How it should be

It is time to lift the mood here a little so I am going to post the list of "one anothers" in the scripture that we are admonished to fulfill.

discuss with one another
say to one another
ask one another
love one another
devoted to one another
honor one another
live in harmony with one another
accept one another
instruct one another
greet one another
agree with one another
encourage one another
serve one another
bear with one another
be kind and compassionate with one another
speak to another with psalms, etc.
submit to one another
forgive one another
admonish one another
spur one another on to love
do not slander one another
don't grumble against one another
offer hospitality to one another
clothe yourselves with humility toward one another
have fellowship with one another
lay down your lives for one another

This would be worth reading at a wedding. It makes great reading anytime.

Divorce and Remarriage

Here is a good article on Divorce and Remarriage by David Instone-Brewer

Putting all this together gives us a clear and consistent set of rules for divorce and remarriage. Divorce is only allowed for a limited number of grounds that are found in the Old Testament and affirmed in the New Testament:
• Adultery (in Deuteronomy 24:1, affirmed by Jesus in Matthew 19)
• Emotional and physical neglect (in Exodus 21:10-11, affirmed by Paul in 1 Corinthians 7)
• Abandonment and abuse (included in neglect, as affirmed in 1 Corinthians 7)

Jewish couples listed these biblical grounds for divorce in their marriage vows. We reiterate them as love, honor, and keep and be faithful to each other. When these vows were broken, it threatened to break up the marriage. As in any broken contract, the wronged party had the right to say, "I forgive you; let's carry on," or, "I can't go on, because this marriage is broken."

Therefore, while divorce should never happen, God allows it (and subsequent remarriage) when your partner breaks the marriage vows.

I always thought of divorce as defeat or giving up until someone once wrote to me,

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.

I suppose that not everyone who divorces has a very good reason, but some people do have good reason, and it is no virtue to hang on in the face of abuse, abandonment or infidelity. It was important for me to realize that Jews understood divorce differently from some Christians. But the scriptures are clear that there is a time to let a partner go. 1 Cor. 7.

Aggressive Domination

I have been arguing that both complementarians and egalitarians would be happy to see authentein translated as "dominate." Egalitarians see this as a negative value and complementarians see it is a positive masculine value, but a negative feminine value. Then the discussion could move from the discourse of marriage to a discussion of whether Christ actually teaches domination.

The CBMW Gender blog endorsed Manly Dominion by Mark Chanski two years ago.

"Man is to aggressively dominate his environment, instead of allowing his environment to dominate him," Chanski writes. "I am not to be a passive-purple four-ball! I am rather to be a stick-carrying player! In the spheres of my life, I must subdue and rule, and not permit myself to be subdued and ruled.

"We have been commissioned by God to go out and aggressively assert ourselves as masters over every realm of our lives. I have not been assigned to stare out my bedroom, living room, or office widow, passively daydreaming about what I might do, if only there weren’t so many obstacles. Rather I am to get out there, so help me God, and plan it, clear it, and do it, with all my might, to the glory of God."

------------


"In the Lord Jesus Christ, the Christian finds his ultimate model for subduing and ruling over the opposing circumstances of our sin cursed world," he writes.

"In Him, we find a hand to put over our mouths when we begin to spout rationalizations and blame-shiftings. In Him we find a holy rebuke to our every excuse for not doing our biblical duty in every difficult situation. In Him, we find a sacred reprimand to our cowardly claims of ‘I’m a victim, so I can’t.’"

In his review Robinson writes,

Manly Dominion provides biblical insight the Christian man and his calling to action within vocational labor, husbanding, church leadership, child rearing, spiritual living, decision-making, and romance.

It is clear that Chanski believes that God gives the dominion of the world to men only, and men only imitate Christ. There seems to be a misunderstanding of Gen 1 here. It says,

26Then God said,^(O) "Let us make man^[h] in our image,^(P) after our likeness. And^(Q) let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."

27So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
^(R) male and female he created them.

28And God blessed them. And God said to them,^(S) "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth." 29And God said, "Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit.^(T) You shall have them for food. 30And^(U) to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so. 31^(V) And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

It is clear that "dominion" was given to the man and woman over nature. I think many of us struggle to understand what is meant here by "dominion" but it is clearly something given to man and woman together. I have no idea what kind of Biblical explanation could underly Chanski's thesis.

Jesus himself talks about domination in Luke 22:25,

25And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors.

26But ye shall not be so: but he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger; and he that is chief, as he that doth serve.

27For whether is greater, he that sitteth at meat, or he that serveth? is not he that sitteth at meat? but I am among you as he that serveth.

"As one who serves", as a servant. This is a reversal of domination. Shall we serve creation? That is one possible interpretation.

Open Letter to Pastors

Open Letter to Pastors by Jeannie Babb Taylor

Christian leaders set the stage for domestic violence by perpetuating pop-culture stereotypes of femininity and masculinity. T. D. Jakes claims in his book Woman, Thou Art Loosed that all women were created to fulfill the vision of some man. Jakes bases his gender theology solely on the physical characteristics of male and female genitalia, insisting that all women are "receivers" and all men are "givers." This false dichotomy breaks down quickly when one considers that female sexuality includes giving birth and giving milk. More importantly, Jakes deviates from Scripture in claiming that women and men must operate like their genitalia in every facet of life.

More by Evan Stark

Violent Crime: Assessing Race and Ethnic Differences By Darnell Felix Hawkins
Chapter 9 Race, Gender and Woman Battering by Evan Stark

Coercive Control : 5

Despite these inroads, coercive control remains marginal to mainstream thinking. It is rarely acknowledged in policy circles, has had almost no impact on domestic violence policing or criminal law, and commands no special funding. Although providers and advocates may ask about elements of coercive control, I know of no programs or interventions that address it. Everyone acknowledges that domestic violence is about power and control. But we have yet to incorporate this truism into our understanding of abuse or our response.

