She is submissive but only for the sake of the good. She persists until the right triumphs.
Boaz pays her the ultimate compliment in 3:11:
“Don’t be afraid, my daughter. I will do for you all you ask. All my fellow townsmen know that you are a woman of strong and noble character” (’shet chayil).”
BTW, NLT wrecks this verse. But then, every translation from KJV on messed up 2:1. Only if 2:1 and 3:11 are translated concordantly does what the Hebrew implies become clear: both Boaz and Ruth are individuals who stand out for their ruth, courage, boldness, and strength. They are each other’s equals. Naomi, the bitter, now saw the unbelievable. Her daughter found what she never found: “a place of rest” (3:1; cf. 1:9), that is, a marriage after God’s own heart. That is the biblical ideal.
The ideals of manhood and womanhood mirror each other in the Bible. It’s not just Ruth. It’s Shiphrah and Puah, Deborah, and Esther. It’s the “woman of character” of Proverbs 31. In the NT, a good example is the Syro-Phoenician woman.
All submission, even the endurance of abuse, by man or woman, with Jesus as the model, is goal-oriented in the Bible. If the goal is no longer reachable via submission, submission should end.
In the Bible, this is called fearing God rather than men. Complete insubordination is permitted whenever subordination threatens life and limb. It’s right there in Exodus 1:15-21.
You don’t have to be an egal to teach these things. It has nothing to with egalism. Shiphrah and Puah, Deborah, Ruth, Esther, and the Syro-Phoenician woman lived in very patriarchal contexts. They may well have all referred to their husbands as ‘my Lord.’ But that didn’t stop them for a minute.
“A woman of strength is the crown of her husband,” says Proverbs 12:4. A woman of courage and ruth, who stands up to the Lord himself if the situation requires it (Mark 7:24-30). Why a man would want anything less is beyond me.
Thank you, John, for you 8:27 comment. That was excellent! Would you mind if I quote you?
Don wrote: “In my understanding, a husband seeks God’s will for his life, a wife seeks God’s will for her life and both seek God’s will for the marriage.”
Then David wrote: “Don, that’s an interesting distinction, but since in a marriage the spouses’ lives are intimately linked, I’m not sure I understand how such a distinction would play out in real life.”
The basic idea is that if some decision would affect the other, then both are a part of the decision making process (assuming they want to be). In other words, their are decisions that are in the husband realm, the wife realm and the couple realm.
I am not referring to a case with potential for harm, like an emergency, then you act to prevent/reduce harm and there may be no discussion at all. But this is rare.
Don wrote: “I think both are to seek God’s will for the family, asking together and asking separately. The question is how is it confirmed for the family?”
David replied: “How is God’s will confirmed? By a variety of means. You look at whether a direction is consistent with God’s Word, whether the consequences are likely to be good or bad, at whether both spouses are in agreement, at how the children feel about it, at whether one of the spouses has a clear “check” or lack of peace about it, etc. If you’re looking for a clear “all things being equal, it’s what the husband thinks,” you won’t get that from me. Neither, I think, will you get it from most comps.”
How is what you wrote part of the comp model? It sounds like the egal model to me. (Mind you, I LIKE that aspect, so I am not disagreeing with you, just trying to understand.)
Gem,
Feel free, of course, to disseminate any comments I make, if you find them helpful.
David, you wrote,
I wrote the bit about Lisa becoming desperate as a kind of confession of my own slowness to understand the depth of what she was feeling.
I took it as such (and appreciate it – as I said, you are not alone!)
I’m beginning to suspect from these discussions that I cannot confess my own failures without those being used against me. Would it really be better if I pretended I have the perfect marriage and am the perfect husband?
I am sorry that you feel your confessions are being used against you. All that I (and, I think, the others, although I obviously can’t speak for everyone, but am going on what I’ve read) intended was to ask whether this particular failure, and by extension others like it that men may make, had anything to do with your comp. beliefs. I think this a reasonable and fair question.
(No one is expecting perfection from you or anyone else; this debate is not about perfection, but about marriage!)
I am finding complete agreement with the things you have said of late as to the way you believe that husband and wife should relate together. This causes me to wonder how these things are compatible with a husband-authority/leader-based view of marriage (which I think you subscribe to in some form?)
(I apologize if I’m wondering about something you’ve explained already!)
“I am finding complete agreement with the things you have said of late as to the way you believe that husband and wife should relate together. This causes me to wonder how these things are compatible with a husband-authority/leader-based view of marriage.”
Nothing really to wonder about here. Exousia / authority is not a negative concept in the Bible, and by extension, in compism or egalism, insofar as it relates to a Christian marriage. It becomes negative if and only if it is abused.
Christ is the model for the exercise of authority, and “Christlike domineering authority” and “Christlike oppressive leadership” are oxymorons.
Christ exercises his authority, furthermore, in imitation of his Father. As we learn from the Parable of the Talents (Luke 19:11-27), God is the ultimate delegator. He does not have a micromanaging bone in his body. He trusts, and later verifies. He does not control things every step of the way.
In a marriage, whoever it is, husband or wife, who takes the lead in the kitchen, in financial affairs, or whatever, exercises authority in a positive fashion if the principle of mutual consent is given sufficient scope. Otherwise, authority is abused and it becomes oppressive.
It is very sad that so many of us have had a very negative experience of being under someone else’s power. Since realistically so many of us will never marry again, we need to learn to move on into another way of being and thinking.
Most of us are dealing with the one parent family now and need to configure a new framework. We need to forge a new sense of ourselves as parents, as members of a larger family and community.
I am not promoting the one parent family. However, if this is our circumstance, and I sense that it is for many of us here, we need to experience this in positive ways.
I am very grateful for family and friends and am much indebted to other women who have acted as protectors and mentors in my life. I spent the weekend remembering Grace Irwin who was such a positive model for the women in my family.
It is also comforting to remember that the women of the Bible were strong caregivers in their own families.
David, I appreciate your thoughts.
I haven’t read the other comments here but I must say that Ware’s assertions of equality are bluntly contradicted by his notion of female as being a mediated image bearer who derives her humanity from the man (not from God).
You imply that egalitarians are giving Ware’s words meanings that he doesn’t intend and that he’s just to dense to forsee this and so promote a more constructive dialogue by using different language.
I do not think he can say these things and believe that both male and female are fully and equally the image of God. Nor can I believe him ignorant of the historical context of words like “derived” or “mediated”. Words mean things and his reveal a theology much more Aristotelian than Christian on gender issues.
John,
Nothing really to wonder about here. Exousia / authority is not a negative concept in the Bible, and by extension, in compism or egalism, insofar as it relates to a Christian marriage. It becomes negative if and only if it is abused.
I am not setting up authority as a negative concept. (I am not sure why the response to objection to unilateral husbandly authority/leadership is often an assumption that the objection is due to a negative conception of authority. This is not the case, at least for me.)
My objection is to the notion that the husband has an authority or leadership that takes precedence over the wife’s.
That a husband has an honored position as head of a marriage or a family I do not contest. In this honor, he takes precedence. But he does so as a family representative, and in this may have privileges that the other family members do not have. This I accept, and even welcome.
But I do not see this as an overall greater authority or leadership over all or even most facets of family life.
I do not think the husband has a superior authority in a marriage. A different one, perhaps, but not a preeminent one. I think this is borne out in the biblical record.
Bonnie,
I’m just trying to understand in what sense and to what degree compism and egalism differ in theory and in practice once two principles praised in the Bible, domain-based authority and mutual consent, are given sufficient scope within the framework of choice.
I don’t see much of a difference at all.
You say:
“My objection is to the notion that the husband has an authority or leadership that takes precedence over the wife’s.”
I have already argued that in any healthy marriage, comp or egal, there will be domains in which the husband has authority or leadership that takes precedence over the wife’s, and other domains in which the wife has authority that takes precedence over the husband’s. In no domains and under no circumstances, however, is the exercise of authority to be understood as the exercise of absolute authority. For the Christian, all human authority is limited by and must be contained within the bounds of the new commandment.
Furthermore, the exercise of authority is goal-oriented by definition. There is no such thing as authority for authority’s sake. For the Christian, the goal is about outdoing one another in love in all relationships.
You also say:
“That a husband has an honored position as head of a marriage or a family I do not contest. In this honor, he takes precedence. But he does so as a family representative, and in this may have privileges that the other family members do not have. This I accept, and even welcome.”
In today’s culture, to say what you did is sometimes counter-cultural, and helpful for that very reason.
When we have a parents’ night for confirmation class, for example, I am always pleased when Dads and not just Moms show up. Spiritual authority in particular has too often become the exclusive preserve of women, and religion itself feminized at all levels except the very top. There is no biblical warrant for that arrangement.
It is also possible to overdo the emphasis on the husband as head of the marriage or family.
You go on to say:
“I do not see this as an overall greater authority or leadership over all or even most facets of family life.”
Under a traditional and still widespread form of complementarianism, the three K’s (Kinder, Kuche, und Kirche) – children, the kitchen, and the church – are the domains in which wives are the primary decision-makers with the husbands the ultimate decision-makers in life-changing situations and matters of life and death. He is also the one who must give away his daughter to another man. In short, a healthy marriage, comp or egal, will not involve husband or wife making all or most of the decisions across all domains.
“Overall greater authority,” traditionally and, as I have observed it, in healthy arrangements comp or egal, is not about husbands not deferring to their wives in central areas of the management of a household.
It is about being a court of last appeal in difficult cases. It is about bearing responsibility for awful decisions that involve choosing, not between the good and the bad, but between two evils each of which is equally terrifying.
Now, a wise comp husband will seek to achieve mutual consent in cases in which he is turned to as the court of last appeal. So will a wise comp wife in the domains in which she is primary decision-maker. But this is not always possible.
Authority is sometimes “one-against-all” authority. As when my wife serves liver for dinner to the disgust of everyone else in the family. Nevertheless, we all bend the knee without complaining. Well, I’m not sure about the last point, but you see what I’m driving at.
Now, will an egal husband and an egal wife do anything differently than I just described? Not at all, so far as I can see.
If egalism is understood as holding a referendum on everything, such as whether to have liver for supper, go to church on a particular Sunday as a family, and so on, then something has gone terribly out of whack.
BTW, I see a lot of egal families tending toward a referendum-style of organizing family decisions. It is not a good tendency.
Ultimately, the only one who can exercise authority well is the one who actually possesses authority. The authority of hypocrites is by definition abusive.
Most of the marriages I see that are continually in hot water are that way because one or both the spouses lack the only real basis for exercising authority in the first place: a life and a spirit in tune with the Author of all and the Authorizer of all authority.
In short, a healthy marriage is not about eliminating hierarchy. It’s about giving sufficient scope to the principle of mutual consent within domain-based hierarchies. It’s about goal-oriented exercise of authority.
It’s about sacrificial love which, according to Ephesians 5, is to be modeled first of all by the husband. Not exclusively, but first of all. There is great authority, indeed ultimate authority, in sacrificial love.
I would like for David or another comp to respond to my query where I claimed David seemed to be conforming more to the egal model than the comp model. I appreciate John responding from his perspective, but it is still only his perpective.
John wrote: “In short, a healthy marriage is not about eliminating hierarchy. It’s about giving sufficient scope to the principle of mutual consent within domain-based hierarchies. It’s about goal-oriented exercise of authority.”
I think there is a HUGE difference between voluntary hierarchy and mandatory hierarchy. If a wife does X better than a husband and wants to do X, it makes sense to let the partnership decide that the wife do X most/all of the time, and the same for the husband. There is a world of difference tho if because one is a wife (or husband), one MUST do X.
On head/kephale, I think it is Biblically POSSIBLE for the husband to claim a mapping to the kephale in an army for the marriage, which is the most dangerous position in the front, NOT the leadership position, archon. But I do not see more than that.
Don says:
“If a wife does X better than a husband and wants to do X, it makes sense to let the partnership decide that the wife do X most/all of the time, and the same for the husband.”
That sounds like a wise practical rule of thumb. But sometimes a couple and a family face very tough decisions that amount to lose-lose propositions. Who takes ultimate responsibility for the decision in these cases?
Perhaps I’m wrong about this, but I think that responsibility in such cases usually falls to the husband in egal as well as comp arrangements. But get this: as a rule, it is the wife who empowers the husband to take final responsibility in precisely those cases.
In a passage like Matthew 2:13-15, Joseph is the one who takes the lead. It is servant-leadership, but it is leadership. Indeed, the angel appears to Joseph and not Mary.
If egalism were so important, the angel would have appeared to both and addressed them both. Somehow I don’t think egalism is as important as some people think it is.
However, comps who generalize on the basis of passages like this, that it will or should be the husband who always takes the lead, have not read the Bible carefully.
In the case of preparing the way for David and the messianic promise which issues from that, God bypasses the husband (do you remember his name? Most people don’t) and works directly with Hannah. She takes the lead and also has to overcome the stupidity of a dork of a priest. She is a woman of great strength and faith. Just the kind of woman any decent man would wish to have at his side.
Her husband Elkanah, precisely because he loves her and trusts her, gives her all the space she needs to do what she wants to do.
The permission is empowering. Note, however, the decisive thing, the vow to give the boy back to the Lord, is not a joint vow.
If egalism was so important, it would have been a joint vow. But it suited God that the Messiah come to us through the vow of a woman only. Just as it suited to God to bring Jesus into the world through a woman only, without male concourse.
Not very egal of God, but God, I’ve noticed, doesn’t care as much about our little systems as we do.
None of this changes the fact that seeking the consent of one’s spouse is an essential component of a healthy marriage. Indeed, mutual consent is important though not all-important in all human relationships: church, politics, the workplace, parent-child, and of course marriage.
I’m not a comp, but I notice that marriages of whatever framework in which the husband or the wife refuses to trust, delegate, and defer, but instead keeps his/her partner on a tight leash, are bound to be unhappy and are at a high risk of imploding.
Constriction has a place in human relationships. It is useless to pretend otherwise. But any relationship among Christians whose hallmark is constriction is unbiblical by definition based on passages like Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, and Philippians 2.
“I would like for David or another comp to respond to my query where I claimed David seemed to be conforming more to the egal model than the comp model. I appreciate John responding from his perspective, but it is still only his perpective.”
Thanks Don, I agree.
David, your original post on this subject sounded Patriarchal even though you most likely did not intend it too.
As time went on and you gave more and more explanations and details about the post, I could not see the difference between these explanations and what most Christian egals support. I would be very curious where your ‘compism’ comes in. Are you the final ‘tie’ breaking decision maker if it comes to that? Do you teach your wife scripture but she does not ever teach you?
On Hannah and Elkanah, here is my egal understanding, contra John’s claims,
1Sa 1:22 But Hannah did not go up, for she said to her husband, “As soon as the child is weaned, I will bring him, so that he may appear in the presence of the LORD and dwell there forever.”
1Sa 1:23 Elkanah her husband said to her, “Do what seems best to you; wait until you have weaned him; only, may the LORD establish his word.” So the woman remained and nursed her son until she weaned him.
Num 30:6 “If she marries a husband, while under her vows or any thoughtless utterance of her lips by which she has bound herself,
Num 30:7 and her husband hears of it and says nothing to her on the day that he hears, then her vows shall stand, and her pledges by which she has bound herself shall stand.
Num 30:8 But if, on the day that her husband comes to hear of it, he opposes her, then he makes void her vow that was on her, and the thoughtless utterance of her lips by which she bound herself. And the LORD will forgive her.
The Mosaic covenant has a rule that the husband can negate a vow of his wife, but he needs to do it when he first hears it. This is the purpose of these verses, showing that Hannah did not act alone, but in an egal manner with her husband inside the Mosaic covenant.
On Matthew and Joseph seeing an angel, Mary also saw an angel as told in Luke. Both were leaders in the family of Jesus.
Matthew gives the story from Joseph and Luke from Mary; they do not contradict each other, they harmonize with each other in a beautiful demonstration of mutual submission.
the husbands the ultimate decision-makers in life-changing situations and matters of life and death.
Do you endorse a paradigm in which the mother has no authority in matters concerning the life and death of herself or her children?
I cannot recommend it.
John,
If there is a lose-lose decision to make, why would that not be good to be a joint decision? If both are affected and both want to be a part of the decision, why not?
“Do you endorse a paradigm in which the mother has no authority in matters concerning the life and death of herself or her children?”
Of course not. That is not what I said. I was trying to describe, perhaps too awkwardly, what has been and is a very common arrangement in which ultimate decision-making in life-changing situations and matters of life and death is vested in the husband.
A decent husband will make the ultimate decision only after much soul searching and, in normal cases, after consultation with wife and family. In normal cases, a husband would no longer be loving if he did otherwise.
For example, there are situations of paralysis in which a choice has to be made between two bad options and no one wants to make it. Traditionally, neo-traditionally, and in most egal marriages I have observed, the burden of making that decision falls on the husband. Precisely because it is a difficult decision, it is normally made only after much consultation.
BTW, is this some sort of absolute rule? Of course not. Sometimes it is the wife who goes out on a limb, packs up the car, and ensures that the whole family moves to Texas (or whatever) against the will of everyone, including herself, because it still seems the best thing to do. Sometimes, “a little child will lead them.”
Don,
Of course Hannah did not act alone, and neither did Joseph. A relationship would have to be pretty sick for a wife to give away her child without seeking the consent of her husband. Joseph would have been a very inconsiderate person if he had packed up his family and put them on the road to Egypt without prior consultation with Mary. Said consultation is nowhere described in the text, but we can safely assume it took place.
But your conclusion that Hannah and Elkanah on the one hand and Mary and Joseph on the other understood their marriage along egal lines does not follow. No serious scholar would make such a statement.
People in Bible times lived within patriarchal cultures and organized their lives accordingly. Notice how Hannah addresses her husband. Notice how she is one of two wives.
There are a few people today who claim that one can be bigamous or polyandrous and that that somehow is compatible with egalitarianism.
Could have fooled me. Personally, I’m in favor of keeping both illegal.
Elkanah and Hannah, Joseph and Mary did not have egal marriages. That would be quite the anachronism. But they obviously treated each other with great consideration. That’s what matters anyway.
Don, if you are claiming that only egals treat each other with consideration such that a couple whose life is characterized by love going in both directions is by definition egal, you need to say so up front.
I sometimes get the impression that that is what you think: that compism is by definition an arrangement in which the husband is domineering and disrespectful to his wife.
Surely there are comp marriages that fit that bill. There are plenty of egal marriages that do as well.
A Christian comp or egal marriage ceases to be Christian, however, insofar as it is characterized by such abuses.
and in most egal marriages I have observed, the burden of making that decision falls on the husband.
Typically a medical doctor likes to know that the wife has equal participation in the decision-making. I cannot frankly endorse anything else. In fact, I do not know of any mother who lets the burden of such decision-making fall to the father.
I do know that sometimes a father will insist on his unique authority in these situations and they lead to intensely difficult situations and divorce.
I regret that I cannot imagine a life or death situation in which the husband ought to have authority over the wife. Naturally if the husband were an army or police officer, he might by virtue of his secular authority have more authority in the family. Barring this, I believe that it is harmful to the wife’s interests and loving care for her children to put her under the husband’s authority in matters relating to the safety of the children.
Perhaps you could give an example of what you mean by a life or death situation where the husband, by virtue of being male, ought to have more authority than the wife. I cannot imagine one.
There are mutual acts and non-mutual acts. My take is an egal marriage has a better chance for more of the former and less of the latter, everything else being equal. Anyone can sin, no question about that and anyone can act in a loving way; the question is what models encourages the latter? And assuming many do, which one does it best?
The act of Hannah giving up her child was a mutual decision.
Joseph was not even going to marry Mary except for angelic intervention after Mary’s agreement to bear Jesus.
“the husband, by virtue of being male, ought to have more authority than the wife.”
I’m not sure that it has ever been about being male. Of course, there are some grounds for thinking in these terms. That’s why language speaks of the “alpha male” but not so easily of the “alpha female.” In any case, note that I was being careful to be descriptive in my comment, not prescriptive.
To be sure, culture is never neutral. For example, the very fact that in North American culture men do not normally wear kilts makes it prescriptive that they do not.
It is not so much about being male or having “alpha male” instincts (something a minority of males have in abundance) as about being the titular head of the family. This remains the cultural (not biological) norm across the world based on observations I think anyone can make.
On my blog, I once gave a heart-wrenching example of a life and death situation in which the husband took ultimate responsibility for the decisions that were made. I’m referring to Jochen Klepper, the great German novelist and hymnwriter who chose to commit suicide with his wife and daughter rather than be gassed to death at Auschwitz.
Klepper’s marriage (we have voluminous documentation) was characterized by great tenderness and consideration. He was also the head of his family in the traditional German sense (Klepper not incidentally wrote a novel entitled Der Vater).
If we are being told that such arrangements are simply wrong, I don’t buy it. If we are being told that such arrangements must be opposed, I object.
It is always possible to claim – though there is little or no hard evidence to support the claim – that abuse rates are statistically higher in traditional and neo-traditional marriage arrangements.
Even if that were true, it is not per se a strong argument against traditional and neo-traditional arrangements. It is an argument that the risk of abuse needs to be addressed with a proportionally higher degrees of consistency in some cultures and sub-cultures.
Of course, there is far more to the question of how the Christian faith intersects with culture than I have touched on here. It’s helpful to work with models like that of H. Richard Niebuhr.
I’m following and enjoying this discussion. Really good food for thought….
I think that Elkanah shows respect for his wife’s authority to make that decision regarding their son. I think Mary exercised authority and made the decision to accept God’s call without ever consulting Joseph (her betrothed).
And I think a wife MUST protect her children. She has a responsibility and CALL from God. The word translated “keeper” in Titus 2 is not about housecleaning, it is about PROTECTING her household. If her husband is doing things which endanger her and the children, she errs to think that she is off the hook with the excuse of “but I was submitting to my husband”.
“The act of Hannah giving up her child was a mutual decision.”
Yes it was, and it took place in a hierarchical marriage arrangement. Furthermore, the initiative was Hannah’s and the conclusive vow was hers, not her husband’s.
From the point of view of the Bible, Hannah’s actions, and Elkanah’s assent to her initiative, are entirely praiseworthy. Hannah was a woman of strength, a model for women and men in any age and under any cultural circumstances.
To me, these considerations illustrate how the “all other things being equal, egal is better” argument carries little weight.
The key and decisive element in any marriage is the quality of faith of the people involved, the positive exercise of authority by husband and wife that flows from it, and the mutual consideration that is connatural to a vital faith.
The claims of ideological comps and egals alike, insofar as they give the impression that the framework they tout solves all problems, are profoundly misleading.
It reminds me a little bit of the situation my mother found herself in. In the midst of an unhappy marriage with my father (for which he bore the greater guilt), she had an affair and married someone else. Her current husband is by no means a terrible person – quite the contrary. But my mother eventually realized she had just traded one set of problems for another.
I worry about comps and egals alike who think that their framework of choice is some sort of answer to problems they face or think they will face. It is not.
The real answers are of a different nature, and are clearly taught in scripture in passage after passage, beginning with Romans 12, 1 Cor 13, and Philippians 2.
