What Does God Say About All This?

I have made a number of posts which I thought would create some controversy in the past, but nothing like this one probably will.

OLD TESTAMENT 

One of the issues that often stop people from living lives that fulfill them by paying proper heartfelt homage to women and following their hearts, is that we are told that God is all for a complete and absolute Patriarchy. God created man to have dominion over the world and woman was created as a 'companion' for man and as a 'helper'. The role of woman as a mere 'helper' to man in Genesis 2:18 is usually taken to mean that she is some kind of domestic servant and certainly an inferior to him in some important capacity.

Later we are told that women need to obey their husbands and men need to rule their homes.

That IS what we are regularly told. But is it what the Bible actually teaches?

In Genesis 2:18 we read: <<The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”>> or "I shall make a helper fit for him..." or "I will make him a helpmate..." or "I will make an aid fit for him..."

So were women intended to be 'assistants' or 'servants' for man from the beginning?

In Hebrew the words we have been translating into "A fit helper" or "Help mate" are "ezer kenegdo".  Dr. R. David Freedman informs us that the word 'ezer' has two roots. It can mean "to rescue, to save," or "to be strong."

So if we re-examine this phrase we see: "Woman, a Power Equal to a Man," or "Woman, one who will rescue man". Of the forty five times the word ezer is used forty two of them refer to help coming from one who is stronger than the one being helped. That 'help' is coming from a stronger more secure position and there is no need for reciprocal help being given back.

Often it is used in terms that God is the 'Helper' of Israel. Such as Deuteronomy 33:26 "There is none like the God of Jeshurun, The Rider of the Heavens in your strength and on the clouds in his majesty."

There is no reference where 'ezer' is used as a term to denote an inferior or powerless state.

It has been suggested that Genesis 2:18 might better be interpreted as : "I will make a power [or strength] corresponding [and equal] to man"

Now when we throw the second half of the phrase  'kenegdo' into the description we find that it means "...as in front of him...".

Here I quote the Phronethinking article I link to in the references section:

<<The substantive, negdo, means 'that which is conspicuous, in full view of, in front of', the related noun, nagid, means a 'ruler' or 'prince', and the verb, nagad, means to 'declare, tell, expound, reveal, announce' (interesting in the light of the denial of women teachers by some) or 'go ahead'. This last one suggests 'achievement, pioneering, risk and deliberate thrust into the unknown'.

Thus anyone attempting to use v.18 to put women down or dismiss their ministry is in danger of having the Hebrew words thrown back at them as rather suggesting woman's superiority, ability to declare, teach, expound and reveal, and to be a pioneering leader out in front! >>

Deborah and the Day of Deliverance

So, at the VERY LEAST we now have a picture of woman, not as subservient 'helper' to man, but AT LEAST his complete equal. 


Now I shall quote the 'godswordtowomen' link:

<<What God had intended, then, was to make a "power" or "strength" for the man who would in every way "correspond to him" or even "be his equal."

The Torah Study for Reform Jews says, "From the time of creation, relationships between spouses have at times been adversarial. In Genesis 2:18, God calls woman an ezer kenegdo, a "helper against him." The great commentator Rashi takes the term literally to make a wonderful point: "If he [Adam] is worthy, [she will be] a help [ezer]. If he is not worthy [she will be] against him [kenegdo] for strife.">>

So to me, Woman - God's final (and best) creation is here to 'be equal' but out in front. She will 'help us' by leading us especially in spiritual matters but ONLY IF we are worthy of her help!



NEW TESTAMENT

The other passage which is usually used to define woman's inferior position to man is Ephesians  5: 21-24 <<Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. ²³ For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. ²⁴ Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.>>

Now that sounds pretty straight forward and I would guess that over 90% of people who hear it or read it take it at face value. But let's dig a little bit deeper.

 As we continue on just a little further we find in Ephesians 6: 1-3:
<<Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. ² “Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise— ³ “so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”>>

I don't think there should be much debate about this. In GENERAL, children should obey their parents. Of course they should not obey them if they are evil or abusive, but in general 'godly parents' should be obeyed and honored by their offspring. 