The major source for the model of coercive control are the victims and perpetrators of abuse with whom I and others have worked. The women in my practice have repeatedly made clear that the most serious harms they have suffered involve how their partners have kept them from fulfilling their life projects by appropriating their resources; undermining their social support; subverting their rights to privacy, self-respect, and autonomy; and depriving them of substantive equality. This is the evidence on which I base my claim that coercive control is a liberty crime. Preventing a substantial group of women from freely applying their agency in economic and political life obstructs overall social development .

The new model is rooted in the same tenets that gave birth to the battered women’s movement—that the abuse of women in personal life is inextricably bound up with their standing in the larger society and therefore that women’s entrapment in their personal lives can be significantly reduced only if sexual discrimination is addressed simultaneously. In the early shelters, the interrelatedness of these tenets was grounded in the practice of empowerment, whereby the suffering of individual victims was mollified by mobilizing their collective power to help one another and change the institutional structures that caused and perpetuated women’s second-class status, an example of women doing for themselves. Our challenge is to resurrect this collective practice and broaden its political focus to the sources of coercive control.

Coercive Control by Evan Stark [Word Document] HTML

This paper helps to differentiate between physical violence and coercive control. A relationship can be violent due to alcohol and substance abuse and other reasons without coercive control. A relationship can be coercive without violence. In some relationships, coercion is accompanied by violence.

Coercive control is typically control by the male partner over the female. Very few men are in a situation where they can only leave the house with the permission of their wives. However, patriarchy puts women in this situation all the time. The wife is there to meet the husbands needs and must submit to his choices for her.

For example, if she wants to join an exercise program, it must not interfere with his preferred meal time, it must not be in a facility where men attend, it must not be too expensive, it must not promote dance and rock music, and so on. Each activity is controlled by the husband's sense of what is right, although he does not have to actually set up the activity himself. He simply dictates what is appropriate and if nothing meets his requirements the activity is suspended.

I have a hard time understanding how patriarchy does not contribute to this kind of mess. Patriarchy is not necessarily going to correlate with greater violence, but we do know it does not correlate with less violence. However, it correlates with denial of decision-making power for the woman.

Stark writes,

What is taken from the women whose stories I hear almost daily—and what some victims use violence to restore—is the capacity for independent decision making in the areas by which we distinguish adults from children and free citizens from indentured servants. Coercive control entails a malevolent course of conduct that subordinates women to an alien will by violating their physical integrity (domestic violence), denying them respect and autonomy (intimidation), depriving them of social connectedness (isolation), and appropriating or denying them access to the resources required for personhood and citizenship (control). Nothing men experience in the normal course of their everyday lives resembles this conspicuous form of subjugation.

I don't know if it is possible to ever get someone who has not experienced this to imagine it. Do some think that women have a completely different constitution and will find fulfillment in subordination? Teaching the subordination of women ensures that some women will suffer this total deprivation of human dignity. It will ensure this. When a preacher preaches subordination some will be subordinated.

I would like to see a law which makes it illegal to put "obey" in the marriage ceremony, and a law which forbids teaching the "subordination of women" in the pulpit. The suffering is vastly greater than having someone steal a concrete physical belonging from you. Having someone rob you of your dignity is a crime more heinous than having your wallet stolen, your home ravaged and your body bruised.

The subordination of women should be criminalized.

Coercive Control :4

What is taken from the women whose stories I hear almost daily—and what some victims use violence to restore—is the capacity for independent decision making in the areas by which we distinguish adults from children and free citizens from indentured servants. Coercive control entails a malevolent course of conduct that subordinates women to an alien will by violating their physical integrity (domestic violence), denying them respect and autonomy (intimidation), depriving them of social connectedness (isolation), and appropriating or denying them access to the resources required for personhood and citizenship (control). Nothing men experience in the normal course of their everyday lives resembles this conspicuous form of subjugation.

Some of the rights batterers deny to women are already protected in the public sphere, such as the rights to physical integrity and property. In these instances, law is challenged to extend protections to personal life. But most of the harms involved in coercive control are gender-specific infringements of adult autonomy that have no counterpart in public life and are currently invisible to the law. The combination of these big and little indignities best explains why women suffer and respond as they do in abusive relationships, including why so many women become entrapped, why some battered women kill their partners, why they themselves may be killed, or why they are prone to develop a range of psychosocial problems and exhibit behaviors or commit a range of acts that are contrary to their nature or to basic common sense or decency.

Coercive Control by Evan Stark [Word Document] HTML

Any Christian community which does not teach personal autonomy of wives is enabling coercive control, the infringement of basic human rights and the subordination of women. It is extremely difficult and humiliating for anyone to describe what it is like to be a victim of coercive control. However, it is evident in the readings of women on the internet that they are experiencing it. One women speaks of how difficult it is for her to kill her attitude of entitlement to make her own decisions about such things as cleaning the house and running errands.

What is amazing is that her story is posted for everyone to read as if it were a noble thing instead of an infringement of basic human dignity. Could a man imagine submitting every action of his day within his own home to someone else for approval?

Coercive Control: 3

My goal in posting from Evan Stark's work is to show that any Christian community which encourages authority of male over female is directly feeding incidents of coercive control. Some may think that domination is a neutral and amoral action. However, Stark shows how domination deprives women of basic human rights through being controlled.

It is not enough to combat the physical violence that is a concrete indication of control in some cases. It is the control itself that so deeply marks, deprives, and dehumanizes.

I will post from this paper [HTML] by Evan Stark for a few days.

Coercive control is a model of abuse that attempts to encompass the range of strategies employed to dominate individual women in personal life. Alternately referred to as coerced persuasion; conjugal, patriarchal or intimate terrorism; emotional or psychological abuse; indirect abuse; or emotional torture, it describes an ongoing pattern of sexual mastery by which abusive partners, almost exclusively males, interweave repeated physical abuse with three equally important tactics: intimidation, isolation, and control.