John,
The exact point of my posting was to show how Hannah’s vow was NOT conclusive, under the rules of the Mosaic covenant. How you can claim it WAS conclusive is beyond me.
I do not see anyone saying the egal model is the answer to every problem in marriage, it ain’t. Can we let that straw man die? However I do believe it is best model to use among choice of models in the sense of having the best chance for the other loving verses to apply. Can the other loving verses apply in a hierarchical marriage? Sure they can, but they seem to depend more on the willingness of the one on top, the husband, since HE IS IN CHARGE to a greater or lesser extent. HE GETS THE FINAL SAY and in that aspect has the last chance to sin, to be selfish. Will he be selfish, who knows? But the risk is ALWAYS there when he has that kind of power.
I am trying to see you blog on the Klepper story but I cannot find a search engine.
Do you have a link or links to other sites?
http://www.lutheranwiki.org/Jochen_Klepper
is a LOT on him.
“Mary exercised authority and made the decision to accept God’s call without ever consulting Joseph (her betrothed).”
Gem, that is an excellent point.
There are occasions in life in which consultation is not a practical option or is inappropriate. Mary would no longer have been a model of faith and strength if she had responded, “Wait a second. I need to get Joseph’s opinion on this.”
Furthermore, consultation is sometimes not a practical option in life and death situations or situations in which a snap decision is required. This is one more reason lines of authority need to be clear in a marriage. In healthy marriages, they usually are, implicitly more than explicitly, but not according to a one-size-fits-all formula.
The strength of a marriage is tested by situations fraught with danger. A couple of years ago, our youngest, Anna (that’s Hannah, by the way), got into my wife Paola’s bedside drawer and swallowed a bunch of pills. It wasn’t long before Anna was very very sick and Paola didn’t guess why until we were already on the way to the emergency room.
Paola is a very independent person but in this situation she leaned on me in ways she does not normally find necessary. To some extent, a role reversal took place. She usually takes the lead when it comes to sickness and health care issues with the kids.
In this case, however, she preferred that I take the lead. I was almost as scared as she was, but I tried not to let it show, and of course we discussed whatever decisions had to be made that very long night in the hospital.
Guess who pulled us through? Little Anna, of course. Even as she barfed up charcoal and all the rest for the tenth time, she remained happy to have both of her parents’ attention for a change, not to mention that of several nurses and doctors at the hospital.
Three things are important in a situation fraught with danger and I object to ideologies which stress one to the exclusion of the others:
(1) Office-based authority
(2) Gift-based authority
(3) (last but not least) Mutual consideration and the communication that flows from it
Office based authority was not what kicked in when Paola deferred to me more than usual in the situation described. At least, I don’t think it was (comps might have another opinion).
A clear case of office-based authority was that exercised by the doctor when we were in the ER. We deferred to her authority on principle without any foreknowledge of her specific gifts.
A clear case of gift-based authority would have been if the ER had allowed the nurse on duty who was most gifted at finding a vein and drawing blood from a patient to have drawn blood from Anna. Instead, in a typical abuse of the principle of hierarchy, office (who was assigned to that room) took precedence over charism (who on duty was best at the task to be done).
What ensued was a mess and a trauma for all concerned. A nurse ungifted at finding a vein and drawing blood tried repeatedly to do it without success. She was in more pain than anyone else.
If I remember right, she finally succeeded. Rarely have I seen a hospital floor operate on the principle of gift-based authority, in this realm or in general. I consider this quite unfortunate.
Mutual consideration and communication. The situation would have been entirely compromised if I had stepped in and restrained the ungifted nurse and insisted on having a nurse who knew what she was doing. Believe me, that is what I wanted to do.
It’s important in life to pick one’s battles very carefully. I know of no set formula.
One’s entire identity is on the line in situations of danger. People discover things about themselves and about others in such situations that they were unaware of beforehand.
Luk 1:26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,
Luk 1:27 to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary.
Luk 1:28 And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!”
Luk 1:29 But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be.
Luk 1:30 And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
Luk 1:31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.
Luk 1:32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,
Luk 1:33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”
Luk 1:34 And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”
Luk 1:35 And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy–the Son of God.
Luk 1:36 And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.
Luk 1:37 For nothing will be impossible with God.”
Luk 1:38 And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
There are a few points:
1. Mary does not consult with Joseph, her betrothed.
2. Mary simply ACCEPTS what she has been told will happen.
3. Mary does this without knowing the results, she trusts God. We see from Matthew that one expectation would have been the breaking of the betrothal by Joseph, altho this does not happen due to angelic intervention.
4. Jesus would have been considered a mamzer/bastard as people in the village could count to 9 months. This is hinted at in the gospels. Both Mary and Jesus would have shame from others based on this. Yet Mary agreed.
John,
I will try to summarize my understanding of the Jochen Klepper story. He married a Jew who had 2 daughters by her previous marriage and who converted, but this was not good enough for the Nazi state. One daughter escaped, but when he tried to get his wife and daughter out of Germany, he found he was too late and realized those 2 were headed to extermination as Jews. He decided to die WITH THEM, instead of letting the evil Nazi state take them away. Perhaps he would have been exterminated also, this is not clear, but his decision was understandable in any case, he worked to avoid the greater evil. Some might decide differently, I judge none of them in the face of this level of systemic evil.
On your hospital example, I once had atrial fib and the admitting nurse needed to get a line open BEFORE admitting, but she was an absolute hack. I did get another nurse, after being traumatized by the first. I thot that was crazy, as it risked making my afib worse, so I objected.
In both cases, I do not see them as relevant to ANY marriage model, these are extreme situations where one falls back on the basics of love, the models are simply not relevant, one way or the other. One does the best one can. However, these situations should be rare.
My point is one does not decide on marriage models based on extreme exception cases (as the models do not even matter then), the decision is made on day to day things.
Sorry that I have not taken the time to index my blog properly.
The link is:
http://ancienthebrewpoetry.typepad.com/ancient_hebrew_poetry/2008/01/war-and-peace-i.html
I got there by putting “ancient hebrew poetry” and “jochen klepper” into google.
Don, you say:
“HE IS IN CHARGE . . . HE GETS THE FINAL SAY . . .”
I know that that is what you understand compism to be about. I don’t deny that some very ideological comps come across precisely in that way, with all capital letters, too.
Viewed from the point of the Bible, however, it is a perversion of the paradigm. People in the Bible lived within structures, expectations, and mores that were more patriarchal than extreme neo-traditionalists might hope for in their wildest dreams.
But you still can’t find “HE IS IN CHARGE . . . HE GETS THE FINAL SAY . . .” anywhere in the Bible. There is something sick about talking that way, and you don’t have to be an egal to figure it out.
Note that comps on these threads – David, Marilyn, Letitia, Gem, Ellen, etc. – do not think of or speak of compism in these terms.
If I ever heard a preacher go on like that: “HE IS IN CHARGE . . . HE GETS THE FINAL SAY . . .” without very careful qualification, I would count it a joy, a privilege, and a Christian witness to stand up, walk right out of the building, and catch some clean air.
I have this crazy daydream sometimes. That some extreme comp is in town, thinks he is preaching to the choir as it were, to an audience in which everyone agrees with him even more than he agrees with himself, and so he goes on a nice little rhetorical rampage.
Unbeknownst to him, the whole compegal community is in the audience (I want to sit next to Merry Quaker, by the way, but I notice she hasn’t commented in a long while). David, Don, Wayne, Peter, and I stand up together with Marilyn, Letitia, Gem, Molly, and Sue (after we convince her to stop taking notes) and all the others, we walk out real dignified in the middle of the rant to the gapes and stares of the rest, and then we go to the hotel where my wife Paola (who, being smart, knew better than to go hear the preacher in the first place) has prepared her best recipes of lasagna and pizza, a sort of Italian Babette’s feast, and we have a party together with our entire families (who had far better things to do than hear the preacher).
As in Babette’s feast, by the end of the party we wouldn’t know or care any longer who was a comp or who was an egal. Because we would realize that what unites us is ten times more important than what divides us.
We might go and have the same walking out experience by attending a rally in which John Shelby Spong is the keynote speaker (a favorite of the uber-egals in my denomination). He knows how to inflame an audience, too.
“My point is one does not decide on marriage models based on extreme exception cases (as the models do not even matter then), the decision is made on day to day things.”
Well, I’m not sure that marriage models do not matter in extreme situations.
In any case, in both extreme and everyday situations, a healthy comp and a healthy egal marriage will look remarkably similar if domain-based hierarchies, the new commandment, and the principle of mutual consent are given sufficient application.
As usual, Don, all nice non-egals turn out to be egals in your estimation.
I know you mean it as a form of praise, but historically speaking, it is improper to classify Jochen Klepper as anything other than someone who united in his being a strong Christian faith and a tender love for his family all the while being a perfect Vater in the traditional German sense.
I agree the the husband gets the final say is NOT in the Bible. It would be great to feast such as you suggested.
I can be missing something obvious, I do not refer to myself as Mr. Oblivious for no reason.
But as far as I can tell, the way the comp position is (carefully) worded is that the husband DOES get the final say or the tie-breaking vote or various other ways of saying the same thing.
If this is not true, I rejoice, but I would want to hear it from someone who claims to be comp.
It is absolutely tragic that in the case where authority in such emergenicies is assigned by gender, and not by whoever is most appropriate, or by mutual consent, the child is likely to end up with only one parent.
It is very frequent that parents of children with serious difficulties divorce. I believe this is due to innapropriate use of parental authority, one over the other, or abdication of authority. Let me say that improper authority, that which is based on the biological gender of the parent, is destructive to the parenting process.
Assigning the father greater authority overall is a recipe for divorce in cases of family crisis, just as much as allowing one parent to opt out of responsibility.
I am not trying to say all nice non-egals are really egals. That is unfair.
I was not trying to claim Klepper was not what he was, I have no idea what he was, so I assume he conformed in a general way to society.
I did say that the models go out the window in extreme situations. And exactly for that reason extreme situations are not a good reason to decide what model makes sense MOST of the time.
You want to justify (or at least suspend judgment on) non-egalism by claiming that in some extreme cases it makes sense. I do not see extreme cases as justification for any model, as the model becomes irrelevant. We simply see this aspect differently.
We do live in a culture where wives command husbands. … we reject all authority structures because we think we know better.
God does not say, I put you in charge now rule. He always tells authorities, I have put you in charge but what I want you to do is love. You are in charge husbands, I have decided this, too bad if you don’t want to be in charge, you are in charge, says God, like I am in charge of you, so I want you to love your wives, in the same way I love the church, so far that you are willing to die for her. Use my love for you as the minimum requirement for how you love your wife.
I think this is pretty clear, the husband is in charge. A sermon preached in the largest Anglican church in Canada and follows the teaching of Bruce Ware as it is promoted by CBMW. Many promoters of CBMW in the congregation, among them Dr. Packer.
I am not going out of the way to find this stuff. This is the face of compism in my life.
Re medical emergencies, I saw a 6 memeber team put together and the operation halted in the middle for 2 hours of consultation. Each doctor had a position, a domain. I do not know whether there was an authority ranking, but in the end the youngest doc won the day and he saw his decision affirmed. It was collaborative planning.
If brain surgeons can operate this way then I don’t see why a husband ever has to say, “I am the alpha male, and my say goes.”
I think that is the first line of divorce proceedings.
With all these similarities in marriage ‘models’ (except in the case of extreme where either spouse is attemption to force, coerce, compel the other) I don’t think the marriage is where the main concern is.
If the image of God is equally within both male and female as the humans God created, then there should be no problems with either women or men being used of God to serve His purposes in whatever ways He chooses. Fellow humans should have no problems hearing the will of God from any person God chooses. Ministry should not be a matter of privileges which is confined to fleshly preferences.
Spiritual ministry is the real place and the true focal point IMO of the primary concerns between egal and non egals. IMO the hierarchalists are so concerned with denying women certain ‘roles’ in ministry that they have theologically reformed doctrine in other areas in order to legitimize the concepts of gender denial in ministry.
However, even that may loosen up some, now that CBMW has felt it acceptable for a woman to hold profound authority in the governments of society.
if domain-based hierarchies, the new commandment, and the principle of mutual consent are given sufficient application.
I have honestly never seen these things included in a comp document.
I am also curious as to why these things are considered essential for day to day stuff but not for life-changing and life and death decisions. I am really puzzled about why mutual consent would be good for the day to day, and not for life and death. It is very worrisome to be a mother in this case. This is where so many marriages founder in a crisis.
“If I ever heard a preacher go on like that: “HE IS IN CHARGE . . . HE GETS THE FINAL SAY . . .” without very careful qualification, I would count it a joy, a privilege, and a Christian witness to stand up, walk right out of the building, and catch some clean air.”
They don’t say that because it would not work. It would not sell books and seminar tickets. They spend lots of time preaching on “roles” and presenting them as biblical. They claim there is a biblical manhood and womanhood. They define the roles and within that defintion is the implication. He leads. She submits. He ‘lovingly’ leads. She ‘joyfully’ submits. (they use lots of descriptors so the abuser in the audience thinks his leadership is always ‘loving’)
You hear this over and over for years. You hear explanations of how creation order means leadership for men and ‘helper’ for women. Her ‘role’ is to support him in ‘his’ mission.
And people flock to this stuff because it is much easier to follow rules, roles and formulas than it is to abide in Christ.
You hear over and over how he is supposed to be the spiritual leader of the home. (Oh how many wives were waiting around for that to happen and complaining about it all the time! This keeps the counseling center at the megas very busy)
There is more. But the effect over a period of years is that women believe this stuff. They believe they act in a ‘role’. They are focused on their ‘works’ in their role. They are not seeking Christ, they are seeking thier husbands will thinking they are seeking Christ by doing that. Whatever that ‘will’ is because most of the time, he does not know either.
No pastor or seminar teacher has to get up and say, ‘the husband has the final say’. It is implied. Inferred in every single lesson, sermon, book, etc. Because….he, and only, he is responsible for the big decisions.
Problem is, the wife is taught that she is responsible for how the husband FEEEEELLLLLLLLS (thanks, gem:o) about himself. So he can always blame her for being unsubmissive, not supporting him or ‘lifting’ him up if he fails at anything.
It is a great system for the guys. Sort of like the one in Genesis that caused the fall.
)
Now, John. This was what I witnessed as a communications consultant for many of these comp seminars and events. Hundreds of them for years. So, go ahead and throw rocks.
)
But, if you go up and ask them if the husband has final say…they will tell you they ALWAYS include the wife in all decision making.
All the time and money spent on this foolishness when men and women should just seek Christ and His Kingdom and all these things will be given to them.
“I have honestly never seen [domain-based hierarchies, the new commandment, and the principle of mutual consent] included in a comp document.”
All the comps I know personally, in my extended family, circle of friends, and through this blog recognize and practice so far as they report the three things I mention, sometimes better than I do in my own marriage.
Perhaps it will be necessary to read comps like Eggerich, Thomas, and others, and/or comp authors Marilyn, Gem, David, Letitia and other comps on these these threads might recommend.
Or you might try a non-egal author like Sarah Sumner, who occupies an interesting middle ground.
“IMO the hierarchalists are so concerned with denying women certain ‘roles’ in ministry that they have theologically reformed doctrine in other areas in order to legitimize the concepts of gender denial in ministry.”
I agree that some comps do this, but I notice the same thing going on some egals. For example, Frank Viola reforms the doctrine of the Trinity to eliminate hierarchy altogether.
I think both extremes are dangerous.
What does Viola say about the Trinity? Does he deny subordination while Jesus was on earth?
I am still wondering if anyone really believes that a man has life or death decision-making authority over his wife and children. I don’t understand this at all. Did I read this correctly?
If Letitia came and preached in my church I would not be upset about complemnetarianism but would only ask that egal men not be called amoebas. I think that is going a little too far.
Don,
Go over to Ben Witherington’s blog for a long and fascinating exchange with Frank Viola. Or check out Peter Kirk’s Gentle Wisdom a couple of weeks back (I think), and the posts and comments there.
Peter, I think, sides with Frank, whereas I side with Ben. BTW, Ben is also egal.
As I understand, Viola thinks the Father and the Son are in a reciprocal authority arrangement, with no subordination except mutual subordination. I don’t think such a view does justice to John 17 (for example).
To be honest, when someone starts tampering with the doctrine of the Trinity to support either comp or egal thinking, I take that as a sign of extremism.
The problem I see is that the ideals of mutual consent and mutuality are not compatible with the ideal of husband as authority and husband having ‘final say’. It is either one or the other. So what happens is that husbands who are sensitive to their wives end up listening and considering their wives, which most often ends up in mutuality and mutual consent. They then just hold the ‘final say’ card in theory in case they might need it. This gives the appearance of ‘headship’ and male authority over the wife. But if they never use this ‘card’, it is in all practicality NOT hierarchical male headship but instead the ideal of mutuality and two becoming as one. This makes it somewhat confusing for egals who hear them talk the talk of male dominance but walk the walk of mutuality.
“Perhaps it will be necessary to read comps like Eggerich, Thomas, and others, and/or comp authors Marilyn, Gem, David, Letitia and other comps on these these threads might recommend.”
John, Wayne posted a thread asking people to give scripture that teaches male leadership only.
If there is scriptural support for that, why not post them there?
“They then just hold the ‘final say’ card in theory in case they might need it.”
But anyone who uses the ‘final say’ card in that way no longer loves his wife as Christ loved the church. Paul, who addresses husbands within a patriarchal framework, leaves husbands no alibi for that kind of behavior.
Suzanne,
I gave a couple of examples already in which life and death authority or authority in situations of danger was vested in the husband (one from my own life, another from the life of Jochen Klepper). I continue to believe that the examples I gave are not unusual.
Don is certainly right that Klepper exercised the authority vested in him (as a traditional German Vater) with great consideration for his wife and children. In a traditional or a neo-traditional framework, to do otherwise would constitute unfaithfulness to basic fundamentals of the Christian teaching.
Lin,
Some comps on these threads have already been clear about their favorite authors.
Don, you asked how the way Lisa and I make decisions is consistent with complementarianism, and Lin, you asked if I see myself as having the tie-breaking vote. I’ve tried to answer those questions in my most recent post.
I’m afraid I’m very busy with work these days, so I may be slow to deal with all the comments here. Please bear with me if I’m silent for days at a time.
“Perhaps it will be necessary to read comps like Eggerich, Thomas, and others, and/or comp authors Marilyn, Gem, David, Letitia and other comps on these these threads might recommend.”
I recommend Thomas who is comp. His book for women speaks life. He emphasizes relationship with GOD which I think is key. (see “Sacred Influence”- Complementarian Gary Thomas Speaks Life to Women: a book review
As Lin alluded to, much of the teaching out there on marriage winds up feeding a destructive form of husband and marriage idolatry which contributes to the high divorce rate among Christians IMO.
I expect I would appreciate Sarah Sumner’s book as well. I accept and believe that husbands have power/authority. They can use that for good or evil in their marriages and families. (and the same for wives. They have power/authority within their marriages and families to speak and minister life or death by their words and actions.) The authority of we image-bearers should be acknowledged, nurtured, and embraced for GOOD. Saying “men don’t have it” (egals) or saying “women don’t have it” (comps) is inaccurate and counterproductive IMO.
If Letitia came and preached in my church I would not be upset about complemnetarianism but would only ask that egal men not be called amoebas. I think that is going a little too far.
October 1, 2008 5:37 PM
I can recall egal men also being referred to as wimpy by a comp on this blog. I did not think that was helpful, either. But it is the prevailing view at CBMW. Russell Moore is calling for more Patriarchy because he is teaching that comps are wimps. He wrote about it in an article for the Henry Institute.
The phrase “tampering with the Trinity” is used these days. CBMW claims a permanent hierarchy in the Trinity and CBE claims no permanent hierarchy, so it is clear they disagree.
When an ECF or early church council writes about the Trinity, I am not sure how to understand it, let alone what to make of it assuming I understand it, as I do not accept these writings with the same authority as Scripture.
gem wrote: “The authority of we image-bearers should be acknowledged, nurtured, and embraced for GOOD. Saying “men don’t have it” (egals) or saying “women don’t have it” (comps) is inaccurate and counterproductive IMO.”
I am egal and think both men and women have power and authority, in a marriage they share it, so I certainly do not think one or the other does not have it.
Some comps on these threads have already been clear about their favorite authors.
October 2, 2008 5:52 AM
??? I don’t know what you are referring to here.
From http://equalitypress.wordpress.com/2008/08/27/ivp-dictionary-on-the-trinity/
From The New Dictionary of Theology edited by David F. Wright, Sinclair B. Ferguson and J.I. Packer (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000, c1988.), 693. The article is by Gerald L. Bray.
Western Trinitarianism was matched by its Eastern rival, which is associated with the name of Origen. Working quite independently of Tertullian, Origen developed a doctrine of the three hypostaseis of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, which were revealed to share the same divine ousia (essence). Origen arranged these in hierarchical order, with the Father as God-in-himself (autotheos), the Son as his exact image, and the Holy Spirit as the image of the Son. He insisted that this order existed in eternity, so that there could be no question of saying that there had been a time when the Son had not existed. But he also maintained that the Son had always been subordinated to the Father in the celestial hierarchy.
This view was later questioned by Arius, who argued that a subordinate being could not be co-eternal with the Father, since coeternity would imply equality. He was countered by Athanasius and others who replied that the Son was indeed co-eternal with the Father, but not subordinate to him, except in the context of the incarnation. Classical Trinitarianism developed in earnest after the Council of Nicaea (325). There it had been stated that the Son was consubstantial (homoousios) with the Father, but soon afterwards this key term and the doctrine it embodied were widely rejected in favour of compromise formulae, such as homoiousios, ‘of a similar substance’. Athanasius, almost alone in the East, but after 339 with the support of the West, battled for an understanding (reflected in homoousios as he read it) which would make the Son numerically identical with the Father. The Son was not to be regarded as a part of God, nor was he a second deity; he was simply God himself, in whom the fullness of divinity dwelt (Col. 2:8) and in whom the Father himself was to be seen (Jn. 14:9). Eventually his viewpoint was secured, but not before controversy had broken out over the Holy Spirit.
(bold is mine)
Looks like Athanasius is to egalitarians as Origen is to complementarians in their understandings of the Trinity. Thank God for the work of Athanasius and the establishment of his creed.
And in this Trinity none is afore or after Other, None is greater or less than Another, but the whole Three Persons are Co-eternal together
Equality within the Trinity is hardly a feminist idea. It is pure orthodoxy.
—end quote—
Don, thanks so much for that resource. I just copied it on another forum where it could be discussed.
Don,
I think you might to do some more reading before you jump to the conclusion that in the Trinity, equality in essence and hierarchy of function are incompatible. Good places to start: Jaroslav Pelikan, The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (Vol. 1); T. F. Torrance, The Trinitarian Faith: The Evangelical Theology of the Catholic Church. At some point, one has to read the primary sources.
I see “biblical egals” making the above category mistake rather often in other contexts: that of simply overlooking the many examples of equality of essence / hierarchy of function in human culture – for example, in the employer/employee relationship and the parent/child relationship.