Now when we get to Ephesians 6: 5-9 we see this:

<<⁵ Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. ⁶ Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. ⁷ Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, ⁸ because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free.
⁹ And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.>>

Whoa! Is the New Testament instructing us that slavery is just fine and is 'just the way life is' so we should simply do our best to live as proper as slaves or as slave masters?

Does the Bible Condone Slavery?

(Well as long as the 'Master' is really a 'Mistress' it sounds pretty good to me! OK, I digress and am a bad boy who should be punished for this.)

First thing I would like to say about all of this together is "These are NOT the direct words of Jesus or Yahweh. These are the words of a letter written to the church at Ephesus and attributed to the apostle Paul. So this is a letter written to a specific group of people in a specific place at a specific time.

This does not mean that we can not learn eternal wisdom from it. It means that context is important.

Recently I sat through a month long series of sermons on Ephesians 5 and 6. I really wanted to hear what was going to be said about it. The passages about wives and husbands was it's own separate sermon as was the sermon on slaves and slave owners and they were separated by more than a week.

In the sermon about husbands and wives, we were told that this was God's eternal truth and the proper relationship between men and women now and forever. Basically 'read this passage literally and obey it as the absolute Word of God now and forever.'

I sat there beside my Queen and we both listened quietly simply absorbing what was being said. Now I know a lot of good Christian homes and I am specifically talking about the women here who will spout this 'eternal truth' back to you day and night. "Oh my husband is the Godly head of this Household!" and then she will tell him where they are going on vacation (Only she doesn't tell him - she suggests and he knows better than to contradict her suggestions), when he will paint the living room or clean out the garage. She is of course only 'reminding him' of his duty as the Godly Head of the Household. She is usually also mad that he is not 'taking the lead' in doing these things which are almost always her ideas anyway.

This behavior reminds me of the line from the movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding", when momma explains to her daughter just before she gets married exactly what: "The man is the head of the household" means. "Yes, the man is the head of the house, but the woman is the NECK. She points the head wherever she thinks it should go!" I loved it!

The man is the head of the household. But the woman is the neck!

Sometimes I think they CALL us the "Head of the Household" just to avoid having to take all the responsibility for everything when things go wrong AND to have the opportunity to humiliate us with it over and over and over again. Oh they DO love to 'put us in our places'!

My wife/Empress was just such a woman. "Oh Honey YOU are the head of this household!" She would tell me and tell me that I had authority to tell her to do this or do that, and I KNEW that it would be a lot better for me if I was not fool enough to contradict her. Basically my 'Lordship' worked best when I used my august power to 'be supportive of her decisions'. I just hated being told how much control and power I had when I think we both knew it was bull no matter how hard we tried to force fit it to the 'Biblical Standard' for our lives.

Should Wives simply OBEY their Husbands?

Later we sat through the sermon on slavery. The fact that this was a member church in the Southern Baptist Convention meant that there was a certain amount of baggage that went with that passage. During the years leading up to the Civil War, the Southern Baptist Convention used those very words to bolster the claims of the Confederacy that slavery was a Biblical norm and that to oppose it on moral grounds was to oppose the Word of God.

Part of the sermon involved reading the words of pastors in the 1850s and 1860s who preached that very idea. But it was also a renunciation of those words and an apology to those who had suffered directly under slavery and all of their descendants down through the ages to come. I can respect that. And I know that the Southern Baptists have been very forward in renouncing the false doctrine of God ordained slavery in America for decades now.

The pastor discussed how slavery in Biblical times was different than 19th century slavery as it was usually done for a period of time and then the debt owed was considered paid and the 'slave' was freed. Yes, being a slave under Jewish rule 2000 years ago was quite different than being a slave in the 1800s in America.

But, we return to our story now. 

Because of the repudiation of Biblically ordained slavery the passages in Ephesians 6 were explained away as being focused only upon the time and place the letter was written to. It was explained that early Christians did not want to appear as revolutionaries and did not want to upset the current societal norms. They did not preach an earthly paradise but one in the next life. So slaves just needed to 'be cool' and wait for their eternal reward. 