The easiest way to understand coercive control is to contrast it to the widespread equation of partner abuse with “domestic violence.” Domestic violence laws and most research in the field take an incident-specific focus and weigh the severity of abuse by the level of force used or injury inflicted what I call a “calculus of harms.” In marked contrast, the coercive control model relies on evidence that most battered women who seek help experience coercion as “ongoing” rather than as merely “repeated” and that the main marker of these assaults is their frequency or even their “routine” nature rather than their severity, a fact that gives abuse a “cumulative” effect found in no other assault crime. Physical harm and psychological trauma remain important in the coercive control model. But its theory of harms replaces the violation of physical integrity with an emphasis on violations of “liberty” that entail the deprivation of rights and resources essential to personhood and citizenship. In this view, the psychological language of victimization and dependence is replaced by the political language of domination, resistance, and subordination. . In the coercive control model, what men do to women is less important than what they prevent women from doing for themselves. In the forensic context where I work, women’s right to use whatever means are available to liberate themselves from coercive control derives from the right afforded to all persons to free themselves from tyranny not from the proximate physical or psychological means used to do this

The domestic violence model emphasizes the familial, cultural, interpersonal and psychological roots of abusive behavior. The coercive control model views the dynamics in abusive relationships from the vantage of the historical struggle for women’s liberation and men’s efforts to preserve their traditional privileges in personal life in the face of this struggle. The incredible strides women have made towards full equality, particularly since the l960’s, have been widely documented. These gains make it increasingly difficult for men to ensure women’s obedience and dependence through violence alone. In the face of this reality, millions of men have expanded their oppressive repertoire to include a range of constraints on women’s autonomy formerly imposed by law, religion, and women’s exclusion from the economic, cultural and political mainstream, in essence trying to construct a “patriarchy in miniature” in each individual relationship, the course of malevolent conduct known as coercive control. Although the aim of this conspicuous form of subjugation is to quash, offset or coopt women’s social gains (taking the money they earn, for instance), this strategy relies for success on the persistent inequalities based on sex that remain, including the huge gap in job opportunities and earnings that continues to advantage men.

Coercive Control by Evan Stark

Coercive Control cont.

Hugo Schwyzer quotes from Coercive Control,

Because women have such ready access to rights and resources in liberal democratic societies, it is widely assumed that if abusive relationships endure, it is because women choose to stay, a decision that seems counterintuitive for a reasonable person. The logical explanation is that women who make this choice are deficient psychologically or in some other respect. Yet researchers have failed to discover any psychological or background traits that predispose any substantial group of women to enter or remain in abusive relationships. Battered women do suffer disproportionately from a range of psychological and behavioral problems, including some, like substance abuse and depression, that increase their dependence and vulnerability to abuse and control. As we will see momentarily, however, these problems only become disproportionate in the context of ongoing abuse and so cannot be its cause…

Read the rest of his post. Incredibly a complementarian actually wrote the following to me very recently.

When women stay in abusive situations, the reason is most likely psychological, not religious. For example, low self-esteem or fear of being alone.

Stark continues,

In fact, around 80% of battered women in intact couples leave the abusive man at least once. These separations appear to decrease the frequency of abuse, but not the probability that it will recur. Indeed, the risk of severe or fatal injury increases with separation. Almost half the males on death row for domestic homicide killed in retaliation for a wife or lover leaving them. As we’ve also seen, a majority of partner assaults occur while partners are separated. So common is what legal scholar Martha Mahoney calls “separation assault” that women who are separated are 3 times more likely to be victimized than divorced women and 25 times more likely to be hurt than married women.

This information needs to be combined with the information from Lundy Bancroft that male entitlement is part of the abuse picture.

In the comment zone of Schwyzer's post Richard adds quotes from Judith Lewis Herman’s book “Trauma and Recovery” (1992),

So far, I haven’t read anything about the book that indicates that it’s truly groundbreaking. On another site, in fact, Evan Stark stated, “Others have said some of this before. But I think you’ll find, when you read the book, that it hasn’t been put together in this way before.”

Indeed, the use of the phrase “coercive control” in the context of domestic violence prevention and intervention goes back at least as far as Judith Lewis Herman’s book “Trauma and Recovery” (1992). In the chapter simply titled “Captivity,” she wrote, “Prolonged, repeated trauma, by contrast, occurs only in circumstances of captivity. When the victim is free to escape, she will not be abused a second time; repeated trauma occurs only when the victim is a prisoner, unable to flee, and under the control of the perpetrator.”

Herman added, “Political captivity is generally recognized, whereas the domestic captivity of women and children is often unseen.”

Finally, she noted, “Captivity, which brings the victim into prolonged contact with the perpetrator, creates a special type of relationship, one of coercive control. This is equally true whether the victim is taken captive entirely by force, as in the case of prisoners and hostages, or by a combination of force, intimidation, and enticement, as in the case of religious cult members, battered women, and abused children. The psychological impact of subordination to coercive control may have many common features, whether that subordination occurs within the public sphere of politics or within the private sphere of sexual and domestic relations… In situations of captivity, the perpetrator becomes the most powerful person in the life of the victim…”

Thus, I’m looking into how Stark’s concept of “coercive control” is substantially different from Herman’s? In what way, if any, does his work even rely or build on Herman’s (and “others”)?

I’m also intrigued by Stark’s suggestion that “coercive control” should be considered a “liberty” crime, since it is “designed to take away women’s freedom, autonomy, and dignity.”

That is true, of course. But, in most societies, it’s not just a man, one man, that cripples and crushes a woman’s, one woman’s, capacity to make choices and act on them. Instead, an abused woman is also made unfree by “manhood” often as it has been socially constructed within the context of a still-patriarchal society.

“In other words,” as wrote Nancy J. Hirschmann in a Frontiers article titled “Domestic Violence and the Theoretical Discourse of Freedom” (1996), “the ultimate barrier to women’s freedom is patriarchy, or the social, legal, and economic control that men are accorded over women; all other particular and specific barriers that individual women experience at any given time or place, in any given relationship, in any given experiential moment, can be understood only in this larger repressive context. Accordingly, battered women’s freedom is restricted by men’s violence and the sexist values that underpin and perpetuate it.


Women’s freedom requires that this violence and its ideological supports be ended. As long as society does not recognize and support that goal, however, it is up to individual women to manage and cope in the best way they can. When looked at from this perspective, what may appear to be complicity, internalization of abuse, or even masochism may in reality be a form of resistance, management, or just plain survival…. But that does not mean she does not feel fear, that she wants or enjoys the beatings, or that she is free.”