It is typical of patriarchy to think of the husband / wife relationship along the same lines. People in Bible times construed marriage in this way. To one degree or another, the same is true in much contemporary culture, but not in contemporary Western culture. There are all kinds of gradations here. I simplify greatly.
Back to the Trinity. To tear apart the synthesis, reduce it to an antithesis, and then exclude hierarchy or equality in thinking of the Trinity is fatal.
Not only will it be impossible to make sense of the classical doctrine of the Trinity. It will be impossible to make sense of a passage like John 17. Surely it is obvious that this passage combines a sense of hierarchy and equality between Father and Son. Surely it is obvious that the very terms, Father and Son, imply hierarchy. Surely it is obvious that the prologue to the Gospel of John implies equality of essence.
I remain convinced that the compegal debate has generated extremes that are productive of heresy.
I gave a couple of examples already in which life and death authority or authority in situations of danger was vested in the husband (one from my own life, another from the life of Jochen Klepper). I continue to believe that the examples I gave are not unusual.
Can you not think of just as many counter examples. It seems that gender is incidental to these examples. Has your wife never made a life-saving decision in your family? Doesn’t it go back and forth.
I am part of a large multigenerational family. Frequently decisions even of the life and death sort are vested in the male or female,
a) the oldest sibling
b) most financially established
c) person who is closest, most available, most well trained, etc.
There are only a very few things that tend to go to a person because of gender – it is a small factor.
I cannot personally think of any way at all that maleness ought to have a play in greater overall authority. I just cannot see a link between maleness and authority as a moral connection. It seems incidental.
I believe that any time the male tries to have final say over the female because of his gender, one should suspect a sinful motivation. If the male has always been the decision-maker and continues to do so because the female consents, then that is a pattern, but there is no moral obligation for this.
I guess this just no longer makes any sense. It does not connect to any reality I know, and half of women are single so the only reason to discuss it is to free the women who are held against their will.
John,
John 17 shows Jesus in his incarnation and the sending of the Son is not an issue but is a requirement for a judicial matter. I send my husband to do errands and neither of us would ever claim the sending makes me over him in a hierarchical position of authority. I have an entire section on this in our new DVD on the Trinity. In it I discuss why it was so important that Jesus was sent from the Father and it has nothing to do with hierarchy.
You said: “Surely it is obvious that the very terms, Father and Son, imply hierarchy.”
The terms “Father and Son” do not imply hierarchy in adults. Surely you are not trying to tell us that your father has a hierarchical rule over you? In adults the term “Father and Son” imply relationship not hierarchy.
I would really encourage you to get a copy of the DVD “The Trinity Eternity Past to Eternity Future Explaining Truth Exposing Error” available at http://www.mmoutreach.org The stamping of the disks should be complete by this week and we expect we will have received the disks and have them ready for shipping by October 15th.
The DVD project goes through every argument given against the full equality of the Son regarding his authority, his will and his glory. The arguments posed for the subordination of the Son are refuted from the scriptures alone and we show how the lesser view of Jesus with an eternal subordinated position in the Trinity dishonors the Father. Bruce Ware’s arguments from his book on the Trinity and his audio lectures are soundly refuted and they are included in the 2 DVD set for all to hear.
It is time that we stand up for the full Deity of Jesus Christ including his full honor, glory, will and authority. Those who have led the Church to bring Jesus down to a lower level, do so with an agenda. We simply cannot let this go unchallenged.
Cheryl,
I agree with you, but only by half.
That is, you are sensitive to the tampering being done to the doctrine of the Trinity on the part of some comps, but you are insensitive to the tampering being done to the doctrine of the Trinity on the part of some egals.
I also think your reading of John 17 is quite forced. If you look at how the Father-Son relation is understood in classical commentary before the comp-egal wars, you will discover a more natural take on the passage which does not line up with either that of Ware on the one side or Viola on the other.
This is a typical case of the ravaging and blinding effect of polarization.
On the Trinity, God is infinite and we are finite, so I simply do not accept that any normal human understands all about the Trinity.
I already know that RCC theologians can get something wrong about interpreting the Bible, as I am a prot. They can also get something right.
I only accept Scripture as definitive for my faith, as well as what has been revealed to me personally and which I agree no one else needs to accept.
I assure you I have no trouble at all understanding John 17 such as I do as compatible with my understanding of no permanent hierarchy in the Trinity. In John 17, Jesus was speaking when incarnate.
a) the oldest sibling
b) most financially established
c) person who is closest, most available, most well trained, etc.
I should make clear that in my family, the answer to all of these is “female.” So, if the answer to these categories is “male” then the male will seem like the overall authority. But if the answer is female then she becomes the “overall” authority. There is nothing that says it has to be male. This is fictitious and is used innapropriately by males to impose in sinful ways their own sinful will.
I consider this to be a great wrong that is harboured within the church. It must be repudiated. Wade Burleson has it right by fighting this in no uncertain terms. I understand that he is a complementarian who has chosen to fight the evil rather than compromise. I have no idea why an egal would compromise.
This teaching entails great wrong doing and suffering.
I recommend Cheryl’s DVDs and analyses, she can see things others miss and at the least will make you think.
John,
When we look at the Trinity, we fail to properly evaluate it if we only look at the incarnation. In my DVD I go through the questions of authority, will, glory, etc from the Old Testament to show the Son in his eternality in the Godhead before the incarnation. This is the place where a subordinated will and a subordinated authority would prove itself. An eternally subordinated pre-incarnate Christ is not shown in the Old Testament.
I do not have time here to argue the case against an eternal subordination of the Son. It is carefully done in my DVD with related audio and graphics.
Also, when I was a complementarian myself, I never believed or was taught that the Son was in a subordinated position in the eternal Godhead. In fact if I had believed he was subordinated, I would not have been very effective in witnessing to JW’s for all those years. One cannot witness of a subordinated, less authoritative Jesus in the Godhead to a JW. You can effectively witness of the one who is fully God with full authority leaving aside that authority, power and glory to go after incarnation for our benefit. You cannot effectively witness about one who laid aside something he never fully had in the beginning.
As I said, this is a very serious matter and we need to fight for the full authority of Jesus. No one is going to teach a lesser authority assigned to Jesus and have me sit by and say nothing. We will not let this error continue in the church without speaking up and calling attention to the error so that the error stops.
Once you have looked at the information presented in the DVDs, I would ask that the evidence is weighed by scripture and if I am in error, that you show me where.
John wrote: “This is a typical case of the ravaging and blinding effect of polarization.”
I find the quote itself polarizing and wish John would not state such things. If anyone wishes to discuss Bible interpretation, go ahead and we can see where we differ. To state others are polarizing is itself polarizing and should be avoided.
“In John 17, Jesus was speaking when incarnate.”
Well, then, the question becomes the extent to which the hierarchy in evidence when Jesus was incarnate is a model for hierarchical relationships among human beings in general.
And in particular, which elements of that relationship are relevant to a marriage ethic and which elements are not.
“It seems that gender is incidental to these examples.”
In the case of Jochen Klepper, it was his role as Vater, normally but not absolutely associated with gender in traditional societies, that meant he had the vested authority he did. It was not incidental in the least.
In traditional societies, it is understood that if the husband is a drunk and/or a moral weakling it might very well be the wife who is the real Vater of the family. So you are right as far as that goes. But the exception to the rule does not alter the rule, but confirms it.
In the case I gave from my own life, I would hesitate to describe gender as purely incidental. It sounds like a normal though not universal occurrence in such situations for things to have gone as they did.
In any case, I would object as much as the next person if examples like this are leveraged to suggest that the principle of mutual consent no longer applies. Insofar as possible, it can and should apply.
That’s where spousal abuse comes in. When coercion becomes the norm and the principle of mutual consent is given insufficient scope.
John,
You point out that mutual consent needs to be given sufficient scope. I agree.
Why not go to the limit with this idea? Egal is mutual consent everywhere, as a partnership, no one on top.
What does it gain anyone for one party or the other to be on top based on gender?
I can even understand in extreme situations, one spouse might be “cracking up” from the stress and the other takes steps to redeem the situation as best one can. But it might be either spouse who is overstressed.
Don wrote: “In John 17, Jesus was speaking when incarnate.”
John replied: “Well, then, the question becomes the extent to which the hierarchy in evidence when Jesus was incarnate is a model for hierarchical relationships among human beings in general.
And in particular, which elements of that relationship are relevant to a marriage ethic and which elements are not.”
Jesus perfectly obeyed God, this is what we are called towards. That Jesus is our model and one of the ways is in his obedience to God is what I can find Scriptural warrant for.
What other applications are there? I cannot think of any off hand, but if anyone can find the relevant verses, please share them.
John,
You said: “Well, then, the question becomes the extent to which the hierarchy in evidence when Jesus was incarnate is a model for hierarchical relationships among human beings in general.”
Jesus’ submission is not an example hierarchical relationships as the Father never took authority over him. It is an example for all of us to humble ourselves and serve each other. Since the one who would be the top of the hierarchical ladder if there was such a thing, is told to put themselves under the others to serve (both the husband is to sacrifice everything for his wife and the leader in the church is to be a servant of all), there is in essence no hierarchical instruction at all but only the servanthood model for all.
The issue then of the eternal Trinity cannot be an example of our relationships as a hierarchy. In the eternal Trinity there is no one person taking authority over another nor any real need for submission outside of the incarnation, because all have the same will and none of the persons ever has an opposing view.
God is unique. We are not God. Our model is the humility and the humanity of Jesus – the one who was fully God in every aspect of his Godhood, but who gave all of his rights up to humble himself to become man. This is our example.
Cheryl,
First of all, I didn’t realize you have a video out and have clearly put much thought into this. I trust you have widely in the Church Fathers so that what I have to say will not be unfamiliar to you.
Once again, I have no issue with you taking on JWs, “biblical Unitarians,” and anyone who thinks it’s wrong to pray to Jesus.
My question is this: do you have an issue with me because I consider anyone who describes the Father-Son relationship as a reciprocal authority arrangement – on the analogy of a modern egal marriage as it were, with the promises exchanged identical – as heretical?
There are reciprocating but also non-reciprocating aspects of the Father-Son relationship. A non-reciprocal example: the Son gave himself up for us to God as a sacrificial offering (Ephesians 5:2). A hierarchy of function is in evidence in this instance. Furthermore, God does not reciprocate, giving himself up for us to his Son as a sacrificial offering.
If you wish to claim that the chief events of salvation history in which the persons of the Trinity are involved do not imply both equality of essence and hierarchy of function, you have in my opinion lost the precious balance I am familiar with from patristic tradition.
The Fathers, BTW, were all in love with hierarchy, too much for my taste, but that does not mean that God did not inspire them in the formulation of the doctrine of the Trinity.
Still, if you have decided to contest the patristic tradition and its acquiescence to hierarchy and declare it unbiblical, fine, but please say so straight out.
“In John 17, Jesus was speaking when incarnate.”
Well, then, the question becomes the extent to which the hierarchy in evidence when Jesus was incarnate is a model for hierarchical relationships among human beings in general.
And in particular, which elements of that relationship are relevant to a marriage ethic and which elements are not.
October 3, 2008 11:29 AM
This presents a problem within the Body. The Incarnation was temporal. And earthly ’sons’ grow up to be adults so making this a model for earthly relationships becomes a problem. Christians are to mature and become more Holy. The same with a marriage because both believers are adults. The Trinity has ONE united will. Humans do not. There is a big danger in trying to prove inherent hierarchies within the Body by using the Trinity. As some have said, where do you put the Holy Spirit in such a model?
When it comes to the Trinity, polarization may be worth it in order not to downgrade Jesus Christ.
Sometimes when we are determined to find positions on the fence or a ‘middle’ way for the sake of faux unity, we end up denying truths that are important. Our unity is to be spiritual and Jesus Christ is the sole reason for that unity.
John and Cheryl,
Did the church fathers believe that the father and the son had two wills, one subordinate to the other; or only one will?
Do you believe that a husband and wife have two wills, one subordinate to the other, or only one will?
If both have one will, then the wife exists as a person without a will. She is no longer a person.
If both have two wills, then the will of the son is not the same thing as the will of the father. Will in the godhead is divided.
The only honest thing to do is separate the consideration of the will in the godhead and the will in marriage from each other and say that they are not analogous.
I continue to believe that to make marriage an authority and submission relationship in which the wife must always submit, and the husband must always be in charge is an evil against the person of the wife, and, in fact, it is evil also for a man to believe that he is god to his wife.
It would be better to call this a cult right away.
Of course, I do believe that Ware’s treatment of the trinity is heresy as well, since one can no longer pray to the son. Christ has a separate will, according to Ware, but it is eternally subordinated, as a wife’s should also be.
You cannot find the subordinate spirit as a person who has a separate but subordinate will in the church fathers. I think their writings are clear on this.
“there is in essence no hierarchical instruction at all but only the servanthood model for all.”
You probably won’t be surprised if I point out to you that those who formulated the doctrine of the Trinity thought otherwise. They saw hierarchy as an essential characteristic of existence and did not think of it as in contradiction necessarily with equality of essence or dignity.
Furthermore, they thought of the servant – served relationship as one in which hierarchy is instantiated.
For example, Christ is our Master and Lord yet also our servant. We also serve him. On the other hand, we are not his Master and Lord. It is not a reciprocal authority arrangement even though the relationship is characterized by reciprocity in terms of servanthood (but not masterhood).
I understand where egals who reduce the dynamics within the Trinity to pure mutual servanthood are coming from. But I don’t think a careful reading of scripture supports this view. Indeed, it is a very dangerous doctrine once one applies it to soteriology.
Furthermore, the Bible also counsels obedience to secular powers – within limits – powers which certainly cannot be thought of as in a reciprocal authority arrangement with the governed except in a very weak sense.
“There is a big danger in trying to prove inherent hierarchies within the Body by using the Trinity.”
I agree, Lin. Egals however who export all hierarchy out of the Trinity in response play right into the hands of those with abusive notions of hierarchy.
Egals who do this make the issue hierarchy itself. Big, big mistake it seems to me. You don’t have to read much of the Bible to see how foreign to it such a conception is.
Don, you say:
“You point out that mutual consent needs to be given sufficient scope. I agree.
Why not go to the limit with this idea? Egal is mutual consent everywhere, as a partnership, no one on top.”
Well, I almost agree with this. In any case, I think there are excellent egal marriages that are premised on this in principle, although in practice domain-based hierarchies kick in on a regular basis such that, beside being a partnership, it is also hierarchically structured in small and large details.
The limits to mutual consent are threefold: moral, practical, and consensual. Thus, mutual consent is sinful if it is consent to sin (happens all the time, BTW). It is also impractical when snap decisions need to be made, or when consultation is just a plain waste of time (it often is in domain-based hierarchies).
Finally, by mutual consent, some decisions may be vested in one spouse or the other. To be sure, this is a paradox. Traditionally, decision-making has taken place according to domain with people pulling rank on rare occasions based on moral imperatives, force majeure, etc.
Overall authority was vested in the husband, but more in terms of a framework than a decision-by-decision basis. Just as David Lang has pointed out in his marriage.
I think many egal marriages involve overall authority of the husband at one or more levels. But egalism lacks a framework in which to speak about that authority, so it often is exercised without their being a way to describe it as such.
In any case, prescriptive overall authority carries its own risks, so I understand why egals – including myself – shy away from it.
John,
I am finding your last post to Cheryl unclear. Jesus when human obeyed the Father, this was functional subordination and no one I know disputes that.
The question being raised is permanent subordination, which I do not agree with. Do you agree or disagree with this? From what you wrote I cannot tell.
John wrote: “I think many egal marriages involve overall authority of the husband at one or more levels. But egalism lacks a framework in which to speak about that authority, so it often is exercised without their being a way to describe it as such. “
I am egal and believe in authority. And I accept the 3 limits on egal you mentioned. But I do not understand what I quoted above. Is it semi-symmetric, does the wife also have authority in a similar, but perhaps not exact way, for example in different domains?
If the husband is special in some way when compared to the wife, how is this egal?
John,
You said: “You probably won’t be surprised if I point out to you that those who formulated the doctrine of the Trinity thought otherwise. They saw hierarchy as an essential characteristic of existence and did not think of it as in contradiction necessarily with equality of essence or dignity.”
Those who formulated the doctrine of the Trinity may have seen hierarchy as part of our human existence. However this isn’t what we are talking about in this post. We are talking about the Trinity and the essence of the Trinity outside the incarnation.
Those who formulated the Trinity doctrine did not say that the Son had a subordinate authority or that the Son was eternally under the authority of the Father.
Whatever else the fathers who formulated the Trinity said about men and women is not that important. They were fallible men who I am sure they also believed that it was God’s will for men to have slaves.
You said: “For example, Christ is our Master and Lord yet also our servant. We also serve him.”
Christ is the one exception because he is the only one who is human plus Divine. He is our Lord because he is our Creator not because humans are meant by God to have a hierarchical rule over their brothers. Husbands are to be like Christ in his humanity, not in his Deity.
You said: “I understand where egals who reduce the dynamics within the Trinity to pure mutual servanthood are coming from. But I don’t think a careful reading of scripture supports this view. Indeed, it is a very dangerous doctrine once one applies it to soteriology.”
I do not know anyone who denies that Jesus lowered himself to a position of servanthood to us and subordination to the Father. But what has this to do with the essence of the Trinity? It is a very dangerous matter to take the period of time of the incarnation and make this a shoe-horned fit into the eternal nature of the Trinity. As I said in a previous post, the Old Testament is where the eternal subordination will either be found or be rejected. The truth is that is isn’t to be tested by the incarnation.
When I finished my script on the Trinity, I gave it to my pastor to read and critique. He gave me a few suggestions for making the script better and regarding the place of Christ in the Old Testament he wrote “Wow!” in quite a few places. He learned things about the pre-human Jesus that he had never seen before.
This is the thing that I have at fault the most with Ware and other strong comps who refuse to look to the OT for the eternality of the Trinity. It is like they are blinded by the incarnation and cannot see beyond the voluntary subordination of Jesus. I hope to change that view so that people’s eyes can be opened to see Jesus in his full Deity alongside the Father.
John,
You said: “First of all, I didn’t realize you have a video out and have clearly put much thought into this. I trust you have widely in the Church Fathers so that what I have to say will not be unfamiliar to you.”
The focus for me has always been the scriptures. While I appreciate the church fathers and have seen how they hold the Son of God up as completely equal with the Father in his attributes, his essence, his power, his authority and his will, the most important thing is “What saith the scriptures?” This is my bottom line.
You asked: “My question is this: do you have an issue with me because I consider anyone who describes the Father-Son relationship as a reciprocal authority arrangement – on the analogy of a modern egal marriage as it were, with the promises exchanged identical – as heretical?”
I do not know anyone who teaches that the Son takes authority over the Father in the Trinity to make him do something that is against his will. In the Trinity there is no need for one to take authority over the other. There are commands in the imperative for both the Father and the Son during the incarnation, but I haven’t seen anything of the sort in the eternality of the Godhead. I have also not seen the writings of anyone who says that in the eternality of the Godhead (not the period of the incarnation) that one person takes authority over another person in the Godhood. I would consider this to be very wrong and also a dangerous position.
Regarding the issue of reciprocating during the time of the incarnation, the Son obeys the Father and the Father obeys the request of the Son. However let’s go beyond the incarnation to see the eternal Trinity. Where is there a one-sided reciprocating outside the incarnation? For anyone to make statements about the eternality of the Trinity they must speak outside the incarnation.
You said: “If you wish to claim that the chief events of salvation history in which the persons of the Trinity are involved do not imply both equality of essence and hierarchy of function, you have in my opinion lost the precious balance I am familiar with from patristic tradition.”
I have always said that Jesus willingly placed himself under the Father. There is absolutely no doubt about that. However, once again the essence and function of the Trinity will be found outside the incarnation. Looking for the full expression of the Trinity from within the period of the incarnation will skew what is eternal for what is temporal.
You said: “Still, if you have decided to contest the patristic tradition and its acquiescence to hierarchy and declare it unbiblical, fine, but please say so straight out.”
The heretical element is not in the hierarchy among men. That is unbiblical but not in my opinion in the realm of heresy. Once we go down the pathway of removing Jesus’ full authority in the Godhead, a position that he shares with the Father and the Holy Spirit, we are on very dangerous ground. We must lift up Jesus and give him his proper place. If we do not, then we will be in a position to dishonor the Father.
John, you made two comments that lead me to believe you have totally misunderstood me and perhaps, others, too.
1.
“I understand where egals who reduce the dynamics within the Trinity to pure mutual servanthood are coming from. But I don’t think a careful reading of scripture supports this view. Indeed, it is a very dangerous doctrine once one applies it to soteriology.”
Let me be clear. I, in NO way, want anyone to think that I believe in the eternal mutual servanthood of the eternal Trinity. I never said that. I personally do not know any egals who think this way. From whom did you get this notion? I feel like some comments have been twisted a bit for you to come up with that descripter. It is becoming a trust issue with you, John. You seem to take comments and twist them adding in your own ideas.
I hope I made it clear in this thread that equating human relationhips with the Trinity is wrong, dangerous and only leads to the confusion we see here now. And I hope I made it clear that I believe the Trinity has a united will.
2.
“There is a big danger in trying to prove inherent hierarchies within the Body by using the Trinity.”
I agree, Lin. Egals however who export all hierarchy out of the Trinity in response play right into the hands of those with abusive notions of hierarchy.”
I would also like to make it clear that we must always declare in comments if we are referring to the Incarnate Son or not. It keeps comments from being very confusing and circular trying to decipher meanings.
As Cheryl so aptly put it: Jesus’ submission is not an example hierarchical relationships as the Father never took authority over him. It is an example for all of us to humble ourselves and serve each other.
John, I think it would help to actually quote our words next time if you are confused about what we saying. Please try not to imply meanings as if that is what I said. I get a bit testy about this since we are talking about our Lord and Savior.
Thank you.
Sue,
You asked: “Did the church fathers believe that the father and the son had two wills, one subordinate to the other; or only one will?”
The church fathers believed that each person had a will as each is an individual person, but that their wills are the same. There cannot be a subordination of wills unless the wills are different. This is not possible in the Trinity. It wasn’t until Jesus added a human will to his will as God Almighty, that it was possible for him to have a will that could be different than that of the Father. Jesus subordinated his human will to the will of his Father.
You also asked: “Do you believe that a husband and wife have two wills, one subordinate to the other, or only one will?”
I believe that husband and wife have two wills because they are two persons. The life-long challenge is to work to have a united will. Not that one will is gone and only the other person’s will is left. After all they are to be one-flesh, not one person. When men try to take over their wife’s will, part of who she is as a person is destroyed. Mutual voluntary submission is the only biblical way to work towards a creation of a united will.
You said: “If both have two wills, then the will of the son is not the same thing as the will of the father. Will in the godhead is divided.”
In the Godhead they are three yet one. Three wills yet one will. It is difficult for us to comprehend because as humans we struggle to be consistently worked together with one united will. Yet even though they have a united will in the Godhead, they must also have their own personal will or the very idea of person becomes meaningless. Each can speak on their own, therefore each must have his own will. The key is that their will is never in opposition. It is always united.