It is obvious to anyone who studies (at least this is the BASIS of the Protestant church) the New Testament that when Christ dies on the cross, the entire temple system is overthrown! No longer would anyone need to go to a priest and have the priest pray for them and act as their intercessor. 

Christ Himself becomes the personal intercessor for each and every one of us! The human being prays directly to God and his (or her) sins and absolved. 

THIS is what is revolutionary! Every man, woman, and child from every tribe and people group, every age and both sexes on Earth now has DIRECT connection to God. This means that every person has a sacred individual value before God! Slaves are the children of God just like Kings and Queens are. Hottentots, Mongols, and Canadians all have the same access AND the same responsibility before their Creator.

So the letter to the Ephesians was written to Ephesians in the first century AD when slavery was common in society.

Now the punchline.

Certain Expectations Have Been Upside Down For A Long Time!

So was Patriarchal privilege common in the society of Emphasis at this time? OF COURSE IT WAS. It has been the way the world worked since the dawn of time, especially in the Middle East. 

Would it have been seen as Revolutionary if Christian wives started to act as equals or even as the bosses of their husbands? Of course it would have! Would this have made the society around the early Christians a little more nervous and been more off putting? Uh I think the answer is YES!

So to avoid upsetting general society slaves were told to be quiet and obedient. While wives were told to be quiet and obedient at the same time a few lines earlier and yet that order was to be seen as eternal and absolute in every situation. 

For further cross reference on all this think on the story in Acts Chapter 5. The first people Jesus instructs to do something after His death and resurrection are the man Ananias and his wife Sapphira. Together they are instructed to sell a piece of land and donate the money to the church.

The point I am making here is that the two of them are dealt with directly and by name. They both have certain privileges and responsibilities. God does not say "Ananias I want you to sell that land that you own. Make your wife understand." He addresses them both by name and when they fail to obey He extracts the same price for disobedience from each.

Her Majesty my Queen sat with me through the entire series and had little to say. I told her what I have written here and she listened and smiled. I don't think any of this was ever a problem for her she just accepted it as a divine mystery. But I will say this, she has never come back to me since and said: "Look you are the head of this household! You need to lead this or that!" as she used to regularly before then.

I know that others of you have struggled with this before. "How can I submit to my wife's authority over me when God tells me that I must rule over her!?" Well what I am telling you is that as far as MY UNDERSTANDING is concerned and I say you should go and investigate it for yourself, this is not really the case.

God did not make man thinking that He was done, and then decided after the fact that man needed a support system. God created woman to be at least, man's equal. AT LEAST!

This is editorial now:
To me and my understanding, God created woman LAST. He created everything in order of complexity and value in ascending order from the deeps, to the land, to the plants, to the beasts, to man. THEN He created woman, His final and greatest creation.

God's Final and Finest Creation - Woman!

God LOVES women! In fact there had been resurrections from the dead in the old testament, but Jesus is the only one who ever brought a female back from the dead. He brought back the daughter of the Roman soldier who asked Him to and believed on Him.

The church itself is called "The Bride of Christ". It is not the "Husband of Christ." It is not the "Partner of Christ". It is the Bride.

DEEPLY personal editorial now:
I have always had trouble envisioning God as purely masculine. I mean does it not make sense at some level that the Creator of the entire universe would not have AT LEAST the nurturing nature of a woman? He gave birth to all things and watches over them and encourages them as they grow? My emotional makeup just says that certainly sounds like the divine female to me.

These thoughts have been burning inside of me for some time and I HOPE that they will be of value to some of you. If you are a believer, know that it is fine to respect and even revere women. If you are not a believer well - let's just let this entry slide by. If I get any off track comments about religion beyond what this entry talks about I will simply delete them.

So go now, go and be attractive to, go and love, and go and serve the women in your lives!

You Have Had Enough Computer Time!
Go and Please Her Ladyship Now!

References:

http://phroneothinking.blogspot.com/2009/08/genesis-218-ezer-kenegdo.html

http://www.godswordtowomen.org/ezerkenegdo.htm