I wonder, of course, whether Stark also indicts patriarchy in his book and, if so, also makes recommendations for finally bringing it to justice.

It has been widely known and discussed for decades now that batterers “develop an obsession when the victims try to leave” and “intensify physical violence and threats of homicide and suicide” (see, e.g., Subadra Marharja’s brief survey of research online titled “Violence in Marriage: Why Do Women Stay” [ca. 2000]). “Community response,” adds Marharja, “has been a major deterrent for many women to leave abusive relationships,” with the protective and legal systems being “largely responsible.”

Therefore, what I hope Stark does is offer clear and compelling advice on how DV preventionists and interventionists can put way more of their money and long-term resources where their collective mouth is to further ensure that no abused woman is LEFT behind.

Here is another powerful post. Stark's book generated a lot of discussion which I missed until now. Here is the conclusion,

Of course, ultimately the only way to really eradicate domestic violence is to eradicate inequality between men and women. I firmly believe that oppressive violence is just a manifestation of oppression itself, and just one of many tools that a dominant class uses to keep an oppressed class under the boot. Note, I’m not saying that all intimate violence everywhere will disappear; there’s always going to be control freaks who flip out when they feel that their sexual partners are retaliating against their control. But the majority of male-on-female domestic violence comes from the fact that men have been socially conditioned to feel entitled to control over and subservience from women, and when they don’t get it, many of them flip out. Until that sense of entitlement is eradicated, we’re going to see this problem persist.

There it is again. Male entitlement must be eradicated. It is time that Christians face this reality.

Coercive Control

Coercive Control by Evan Stark,

Despite its great achievements, the domestic violence revolution is stalled, Evan Stark argues, a provocative conclusion he documents by showing that interventions have failed to improve womens long-term safety in relationships or to hold perpetrators accountable. Stark traces this failure to a startling paradox, that the singular focus on violence against women masks an even more devastating reality.

In millions of abusive relationships, men use a largely unidentified form of subjugation that more closely resembles kidnapping or indentured servitude than assault. He calls this pattern coercive control. Drawing on sources that range from FBI statistics and film to dozens of actual cases from his thirty years of experience as an award-winning researcher, advocate, and forensic expert, Stark shows in terrifying detail how men can use coercive control to extend their dominance over time and through social space in ways that subvert womens autonomy, isolate them, and infiltrate the most intimate corners of their lives.

Against this backdrop, Stark analyzes the cases of three women tried for crimes committed in the context of abuse, showing that their reactions are only intelligible when they are reframed as victims of coercive control rather than as battered wives.

The story of physical and sexual violence against women has been told often. But this is the first book to show that most abused women who seek help do so because their rights and liberties have been jeopardized, not because they have been injured. The coercive control model Stark develops resolves three of the most perplexing challenges posed by abuse: why these relationships endure, why abused women develop a profile of problems seen among no other group of assault victims, and why the legal system has failed to win them justice.

Elevating coercive control from a second-class misdemeanor to a human rights violation, Stark explains why law, policy, and advocacy must shift its focus to emphasize how coercive control jeopardizes womens freedom in everyday life.

Fiercely argued and eminently readable, Starks work is certain to breathe new life into the domestic violence revolution.

Reviews

"Evan Stark's brilliant book will transform our understanding of violence against women and place the anti-abuse campaign squarely in the center of the feminist revolution and the movement for universal human rights.


In Stark's new paradigm, we see that physical violence is only the tip of an iceberg of intimidation, isolation, and deprivation of daily necessities that amounts to a denial to women of personhood and full citizenship. Every human rights theorist, advocate, and jurist needs to read this landmark volume and use it to reinvigorate the movement toward true equality for women. If every law enforcement officer, shelter provider, social worker, and legislator would also read the stories Stark tells about women's everyday struggles in hostage-like relationships, society's approach to the abuse of women would be immeasurably strengthened."-- Heidi Hartmann, Institute for Women's Policy Research and the George Washington University

"Evan Stark has written a momentous work conceptualizing abuse of women by their intimate partners as a major human rights violation. Dr. Stark has explicated the concrete deprivations and structural restraints which are the daily realities of women who have abusive intimate partners. He shows how these abuses create hostage-like living conditions and constrain women's ability to function as fully free citizens in society. Coercive Control is essential reading for everyone in the mental health and legal professions who treat and represent women. It will help us grasp the oppression suffered by women who may not have visible, physical injuries so that we may help them achieve safety and freedom."-- Marjory D. Fields, J.D., family law and human rights lawyer in private practice and retired Justice, New York State Supreme and Family Courts

"Coercive Control is compelling in the way it frames woman-battering as a web of coercive controls and enforcement. Evan Stark provides a rich history of the refuge/shelter movement and a powerful critique of the criminal legal system. This pathbreaking exploration of the entrapment of women in intimate partnerships, with its important exploration of social context and critical focus on male social and economic privilege, is a must reada crucial addition to the literature."-- Barbara J. Hart, Senior Policy and Legal Advisor, Battered Women's Justice Project

Anything that eprives women of personal autonomy is against basic human rights for women.

Authority 7: one another

In his letter Grudem remarks that "one another" in "submit to one another" means that some submit to others. Grudem writes,

My argument for Ephesians 5:21 is that "being subject" to someone in the sense intended by Greek hypotassō is a one-directional activity. In that sense it is like the action of "killing one another" - in the nature of the action of killing, one person kills and the other is killed. The dead person does not rise from the dead after a few minutes and kill the other person, nor could every single person kill every single other person. Killing one another rather has the sense "some to others," in that some were killing others.