You said: “The only honest thing to do is separate the consideration of the will in the godhead and the will in marriage from each other and say that they are not analogous.”
Amen! Absolutely. The difference I see, though, is that as fallible humans we are capable of having separate opposing wills. This is not possible in the Trinity. The will of the Godhead is not the same as our will.
You said: “I continue to believe that to make marriage an authority and submission relationship in which the wife must always submit, and the husband must always be in charge is an evil against the person of the wife, and, in fact, it is evil also for a man to believe that he is god to his wife.”
Yes, I too believe this. I was almost absorbed and for a long time was a non-person. My husband, God bless him, was doing the very best he could with the model that he had. When we ditched the model, much remained the same in some ways, but everything changed in other ways. Now I have a choice. Before I didn’t. Now I am a full person.
You said: “Of course, I do believe that Ware’s treatment of the trinity is heresy as well, since one can no longer pray to the son. Christ has a separate will, according to Ware, but it is eternally subordinated, as a wife’s should also be.”
I think that they key here is not that Ware attributes Christ with a separate will in the Trinity. The key is that he attributes Christ with a will that is not used. A will that is not exercised is a different will than the Father and this is heretical to me. This starts the road to a different Jesus than the one portrayed in scripture. There is a different Jesus – one who is eternally subordinated and does not do his own will; and a different Spirit – one who also does not do his own will but only does the will of the Father.
You said: “You cannot find the subordinate spirit as a person who has a separate but subordinate will in the church fathers. I think their writings are clear on this.”
This is exactly right. The teaching of a subordinate will forces the wills to be different. This is not possible in the eternality of the Trinity in the Creeds.
Don, you say:
“Jesus when human obeyed the Father, this was functional subordination and no one I know disputes that.”
But the Son was also fully God when he obeyed his Father. This is a mystery but it is right there in the doctrine of the Trinity. The incarnational Son is not God any less because of the kenosis that incarnation entails. He is God precisely in the kenosis that the incarnation entails. Sorry if I have gone all paradoxical on you, but that is what the doctrine of the Trinity is all about: holding fast to a series of paradoxes.
Beyond that, there is more than one way to understand the perichoresis between the persons of the Trinity in terms of salvation history and all of eternity. So it’s not an easy subject matter.
Perhaps there are egals who are saying that the Son’s relationship to the Father pre- and post-incarnation is analogous to that between husband and wife. Perhaps there are comps who are saying that the incarnate Son’s relationship to Father is analogous to that between husband and wife. If those are the terms of the debate, it sounds sterile to me.
I do know this, that there is a tendency among some egals to dispute functional subordination per se. Hierarchy itself is the issue for some egals. Check out Frank Viola. Lots of interesting experimentation on the practical level with Frank and company, but I am not impressed by the revamp given to the doctrine of the Trinity.
Now, if egals who want to be orthodox on the Trinity only criticize comps who stray from that, what does that say? That they don’t really care about the Trinity. They just want to criticize comps.
Suzanne, you say:
“I continue to believe that to make marriage an authority and submission relationship in which the wife must always submit, and the husband must always be in charge is an evil against the person of the wife, and, in fact, it is evil also for a man to believe that he is god to his wife.”
One can even go one step further. It is a total misunderstanding of a human being’s relationship to God to think of it in the exclusive terms of authority and submission. Look at the book of Job and the Psalms. God accepts reproof and complaint from human beings if it comes from a sincere heart and is motivated by the need to redress wrongs.
Indeed, God is miffed in the Bible if we do not seek to redress wrongs in intercessory prayer with him. By analogy, within marriage, wrongs that need to redressed not only can but must be taken up, by either wife or husband according to the circumstances, even if that involves reproof.
On the other hand, it is perfectly possible for a marriage to conform to an authority – submission template, so long as “authority” is seen as a positive and empowering gift which authorizes others and delegates authority in turn. This is precisely the kind of authority Christ demonstrates toward his followers.
Any father, mother, or employer who instead uses authority to domineer has not a single NT leg to stand on. Any husband who exercises authority in a non-empowering fashion, or fails to delegate and share authority along domain-specific lines, or fails to give the principle of mutual consent sufficient scope, has not a single NT leg to stand on.
Indeed, a husband is left without any alibi whatever should he exercise authority in a domineering way. It is simply impossible to domineer and love one’s wife as Christ loved the church at the same time.
What changes if we switch to an egal marriage framework as has become typical in some cultural settings since the rise of modern feminism? In theory, wives, not only husbands, have less excuse than ever to command over their spouses, be contentious, and so on.
That the modern age has not seen a decrease in contentiousness and abuse of authority in the family but a ripping apart of the family at the seams must however give pause for thought.
So far as I can see, all comps on these threads realize that compism is dead in the water as soon it does not express in precept and in practice the central teachings of Paul which regard our behavior in general: Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Galatians 5:22-26; and Philippians 2.
But that is equally true of egalism. Whenever egals fail to stress this, I see a false gospel being offered. It is a cruel offer, because it promises so much, but delivers so little.
I think many egal marriages involve overall authority of the husband at one or more levels.
Just as many traditional marriages involve the overall authority of the wife on one or more levels. None of this argues for authority by gender. This is the alienation of authority from morality and sadly is experienced by many women. It is time to repudiate biologically assigned authority.
“I agree, Lin. Egals however who export all hierarchy out of the Trinity in response play right into the hands of those with abusive notions of hierarchy.”
Are you speaking of the Incarnate Son here?
“I do not know anyone who teaches that the Son takes authority over the Father in the Trinity to make him do something that is against his will. In the Trinity there is no need for one to take authority over the other.”
No, no one teaches that, because the understanding of authority implied thereby is unscriptural. Positive authority in the Bible and indeed in life general by definition tends to work by delegation and mutual consent though neither principle is or should be absolute.
What some egals tend to do is speak of authority in an exclusively or predominantly negative sense, as “authority over,” as something that one day will done away with entirely, or as something that should not be a part of authentically Christian relationships.
This kind of teaching is just as pernicious as the teaching which legitimizes the abuse of authority by not crafting a concept of authority in line with all of scripture, which gives wide scope to the principles of mutual consent and domain-based hierarchy.
For the rest, I do not find it at all attractive to make a sharp distinction between the Incarnate and Eternal Son. The kenosis which is characteristic of the incarnate Son is also characteristic of the eternal Godhead. Furthermore, kenosis is compatible and indeed essential to the exercise of positive “authority over.”
I remain convinced that ideological compism and egalism alike set aside the traditional content and emphases of the doctrine of the Trinity to score points in often sterile and counter-productive polemics.
Lin,
You might not have noticed or perhaps I did not emphasize the point enough, but in referring to what in my judgment is dangerous egal teaching about the Trinity, I was referring to the views of Frank Viola in particular. For some of the debate about this, I encourage you to take a look at the long exchange between Ben Witherington and Frank Viola on Witherington’s blog, not to mention discussion elsewhere, such as on Peter Kirk’s blog.
In any case, now that you state your own positions, I admit I find them troubling as well. I see that you also define hierarchy in such a way as to make it evil from the get-go. Once that is done, all relationships characterized by authority on one side and submission on the other are suspect, regardless of the scope which the principle of mutual consent is given within that context. You say:
“Jesus’ submission is not an example hierarchical relationships as the Father never took authority over him.”
But Jesus was in a hierarchical authority arrangement as opposed to a reciprocal authority arrangement with his Father. Surely this is obvious. That is the only explanation for Jesus saying, “not my will, but thy will be done.”
In a healthy comp or egal marriage, that works itself out over and over again across domain-based hierarchies. For example, since my wife is vested with over-all authority in the kitchen, it’s often, in my case, “not my will, but thy will be done.” Of course her leadership in the kitchen is servant-leadership. But it is still leadership, and my role is to follow her lead.
In terms of over-all authority, the same occurs. If one is an egal, over-all authority granted to the husband or the wife in specific instances or on principle is by mutual consent. But is it really different in a healthy comp marriage? Based on observation of healthy comp marriages in my extended family, I would say no. In specific decision-making decisions, I see comp husbands allowing their wives to veto their preferences because they love their wives with sacrificial love. I see comp wives deferring to their husbands whenever by so doing they can show life-enhancing honor and respect. I see the overall authority that is exercised attentive to a proper emphasis on mutual consent, with the common good in mind.
For the rest, I refer you to a previous comment of mine about the dangers of making a sharp distinction between the incarnate Son and the eternal Son.
I have this uneasy feeling, as I often do when talking about the underlying theology of the creeds with a-creedal Christians, that the doctrine of the Trinity is not being seen for what it is: a radically moderate teaching designed to avoid extremes of all kinds.
John you seem to acknowledge the extreme evil of what I protest. I am saying that it is taught and it is evil. But if you support the evil you decry, I can no longer converse on this. It is far too distressing.
Men are sinners, as are women, and they will exercize authority in sinful ways. All human beings are sinful and fallible.
That the modern age has not seen a decrease in contentiousness and abuse of authority in the family but a ripping apart of the family at the seams must however give pause for thought.
The modern age has seen a decrease in the silence of women. How do we know what women suffered in the past. I know enough from those who have lived in the east, that the crimes against women are unspeakably evil and violent.
Resubordinating women is an evil. I will not pursue a lengthy discussion on this. Shall we go back to the age where it was accepted that men had other outlets. Where women lost more babies than they raised, where women died in childbirth, and older children were dragged off to the poor house and orphanage, where children were bought and sold.
I have no idea what past golden age you imagine. The past is full of the lower classes, the broken and poor, and dying and disenfranchised. It is not filled with cozy families gathering around the warm hearth.
John wrote: “So far as I can see, all comps on these threads realize that compism is dead in the water as soon it does not express in precept and in practice the central teachings of Paul which regard our behavior in general: Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Galatians 5:22-26; and Philippians 2.
But that is equally true of egalism. Whenever egals fail to stress this, I see a false gospel being offered. It is a cruel offer, because it promises so much, but delivers so little.”
What Biblical egals do this? I know of NONE. As far as I know, ALL Biblical egals seek the whole counsel of God. So WHY use these terms of “false gospel”? Who specifically is offering such?
John,
I failed to see where you answered my question about PERMANENT subordination of the son. I do not believe this, do you?
“John you seem to acknowledge the extreme evil of what I protest. I am saying that it is taught and it is evil.”
The difference is that the evil of sinful men and women I insist is not to be confused with complementarianism per se.
Compism as taught by people like Thomas and Eggerichs and as practiced by the majority of comps I know, is not an evil.
Healthy comp marriages no less than healthy egal marriages are an authority arrangement based on mutual consent and wide play given to domain-based hierarchies.
I have never spoke of any period as a golden age. But neither do I make the mistake of thinking that we live a golden age. This is very far from the case.
“ALL Biblical egals seek the whole counsel of God.”
So do ALL Biblical comps.
These are just tautologies. You look a little closer, at teaching and practice, and it is easy to point out strengths and weaknesses in both approaches.
It’s not clear to me that the Church Fathers responsible for the doctrine of the Trinity thought of it as a reciprocal authority arrangement. On the other hand, it is clear that there is history and becoming within the Trinity.
If it sounds like I’m dodging the question a bit, that’s because I am. I need to study the question again to avoid saying stuff I may later regret.
I do know that not being able to pray to Jesus is a dangerous sign.
“I see that you also define hierarchy in such a way as to make it evil from the get-go. Once that is done, all relationships characterized by authority on one side and submission on the other are suspect, regardless of the scope which the principle of mutual consent is given within that context.”
I thought I had made it clear in many exchanges over this blog that there are scriptural hierarchies such as parents, civil government, employers, etc.
I do not see hierarchies described in scripture for the Body or for marriage. I see voluntary mutual submission in both. We are to ‘listen to’ our elders (unless it is Jim Jones
) But in the case of the Body and marriage we are to have wisdom and discernment.
I see you as defending the comp position over the egal position and trying to imply that we hate all hierarchy. Not true.
“Jesus’ submission is not an example hierarchical relationships as the Father never took authority over him.”
But Jesus was in a hierarchical authority arrangement as opposed to a reciprocal authority arrangement with his Father. Surely this is obvious. That is the only explanation for Jesus saying, “not my will, but thy will be done.”
Again, you are talking about the Incarnate Son.
“I see the overall authority that is exercised attentive to a proper emphasis on mutual consent, with the common good in mind.”
John, You always go into what you ’see’ or long explanations about domain based authority, etc.
I agree with Sue. I am not interested anymore in how the people you see live their lives. I am interested in whether comp teaching is biblical or not. Let us strive to live biblically, not find third ways or live on the fence where everything is so fuzzy. I am also interested in how comp teaching it has been narrowed over the last 25 years to elevate men over women and silence women from using their gifts in the Body. How it is working its way toward Patriarchy.
Sinful people are going to take teaching and twist it to their advantage. Many may not really be saved and that is the root problme. But, what advantage does teaching mutual submission bring to one person over another?
John wrote: “So far as I can see, all comps on these threads realize that compism is dead in the water as soon it does not express in precept and in practice the central teachings of Paul which regard our behavior in general: Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Galatians 5:22-26; and Philippians
But that is equally true of egalism. Whenever egals fail to stress this, I see a false gospel being offered. It is a cruel offer, because it promises so much, but delivers so little.”
As someone who has been around more comps than you (since you live in the secular Berkely of the mid west) and was involved in marketing comp seminars and books in the bible belt, I can categorically tell you that your first paragraph is very wrong about mainstream comps. Big time wrong.
Even on this blog I have seen egal men referred to as amoebas and wimps by comps. I have seen women egal women referred to as feminists with the writer refusing to define what is feminist.
I have never spoke of any period as a golden age. But neither do I make the mistake of thinking that we live a golden age. This is very far from the case.
I don’t think we live in a golden age either.
But the law has enabled women to be immeasurably better off. That is a simple fact. Resubordinating women to sinful men will ensure suffering, more suffering than not doing so. We all suffer, but we still make attempts to impose crazy and nonsensical things like speed limits in order to limit the suffering. Please understand that authority assigned by gender ensures suffering for some women. It cannot do otherwise.
A man may suffer from lack of love, but he cannot by use of authority cause himself to be loved. That is just a fact. Neither man nor woman can make themselves loved by authority or submission.
But they can prevent themselves from the utter deprivation of a human like life by getting out from under male assigned authority.
If we were to restrict this entire conversation to only healthy people, then things might be different. But is Christianity only for the healthy? That is the message I am hearing. Is there no place for picking up the pieces of those whose lives have been devastated by wrongful church teaching?
“authority assigned by gender ensures suffering for some women. It cannot do otherwise.”
This is true, just as authority assigned to anyone ensures suffering for someone else, since people have a tendency to abuse authority.
Thus we have an argument against assigning authority to anyone. Indeed, this is an inherent tendency of modern egalism, one of its great weaknesses. The arguments used to buttress it end up undermining the assignment of authority in general.
The way out of the impasse is to define authority with greater care. Exousia in the positive sense in the Bible leads to the empowerment and salvation of those who place themselves under it. It is goal-oriented. Once the goal is lost sight of, positive authority is denatured. Furthermore, in marriage in particular, the principle of mutual consent is praised and exemplified in the Bible, though not absolutized.
“If we were to restrict this entire conversation to only healthy people, then things might be different. But is Christianity only for the healthy?”
This is a complex topic. I will touch on one aspect only, a part that moderns find difficult to swallow.
Christianity is not for everyone. Incorrigible brothers and sisters are to be ejected and treated as “pagans and tax collectors” (Matthew 18).
The churches have taken a long time to wise up to this, and then only in part. Some churches remain in la-la land on the subject.
The most obvious example relates to pedophiles among the clergy. Not too long ago, the Roman Catholic Church and indeed all churches tended to forgive and – in best case scenarios – seek to rehabilitate. Sex offenses, of course, are a consummate form of abuse.
Psychiatrists were co-responsible for the mess, insofar as they claimed rehabilitation was possible.
It’s not, or at least there are no sufficient guarantees that therapy will succeed.
A new ethos is developing which has prudence on its side. For example, in the United Methodist Church, things like spousal abuse and sex offenses are grounds for immediate dismissal. Even rather pervasive disorders like alcoholism are handled differently than in the past. Once upon a time everyone was supposed to put up with things like this and try to work around them. No more.
An alcoholic clergy person is now put before an aut-aut: take a leave of absence and undergo serious rehab in a top-shelf facility and then seek approval to return, or resign immediately.
Christianity is for sinners, but not for those in denial about their sin. At some point, those in denial about their sin must be treated harshly.
This is not easy to do and requires spiritual judgment and maturity. Said maturity is in short supply among both comps and egals, but I have seen it in evidence among comps and and I have seen it missing among egals.
For example, my parents were deacons in a comp congregation when my mother had an affair and kicked my father out of the house. But the leadership of the congregation knew both my mother and father well, and somehow knew how to assign relative blame and exercise church discipline appropriately under the circumstances. Thus my father was stripped of his role as deacon and left the congregation as a result. My mother remained as head of the deaconesses.
A counter-example, from an egal congregation. The Ad Council chair, a prominent prof at the university, has an affair with a student. His wife is left hanging, from whom he has been “cordially” estranged in-house for a long time. It should also be pointed out that the affair was sincere, led to marriage and the adoption of a child (I remain friends with all sides in this). He was also an excellent chair. Kind and thoughtful. Really. His pastor did not ask him to step down, even though his betrayed wife remained in the congregation, and was seeking both comfort and redress.
In my judgment, that egal pastor, and the other egal members of the council, erred in not asking the chair to step down.
We live in a broken world. In that world, compism and egalism are too often fig leaves for cowardice, immaturity, and abuse.
“I am not interested anymore in how the people you see live their lives.”
I understand that, Lin. I am no help to you at all. The more you claim on the basis of your experience that comps are by definition unfaithful to the biblical message, the more I will produce counter-examples from scripture, history, and experience which demonstrate the contrary.
I remain convinced that neither compism nor egalism can save a marriage, and that neither, per se, dooms a marriage.
By suggesting otherwise, both hardline comps and hardline egals in symmetrical fashion demean the marriages of many, many people. Personally, I’m not about to stand for it.
What makes for an excellent marriage? Three things: (1) the positive exercise of authority which authorizes and empowers everyone under its sway; (2) adherence all around to the new commandment and, where appropriate, the principle of mutual consent; (3) the establishment of domain-based hierarchies.
Comp and egal marriages alike are capable of instantiating all three things. I am currently reading the Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas, a frequent guest on Focus on the Family and Family Hour. He is a comp who clearly supports the application of (1) through (3).
Craig Keener and John Stackhouse are egal scholars who affirm orthodox Trinitarian doctrine but also argue that it just doesn’t make sense to apply Trinitarian theology to marriage. Their approach is different from that of other egals who export hierarchy out of the Trinity as a means to the end of promoting egalism as they understand it in many spheres, marriage and church polity in particular.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3803/is_199904/ai_n8832969/pg_11
http://stackblog.wordpress.com/2008/04/19/does-the-trinity-prove-anything-about-gender-not-much/
“Christianity is not for everyone. Incorrigible brothers and sisters are to be ejected and treated as “pagans and tax collectors” (Matthew 18).
The churches have taken a long time to wise up to this, and then only in part. Some churches remain in la-la land on the subject.”
The big problem is that mainstream comp teaching makes the man who ‘rules’ his home look like a model Christian husband even if he is verbally abusive. It is the teaching which gives him cover for his church face and home face.
Here is an example of mainstream comp teaching from a CBMW alum and SBC leader:
http://kerussocharis.blogspot.com/
“What makes for an excellent marriage? Three things: (1) the positive exercise of authority which authorizes and empowers everyone under its sway; (2) adherence all around to the new commandment and, where appropriate, the principle of mutual consent; (3) the establishment of domain-based hierarchies.”
What you write is more of the formulas and roles that lead people AWAY from a Christ centered life being filled with the Holy Spirit. They have to spend time learning what all that means and implementing it without a changed heart.
The answer is when both are seeking the Kingdom of God with all their hearts.
Why not start there?
‘What makes for an excellent marriage? Three things: (1) the positive exercise of authority which authorizes and empowers everyone under its sway;…(3) the establishment of domain-based hierarchies.’
Could you provide me with some actual scriptural teaching for these concepts where the bible with it’s word choice discusses both these points within marriage?
The way out of the impasse is to define authority with greater care.
You cannot supervise every home. Either domain based authority is modeled and expected, or it is explicitly taught from the pulpit. However, if TOTAL authority to the male and TOTAL submission to the female is taught, then the result is unspeakable. It is better not to live. It is better not to be a Christian. Much better to be a concubine in a pagan harem and be free inside, than to be bound and fettered in one’s mind as well as body.
I think that perhaps you are right, not all of us should be Christians. You have certainly made me think deeply on this, lately. Certainly I don’t want what is being described in this forum.
Once again, we are all sinners and that is reason number one not to give men more power than women. Giving a male more authority than his wife will never make him more loved or more respected. If it is broken, forcing authority is not going to do any good, but create greater misery.
I realize that women can be cruel. And they can have power. But a church that preaches that one partner should have more power than the other partner is preaching sin, not just allowing it. It is like slavery.
Curiously, I don’t think that Chrysostom was preaching that men should have more power than women. I don’t like the way he balanced the scales, but he did try. I am not accusing all of church history of sin. I am accusing the male teachers of “men on top” of sin. I am not interested in that type of Christianity any more. It is repugnant.
Why can’t men and women both learn loyalty and tender kindness to each other. And if it can’t be so, then some people simply have to move on. This is reality. I am tender hearted enough to believe that a man should be loved.
John wrote: “I remain convinced that neither compism nor egalism can save a marriage, and that neither, per se, dooms a marriage.
By suggesting otherwise, both hardline comps and hardline egals in symmetrical fashion demean the marriages of many, many people. Personally, I’m not about to stand for it.”
No one says using the egal model means all will work. There is ALWAYS sin in everyone. The question is which has the best chance to work the best for all involved. I am convinced that for almost all, that is being egal.
This does NOT demean any marriage, the claim to egal is simply the claim to MORE mutuality and if you are going to claim that is somehow bad, you need to explain how.
where appropriate, the principle of mutual consent;
And does the man decide where this is appropriate? Exactly what does this say about woman? She is clearly less capabale of deciding what is appropriate than man. There is no other conclusion. Oddly this is not my experience in life. Men are not better at being appropriate in any way, shape or form. It is impossible to whitewash this stuff, no matter how hard you try. It is a real turn off.
Just because women can also hurt, can also do wrong, is no justification to go after them and put them under male “overall” authority. I find this kind of thinking very inapropriate. It is shocking actually.
Lin says:
“mainstream comp teaching makes the man who ‘rules’ his home look like a model Christian husband even if he is verbally abusive.”
This is not mainstream comp teaching where I am. At the Christian bookstore in my (the Fond du Lac WI) area, among 100+ (mostly soft comp) titles under “Relationships” I could not find even one book or author that suggests that verbal or any other kind of abuse is permitted.