I thought I would do a rough search in English for "one another" in the scriptures. I found the following,

discuss with one another
say to one another
ask one another
trample one another
accept glory from one another
stare at one another
love one another
degrading their bodies with one another
inflamed with lust for one another
devoted to one another
honor one another
livein harmony with one another
pass judgement on one another
accept one another
instruct one another
greet one another
agree with one another
encourage one another
serve one another
bear with one another
be kind and compassionate with one another
speak to another with psalms, etc.
submit to one another
in your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had
forgive one another
admonish one another
hate one another
spur one another on to love
do not slander one another
don't grumble against one another
offer hospitality to one another
clothe yourselves with humility toward one another
have fellowship with one another
lay down our lives for one another

I do not see one instance in which one class of person is to follow these commands towards another class of person. I do not believe that Christians are broken into two classes, male and female, and female are to submit to male, and male are to have authority over female. That is the implication of the interpretation that some Christians are to submit to other Christians.Quite frankly, I don't see how Christianity would be a revolutionary religion if that were the case.

The teaching to serve and offer hospitality to one another is surely that one person offers hospitality to another and later in return, the other offers hospitality. Each offers hospitality and service out of their ability to do so.

Authority 6: returning to the evidence

This is the evidence on αυθεντεω which Grudem discusses. There really isn't anything else.

1. Scholia Graeca in Aeschylus, Eumenides 42a (first century B.C.): "The murderer, who had just committed an act of violence [authenteō ]," where authenteō (perfect participle) means "to commit violence" or "to murder."

2. BGU 1208 (first century B.C.): "I had my way with him [authenteō ] and he agreed to provide Calatytis the boatman with the full payment within the hour."

3. Philodemus, Rhetorica II Fragmenta Libri [V] fr IV line 14 (first century BC): "These orators ... even fight with powerful ( authenteō ) lords." (This is a hypothetical reconstruction of a fragmentary text.)

4. Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos III.13 [#157] (second century A.D.): "Therefore, if Saturn alone takes planetary control of the soul and dominates (authenteō ) Mercury and the moon ..."

What about this evidence? According to Grudem Linda Belleville quotes this evidence to prove that αυθεντεω means "misuse authority". Of course, it is the same evidence that Grudem and Kostenberger use to prove that αυθεντεω means to "exercise authority". I do not believe that the evidence supports either case.

Grudem writes this about the first quote,

But the first example should not be considered relevant for this discussion, since the comments on Aeschylus, Eumenides found in the Scholia Graeca are from a 10th century A.D. manuscript.²¹ Belleville gives the reader no indication of why she claims a date of "first century B.C." for this 10th century A.D. reference.

The second quote is the one that is listed in the original study by Baldwin under "compel, to influence someone." and Grudem agrees with this assessment. Ev. Fem & Biblical Truth. page 677 - 680. According to Grudem other translators suggest "prevail" and mention that this is a hostile relationship involving insolence. The fact that Baldwin was able to find someone who would provide a translation with "exercise authority over" has no relevance whatsoever to the argument. As Grudem says, page 680, "The translation of this text is disputed."

The third quote is from the Philodemus fragment. The problems with it are so manifold that I am surprised to find it quoted at all. It no longer exists except as a hand-made facsimile. The word authentein is reconstructed within this fragment. Grudem writes,

In the third (the fragmentary manuscript), the meaning, "authoritative lords" makes good sense, and it would be impossible to demonstrate the meaning "lords who misuse authority." Baldwin's gives the translation, "those in authority."

This is not valid information. In fact, there is no evidence that there is any word which can be translated as "lords" in this fragment. Baldwin quotes Hubbell's summary of what might be in this fragment if we knew what the words were. There is no translation and no paraphrase, only a condensed abstract of a general idea. Grudem cannot claim that this fragment has been translated because not enough of it remains.

About the last reference Grudem writes,

In the fourth example, Saturn rules or exercises authority over Mercury (the text is talking about the influence of the planets and no sense of "misuse authority" would be appropriate: Saturn does not "misuse its authority" over Mercury). Baldwin gives the translation, "Saturn ... dominates Mercury and the moon,"²⁴ which is an appropriate way to speak of the relative influence of planets, but once again we find no meaning like "misuses its authority."

While there are many later quotes which supply the meaning of dominate or control in a negative way, there is no actual proof of the meaning of this word apart from its use in astronomy. As far as I can see, one can only prove an amoral use of power such as dominate, for authentein. The truth is that I do not find any command in the Bible for men to behave like this in the church. I do not believe that this is intended to be the benign and appropriate exercise of the teaching gift.

Clearly, in 1 Tim. 2 Paul instructs men not to fight with each other and women not to dominate. There does not seem to be any reference to men dominating in a positive way and thus exercising their authority. Nothing is said about this. Neither would we assume that because Paul does not instruct women not to fight, that they may fight.

I do not believe that it is warranted to postulate a meaning of either "misuse authority" or "exercise authority"for authentein. It is time for those who think they know what this word means to acquire humility and admit that there is no evidence other than "use personal power to make something happen." Is that what Christian leaders are supposed to do? Show me the scripture for this.

It is about time that 1 Tim. 2:12 be translated properly and that people stop talking about a women not "having teaching authority". Teaching is a gift and has authority if it is based on knowledge of the word. There is no other authority.

Authority 6: trampling or loving one another

There are two ways to write about reciprocity. If we love one another, then the person who loves can also be loved. If we kill one another, there is a group of people, within which some people kill other people, but no one person kills the same one who kills him or her.

Two views of submit to one another, in the words of Wayne Grudem,

Everyone agrees that allēlōn has a "reciprocal" meaning. The question is what specific kind of "reciprocal" meaning the term implies. Of course when a writer says that a group of people "love one another" or "care for one another" or, conversely, that a group of people "were killing one another" or that they "were trampling on one another," the meaning is always in some sense reciprocal, because in every case some in the group do something to others in the group. In that sense the meaning of "one another" is reciprocal - the group acts upon itself, in contrast to saying that the group "loves other people," or that the group "was killing other people."

What Belleville fails to distinguish, however, is that sometimes everybody in the group does something to everybody else (loving one another, for example), and sometimes some people in the group do the action to others in the group (killing one another, when some are killing and others are being killed). In English we use "one another" for both senses, and we say they were "loving one another" or they were "killing one another." In Greek likewise, the term allēlōn can be used in both cases. The kind of activity involved determines the exact sense of reciprocal allēlōn that is intended.