Let’s be honest: all true Christian comps and egals agree that anyone who justifies verbal abuse by husband, wife, or anyone else has betrayed the clear teaching of scripture and in particular the teaching of James on the tongue. If
If someone does justify abuse, the problem is not that they are comps. The problem is that they are not Christians.
If so-called biblical comp teachers in your area are nonetheless justifying abusive behavior, the most effective solution will not be to tell people that compism is “simply wrong,” enables abuse, or other false and misleading claims.
I would think that even an egal who is convinced that egalism is the ultimate solution for everyone will concur that the most practical short-term solution will be to steer comps to comp resources which repeatedly point out that abusive behavior is incompatible with biblical teaching. I note that both Gary Thomas and Emerson Eggerichs make the point consistently.
Lin, you also say:
“The answer is when both are seeking the Kingdom of God with all their hearts. Why not start there?”
Absolutely. Paul and Peter however also give gender-differentiated advice to those in marriage. How and in what sense are we to follow that example today?
It’s a question comps try to answer. It’s a question egals also need to answer.
Kathy:
As far as scriptural support for (1) the positive exercise of authority which authorizes and empowers everyone under its sway; and (3) domain-based hierarchies is concerned, the positive exercise of authority is modeled first of all by Christ himself.
Note how he is never heavy-handed as a teacher or a healer. His authority is mature and loving precisely when he allows the Syro-Phoenician woman to win the argument and obtain healing for a sufferer.
Furthermore, Jesus delegates to and authorizes his disciples to make use of the power of the keys, Peter first of all (Matthew 16:19), but also all Christians (Matthew 18:18).
At issue is the power of binding and loosing, which is in the first instance the ministry of forgiveness, but also the sanctioning of incorrigible transgressors.
Forgiveness is an authorizing and empowering activity, but this is also true of sanctioning. Presumably it is not necessary to read Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment in order to realize that a criminal’s punishment is necessarily a part of the healing process.
In marriage how does this apply? Any marriage will fail unless it is characterized by the power of forgiveness (loosing). I have observed that in many unhealthy marriages forgiveness is routinely withheld by a power-tripper in the negative sense.
But any marriage can be put into jeopardy by, for example, adultery, in which case the sanctioning if reconciliation is deemed out of the question is initiated by the victim, either husband or wife.
Sanctioning is a positive exercise of authority, though there are no hard and fast rules for when to apply it. One’s whole integrity, i.e., moral authority, is on the line in that moment.
Beyond that, a husband exercises his God-given authority whenever he loves his wife as Christ loved the church and whenever he esteems her (Ephesians 5:15;; 1 Peter 3:7).
Does the husband’s love and esteem take the form of leading by example and reproving when necessary? They do: those are forms of love Christ has for us.
A husband would not love his wife as Christ loved the church if he failed to lead by example and reprove when necessary. But note that Christ’s authority is tremendously positive precisely because it expresses itself even and especially in leading by example and in reproof by means of unconditional love.
How does a wife exercise authority in such a way as to empower and authorize everyone subject to it?
In the same ways: the power of the keys (forgiveness and sanctioning) and the gift of love, the one debt we always owe one another according to Romans 12. Once again, love can and sometimes does consist in leading by example and in-your-face reproof.
How do the above facts fit in with Paul and Peter’s emphasis on the respect and submission wives owe their husbands? Well, that goes beyond Kathy’s question, so I will stop there. (Smile)
As for domain-based hierarchies in marriage, this is assumed everywhere if you read your biblical narratives carefully. Explicit passages: Prov 31; Titus 2:5.
Sue says:
“the principle of mutual consent . . . does the man decide where this is appropriate?”
In healthy marriages, comp or egal, it is rare indeed that important decisions are made outside of mutual consent. Less important decisions will be delegated to one or the other by mutual consent. There are occasions in healthy comp and egal marriages alike in which important decisions tend to be vested in the husband; there are other important decisions that tend to be vested in the wife, in accordance with domain-based hierarchies.
What about super-important, life-changing, agonizing decisions?
I’ve noticed in talking to husbands and wives in marriages of the old school (love-obey) that what comes into play is a delicate dance between office-based and gift-based authority. I’ve noticed that same delicate dance in action among comp couples in my extended family. How does their dance differ from the one I’m used to in an egal setting? Little or not at all.
In short, on principle the exercise of authority in both frameworks based on mutual consent. In one framework, by the joint decision to vest overall authority on principle in the husband; in the other, by the joint decision to exercise overall authority jointly.
So long as husband and wife are practicing Christians who have internalized Romans 12, 1 Cor 13, and Philippians 2, there will however not be a stark difference when it comes to conflict resolution and decision-making,
Ideological egals and ideological comps want to say there is a stark difference. But there isn’t. Let me explain why once again, but in more creative fashion.
To simplify, love in the Christian sense is one part leading by example, one part sacrifice and deference, and one part reproof.
Conversely, submission in the Christian sense (which NECESSARILY involves non-submission to men in the name of submission to God) is one part leading by example (interestingly, submitting from one side leads to submitting from the other side), one part sacrifice and deference, and one part reproof.
Can I be convinced that compism per se or egalism per se are permicious? I don’t think so.
It’s one of the joys of being a pastor. Over the last 25 years, I’ve seen a lot of marriages up close and personal, of the traditional, neo-traditional, and egal varieties. The good ones, regardless of framework, are full of positive authority, full of mutual deference, and full of outward-directed altruism.
So don’t ask me to convince traditionals or neo-traditionals to be egals. At the most, I will want to make sure that they give sufficient scope to the principle of mutual consent.
Nor will I be asking egals to become comps. At the most, I will want to make sure that they conceive of their marriage, not as some sort of democracy, but as a republic in which the positive roles of authority and hierarchy are properly recognized.
I cannot understand how anyone can argue against treating women as functional equals. But apparently I am naive. I am a little less naive for spending time here. I am now more aware of the persistence of the desire men have to defend a position of – what can I politely call it when someone has more power, more authority, more position than the other?
Certainly there can be no logical discussion on this topic. A woman must protect and distance herself.
I could not read to the end of your comment, John.
Can you not imagine what it is like for women who have had NO authority, no power, no permission to do anything. And to know that this is taught in the church. Total and absolute deprivation of all decision-making. And you smile and find it hilarious. The pain that this discussion causes is incredible. If treating a human being in a subhuman manner is only a matter of hilarity to others, then Christianity is in disrepute and becomes hightly unattractive. I hope there is some other kind of Christianity than what I read here, because I don’t want this kind.
I refuse to acknowledge that what I am reading here is part of the discourse of Christianity. I must step outside of this.
“This is not mainstream comp teaching where I am. At the Christian bookstore in my (the Fond du Lac WI) area, among 100+ (mostly soft comp) titles under “Relationships” I could not find even one book or author that suggests that verbal or any other kind of abuse is permitted.”
Do you really think they would actually say it is permitted? Did you visit the link I provided? See what the teaching is and how it fleshes out. In another mainstream sermon, Ware did not say abuse was ok. He said unsubmissive wives trigger abuse. So let’s stop with trying to find books or sermons that say abuse is ok by comps. It does not work that way.
“Let’s be honest: all true Christian comps and egals agree that anyone who justifies verbal abuse by husband, wife, or anyone else has betrayed the clear teaching of scripture and in particular the teaching of James on the tongue.”
I have worked with and been around comps for 20 years. I have NO idea what a true comp is. They are all over the board. Even David Lang confuses me and I cannot figure out if he is a true comp based upon his responses to his posts here.
“If someone does justify abuse, the problem is not that they are comps. The problem is that they are not Christians.”
Paige Patterson, President of SWBTS, former president of the SBC is not a Christian? Did you visit the link I provided? There are quite a few people who think Patterson listened to the Holy Spirit and sent that woman back to possible abuse so her husband could be saved. They think he is a hero for doing that.
“If so-called biblical comp teachers in your area are nonetheless justifying abusive behavior, the most effective solution will not be to tell people that compism is “simply wrong,” enables abuse, or other false and misleading claims. “
Once again, you don’t get it. They are not going around telling men to abuse their wives. They are telling wives how to deal with it and in many cases putting all the responsibility for abuse on her.
“I would think that even an egal who is convinced that egalism is the ultimate solution for everyone will concur that the most practical short-term solution will be to steer comps to comp resources which repeatedly point out that abusive behavior is incompatible with biblical teaching. I note that both Gary Thomas and Emerson Eggerichs make the point consistently.”
The comp system will always be a problem for the unregenerate. And it provides cover for those who abuse the teaching.
“The answer is when both are seeking the Kingdom of God with all their hearts. Why not start there?”
Absolutely. Paul and Peter however also give gender-differentiated advice to those in marriage. How and in what sense are we to follow that example today?”
How does that relate to a 21st century context where women are not consideredlegal property? I think their advice elevated women beyond that ingrained thinking for that time.
“It’s a question comps try to answer. It’s a question egals also need to answer.”
Comps answer it by stopping women in the church from exercising all their gifts. They develop man made roles and rules to answer it. These roles and rules are for marriage, too. They ignore all the teaching on gifts and prophesying where there are no pink and blue examples. They are for ALL.
BTW: In your answer to Kathy you used the word ‘reprove’ or a variation of it for husbands to wives, 3x.
You did not use it once for wives to husbands.
John,
“Binding and loosing” are the Pharisees’ terms for forbidding and permitting, in context they apply to the disciple’s ability to interpret Scripture, not punish and forgive.
The basic flaw in comp-land is that the marriage working is hugely dependent on the maturity of the husband, in laying down his supposed rights. Who says males are mature? Lots of women testify that SOME are not.
It is clear to me that egal is simply safer in the sense that it does not depend as much on the husband’s lack of sin, which is always problematic.
Men are to “reprove” their wives? What religion does this forum belong to?
Having been following this thread without comment for a while, just a couple of points:
1. No, comps (normally) don’t overtly teach men to go and abuse their wives, but what happens in practice in many comp churches is that the mindset stops them from recognising all the subtler forms of emotional abuse when they happen. A woman feels powerless, micromanaged, uncared for, usede etc and if she brings it up at all, say in a ladies’ bible study, she’s simply told that’s what marriage is and she has to submit with an uncomplaining spirit. In these churches the problem is that no one calls it abuse unless his behaviour is just about life-threatening. Wives are held accountable, husbands are not. Please, I’m not suggesting all comps are like that, but enough are to infect the thinking of many faith communities and destroy many women.
2. Domain based hierarchies. I’d never heard it put that way until this discussion, but it’s certainly a fact of life for most couples. It strikes me though, that a comp/egal difference here is that traditional comps often divide the domains based on traditional expectations, where as egals feel much freer to work them out on the basis of individual gifts and competencies rather than gender
“The basic flaw in comp-land is that the marriage working is hugely dependent on the maturity of the husband, in laying down his supposed rights. Who says males are mature? Lots of women testify that SOME are not.”
The basic flaw of marriage is that it is hugely dependent on the maturity of those who are a part of it and “lay down” their “supposed rights.” Egal marriages fail all the time because one of its components or both lay down supposed rights.
Egalism is a completely unreliable protection against a spouse who is abusive or controlling. Check out the divorce stats if you have doubts on that one.
The only, I repeat, the only adequate protection against an abusive or controlling spouse, male or female, is the whole armor of God offered to the believer: see Ephesians 6.
The strength God alone provides is only remedy in life in all kinds of unsafe circumstances.
It is also sometimes necessary to simply pick one’s battles, which means that sometimes, the only reasonable thing to do is to walk away from a marriage that is compromised by sin and sickness.
In contemplating this route, it is best to do so with the full support of family, friends, and congregation.
Sue says:
“Men are to “reprove” their wives? What religion does this forum belong to?”
The biblical one. Speaking the truth with love is often a form of reproof. A marriage not to mention any human relationship that is intolerant of reproof is shallow and superficial.
KJV Proverbs 27:17:
Iron sharpeneth iron;
So a man sharpened the countenance of his friend.
NLT:
As iron sharpens iron, a friend sharpens a friend.
In context, this verse is a positive counterpoint to the preceding, Proverbs 27:15-16.
Biblical religion. It’s not for everyone.
Perhaps it has not been made plain that for ideological complementarians Philippians 2 is for women only. Here is a comment on the eternal subordination of a woman to whoever she was married to on earth,
Consider, moreover, that in the new creation those who were wives in the former dispensation, will have the mind of Christ, “who, although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and . . . humbled himself” (Phil 2:6-8). They will see in the example of Christ, as never before, the beauty and glory that inheres in gracious, selfless submission. With both man and woman thus perfected and transformed, are we to suppose that the new creation will abandon the order established in God’s original creation? I think not. Rather, such relations will bring to each true joy, and to God, more glory than before.
Since the submission of women is so wonderful and part of God’s creation it will certainly continue into eternity. What kind of man dreams of subordinating women for eternity? What kind of man dreams of subordinating women at all?
Only women submit, in imitation of Christ. Men are in charge in imitation of God. This is what complementarianism is grounded on.
Men in charge, and women in submission – for eternity.
On the other hand, even a Christian man may be known to say that marriage is hell. But now we know that this hell will continue in heaven – for eternity.
Oh, you mean that husband and wife reprove each other in reciprocal relation? I am confused. You wrote,
A husband would not love his wife as Christ loved the church if he failed to lead by example and reprove when necessary.
I don’t see why men should lead. It makes less sense to me the older I get. It just hasn’t done any moral good in my life so far. Quite the opposite.
I’m sorry, but this discussion has made gender-based leadership increasingly unattractive.
Yes, every marriage is dependent on the maturity of both believers.
But a comp marriage has an additional challenge over an egal marriage in that when the husband is sinning it might not be recognized as such and in fact be blamed on the wife for not submitting enough.
The asymmetry is a concern as we are all sinners and have blind spots. And when you combine a husband’s blind spot or sin with a claim that it is the wife’s fault; this is nothing but trouble. It will not be solved in that system as the problem is being placed on the wrong person.
“Egalism is a completely unreliable protection against a spouse who is abusive or controlling. Check out the divorce stats if you have doubts on that one.”
Can you link to divorce stats that show breakdowns for comp vs egal marriages?
Lynne says:
“Wives are held accountable, husbands are not.”
I’m sure there are comps that tend in this direction. But that really would be compism falsely so-called.
For a better model of what compism can and should be, I would direct you to David Lang’s posts on this blog. Best-selling comp authors Thomas and Eggerichs, which I am reading right now as recommended by Gem and Marilyn, have an entirely different approach in which accountability and responsibility are emphasized in particular for husbands.
Male irresponsibility has no basis in compism in terms of its first principles. I think this should be obvious to all.
Sue says:
“Only women submit, in imitation of Christ. Men are in charge in imitation of God. This is what complementarianism is grounded on.”
That is a very inaccurate description of compism. I wish to note that so long as this is the tenor of the debate on compegal, it is not a safe place for genuine dialogue. Generalizations of this kind are patently false and inflammatory.
I was thinking to myself today if I would recommend compegal as a place of dialogue for friends and family who are comps. The answer is no.
Its threads contain too many attacks of the kind just quoted. If this kind of attack continues to be permitted on these threads, rest assured that only very thick-skinned comps will bother to participate. Indeed, this is already the case.
For the moment, I consider the compegal experiment a failure for lack of sufficient moderation.
I know that Wayne has repeatedly appealed to commenters to respect the guidelines, but they are not being respected.
“Speaking the truth in love” and making unsupportable generalizations of the kind quoted above are incompatible.
I also wish to say this: if someone’s experience of male or female leadership has been very negative at some point, it is a psychological truism that said individual will struggle with leadership detained by someone of the same gender that was abusive from that time on.
But that is not an argument against males or females detaining roles of leadership.
For example, a male who at some point was severely abused psychologically by a female (the mother being the classic case discussed in the literature) will struggle far more than others with accepting even the most positive and benign exercise of authority from a female.
You can blame the victim all you want, but it leads nowhere.
It also leads nowhere to make the experiences of the victim a general argument for rejecting the exercise of authority on the part of someone of the same gender as the one who abused in the first place.
Don says,
“The asymmetry is a concern.”
It was, it seems to me, a concern to Paul as well. Which is why, though he upheld the asymmetry in his teaching, he left the husband with zero room for abusing it by stipulating that a husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the church.
If asymmetry is the issue, the problem is not with compism. It is with the NT household codes, which give asymmetrical advice to components of the household (husband-wife, parent-child, master-slave) according to accepted cultural norms.
The asymmetrical advice results in the preservation of the hierarchical structures but along radically new coordinates defined by Christology and the Christian faith in general.
Lin,
The divorce stats I had in mind are those I see before my eyes as a pastor. Most of the divorces I get to witness are between egals. Perhaps most everyone is comp where you are so you are unfamiliar with this. The amount of nastiness to be observed among self-identifying egals is breathtaking. I’m not saying that controlling or abusive is more comon among egals than comps. But I know of no evidence that it is less.
As you yourself has emphasized on other occasions, what really matters is basic Christian maturity and commitment to Christ’s Kingdom. Where this is lacking, marriage is often a hell in the making.
For example, a male who at some point was severely abused psychologically by a female (the mother being the classic case discussed in the literature) will struggle far more than others with accepting even the most positive and benign exercise of authority from a female.
And how would such a man feel if he were told that a woman had to in authority over him because she was a woman, and that he would be in subordination to female authority for all of eternity because that was how God created him and he should be joyous about it.
Just think of how a man abused by a woman would feel at permanent, pervasive and eternal authority of a female over his every action as a way of becoming a Christian. How would an abused man accept permanent submission to a woman in every aspect of his life, as a spiritually necessary practice, for getting to heaven?
Is this realistic? This is asked of women all the time. And women don’t like it.
“If either husband or wife seek power over the other, it is hell in the making.”
Indeed, both domineering husbands and domineering wives do not have a single scriptural leg to stand on.
Beyond that, the challenge is to tend to integrate a positive understanding of the exercise of authority, by both husband and wife, into an ethos of marriage.
So long as egals fail to do this, they leave the field wide open to comps, even hard-line comps, who satisfy people’s quest for models of authority and discipline to replace the relative anarchy that is typical of prevailing egal culture.
There is a reason why soft comp materials dominate the Christian book market. Soft comp resources are not perfect, but they show far more balance than do resources produced by the more ideological extremes on either side.
John,
We simply disagree about Paul teaching asymmetry. If you really believe that, then I do not see how you are egal.
As you promote non-egal teaching without caveats, I really do not see how you are egal.
And some of the things you say are said by milder non-egals but by no other person I know that claims to be egal besides you. An example is limiting the scope of mutual consent to some residual extra for the male, as far as I can tell, but it is unclear.
You might be a milder non-egal than CBMW, but still a non-egal and it would be less confusing for everyone here if you admitted this.
I appreciate that milder non-egals are closer to egalism than more extreme non-egals. And even a free/slave marriage can work, so lesser forms of non-egal marriages can work. It depends on the maturity of the spouses.
“The divorce stats I had in mind are those I see before my eyes as a pastor. Most of the divorces I get to witness are between egals. Perhaps most everyone is comp where you are so you are unfamiliar with this. The amount of nastiness to be observed among self-identifying egals is breathtaking. I’m not saying that controlling or abusive is more comon among egals than comps. But I know of no evidence that it is less. “
Perhaps you are dealing with cultural Christians. Or what we might deem ‘Christians in name only’.
Is your counseling affiated with the UMC? Or are you just affiliated with that denomination as a member? I know 3 UMC pastors very well and all three are Universalists.
Lin,
I am a Waldensian pastor serving a UMC congregation. My counseling takes place in the context of my parish.
There are UMC pastors who are Universalists. How they square that with the Bible they preach from on a Sunday morning is beyond me.
Many people who self-identify as Christians and as egals who, for example, abide by the Golden Rule, are fooling themselves on both counts. I don’t deny this.
Many people who self-identify as Christians and as comps who, for example, love their wives as Christ loves the church, are fooling themselves on both counts. I don’t deny this either.
I know comps, including members of my extended family, who grew up in an egal household but now have excellent marriages built on (soft) comp principles.
I have egal friends who grew up in a traditional or comp household but now have excellent marriages based on (soft) egal principles. Yes, indeedy.
What makes for an excellent marriage? Not compism or egalism. Neither does the trick.
Excellent marriages are full of the positive exercise of authority, mutual deference, sacrificial love, and domain-based hierarchies.
Unfortuantly, there is much more to the comp issue than marriage within the Body. Denying the exercising of spiritual gifts to women is another concern.
Very glad to hear you are not a Universalist. But some of the examples you tend to use do not sound like Christians at all so I get a bit edgy when you lump them in as if they are true Christian egals following Christ.
Don,
You make a number of misleading statements I wish to correct.
You say:
“We simply disagree about Paul teaching asymmetry. If you really believe that, then I do not see how you are egal.”
You will discover, if you read further among egals who are biblical scholars, that many others conclude that Paul upheld asymmetry. Here are a few authors to get you started: Andrew Lincoln, Carolyn Osiek, and John Elliott.
You also say:
“As you promote non-egal teaching without caveats, I really do not see how you are egal.”
I always emphasize that what is really important is that 1 Corinthians 13 is the touchstone of a marriage. Your “without caveats” comment is baseless.
You also say:
“[S]ome of the things you say are said by milder non-egals but by no other person I know that claims to be egal besides you. An example is limiting the scope of mutual consent to some residual extra for the male, as far as I can tell, but it is unclear.”
You have this backwards. I have been emphasizing that the scope of mutual consent needs to be very wide. I listed however three limits to which you agreed.
“You might be a milder non-egal than CBMW, but still a non-egal and it would be less confusing for everyone here if you admitted this.”
Well, thank you for the “might.” A touch of generosity goes a long way.
I am a full egal. My bishop is a woman. I am married to a pastor, and she is a solo pastor. In my marriage, authority is vested equally in husband and wife, with all the joys and difficulties that arise in consequence.
No, I am not a “biblical egal.” I’m not about to make Paul and Peter say things they don’t in order to conform what they say to some preconceived notion on my part. I don’t believe that egalism is adequate protection against abuse, or that it only has strengths, but no weaknesses.
Lin, you say:
“Denying the exercising of spiritual gifts to women is another concern.”
I agree completely. Gift-based authority is something I think needs to be valued more highly, and office-based authority adusted to those facts on the ground. We try to do that in the UMC.
It’s not always a bed of roses, and problems do arise. But I have been greatly blessed by fellow elders and bishops female in gender.
On the other hand, I understand why adherence to tradition and / or a particular understanding of scripture makes that avenue unavailable in many churches.
I have a number of former SBCers, Nazarenes, you name it, among my clergy colleagues who decided they wanted to take the plunge on this aspect of the question. I have yet to hear a disparaging word about it once the experience of having a woman pastor and woman pastor colleague is personal.
If we consider slavery vs wage employment, we can certainly say that wage employment is open to abuse. It is open to terrible abuse. However, I do not see that this is an argument for slavery.
This is how I understand the discussion here. Giving men and women equal rights is open to abuse. Therefore, there is no advantage to giving women equal rights. So why should women have any rights at all. If men were perfect women would need no rights in the law. I hear this being suggested. If men followed 1 Cor. 13 women would need no rights at all. Is this seriously being proposed?