My argument for Ephesians 5:21 is that "being subject" to someone in the sense intended by Greek hypotassō is a one-directional activity. In that sense it is like the action of "killing one another" - in the nature of the action of killing, one person kills and the other is killed. The dead person does not rise from the dead after a few minutes and kill the other person, nor could every single person kill every single other person. Killing one another rather has the sense "some to others," in that some were killing others. Trampling on one another is a similar example: some trample on others, so the group can be said to be "trampling on one another." Waiting for one another when some people are late is the same idea: some wait, and some are waited for.

Submitting to one another should be interpreted in the sense that people trample one another, not in the sense that people love one another.

Belleville says she is unable to understand this distinction in meaning, and therefore she rejects it as a possibility. She says,

Wayne Grudem's claim that allēlous ... in Ephesians 5:21 takes the "common" meaning "some to others" ... boggles the lexical imagination.... And how exactly Galatians 6:2 ("Carry each other's burdens"), 1 Corinthians 11:33 ("When you come together to eat, wait for each other"), and Revelation 6:4 ("To make the people [on earth] slay each other") support such a "common meaning" is likewise incomprehensible.¹⁴

But is it really that difficult to understand that Paul in Galatians 6:2 did not want every single person in the churches of Galatia to carry every other person's burden (each person would be carrying hundreds of burdens!), but that he wanted some to help others as they had need? Is it really "incomprehensible" that in 1 Corinthians 11:33, Paul wanted some (who were on time) to wait for others (who were late), not that those who were late should wait for those who were on time? And is Belleville really unable to understand that in Revelation 6:4 some were killing and some were being killed (rather than the impossible idea that every single person was killing every single other person)? These are straightforward understandings of these passages. Belleville's only objection is to say that she finds them "incomprehensible."

Now with respect to Ephesians 5:21, our conclusion is (1) that allēlōn often takes the sense of "some to others" within a group, when the activity described is by nature a one-directional activity, and (2) that hypotassō always indicates a one-directional submission to an authority. Therefore we do not need to invent a new, unprecedented meaning for hypotasso in Ephesians 5:21. It takes a common, ordinary meaning, "be subject to an authority," and allēlōn takes a common, ordinary meaning, "some (in the group) to others (in the group)."

No reciprocity here. Apparently there is no situation in which I bear the burden of someone else, who bears my burden with me.

To return to the original question, it is significant that Belleville has brought forth no counterexamples for this sense of hypotassō as one-directional submission to an authority.

But Belleville's point is that Christianity introduces this concept of reciprocity. It is significant that there is no command in the Christian scriptures to use or have authority one over the other, except in an reciprocal situation.

While one cannot prove reciprocity in submission from a direct quote, one can most certainly prove reciprocity in authority. Since the complementarians themselves set up an authority-submission paradigm, I would think that this would satisfy them as proof. 1 Cor. 7:3-5,

The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5^(C) Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again,^(D) so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

Is someone going to say that this use of "one another" is not reciprocal? It is distressing to see how the reality of being male and female is warped by the eternal model of authority-submission. But it is doubly distressing to see how the scriptures are also misunderstood and misrepresented.

If authority can be given mutually to each over other, then likewise submission. That is the mystery of Christianity. How sad to see this message is missed by some.

Authority 5: Chrysostom

Homily 10 on Colossians by Chrysostom

See how again he has exhorted to reciprocity. As in the other case he enjoins fear and love, so also does he here. For it is possible for one who loves even, to be bitter. What he says then is this. Fight not; for nothing is more bitter than this fighting, when it takes place on the part of the husband toward the wife. For the fightings which happen between beloved persons, these are bitter; and he shows that it arises from great bitterness, when, says he, any one is at variance with his own member. To love therefore is the husband's part, to yield pertains to the other side. If then each one contributes his own part, all stands firm. From being loved, the wife too becomes loving; and from her being submissive, the husband becomes yielding. And see how in nature also it has been so ordered, that the one should love, the other obey. For when the party governing loves the governed, then everything stands fast. Love from the governed is not so requisite, as from the governing towards the governed; for from the other obedience is due. For that the woman has beauty, and the man desire, shows nothing else than that for the sake of love it has been made so. Do not therefore, because your wife is subject to you, act the despot;(αυθεντεω) nor because your husband loves you, be thou puffed up. Let neither the husband's love elate the wife, nor the wife's subjection puff up the husband. For this cause has He subjected her to you, that she may be loved the more. For this cause He has made you to be loved, O wife, that you may easily bear your subjection. Fear not in being a subject; for subjection to one that loves you has no hardship. Fear not in loving, for you have her yielding. In no other way then could a bond have been. You have then thine authority of necessity, proceeding from nature; maintain also the bond that proceeds from love, for this allows the weaker to be endurable.

I like the way Chrysostom created reciprocity. I would comment on this passage further but I haven't found the Greek text for this yet. Chrysostom carefully balances the power between husband and wife throughout. Its too bad reality isn't like this, but IMO he tried.

This passage also indicates one example of how authentew can be used to mean "misuse of power." From what I have read the meaning of "use power over" is emerging for authentew. Not always in a negative sense, but still the use of power. I don't think men should use power over women, nor women over men.

Authority 4: The fragment's non-existence

I was made aware recently that the Philodemus Fragment does not actually exist, although there is a hand-made copy of it. It is hard to see how this fragment could be called evidence for anything.

However, I find that it is mentioned at least twice on the CBMW website. Wolters mentions it in A Semantic Study of authentes and its Derivatives,

It is possible, however, that the text should read authent[ai]sin instead of authent[ou]sin, in which case we have a form not of the verb authentew, but of the noun authentes.64 If we do read the verb, then its meaning here, according to standard lexicographical reference works, is ‘rule’ or ‘have authority over’.65

65 See S. Sudhaus (ed.), Philodemi Volumina Rhetorica (2 vols.; Leipzig: Teubner, 1896), II, p. 133, lines 12-15. The Herculaneum papyrus fragments in question (now known as P.Herc. 220) are no longer extant, although a hand-drawn copy was published in the nineteenth century. For an extensive bibliography on P.Herc. 220, see M. Gigante, Catalogo dei Papiri Ercolanesi (Naples: Bibliopolis, 1979), pp. 107-108. It is usually assigned to Book V of Philodemus’s Rhetorica, which is being prepared for publication by Matilde Ferrario of Milan; see her ‘Per una nuova edizione del quinto libro della “Retorica” di Filodemo’, in Proceedings of the XVIIIth International Congress of Papyrology, Athens, 25–31 May 1986 (2 vols.; Athens: Greek Papyrological Society, 1988), I, pp. 167-84. However, P.Herc. 220 has been tentatively referred to Book VII in T. Dorandi, ‘Per una ricomposizione dello scritto di Filodemo sulla Retorica’, ZPE 82 (1990), pp. 59-87 (85)

There is no internal evidence which makes the meaning of authent[ai/ou]sin explicit and certainly Hubbell's translation for authent[ou]sin is "powerful" and not "exercise authority." Note that Wolters does not make this clear, but only says "then its meaning here, according to standard lexicographical reference works, is ‘rule’ or ‘have authority over’". This quote does not actually support any particular meaning at all, as far as I know, since too little of the fragment was ever available. This citation simply must be dropped from the debate - it cannot be used by either side.

However, more has been written about this fragment. In An Open Letter to Egalitarians (Revised 2003): A Consideration of Linda Belleville's 2001 Response Grudem writes,

In the third (the fragmentary manuscript), the meaning, "authoritative lords" makes good sense, and it would be impossible to demonstrate the meaning "lords who misuse authority." Baldwin's gives the translation, "those in authority."²³

Baldwin may have given the meaning "those in authority" but clearly Grudem has not yet understood that Baldwin misunderstood the translation. Quoting an error is unhelpful, but it seems that readers are willing to take Grudem's word that Baldwin's study has validity. "Authoritative lords" might make sense, if we knew the word was authentew and if we knew the word following was, in fact, "lords." I suspect that the fragment would sound just as good if we translated the word in many other ways. It is irritating to see the flawed study by Baldwin being quoted as evidence for anything. I would like to see something a little more scholarly.

Grudem has an interesting point here,

When I referred to the meaning "misuse authority" in my first article, I also used the term, "domineer" to speak of such misuse. This was because the word "domineer" means, "To rule over or control arbitrarily or arrogantly; tyrannize."²⁵ But this English word "domineer" must be distinguished from the word "dominate," which has no connotation of misuse of authority, but just means, "To control, govern, or rule by superior authority or power."²⁶ Because "domineer" (a negative term) and "dominate" (a neutral term) sound so much alike in English, perhaps it is misleading to use "domineer" to indicate a misuse or abuse of authority .

Part of the difficulty is that there is no clear difference between "power" and "authority" in Greek. Possibly authentew could be translated as "dominate" in English and that would be acceptable to both sides. Complementarians would understand by it that a woman could not "govern by authority" , and egalitarians would understand that a woman could not "govern by power", because no one should "govern by power".

I don't see any point in lobbying for any particular interpretation at this point, but as a translation "dominate" seems to be a good "neutral" candidate. Maybe I will see it differently later. The way it stands now, complementarians have their interpretation and it restricts women, egalitarians have theirs and it entails equity. If neither one can be proven then we are each responsible for behaving according to our conscience.

The Doll House

The dad, on the left, is making muffins and the mom, is eating oranges. Each child can have their own room full of furniture and a family. They pick the animals and decide who is who. They lay out the rooms and engage in activities, describing what the animals are doing. Sometimes we write a book about this. The kids love to make their own rooms.

Click on the image to enlarge and see what utensils the dad is using to make muffins.

Authority Part 3: Fragment and Paraphrase

A continuation of the Philodemus Fragment -

I have suggested setting aside authentein in 1 Tim. 2:12, as proof that a woman should not have authority, because the evidence for the meaning of this word is very obscure. I have found and reproduced in images the Greek fragment and the English paraphrase for one of the two most cited pieces of evidence for authentein meaning "exercise authority". It is this fragment from Philodemus. My intent is to share this information with any who come here to view it.

The first two images here are from Philodemi Volumina Rhetorica pages 161 and 162 in the electronic version and pages 133 and 134 in the book.

The second two images are from The Rhetorica of Philodemus the preface and page 32 of the electronic version and page 304 in the book.

The fragment has over half of the words missing and it is clear that this is a rough paraphrase. In the third image the middle paragraph serves as a paraphrase for fragment IV.

Click on the images to enlarge.

In the preface, Hubbell writes that

"he is far from positive that the correct rendering has in all cases been attained. ... It would perhaps be more exact to call it a paraphrase than a translation. While it has been possible in general to translate almost literally, there are many passages where the papyrus is so fragmentary that nothing more than an approximation is possible, and the gaps must in some cases be filled entirely by conjecture. At times it has seemed best to condense some of the more prolix paragraphs."

It is evident by the amount of text which is reconstructed, and by relative length of the manuscript and the paraphrase, that this is one of the "more prolix paragraphs" and has been greatly condensed.

One suggestion might be to assign authentein the meaning which it had in astronomy and astrology texts in the second century - to dominate or domineer. This is the translation used by Jerome in the fourth century. I don't know if it is possible to find out what was used in the old Latin texts.

Authority Part 2: the Philodemus Fragment

I have been in a discussion of the meaning of authentein in 1 Tim. 2:12 on Denny Burk's blog and he has now decided to moderate out any further discussion on my part about the evidence for authentein. I wish to post here some of the evidence and resources which I have collected.

Denny recommended that I read Grudem's book, Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth, to see the evidence for authentein meaning "exercise authority". I have done this and found that the reference to Philodemus is incorrect. I am posting the resources for this today and will pursue the discussion as I find the time.

Here is my comment #70 in full from Denny's post,

By way of explanation, Denny commented to me,

“Once again, I would direct readers to Kostenberger’s study. It’s very convincing.”