On the sins of egals, I live and work in a secular world surrounded by egals of all stripes and colours. I also have been part of many “male only authority” communities. I can even think of some good things about some of them.
But I would no sooner recommend “male based authority” as a lifestyle than I would recommend slavery. I have intimate knowledge of both egal and comp relationships. I have quite a varied acquaintance, crossing religions and cultures, and denominational and ideological boundaries. I cannot say enough that ascribing authority on the basis of gender is as wrong as slavery.
I am not aware of any egal books or sermons or literature that speaks against authority. Perhaps they discuss a different way of distributing authority. I do not have a problem with this.
However, the insinuation that egal literature teaches inappropriate things about the proper exercise of authority is something for which no example has been provided. It remains disappointing to me that no evidence of wrong egal teaching has been demonstrated. I also regret that equal treatment for women is not protected or upheld.
I have no respect for those who do not want to defend equal rights for women.
“No, I am not a “biblical egal.” I’m not about to make Paul and Peter say things they don’t in order to conform what they say to some preconceived notion on my part. “
So, it is not biblical in your view? Yet, you practice it?
Suzanne,
Can you give examples of egal books and sermons that speak about hierarchy and the exercise of authority as essential aspects of a healthy marriage? That would interest me.
Lin,
No the Bible doesn’t envision a lot of things I practice, for example, a democratic form of national and local government, worship in which neither male nor female wears a kerchief, etc. Furthermore,though the biblical authors clearly conceived of the universe in a pre-Copernican fashion, I don’t believe that is binding on us.
So I make a distinction between things the Bible teaches or takes for granted for a given time and place, and those that it teaches for all times and places. It’s not easy to make the distinction in a responsible way. But everyone has to make it. Even Southern Baptists (smile).
Can you give examples of egal books and sermons that speak about hierarchy and the exercise of authority as essential aspects of a healthy marriage? That would interest me.
First off, I am not well read in marriage books of any kind. Second, I highly doubt that matters of child discipline and structure would include the lexeme “authority.”
Among the teachers I work with, I find some of them, and certainly they are 90% women, and totally egal, and highly authoritarian. In fact, the trend in teaching today is very authoritarian. What you say about egals has no resonance at all with me.
I see wonderful women, atheists, feminists, who work part time, teaching, foster children and run their household as a very tight ship.
I see them as anti pop TV culture, highly motivated to promote strong study habits, strong family time, and lots of structure. In fact, I often have to sit out of parent teacher meetings because I find these meetings to be highly directive and not something that I can handle emotionally.
I have to say that I do not recognize or have any inkling of a cultural group of egal women who are not highly structured and authoritarian. But I do not think that they would use the words “authority” or “hierarchy.” They would talk about “structure” and “organization” and “responsibility” and “being directive.”
I am not aware of any correspondance between egal gender relations and lack of authority/structure.
The Bible says that worship most certainly CAN be done by both men and women without a kerchief. In 1 Cor 11 men are PROHIBITED from headcoverings, while women are ALLOWED to choose whether to wear headcoverings ala 1 Cor 11:10, altho many translations mangle this.
In any case, it was cultural to that time.
I can see why John does not think Paul was a full egal, because what Paul wrote is not what John thinks he wrote, due to poor translations.
John,
When I said that you promote non-egal teaching without caveats, I can see I was unclear, I meant specifically people like Eggerich.
As an egal, I can promote Eggerich with caveats. I have learned from him. But I do not see you mention that you have caveats with him.
For example, a big caveat with Eggerich for me would be to symmetricize his counsel. He is non-egal, but at least acknowledges egals are possible. He then proceeds to teach from his non-egal perspective and a way to make it EVEN more relevant for egals is to make the teachings symmetric, as they are good teachings, except he says X is for men and Y is for women, while both X and Y are good for both.
“I see wonderful women, atheists, feminists, who work part time, teaching, foster children and run their household as a very tight ship.”
I am aware of this demographic as well, and have had friends of this kind at various times in my life, particularly in Madison, my hometown, which has a high density of, as you say, “wonderful women, atheists, feminists” who do not need men in their lives and who are very authoritarian. Your remarks brought back a flood of pleasant memories.
It is a very unusual demographic, and I think it is fair to say that the premises they build their lives on are very different from those we find in the New Testament.
Still, I am very grateful for the gift of three such women in my life. God blessed me through them, though the word “God,” like “authority” and many other words that are typical of the Christian faith, are not part of their vocabulary.
Suzanne, this sense of gratitude for the example of “wonderful women, atheists, feminists,” is something we share but which many are not likely to understand, so I might as well relate an anecdote or two for the benefit of many, indeed most people, who have not had friends of this kind.
I am what I am because of the witness of two research biologists, both lesbians, a couple, who were friends of my Mom when I was growing up.
As a 13 year old, I spent a summer working with research chemists at a state facility for the mentally retarded. That’s because my teachers had me pegged to be a scientist, since I was off the charts in math and things like that.
But I was not happy doing experiments on rats and discussing formula with chemists. The two women checked in on me once in awhile, figured me out, and arranged for me to spend two days at the end of the summer with the “worst of the worst,” the monsters as they were sometimes called, the macrocephalics and microcephalics and other children with such horrendous physical and mental handicaps that they are kept out of public view.
So I spent two whole days rolling on the ground to the touch and the spit of kids whose fierce affection and need for affection immersed me in a reality that I had, as a consummate bookworm and introvert, been sheltered from. I was face to face for the first time with undiluted emotion which has an intellect all its own, so different and yet so similar to the intellect of rationality.
Those two days turned me life around. It was in the days when you could go downtown on a bus for ten cents and I would do that every night I could, to the main public library and read and read until the library closed and I would catch the last bus.
Before those two days, I had always read science, I loved biology (Stephen Jay Gould) and oceanography and entomology, at most I would read science fiction, Isaac Asimov. But now I knew of a new world, the world of people and emotions and unquenchable hope. I switched to literature, fiction, poetry, and it wasn’t long before the Bible spoke to me as did no other book I had read, with its fierce accounts of human folly and faith.
In other ways, too, those two strong women were like mothers to me. I am grateful for their intense rationality which allowed them to see something in me that no one had seen before, and which led me away from rationality alone.
The last example is more recent. As Paola and I were preparing to have our second child, in Madison this time, we chose “the midwife” route (not available in Italy, but perhaps it is in Canada). What a sisterhood of strong women, these midwives.
I have rarely seen more of a concentrate of pure authority in action than in the time up to and including the birth of Elisabetta. The midwife ruled the roost with a serenity and firm hand, reproved the male doctor with a glance of her fierce eyes – the doctor seemed a mere pipsqueek in her presence. It was the kind of authority that is rare these days. It is precisely the kind of authority the world needs more of.
The world is a better place for such women. If the world has a few of them, God must have a reason for them. Indeed, every congregation I have been in has its share of very strong women, both in the good and the bad sense, and God must have a reason for them, too.
I realize, of course, that most men and most women are never going to possess “natural” authority in so concentrated a form. Those who have such authority or have been given such authority, by whatever “accident” of birth or circumstance, will most likely agree with Paul, not the Paul of Ephesians 5, but the Paul of 1 Corinthians who said, “it is better not to marry.”
Paul, too, had this charism of authority which almost by definition disdains marriage.
You can tell, if you read the letters, that it drove people crazy. It still drives people crazy today, those who read him.
Gifts are wounds. They hurt and cause hurt. But God harnesses them, sometimes against our will, for his own ends.
“No the Bible doesn’t envision a lot of things I practice, for example, a democratic form of national and local government, worship in which neither male nor female wears a kerchief, etc. Furthermore,though the biblical authors clearly conceived of the universe in a pre-Copernican fashion, I don’t believe that is binding on us.”
I believe 1 Corin 11 studied deeply shows that Paul was actually giving women freedom NOT to cover in worship or when they prophesy. I think it has been horribly translated.
But I do not understand your respone. You say it does not envision many things you practice but you have been showing us all the ways YOU believe it upholds comp teaching. yet, you are an egal. You are one confusing guy.
Are there egal marriage books out there? I have never heard of any nor bothered to look. Most of the egal books I have read focus on scripture. I like the way they do not focus on the application of scripture for everyday living.
I would think that application would come from the Holy Spirit to each individual who is seeking the Lord.
John,
I am aware of this demographic as well, and have had friends of this kind at various times in my life, particularly in Madison, my hometown, which has a high density of, as you say, “wonderful women, atheists, feminists” who do not need men in their lives and who are very authoritarian. Your remarks brought back a flood of pleasant memories.
I am simply going to cry from sorrow and your lack of ability to listen.
First, I loved your story and I love Stephen Jay Gould and Asimov although I don’t know who introduced them to me.
Second, surely we agree then that non-comps are not against authority.
But John I cry for you because the women I have in mind love men very much and are married to men and sense that they need men very much.
Don’t you understand that a women can be a “wonderful women, a feminist and an atheist” and be married to a man that she loves very much.
I used that phrase “feminist” and you transposed that in your mind to lesbians who don’t need men. I too know many wonderful lesbian/gay couples. But the women I work with are hetero women who love men. Many of them are married and the rest would like to be.
I do not know how to talk to you of the tenderness that a woman can have for a man. Just because compism has meant that I must distance myself physically forever from men who believe in or endorse male authority does not mean that I have any antagonistic attitude toward men. This is what you read into my comments. I am very sorry for you because you feel that way.
Let’s agree, however, that compism has nothing over anyone else when it comes to the positive exercize of authority. In fact, because comp authority is basically for the purpose of restricting women, it is the opposite of empowering.I would say that comp authority is a very unhealthy authority. I realize that I am talking about hard compism or theological compism and not the marriage books compism.
Paul does not disdain marriage, but he is responding to Greeks who think it is preferred to abstain from sex altogether, even if married. In responding Paul uses a voluntary fence around Torah principle in trying to agree with them as much as possible, while disagreeing with them at a fundamental level.
Paul says there ARE a few for which sex is not a driving force and for those with this gift, they will have more time to serve the Lord; contrasted with being looked down as a failure for not “being fruitful” per the Pharisees. But for most people, they will want to get married.
Don,
I realize that for you symmetry is an essential aspect of your egalism, but it should be as plain as day that Paul and Peter, as one would expect given the particular culture in which they lived and took for granted, did not give symmetrical advice.
In my judgment, egals who fail to concede this point end up making the average Joe and Jane toy with the possibility that egalism is all about making the text say what it obviously doesn’t say.
Lin,
I’m not surprised you find me confusing. SBCs in general, I assure you, find me confusing. I am way outside the box you are familiar with.
It is a typical move of “biblicists” to take passages which they do not follow and claim they do not mean what they have generally been held to mean.
What is “biblicism”? It is the assumption that the Bible provides us with a blueprint for every detail of our Christian lives, inclusive of small details related to the practice of baptism to whether or not to anoint with oil to whether or not to wear a kerchief in worship. True Christian teaching consists of getting these details of interpretation 100 per cent right and then excluding from one’s fellowship those who don’t.
BTW, I have many wonderful friends who are biblicists, some of whom I deem to be better Christians than I am. That is not the point.
The point is that (1) biblicism no less than (2) traditionalism and (3) accommodation to the spirit of this age leads to factionalism and division over second and third-order issues.
Don and Lin,
Is is really only possible to support full egalism from your points of view by claiming that virtually all available translations mistranslate in specific instances, and / or, that things that everyone thought Paul affirmed are in fact unmarked quotations of his opponents?
Both of you appear to have what is known as a “biblicist” hermenuetic (see previous comment). In my view, this kind of hermeneutic forces you, even against your better judgment, to make Paul and Peter into full egals because if they were not, you would have no grounds on which to be full egals yourselves.
This does not follow.
Biblicism is based on an inattentive reading of scripture and a very wooden concept of the interface between faith and culture.
It is inattentive because, rather than noting within the deep unity the obvious diversity in detail in the Bible on a number of theological, ethical, and other issues, it denies that diversity in practice in the interests of creating a “one-size-fits-all” theological and ethical standard that is then imposed on everyone.
BTW, traditionalists and accomodationists to the spirit of this age do the same thing in their own way, so at least you are in “good” company.
Biblicists adapt to cultural change but do so in a covert manner or on the basis of traditional “outs.”
This, it is (now) a traditional “out” to say that biblical authors’ pre-Copernican understanding of the universe is a cultural relic. But tell that to the opponents of Galileo. What is now “obvious” to us was not obvious to anyone except Galileo at the time – and for good reason.
In light of this history, it makes sense to develop more sensible methods of interpretation. However, the history of attempts to do so is far from pretty.
As is well known, as soon as the interface between faith and culture is dealt with more flexibly, pretty soon there are people who throw everything they don’t like out the window based on the distinction.
But that is the risk we all run, in one way or the other. Better to face it square on.
I don’t think Lin’s answer to the question about marriage enrichment resources is a practical one, even though I sympathize with it.
I too have never read a self-help manual on marriage of any kind, at least not until now.
I have just read Gary Thomas’s Sacred Marriage and am working through Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs (thanks to recommendations by Gem and Marilyn).
I don’t agree with everything – I don’t even agree with myself on everything – but I think the books are remarkably well written, make many excellent points, and understand their audiences very well.
Thomas and Eggerichs provide a persuasive comp alternative to the kind of hard line compism Sue has heard in sermoms of her former church (evangelical Anglican, but most evangelical Anglicans are not hard comps, but rather, soft comps or soft egals) and Lin has found in conservative SBC circles.
It is telling if there are no available egal resources that are comparable to those provided by Thomas and Eggerichs.
If your goal is to have as little cultural influence as possible, that is the way to do it: publish only scholarly stuff with Zondervan, Tyndale and what not, but nothing for ordinary folks.
Suzaane,
You say:
“I do not know how to talk to you of the tenderness that a woman can have for a man.”
You don’t have to. I know from personal experience. You drew, as happens to the best of us, unwarranted conclusions from my illustrations. I do not imply nor did I mean to imply that you are a lesbian. If you reread my comment, you will note that I build off your comments, not your persona.
“comp authority is basically for the purpose of restricting women.”
Once again, a completely unsupportable generalization that demeans every single person who self-identifies as a comp.
What I self identify myself as is a Scripturalist, analogous to Karaite Judaism but with my canon including the NT (and not the Apocrypha). All Scripture is given for our instruction and I appreciate it.
I happen to think the Bible does talk about baptism, anointing with oil and headcoverings. Baptism means immersion and corresponded to the mikveh baths of Judaism for Jewish conversion; but this is not legalistic.
Anointing with oil is fine and headcoverings are entirely optional in Western culture, but in 1st century culture Paul forbids men to wear them in church because of what they meant, and gives women the freedom to choose.
It was only after I became egal and thru lots of study did I figure out Paul was full egal, so to my way of thinking it is true that I am just following him as my protege’ and Jesus was a seed-form egal in his 3.5 years of ministry.
WAY before I became egal I was taught by non-egals that Eph 5 should be seen as specific emphasis, not as directed exclusive commands, both need respect but lack of respect can affect men more and both need love but lack of love can affect women more. This was a quasi-symmetrical teaching and it made sense to me then and it mostly makes sense now.
Who would claim a wife does not need respect? Who would claim a husband does not need love?
On the Bible, descriptions are phenomenological, which is a fancy pants word that means physical things are described by the way they appear.
It does appear that the sun goes around the earth and that the earth stands still. Kepler’s math is simpler than Ptolemy’s and Einstein says there is no privileged observer so either can be chosen, but the math with be more difficult with the latter.
The Bible is not a science textbook, it is pre-science.
Sue wrote: “comp authority is basically for the purpose of restricting women.”
John wrote: “Once again, a completely unsupportable generalization that demeans every single person who self-identifies as a comp.”
My take is that the EFFECT of comp teaching is to limit the scope of authority of women and the more extreme the non-egalism, the more limiting the scope of women in both the home and church (and society in some cases).
But how does Sue’s words or mine DEMEAN anyone who is non-egal? To me it is simply a case of the emperor’s new clothes, but I do not mean it to be demeaning. I need an explanation of why stating the obvious is demeaning. Perhaps it is NOT obvious or something I am missing.
“Both of you appear to have what is known as a “biblicist” hermenuetic (see previous comment). In my view, this kind of hermeneutic forces you, even against your better judgment, to make Paul and Peter into full egals because if they were not, you would have no grounds on which to be full egals yourselves.”
Thanks. I will add that to the other things I have been called: Beleiving in trajectory hermeneutics, Following faulty redemptive hermeneutic, a heretic and a feminist among other things. (wink)
I think Biblicist sounds better than all of them because I love the Word.
)
( Actually, I just realize that I am not a married woman in the 1st Century and pray to interpret accordingly)
Don,
The situation is this. This is a conversation between comps and egals and dialogue is a delicate thing. One of the ground rules of dialogue as opposed to pure polemic is that you do not impugn the motives of others for believing as they do.
I have been involved in carefully organized intense dialogues on many issues before, for example, abortion and homosexuality, and as soon as this guideline is neglected, all hell breaks loose.
Indeed, Sue’s comment breaks a specific guideline of this blog and so long as she is allowed to do so, this blog remains an unsafe place for dialogue.
Note how she words her comment:
“comp authority is basically for the purpose of restricting women.”
Purpose goes to motive goes to every person who upholds a complementarian view of authority.
Your own statement about effect, on the other hand, is acceptable within a Christian dialogue setting so long as it is said with love. With that in mind, it might be reworded somewhat, though, if I were the moderator, I would not require it.
From m-w.com
Date: 1850
: adherence to the letter of the Bible
— bib·li·cist \-lə-sist\ noun often capitalized
——
This is certainly not me and I doubt it is lin either.
One needs the Spirit and context to interpret the Bible, just going by the letters can lead to major errors and resulting condemnation.
Don,
You say:
"WAY before I became egal I was taught by non-egals that Eph 5 should be seen as specific emphasis, not as directed exclusive commands, both need respect but lack of respect can affect men more and both need love but lack of love can affect women more. This was a quasi-symmetrical teaching and it made sense to me then and it mostly makes sense now."
I agree with that in broad outline. How does that differ, basically, from the approach of comp author Emerson Eggerichs?
I have issues with specific statements Emerson makes, but I'm having trouble finding a bone to pick at the level of fundamental principle. (I haven't read his whole book L & R yet).
On Eggerich, I am not disagreeing with what he says (I found it insightful) but with what he does not say. In other words, he gives good advice, but targets the husband for the love teaching and the wife for the respect teaching. In other words, he made it gender-specific, per the literal meaning of Eph 5:33. So it is true and good as far as it goes, but it could be made to go even further in goodness by making it symmetrical.
And whenever he used some non-egal assumption I got a brain burp, but I was expecting that.
John,
First you wrote,
You drew, as happens to the best of us, unwarranted conclusions from my illustrations. I do not imply nor did I mean to imply that you are a lesbian.
Perhaps you would clarify why you added the last few words to my quote, when you wrote,
as you say, “wonderful women, atheists, feminists” who do not need men in their lives
I am at loss as to why you editorialize on my comments in this way. It prevents communication.
I am still curious about whether you think that egalitarians are pro or anti proper authority. This has not been made clear.
Second, when I say that
“comp authority is basically for the purpose of restricting women.”
I quote my former pastor who has made sure that women are no longer in the pulpit of his church. I am sure you are aware that Jim Packer, also attending this church, has published a paper called,
“Let’s Stop Making Women Presbyters,” Christianity Today 11 ( 1991):
The work of CBMW and others like Dr. Packer is for the purpose of keeping womnen from being elders and pastors. I consider Dr.Packer a relatively moderate complementarian but he, like several of the prominent complementarians in his church, preach complementarianism against the consent of their wives who no longer attend this church. So no mutual consent has ever been modeled to me. (However, I have to admit that they do not preach from the pulpit that these dissenting women will go to hell. I was told that elsewhere.)
Dr. Packer, for example, is quite clear on the fact that his wife does not agree with his views on the role of women. But he is quite happy to continue to act as an advocate for the removal of women from the pulpit. If you think that he can be quoted elsewhere as saying the opposite, this would not surprise me either.
I have attended church with these teachings for years now, and the intent has been to ensure that women will not be in the pulpit. I don’t know why it is wrong for me to say that this is a motive. I think if they claim that keeping women from eldership is their intent then I should be free to say so.
You believe it is within the comment policy for you to insinuate that all feminists are women who have no need of men in their lives, thus denying that there are self-identifying feminists who do love men.
But I say that complementarians restrict women because frankly I cannot think of any complementarians who do not restrict women from preaching. I just can’t. But I can think of feminists who admit that they need and want men in their lives.
I notice that you have publicly remarked on my not meeting the criteria for posting here, and at the same time you editorialize on my comments and make them seem to mean something which was far from my mind, all the while criticizing me for saying the plain truth, that complementarians seek to restrict women.
The term “biblicism” is commonly applied to a range of tendencies. “Biblicists” are, for example, those for whom confessions, creeds, and past theologians lack even derived authority (norma normata; norms that are normed by Scripture) and insist on going back to the Bible to build up their doctrinal formulations from scratch; those for whom Scripture is a “textbook” of philosophy, politics, ethics, economics, church government, etc.; those who read Scripture with insufficient regard for the texts’ historical, cultural, logical, and literary contexts.
Comps like Vern Polythress have tried to rehabilitate and redefine biblicism into something positive. I remain unpersuaded.
It is no accident that hard comps in particular tend in the direction toward biblicism. Like traditionalists vis-a-vis tradition, they adhere to details in Scripture (or tradition) even if they might be no more than cultural relics, because they would rather err in that direction than the other, that of accommodating to the spirit of this age.
Don,
I hope to get Wayne’s permission to post a dialogue review of Eggerichs book in the near future. If that happens, we can take up the discussion there.
Suzanne,
I stand by my earlier statement that it is not permissible in a dialogue to impugn the motives of your dialogue partner. Unqualified generalizations are to be avoided at all costs.
As for one person in a dialogue “editorializing” on the comments of another, this is perfectly normal in human conversation in general and dialogue in particular.
As far as the specific words I used to state my position – *not yours* – you misread my meaning and give them more scope than they have in context.
We were talking about lesbian feminists, a demographic I respect though I don’t see how they can be Christian (neither do they, for the most part).
It is true, as you suggest, that their non-need of men is relative only.
They will admit that, too, though I also get a bit flustered when they reply (this happens in my hometown, the Berkeley of the Midwest), “we’re working on reducing our need of you further.”
I notice that you have publicly remarked on my not meeting the criteria for posting here, and at the same time you editorialize on my comments and make them seem to mean something which was far from my mind, all the while criticizing me for saying the plain truth, that complementarians seek to restrict women.
October 9, 2008 8:10 PM
This has been a concern of mine, too. One of my comments many threads back was described by John as ’stupidly written’. And, I have thought many times my words were twisted in his responses.
Sue is right about comp teaching but I would go one step further in saying that the almost complete focus on comp teaching over the past 20 years (over more important teaching in the church) is about one human (male) having authority over another (female) WITHIN the Body of Christ.
There are plenty of NT scriptures that negate that type of teaching.
I am concerned about 2 things in John’s responses:
1. He does not seem to be aware of what is now mainstream comp teaching.
2. His recommendations for marriage relationships tend toward the roles, rules and formulas, too, that I fear have people self focused way too much.
I agree with the post Molly put up long ago by the Jolly Blogger, we spend way too much time on thinking about and working on our marriages and not enough time seeking to follow only Christ.
Have our marriage relationships become idols?
John wrote: “The term “biblicism” is commonly applied to a range of tendencies. “Biblicists” are, for example, those for whom confessions, creeds, and past theologians lack even derived authority (norma normata; norms that are normed by Scripture) and insist on going back to the Bible to build up their doctrinal formulations from scratch; those for whom Scripture is a “textbook” of philosophy, politics, ethics, economics, church government, etc.; those who read Scripture with insufficient regard for the texts’ historical, cultural, logical, and literary contexts. “
With that last phrase about being insufficient, no one would ever admit to being one. It is used strictly as a negative term, so I am surprised John would claim lin and me are such.
On creeds, I am non-creedal, but I have recited them and studied them on occasion. There are positives about creeds, but I will list my concerns:
1. They seem too Greek thinking oriented for me, while the Bible was written by Hebrew thinkers. I do not think the earliest creeds are false in what they say, but that they say too little. Someone might assert all the things in an early creed but not be a believer.
2. An original purpose of the creeds was to exclude someone who could not say it in faith, to draw a line between who was in and who was out. I think such is determined by God and not people.
3. In the evolution of creed formation, the process seems to me to have become more and more political with Rome asserting claims and Constantinople asserting counterclaims, etc. As we know, this competition eventually resulted in the Great Schism between EOC and RCC.
On the Bible as textbook, my take is that it is sufficient for faith and practice, as that is a claim it makes for itself; hence I do not need creeds, altho they are faith statements made by some at certain times and so are useful for that. So things related to my faith are guided by the Bible; for example, I am charismatic, if someone would give a prophecy outside of Scriptural norms, it should be repudiated, but one needs to know the Scriptural norms.
It is no accident that hard comps in particular tend in the direction toward biblicism. Like traditionalists vis-a-vis tradition, they adhere to details in Scripture (or tradition) even if they might be no more than cultural relics, because they would rather err in that direction than the other, that of accommodating to the spirit of this age.
October 9, 2008 8:41 PM
I find it astounding that you have read my comments for a while and think this applies to me in an egal capacity. I have consistently discussed the need for cultural context and the need for comps to not dismiss other passages that negate their blanket teaching and put it into perspective for true believers within the Body of Christ.
You do me an injustice, John, by labeling me as such. But you do this to me and others consistently.
John,
I feel uncomfortable with your identifying me as “comp”. I am a recovering hard comp- no birth control, husband micromanaging and controlling down to the tiniest detail, 11 pregnancies, 8 live births, SAHM, former homeschooler, etc. etc, etc…. I don’t self identify as comp or egal. I am sort of in no man’s land. I think men and women are quite different and that the instructions in scripture for husbands and wives are gender specific and I am happy to enthusiastically embrace that they are different which is comp-ish but I also think that men and women are completely equal in value, worth, dignity AND authority which is egal-ish. I think and we should all (including children) be discipled in how to wisely steward the authority which GOD has vested in us as image-bearers.
I find myself disagreeing with BOTH comps and egals on this blog that there must be “agreement in decision making in marriage”. There is conflict in marriage. Used to be the final decision making rested exclusively with hubby and I sucked it up and avoided conflict like a dutiful hard comp wife. Now I make some decisions for myself, my husband, my children, and my household, unilaterally and against his will…. and I think our marriage and family is better for it.
I find myself sympathizing that you are walking in a minefield on this thread (which I have been following). But I very much dislike Eggerich’s book and I see you intend to post a review of it, so I may be a little touchy with you myself soon.
Lin,
You say:
“One of my comments many threads back was described by John as ’stupidly written’. And, I have thought many times my words were twisted in his responses.”
If you go back and reread my ’stupidly written’ comment, perhaps it will become clear that my reference was to something Bruce Ware wrote, not something you wrote.
It is typical in discussions of this kind for dialogue partners to have a hard time understanding each other. It requires patience and you are certainly welcome to challenge my take on something you said at any time. However, specific examples are necessary.
It is absolutely natural in dialogue for people to “editorialize” on each other’s comments. However, as soon as someone else’s motives are impugned, that is what is known as a conversation-stopper.
I remain convinced that you are a biblicist. I tried to state my opinion as graciously as possible. I too am often described in ways that I think are unfitting. It is then up to me to explain why the description does not fit.
You say I do you an injustice by describing you as a biblicist. Well then, let me explain better my point of view. You defend your self-understanding as a non-biblicist by pointing out that you criticize others for not taking cultural context into sufficient account.
I’m glad that you do so, and would probably agree with some of the points you make, but I consider your comeback to be weak.
It is *your* tendency to give insufficient regard to cultural context that I was questioning, not someone else’s.
Whenever someone makes Paul and Peter into full egals, many egals trained in the cultural context of NT times are going to point out how that does not square with what we know of the times, and with a global understanding of Paul and Peter’s teachings.
Correct me if I am wrong, but if you thought Paul and Peter were not full egals, based on your approach to the Bible (label it however you want), you would have no reason to be a full egal yourself.
Finally, your remark about mainstream comp teaching. For all I know, you are right that in your neck of the woods, hard comp teaching of the kind you quote is mainstream. It is not where I am. I can’t even find it on the bookshelves of the local Christian bookstore. People seem to be reading reading Eggerichs and Smalley more than anyone else. Soft comp and soft egal teaching rules the roost where I am. For reasons I’ve stated before, I think you would do well in your context to promote soft comp authors.
Don,
You are right that no one or few people would admit to being biblicists even if that is what they are. In the same way, no one is likely to admit to being a traditionalist, or an accommodationist to the spirit of this age, either – the other two categories I spoke of – even if that is what they are.
But you have yet to convince me that you are not a biblicist. Indeed, your description of your position makes it clear that, from the point of view of a “creedalist” like me, you are a biblicist. See, we’re even.
You have said already that you are shocked by things some egals have written about the “women” verses. You are certainly welcome to elaborate on that, and describe that shocking position, which I share with other egals, with uncomfortable adjectives of your choosing.
That will prod me to defend my position in more detail.
Have our marriage relationships become idols?
Mine was. Or to be more precise, my husband was.
Now I know that marriage is a furnace for sanctification. God never said we will get our needs met there. To the contrary look carefully at the interaction of Jesus with His disciples here. Pay special attention to the words I have bolded:
Matthew 19:3 The Pharisees also came to Him, testing Him, and saying to Him, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?”
4 And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? 6 So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.”
7 They said to Him, “Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?”
8 He said to them, “Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. 9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery.”
10 His disciples said to Him, “If such is the case of the man with his wife, it is better not to marry.”
11 But He said to them, “All cannot accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given: 12 For there are eunuchs who were born thus from their mother’s womb, and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. He who is able to accept it, let him accept it.”
“there are eunuchs who…” THREE TIMES!!!
So, from Jesus lips to your ears: you have a choice, men
How about a new men’s movement “eunuchs for Christ”?
We were talking about lesbian feminists,
No, John, YOU were talking about lesbian feminists, not me. You imply that I was but I was not.
If you are aware of any complementarians that do not restrict women’s roles in some way then please enlighten me. I am not.
I stand by my words,
1. All complementarians restrict women in some way.
2. NOt all feminists are lesbian. I should be allowed to mention the word “feminist” wihout having a dialogue partner assume that I mean lesbian.
Please take your complaints about my comments to the moderator in private from now on.
Gem,
I am happy to refer to you as a non-comp / non-egal, or by whatever other non-label you prefer. Gary Thomas, the author you recommended to me, is, as you know, definitely a complementarian. I look forward to your take on Eggerichs, if Wayne decides to host the dialogue review in preparation on it.
Suzanne,
You are right that you were talking about atheist feminists, whereas I then gave examples of lesbian feminists. These are of course overlapping sets, not equivalent sets. I never implied otherwise.
It is excellent to see you reword your critique so as to remove allusions to motive.
However, I do not plan to keep my objections to violations of the guidelines of this blog private. They need to be publicly confronted, admitted, and withdrawn, as you have done.
Now I make some decisions for myself, my husband, my children, and my household, unilaterally and against his will…. and I think our marriage and family is better for it.
Gem,
Thanks so much for your words. I am glad that this strategy has given you some measure of relief from hard compism. At first, I firmly believed that this would be possible for me as well, but I then realized that I wanted to put down the struggle before old age.
I too would totally agree that men and women are different. There are aspects in which they are deeply the same, as humans, but since we feel so much through our bodies and our acculturation into a gender class, we really are completely different in other ways.
I would embrace the word “complementary” also if it did not entail only submission for the woman and only authority for the man.
I have friends from extreme comp to extreme egal. It is true that all humans are capable of hurting their partners terribly, but giving the male ALL authority or else you go to the hot place, is really an extra doozy that seems to be peculiar to my experience of compism.
I stress that this is my experience, and I do know egals who have been terribly mistreated by either husband or wife. But they are all of them pretty shocked at the extra severity of suffering for women under the teachings I have cited.
Perhaps there simply needs to be a greater awareness that mental cruelty is grounds for divorce. I don’t know.
Here is a description of mental cruelty from Canadian Law FAQ,
* persistent criticism and belittlement;
* persistent and willful withdrawal of companionship;
* refusal to have sexual relations; and
* domineering or tyrannical behaviour.
Perhaps the church is wrong not talk about this more, and simply explain that this is grounds for divorce. Neither men nor women should have to put up with a lifetime of this kind of treatment.
The question is how much suffering can people live with? Can a woman live without being able to make any personal decisions for herself or her children? Can people live with emotional abandonment? In spite of the very extreme sorrow that emotional abandonment causes, I believe that tyranny is worse, because it is not only emotional abandonment but it prevents the person from having other human relationships. It is serious disease and causes enormous harm.
“His recommendations for marriage relationships tend toward the roles, rules and formulas, too, that I fear have people self focused way too much.”
I don’t recognize myself in this description. My emphasis has consistently been on passages like 1 Corinthians 13, Romans 12, and Philippians 2 as the touchstones of all Christian relationships, including marriage.
Gary Thomas, the author you recommended to me, is, as you know, definitely a complementarian.
Sure, and it doesn’t stop me from recommending him
I think there are comps who “speak life” and he is one of them 
I’m not sure what to call myself. Maybe your “Biblicist” works. I take it quite literally down to the jot and tittle (which I know you don’t much care for “interpretation should be at the discourse level and not the word level”- my paraphrase of what I have heard you say several times)
Where I agree with and resonate with you is in not seeing all this in black and white. I think there is an awful lot of gray area. I used to see things in black and white when I was trying to follow the letter of the law of a hard comp paradigm. I used to deliberately choose not to speak a word at church meetings NOT because my church taught that, but because that was what my black and white perspective saw in 1 Tim. 1 Cor, etc where “WOMEN keep SILENT” is taught. Now I feel sorry for those stuck thinking in black and white.
I have to say I disagree with you about the weight of the church authorities, etc. I went through some intense feelings of betrayal at having been misled by various commentaries and commentators and I really have quite a distrust of such “authorities” at this point. I would direct you to Singing Owl’s blog where she has some quotes from “church fathers” about women. Sorry, but I don’t trust men who view women that way. They are not in agreement with GOD in their view of women. To me that makes everything they say suspect. Likewise for many a modern day self-proclaimed “authority”.
Where Eggerich errs grievously IMO is in failing to perceive and chastise the massive disrespect of women among Christians and how devastating and ungodly it is. The Bible and GOD is unfailingly RESPECTFUL of women and teaches respect, value, honor, timay toward wives OR his PRAYERS WILL BE HINDERED. (1 Peter 3:7) Quite a little PROMISE there!
Gary Thomas in his “Sacred Influence” helps women recover their self respect and value to GOD.
from Sacred Influence by Gary Thomas
“God, not your marital status, defines your life.
Is that true of you? The more it is, the more success your will have in moving your man, because weak women usually forfeit their influence.
Look at this from a very practical perspective: do you care much about what a person for whom you have little respect thinks of you? Probably not. So then, how is such a person going to influence you? When their opinion doesn’t matter; they may communicate clearly, honestly, and practically- but you’re still not going to listen to them. In the same way, if your husband doesn’t respect you, if you have sinfully put his acceptance of you over your identity as a daughter of God, then how will you ever influence him for the better?” (Pg 21)
Gem,
You describe very beautifully how Gary Thomas has been a help to you. I look forward now to reading Sacred Influence.
but giving the male ALL authority or else you go to the hot place, is really an extra doozy that seems to be peculiar to my experience of compism.
…
Perhaps there simply needs to be a greater awareness that mental cruelty is grounds for divorce. I don’t know.
I would advise anyone struggling to leverage the pain toward personal growth in their relationship with GOD. As Lin observed, Christians have a tendency to make “marriage” into an idol and then to give up fairly easily when the pedestal cracks and the going gets tough. I am not saying that a woman should stay and put her life in jeopardy, not at all. But she should press in to GOD, pound on HIS chest (figuratively), and watch HIM do miracles in the midst of a desperate situation. Its HIS specialty. And being in that place with HIM is very faith building. I speak from experience.
Sometimes I feel sorry for the people who don’t struggle in their marriage because they don’t get to see Jesus there in the furnace with them.
It does not matter so much to me what labels people use for me, believers were called atheists as they did not believe in the polytheism of the day.
FWIIW, I do not look down on creedal believers, they just seem to have a slightly different set of axioms. I think a creedal believer can be faithful, that is for sure.
It is exactly BECAUSE I am trying my best to understand Paul in 1st century context that I see him as a full egal. I would never have got them without that contextual study.
but giving the male ALL authority or else you go to the hot place, is really an extra doozy that seems to be peculiar to my experience of compism.
and this is where I needed lots of recovery and perhaps still do… I need to STOP allowing people to define me and to believe what GOD says about me.
I’ll confess to you (on this “private” 250 comment thread…), that I have made a decision to leave church and I don’t think I will revisit this for 6 months to a year. I just can’t believe that a man can sit in the pew for some 30 years and only dig his hole deeper with porn and verbal abuse. To me, the fruit is rotten, which reflects poorly on the church. (and we have been members of 12 different denominations over the course of our 26 year marriage, so lots of denoms have had a crack at this). Things he hears from the pulpit do nothing but massage him in his complacency and self-justification I have children at home still 6,8,11,13, and 16. He can take them to church if he wants. I intend to refer to it as “the skunk house” and I am a “skunk house refugee” because there is an odor there and I feel the hypocrisy intensely.
As for my 20 year old, her comment was “now you understand how I feel, mom. You sure aren’t going to hear any judgment from me!” (She goes to church, but she dropped a CCC Bible study which was very legalistic).
On “biblicist” once more.
I have already stated what I think are weaknesses of this approach to the Bible, and I do not plan to stop pointing out excesses in the use of this approach when I see them.
However, I know the rules of the biblicist game, and I can play by them if by so doing I can allow the Bible to speak to people who have difficulty understanding it on other terms.
I myself have difficulty understanding the Bible on biblicist terms because of too much study, if you wish, with biblical scholars, anthropologists, archaeologists, and so on, with Ph.D’s mostly from Harvard and Yale. This has a way of addling the brain.
Furthermore, I think biblicists and creedalists need each other. I happen to be a creedalist, but I know I need biblicists to save me from taking tradition too seriously.
I think comps and egals need each other too. I happen to be an egal, but I need comps to save me from thinking that I have the truth in my backpocket.
John,
The problem is that you mentioned “reproof” only with reference to the role of the husband, as his exclusive domain. Perhaps you did not intend to do that, but it was marked.
The only, I repeat, the only adequate protection against an abusive or controlling spouse, male or female, is the whole armor of God offered to the believer: see Ephesians 6.
Believe me, the civil law is an essential component. Now at least women can initiate divorce. You have no idea what a healthy advance this is. Women can earn a living and separate. What a blessing.
Gem,
I understand what you are saying. However, there must be room for both staying and leaving without moral judgment. If there is moral judgment on the one who leaves some people will live in sin because of this. Fire refines and fire also snuffs out. Marriage is not necessarily a refining fire. It can deal death.
I must be emphasized that sometimes remaining married is living in sin. It is courageous to stay and courageous to leave. I would like to share with you what someone wrote to me some time ago,
May I share some thoughts with you. I know that divorce is a huge issue for Fundamentalists — it is considered a big no-no. But I wonder about that — is that sometimes a way that individuals can become callous or indifferent to their mates’ needs?
I have to say that often I admire those who divorce: it takes a great deal of courage to dissolve something so serious as a marriage, and I can only imagine that those who do it have a very good reason: they must be deeply unhappy or feel threatened.
When I understood divorce as a display of courage instead of a display of cowardice I was greatly encouraged.
I too had to leave my church and utterly reject what I had been taught. It is extremely difficult to struggle with one’s identity. In my view, some churches have caused a great deal of damage and need to be repudiated.
I like your term for this kind of church as the “skunk house.” That has been my experience. Lots of famous complementarian scholars leaving their peculiar aroma in this church also.
“You say I do you an injustice by describing you as a biblicist. Well then, let me explain better my point of view. You defend your self-understanding as a non-biblicist by pointing out that you criticize others for not taking cultural context into sufficient account. “
Is that what I said, John? That I “critisize” others for not taking cultural context into account? *I* said that?
No, it isn’t but you are saying I said that.
Here is what I wrote:
I find it astounding that you have read my comments for a while and think this applies to me in an egal capacity. I have consistently discussed the need for cultural context and the need for comps to not dismiss other passages that negate their blanket teaching and put it into perspective for true believers within the Body of Christ.”
That is why you are not trusted by me. You did the same thing to Sue using ‘lesbian’.
I maintain that you wrote many threads ago that my comment was ’stupidly written’. I checked it several times. I was astounded.
My comment back to you at that time was moderated. Probably for the best.
)
What you are doing here is NOT editorializing, John. This is way past that and into purposeful misrepresentation.
Time for me to bow out, folks.
It is exactly because of some recent archaeological findings in Ephesus that I am even more convinced that Paul was a full egal.
“The problem is that you mentioned “reproof” only with reference to the role of the husband, as his exclusive domain.”
No I didn’t, or I didn’t mean to. Thanks for the opportunity to make my point better.
A marriage not to mention any human relationship that is intolerant of reproof is shallow and superficial.
KJV Proverbs 27:17:
Iron sharpeneth iron;
So a man sharpened the countenance of his friend.
NLT:
As iron sharpens iron, a friend sharpens a friend.
If this is true in a friendship, and it works both ways, it is true all the more in marriage, and works both ways.
Thank God I have a wife who knows how to reprove me. Where would I be without that? I believe the feeling is mutual, though neither of us is particularly good at fessing up to the fact.
I did not withdraw anything. I want to talk about feminists as people who are not against authority in the family.
You switched the topic to lesbians. Thank you for understanding that this was a distraction.
Now, let’s come back to the issue at hand. Are feminists, or egalitarians against proper authority? First, you say they are and then you say they are not.
That egalitarians do not have a proper view of authority has been your major criticism, but you do not defend this in any way.
I did not withdraw my concern about motive. But I have never made comments on the motives of other commenters here.
I claim that one of the purposes of the CBMW and those whose sermons I have heard, like Packer, is to restrict women to certain roles. This is their intent, their objective, their purpose and mission. This is their motive. I do not take this back.
Sue,
I do not condemn those who divorce. Honestly, I wonder if they should have their head examined to risk remarriage, however
If certain behaviors had not stopped, I would divorce and that I have the ability to do so and the intention to do so acted as leverage to STOP those behaviors.
Once the focus on exercising authority over all the people around him stopped, the “control and abuse addiction” turned into other addictions, which are easier to cope with in a way.
I just have to wonder why the men in church spend so much effort and energy exercising authority over everyone and everything else except their OWN issues, iniquities, baggage, sin, and bitter roots??? Now, whenever I hear a man who is obsessed with the submission of everyone else (but himself) I can’t help but wonder what is really going on with him???
“Believe me, the civil law is an essential component. Now at least women can initiate divorce.”
Perhaps you are unaware that women could initiate divorce in many times and places in Greco-Roman antiquity.
You might take a look at:
http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Tyndale/PDF%20files/Monogamy.pdf
If you wish, you can think of it this way: in many times and places, Christian men and women who for one extra-biblical, extra-traditional, or extra-canonical reason or another found it impossible and indeed unacceptable to stay married had an out via civil law.
But, once the civil out is easy and seen as “normal” for the flimsiest of reasons, as it is in our day, a ton of other problems are created.
Perhaps you are unaware that women could initiate divorce in many times and places in Greco-Roman antiquity.
No, I am not unaware of this. But let’s go back to where you discuss how women are at risk for violence when they initiate divorce. Let’s put this together. A woman may divorce but undertakes a risk perhaps even of her life. It is well known that the most dangerous time in a woman’s life is when she leaves her husband. Of course, pregnancy is also a dangerous time. Studies show that the most common reason for death among pregnant women in the US is femicide. She is suddenly no longer completely at the beck and call of her husband and her risk of violence sky rockets.
Now let’s look at patriarchal society and ask if the family of the wife always negotiated safety for their married daughters. Yes, sometimes the father did act to protect his daughter, as Laban made clear that he would. But not always. Often the daughter was told to remain with her husband to protect the honour of the family. In that case the family does not offer protection. This is the most common circumstance by far.
So, in a patriarchal society there might, or might not be, protection for the leaving wife.
What has happened in Canada recently is that the law has arranged a way to deescalate violence during leaving in such a way that it might not happen at all, if one is lucky. A woman at least has a fighting chance. For this to happen though, there also needs to be no-fault divorce which I understand you are against.
I suggest that women should have a chance to experience physical safety in their life, and that these issues ought to be a priority.
It also needs to be recognized that not all women have an extended family around them. This may be an effect of modernisation, but it is a fact. It is not the fault of the woman if she has no family to appeal to. The church certainly is not helping in my experience, and I see a lot of echoes of that among other women posting here.
This is a very serious issue. Men and women both abuse their partners. So why make a woman more vulnerable than a man? Why stack the books against women?
If certain behaviors had not stopped, I would divorce and that I have the ability to do so and the intention to do so acted as leverage to STOP those behaviors.
Perhaps voicing the intention to divorce is crucial. And for those who do not stop their damaging behaviours, they must accept that their spouses will leave. If there was a lot more openness about grounds for divorce, such as the “mental cruelty” clause, then perhaps more marriages could be saved.
“I just have to wonder why the men in church spend so much effort and energy exercising authority over everyone and everything else except their OWN issues, iniquities, baggage, sin, and bitter roots???”
As I’m sure Gem knows, the standards for the exercise of authority found in the New Testament are diametrically opposed to this. For example, an elder or bishop is to above reproach, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, and hospitable (1 Tim 3:2). But these are traits elsewhere said to be typical of any and every Christian who bears the fruits of the Spirit.
Reproachful behavior, intemperate outbursts, lack of self-control, inhospitality to anyone but one’s own, are sure signs that the devil is at work. Which is why we all must pray: deliver us from the Evil One.
I suppose it is not an option in a strict biblicist framework, but in a creedal framework like my own, which allows women to exercise authority at all levels, we have a pool of possible candidates that is, on a conservative estimate, 50 per cent larger.
Just saying.
Furthermore, it seems to be forgotten by almost everyone that the primary authority granted to Christians is that of forgiving and retaining sins. Does no one read the gospels anymore, to see how and what authority Jesus exercises, on the ground and from the cross? It is, in the first instance, a ministry of forgiveness.
That authority bothered the Pharisees to death. It goes unused by Christians today.
Is the inner connection between fraternal correction and answered prayer laid out in Matthew 18 a completely unknown reality? I would hope not, but sometimes I wonder.
The fact is, there is a famine of the word of God in the land. So many substitute gospels. So little real connection to the pulsating heart of the Gospel found on every page of the New Testament.
But the proper response to the utter debasement of the concept of authority by sinful men is not to do away with it altogether. The proper response is that of restoring the concept to its biblical dignity.
Authority is debased by assigning it on the basis of gender. It is that simple.
“I have never made comments on the motives of other commenters here.”
You do so whenever you make unqualified generalizations about the motives of comps. This, I would think, is obvious.
“This has been a concern of mine, too. One of my comments many threads back was described by John as ’stupidly written’.”?
Perhaps you could provide a link? I saw where John left off quotation marks, people misunderstood him to be saying almost the polar opposite of what he was saying, and I’ll bet that despite his attempt to correct the misunderstanding, it remains.
He says here that he was referring to something Ware wrote as “stupidly written”. Based on what I saw before, I’m inclined to believe him. And I think if you link to where you understood him that way he will be able to clarify and apologize if there was a miscommunication.
John,
I have heard that “When I forgive, I set the prisoner free and the prisoner is ME” Forgiveness is really for our own good (and is not to be confused with reconciliation which requires motion on the offender’s part).
Is that what I said, John? That I “critisize” others for not taking cultural context into account? *I* said that?
No, it isn’t but you are saying I said that.
Here is what I wrote:
I find it astounding that you have read my comments for a while and think this applies to me in an egal capacity. I have consistently discussed the need for cultural context …”
Perhaps John is confusing posters? I think that is easy to do when one is scanning multiple replies to a point. I probably am the best fit on here of his definition of “biblicist”. I am not ashamed to confess that I am very skeptical of “cultural context” arguments which I have seen egals use to say that passages like 1 Peter 3 do not apply to marriages TODAY. I have probably gone head to head with Lin herself where she defends cultural context arguments and I defend that the instructions on wifely submission are transcultural and apply to me, today. (and, BTW are for my own good and protection by my loving Father in heaven, NOT to trap me in a cage of cruel treatment)
SUE said:but giving the male ALL authority or else you go to the hot place, is really an extra doozy that seems to be peculiar to my experience of compism.ENDQUOTE
This is from an article at CBMW:
Considerably more controversial, however, than the question of “what we shall be” in the new creation is the question of “what we shall do.” Given that gender identity will remain, is there evidence that functional distinctions will likewise remain in the new creation? Will resurrected saints as male and female have gender-specific roles? How will we relate to one another? Will male headship apply? Initial responses will likely depend on whether such questions are approached from a complementarian or egalitarian perspective. Complementarians, who view male headship and gender-specific roles as part of God’s original plan for creation (and for the present age as well) are more likely to answer these questions in the affirmative…
If they are going to a place like that, then I quite comfortable declaring that am not going to the same place, Sue.
I am going to a place where I- as a little child (Mark 10:14-15)- will sit on Jesus lap in his throne(Rev 3:21) in heavenly places far above any earthly “authority” (Eph 1:20-21).
Gem,
Me too. You won’t find me in any “male headship” heaven.
John,
You do so whenever you make unqualified generalizations about the motives of comps. This, I would think, is obvious.
Compism is by definition the promotion of gender roles, which restrict women from certain roles, that of being a pastor and that of bearing authority in the home. I have am not aware of any other kind of compism. I think the important word in the comment policy is “speculate.” I don’t believe that I am speculating.
You could discuss this with the moderator. If you feel that the “intentional restricting of roles for women” is an offensive description of compism then there needs to be a post on this topic to elucidate a common understanding of the term.
“. If you feel that the “intentional restricting of roles for women” is an offensive description of compism . . .”
You overlook the operative word of my objection: your going to motive.
BTW, I have gone over this with blog moderator. I don’t think Wayne and I disagree in principle. But the moderator prefers in many cases to let the guidelines speak for themselves rather than censure. I understand from him that in some cases, he would rather see the objection made from the floor, so to speak, and not from the chair. That is what I’m doing and will continue to do.
BTW, the blog moderator has more than once wisely asked me to reword a comment I have submitted. I for one am grateful for his intervention when I have spoken too rashly.
So let me clarify.
You make unqualified generalizations of this kind, and go to motive:
“complementarians seek to restrict women”
“the purpose of comp male authority. . . is about putting the woman under law”
These kinds of statement are no different than, in a conversation about abortion, a statement by a pro-lifer who says, “pro-choicers seek to kill babies,” or the statement of an anti-Christian who says, “God’s purpose in sending Jesus to the cross was to torture an innocent human being.”
Now maybe it’s true that pro-choicers seek to kill babies. Maybe it’s true that God’s purpose in sending Jesus to the cross was to torture an innocent human being.
Whether such statements are true or not, they have no place in a dialogue setting. They deliberately poison the atmosphere.
I am not a traditionalist nor a neo-traditionalist, but I have friends, extended family, and parishioners who are. They vest final authority in the husband in some sense but in the bright awareness of and obedience to more basic Christian teaching such as we find in Romans 12, 1 Cor 13, and Philippians 2.
When you claim that comps such as these – and so you claim, because you refuse to qualify your language – “seek to restrict women,” whose purpose is “put the woman under the law,” you dishonor them.
You misread their motives entirely.
Since they are my friends, my family, and my parishioners, I will not stand for it.
Well, what do you call a paper entitled,
Let’s stop making women presbyters.
I don’t remember seeing a banner saying “Let’s kill babies.” If I did, I would be justified in saying that those who are pro-abortion seek to kill babies.
But those who are pro-choice still recognize that death is bad thing but less bad than something else.
Complementarians, however, believe that it is a good thing for women to be restricted to feminine roles. They don’t mind saying that they are for restricting women to women’s roles. They are proud to say this because they think that women are best fulfilled by remaining within the feminine roles only. This is generally viewed in a positive light be complementarians.
“Complementarians, however, believe that it is a good thing for women to be restricted to feminine roles.”
So do egals. The question is, what are feminine roles? How do gifts, interests, and culture (the alchemy of nature and nurture) co-determine what feminine roles are? How are we to allow for and encourage routinization, and still make room for exceptions to the rule?
On these matters, comps and egals differ among themselves, not only with each other.
You ask:
“what do you call a paper entitled,
Let’s stop making women presbyters.”
I call it a paper interested in defending the point of view that women should not be presbyters.
Last time I checked, this remains the viewpoint of Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and the bulk of Protestant churches.
Indeed, I have SBC friends who do not self-identify as comps in marriage but self-identify as comps in the church precisely because they believe that women presbyters are unbiblical.
I am happy to serve in a denomination that works along different lines, and also contains healthy hierarchy on many levels.
But I would never suggest to my SBC, Catholic, and Orthodox friends that their purpose, by not ordaining women elders, is “to put women under the law” and “oppress” them. They would rightly take offense if I did.
But I would never suggest to my SBC, Catholic, and Orthodox friends that their purpose, by not ordaining women elders, is “to put women under the law” and “oppress” them. They would rightly take offense if I did.
Having spent some time with the word search function, I cannot find my comment where I used the word “oppress.” Perhaps if you are serious about getting a comment of mine removed from the forum you would actually copy that comment and then refer to it directly.
Otherwise, it is simply insinuation.
Perhaps I did use the word “oppress” but I honestly cannot find it.
Like your peristent accusations that I advocate some unhealthy feminist leanings, whatever, I now have the impression that this entire conversation is bluff on your part.
It is also worth pointing out that for the SBC and Dr. Packer, they were both in situations where women were being ordained and they were able to terminate this privilege for women. So, in fact, they did restrict women rather than just affirm a long time tradition. They did this intentionally. I watched it happen.
What I perceive is that if there were a movement to restrict women from pastoral roles in your church, you would not protest.
There has been a movement to restrict women from pastoral roles in my church, in the individual church at least, and it was successful. Now I protest. What would you do?
“What I perceive is that if there were a movement to restrict women from pastoral roles in your church, you would not protest.”
That’s not true. On what do you base your perception?
I protest the fact that in my church, the church that was my home for 15 years, women are no longer part of the clergy team and this is a matter of some celebration for the pastor and Dr. Packer. I protest that thanks to Ware women are taught that they imitate God only inasmuch as they imitate the submission of Christ and not the authority of Christ. I protest that women are told that their role is exclusively submission.
I protest that this church which used to benefit from women in the pulpit does not any longer. Women have been restricted. One of the main influences has been complementarian doctrine. This is what I protest.
You have expressed no solidarity with me on the fact that my church used to ordain women and does not now ordain women.
So I want to ask you. If your denomination decided to remove women from the pastorate would you protest? And how would you protest in such a way that you ensured that your protest would not appear to impugn any other denomination which does not ordain women?
“I protest the fact that in . . . the church that was my home for 15 years . . . women are told that their role is exclusively submission.”
Do the thousands who continue to attend your former church, women included, see things differently? Maybe not. Maybe women and men will soon leave in droves.
Or maybe a strong and vital core will endure in difficult times, and women will once again be hired as part of the clergy staff, say, 10 years down the road, as in former days. That would be my hope. Time will tell.
I know what would happen here if a congregation was told the role of women is exclusively submission. It would empty in fairly short order.
Presumably there are other vital evangelical churches in Vancouver where the likes of Fee and Stackhouse, not to mention other faculty members of Regent, attend. I imagine if I lived in Vancouver, I would be attending a church of that kind.
Suzanne, I am happy to express my solidarity for you as you find a new church home, evangelical or not.
It is a solemn truth: whatever you cannot do with conviction is sin. In that sense, the changes at your former church left you without a choice.
I know what would happen here if a congregation was told the role of women is exclusively submission. It would empty in fairly short order.
Unfortunately as Fee retires the major egalitarian voice in Regent is quiet.
I know three Regent profs who attend my former church and their wives attend church elsewhere. It is a sad state. Some women are leaving but not in any organized way. The congregation has been polarized by the fight against same sex blessing. There is a bastion complex and the subordination of women flies below the radar for some and is excruciatingly evident for others. It is a complex situation.
Here is one of my blog posts which I think is particularly sad. I really cannot just walk out and away and forget about an incident like this that happened last month in that church.
Why should a young woman be told that she would be great if she were a man. Oh, too bad young woman. It is not for you, the forbidden fruit. Woman shall be under male headship on earth and in heaven.
Drink the cup of womanhood, John.
“I now have the impression that this entire conversation is bluff on your part.”
In all honesty, I think you know better. I really don’t feel like sorting through all the comments on various threads to discover all over again where you spoke of compism as “oppressive.”
But if you are now suggesting that it is *not* per se oppressive, so much the better.
Compism per se is not oppressive, abusive, or otherwise a net negative though it risks becoming so if it is not suffused with the spirit of 1 cor 13. I realize I am simplifying here. It is also important to emphasize things like the giving and receiving of respect, esteem, and honor. The list is long.
On all these scores, however, the same holds for egalism. It too is an empty suit if it is not filled with things like love and respect.
“Compism per se is not oppressive, abusive, or otherwise a net negative though it risks becoming so if it is not suffused with the spirit of 1 cor 13. I realize I am simplifying here. It is also important to emphasize things like the giving and receiving of respect, esteem, and honor. The list is long. “
What if a comp wife is convicted after years of study that she is being called to ministry (using her spiritual gifts in a way that is not allowed under comp teaching) and that scripture really does allow that but her husband disagrees?
Thanks, Don, for your calm remarks.
But it is also true that every framework has risks that are connatural to it. It is important for egals to name the risks to which their framework is subject. This is the kind of thing people, unless they are highly ideological, are capable of doing.
Thus, if one is a Republican / Democrat, it is still usually possible, after some soul-searching, to admit that one’s party has serious weaknesses and not only relative strengths.
As an egal, I have pledged myself to do this, and I look to fellow Christians, comps and egals, for help.
I found the quote where Suzanne claims that those who do not support the full equality of women as understood by modern feminism (see the quote’s context) – for example, as she elsewhere makes clear, those who do not feel it is appropriate to allow women to be elders, those who feel that husband and wife are equal in value but not equal in function, with husbands expected to provide leadership in ways that are not expected of wives – have hijacked Christianity. According to Suzanne, they “want” to obey Romans 12 “by oppressing women.”
The quote:
“Christianity has been hijacked by those who want to be counter cultural by oppressing women.”
Never mind that Christianity has adjusted and continues to adjust to a variety of non-egal understandings of marriage and ministry throughout the world. Never mind that Christianity has taught for millennia and continues to teach respect for a variety of culturally specific non-egal understandings of marriage and ministry throughout the world.
Never mind that already Paul and Peter, in their patriarchal setting, made both submission and love Christian virtues in gender specific fashion, with specific goals in mind. Never mind.
We are being asked to believe that Christianity has recently been hijacked by people who want to go against the stream “by oppressing women.”
Since roughly half of these hijackers are women, we have women who “hijacked Christianity” and who want to be faithful to Rom 12 by “oppressing women.” I consider this a demeaning statement to make of comp women, some of whom are personal friends, members of my extended family, or people under my pastoral care.
You would think it would be clear that people who live even within patriarchal structures, as was the case universally in antiquity, can be faithful to all of Rom 12 only by not “oppressing women.”
It seems to me that Suzanne makes Paul into someone who was profoundly self-contradictory. As far as I can see, on her understanding, the same person could not possibly have written both Rom 12 and Ephesians 5.
Lin,
You cite the following hypothetical:
“What if a comp wife is convicted after years of study that she is being called to ministry (using her spiritual gifts in a way that is not allowed under comp teaching) and that scripture really does allow that but her husband disagrees?”
A difficult situation, and one that sometimes occurs. I have seen it play out both ways in Catholic contexts, with husbands sometimes learning to accept their wives’ sense of calling, and sometimes rejecting it, with all that then ensues. Ideology, BTW, is over-rated as a factor. We are talking about a delicate dance at best and a miserable war at worst.
It also occurs – often! – that an egal husband or wife is called into ministry and the egal spouse forbids it, because being in ministry, practically speaking, creates a very uneven and unequal playing field. It’s not egal, you know, to be married to a pastor on call 24/7, who pours his or her soul to people on a regular basis, and is not much more than dirty rag by the time he or she rolls back home at 9, 10, or 11 at night.
Egalism is of no help and indeed makes matters worse in some instances of this kind.
However, if the marriage is built on shared goals, these difficulties can be weathered, and the gross inequalities full-time Christian ministry (or being a surgeon, a politician, etc.) creates absorbed.
“Christianity has been hijacked by those who want to be counter cultural by oppressing women.”
I congratulate you for finding the quote. I could not locate it. I still cannot locate it. If you could tell me what post it is on, then perhaps I could comment on it.
By now, I have totally forgotten what the context was and who “those” are.
Perhaps I was referring to those who imagine that women shall be in submission to male headship for eternity.
Perhaps you would ask a woman in your real life what she thinks of this. Is it oppressive or not?
Given, then, that relationships between those married on earth will in some sense remain in the new creation, it remains for us to inquire regarding the nature of those relationships. To put it more directly, will husbandly headship and wifely submission still obtain in the new creation? The egalitarian response, of course, is that all traces of headship and submission will have been removed. The evidence, however, argues to the contrary.
First, consider the argument concerning man and woman as originally created. There is virtually universal agreement that man and woman are ontologically equal, equal in essence and worth, because both were created in the image of God. In the ordering of his creation, however, God formed the man first and gave him responsibility and authority as the head of the human race.41 This headship, far from being a result of the fall-feminist and egalitarian claims notwithstanding-is a central feature of the divine created order.42 Because the new creation is, fundamentally, a return to the divine order that prevailed before the fall, it follows that male headship will remain in the new creation.
I feel oppressed by the thought of being under male headship in heaven. I am not ashamed to say so. If men want to make male headship heavenly they have a long way to go.
If you find the context of the quote, if you cite the post on which you found it, we can discuss it further. It would help if you quoted it the first time you mention it so we won’t waste so much time.
I will not promise not to use certain terms. I will not go to heaven in order to serve male headship.
There is nothing you can ever say to make male headship in heaven palatable. Believe me.
Suzanne,
When you quote people, it would be helpful if you tell us who are you quoting. When you address a “you,” it would be helpful to know who who the “you” is you are addressing.
My quotation was taken from a comment of yours in the “Equity in Decision-Making Thread.”
When you quote people, it would be helpful if you tell us who are you quoting.
There should be the same standard for everybody. Perhaps that could be agreed on at some point in time.
Relationships and roles in the New Creation by Mark David Walton.
When you address a “you,” it would be helpful to know who who the “you” is you are addressing.
There is nothing you [or any human being] can ever say to make male headship in heaven palatable. Believe me.
My quotation was taken from a comment of yours in the “Equity in Decision-Making Thread.”
Here is the dialogue,
John wrote,
The other question is how to deal with oppressive cultures or more precisely, cultures with deeply oppressive norms with respect to caste, gender, race, age, etc.
The approach of the Christian movement, I think, has the best track record, despite its manifold faults and missteps.
Sue wrote,
I agree with your assessment of history. Christianity, in pressing for equality and freedom in matters of gender, race and class has been counter cultural.
But now that the secular culture promotes equality for women, Christianity has been hijacked by those who want to be counter cultural by oppressing women. One cannot say that Christendom is a constant.
Christianity has been better than other cultures. But not uniquely so. Now some Christians are trying to restrict the roles of women from what they were. I used the vocabulary of your comment. I have to ask if you used the word “oppress” on purpose to get me to use it, and then use my comment against me. Perhaps you are disappointed that I won’t write a dissertation on how my views differ from de Beauvoir.
Sue says:
“Perhaps you are disappointed that I won’t write a dissertation on how my views differ from de Beauvoir.”
No, I’m not, actually. But I was hoping for a few paragraphs.
The atmosphere is not conducive.
“Now some Christians are trying to restrict the roles of women from what they were.”
The give-and-take on this issue is already found in the New Testament. Passages like 1 Corinthians 14:33-36 and 1 Tim 2:11-12 also restrict the roles of women out of respect for prevailing culture and a prevailing understanding of Torah, or in response, it would seem, to particular excesses and particular female heretical teachers.
In effect, you are claiming that Christianity was hijacked long ago, by Paul himself.
Not at all. If, as you claim, Paul conceded “out of respect for prevailing culture,” then why do comps now restrict women. The major example is from churches where women used to hold clergy positions and new policies were introduced to prohibit this. What is the reason for this? Not the same as Paul’s.
Comps now are trying to ensure that women are more restricted in the home and church than they used to be. For Paul, one could possibly argue the opposite.
Suzanne,
I think you identify a salient difference. Paul restricted women based on respect for prevailing Jewish and Hellenistic mores. Most churches – the Catholics, the Orthodox, and many evangelicals – restrict women based on respect for tradition and/or a traditional reading of scripture. It is no use pretending that Scripture does not support the traditional understanding. With a few exceptions that do not change the general picture, Scripture does.
Restriction based on tradition is often, but not always, combined with a critique of prevailing cultural patterns. The critique is sometimes very intelligent (see some of the Pope’s encyclicals) and sometimes rather dumb (I refrain, out of charity, from giving examples).
But notice that Paul in 1 Cor 14 frames his respect in terms of respect for tradition (the Law). So the distinction breaks down at a certain point.
Egalitarians like me make the following argument. All cultural development contains elements the people of God can receive from God’s hand with thankfulness. All cultural development also contains healthy doses of poison.
Spiritual judgment about which is which requires an eschatologically oriented reading of Scripture, a dynamic understanding of tradition, and judicious use of reason and experience under the guiding rule of Scripture.
“The atmosphere is not conducive.”
A fortiori, the atmosphere is not conducive to comps engaging in self-critique. It is worth pondering why.
You write,
Egalitarians like me make the following argument. All cultural development contains elements the people of God can receive from God’s hand with thankfulness. All cultural development also contains healthy doses of poison.
I agree. I have never said that culture does not have poison in it. I have asked for examples of harmful egal teaching in the church. You provide none.
Spiritual judgment about which is which requires an eschatologically oriented reading of Scripture, a dynamic understanding of tradition, and judicious use of reason and experience under the guiding rule of Scripture.
I agree.
The main point is that comps in churches where women used to be ordained have succeeded in making that history. They have downgraded women deliberately. The older woman missionary who used to stand in the pulpit is now graciously preserved from this sin. The bride who used to think of herself as having a domain over which she would be in charge, no longer has this misapprehension.
This is not about a judicious critique of culture or judicious use of reason. This is about ensuring that women devote their life to helping men meet the goals of the male, and supporting male leadership. This is about convincing women to be “followers.”
“I have asked for examples of harmful egal teaching in the church. You provide none.”
Yes, I have. Over and over again. For ecample, I often take something you say and teach, and point out how in my view it is in error and leads to error and is hurtful to all balanced comps, a category you fail to acknowledge.
You hurt them by denigrating all complementarians without distinction.
Or I take something another commenting egal says and teaches, and point to some way in which, in my opinion, it distorts the biblical witness in its own way. Whenever the biblical witness, the results will be harmful. This is a fundamental premise of evangelical theology which you may or may not agree with. I consider it very important.
Examples of harmful gaps I have given relate to the importance of exercise of authority *on behalf of* and the need for positive hierarchy and delegation in marriage. Once again, these very threads exemplify how difficult it is for some egals to integrate these emphases into their approach.
Marriages which lack a positive exercise of authority on the part of both husband and wife are hurtful to the parts. In a family unit with children, the results of a lack of positive authority are often devastating.
Ihe lack of these emphases amounts to sins of omission.
I have pointed out how there is both individualism in a positive sense and a negative sense, and that egalism in the current cultural context is exposed to negative individualism.
The list goes on. That is just for starters.
JOHN said:Marriages which lack a positive exercise of authority on the part of both husband and wife are hurtful to the parts. In a family unit with children, the results of a lack of positive authority are often devastating.
I agree completely. We all HAVE authority. The question is what we do with it? In my hard comp days I was blind and in denial of my authority which was NOT a LIFE giving lifestyle for those who could have benefited from my proper exercise of authority or for myself. (precisely that devastating LACK of positive authority which you cite)
[...] September 28, 2008 by Charis John Hobbins of Ancient Hebrew Poetry posted this excellent Bible teaching in a comment on Compegalitarian: [...]