I don’t know if I have read the right article by Kostenberger. However, I read this one.

http://biblicalfoundations.org/pdf/Studies12.pdf

In the footnotes, Köstenberger provides the only two pieces of lexical evidence which he thins are relevant. He says,

41These two references are: Philodemus (1st cent. BCE): “Ought we not to consider that men who incur the enmity of those in authority (συν αυθεντουσιν) are villains, and hated by both gods and men”; and BGU 1208 (27 BCE): “I exercised authority (Καμου αυθεντηκοτος) over him, and he consented to provide for Calatytis the Boatman on terms of full fare, within the hour.” For full Greek texts and translations, see Baldwin, “Appendix 2” in Women in the Church, 275–76. (in the PDF page 13)

The first citation is a reference to Philodemus. However, authentein is definitely not translated as “those in authority” but as “powerful lords” or something of the kind. Several lines later, there is a reference to “those in authority” but not in connection to authentein. It seems there has been a mix up.

The second citation it the one that Grudem suggests should be translated as “compel”. Therefore, in spite of Köstenberger’s footnote, neither of these two citations gives the obvious meaning “exercise authority”. Whatever the meaning is, I would like to see it properly cited.

And here is # 69,

The Philodemus quote is a bit difficult, since it is, as I said, a fragment, and the phrase is a quote from an unknown source, so undated, I would presume.

But the phrase is “fighting with powerful(?) lords(?)”

διαμαχοντοι και συν αυθεντ[ου]σιν αν[αξιν]

Since anax is not in BDAG, I am guessing that it is not a Hellenistic term at all.

My guess is that it is a Homeric term, but that is just a guess. But maybe the word isn’t anax, it is reconstructed also.

The entire fragment is not translated but Hubbell gives a precis of sorts. It is all available on the internet, so you can translate this yourself and see if authentein has a positive or negative meaning. But it most certainly is not translated as those in authority, as Kostenberger claims. “Those in authority occurs further down in the piece.

I think that if this quote is being used to shore up the translation “exercise authority” then it should be properly translated, possibly by a secular and non partisan scholar. But I don’t really think that anything new will be revealed from a fragment.

Philodemi Volumina Rhetorica

and

The Rhetorica Philodemus.

Do you have the reference?

My guess is that it is a more or less neutral term referring to the exercise of sheer might in this case, a secular power with no moral right attached to it. That is a concession BTW, it could mean usurpers - who knows?

Comment # 75,

Denny,

Unless you can assure me that Andreas has corrected his citation of these two references, it is not worth my time and money to acquire the book. Basic accuracy must be attended to.

If you have the book, then it would be helpful at this point to cite how Andreas deals with Baldwin’s study.

I have to assume at this point, given your reluctance to respond, that there is no evidence to support the meaning “exercise authority” for authentein.

To whom will Jesus say,

“Well, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over ten cities.” Luke 19:17

I claim that God gives authority to the one who is faithful in a very little.

You claim that God gives authority to the male.

Denny responded with,

Suzanne,

If that is your assumption, then your assumption would incorrect. The simple truth is that I have spent a lot of time going back and forth on this thread, and I simply don’t have time to keep it up. Yes, there are alternate translations of the passages you cite. I could get them for you and type them out, but I’m not going to. You can read them in the appendix 7 of Wayne Grudem’s book, Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth: An Analysis of More Than 100 Disputed Questions. What you’ll find if you survey the over 300 uses of this term (all of them are listed in Grudem) is that “exercise authority” is a possible rendering for some texts within the timeframe you’ve cited. Let me encourage you to investigate some of that evidence.

For those who have been watching this thread, I am going to have to exit at this point. It’s becoming too time consuming. There are plenty of answers to the questions that Suzanne is asking, most of which are provided in the Grudem book I cited above. I hope that interested readers will take time to investigate this matter fully.

Thanks,
Denny

Denny then started moderating comments and I was unable to let him know that Grudem makes the same error. I did actually publish that error earlier in the discussion. I would be willing to continue this discussion if anyone asks for further references.

Authority Part 1

I propose that 1 Tim. 2:12 be removed from a discussion of authority until after all else has been explored. This is, first, because the word αυθεντειν in Greek had no connection with the word εξουσια the word which is usually translated authority. Second, the Latin Vulgate translated αυθεντειν as dominare, and Luther as herr sein, to be the lord. Third, in English this word was translated as "usurp authority" at a time when a usurpation was a serious crime.

I propose that the first basis of authority in the church be based on baptism. The following is from Luther's Appeal to the Ruling class.

To call popes, bishops, priests, monks, and nuns, the religious class, but princes, lords, artisans, and farm-workers the secular class, is a specious device invented by certain timeservers; but no one ought to be frightened by it, and for good reason. For all Christians whatsoever really and truly belong to the religious class, and there is no difference among them except in so far as they do different work.

We all have one baptism, one gospel, one faith, and are all equally Christian. For baptism, gospel, and faith alone make men religious, and create a Christian people. When a pope or bishop anoints, grants tonsures, ordains, consecrates, dresses differently from laymen, he may make a hypocrite of a man, or an anointed image, but never a Christian or a spiritually-minded man. The fact is that our baptism consecrates us all without exception, and makes us all priests.

When a bishop consecrates, he simply acts on behalf of the entire congregation, all of whom have the same authority.

Every one who has been baptized may claim that he has already been consecrated priest, bishop, or pope, even though it is not seemly for any particular person arbitrarily to exercise an office. Just because we are all priests of equal standing, no one must push himself forward and, without the consent and choice of the rest, presume to do that for which we all have equal authority. ....

Hence we deduce that there is, at bottom, no other difference between laymen, princes, priests, bishops, or in Romanist terminology, between religious and secular, than that of office or occupation, and not taht of Christian status. All have spiritual status, and all are truly priests, bishops, and popes. Bu Christians do not follow the same occupation.

I accept that Luther taught that women should be quiet and submissive and not teach. However, this is a discussion of the concept of authority in the abstract. Luther does not present a theory of authority that excludes women because authority is based on baptism. We now allow women to hold office in the secular world but not in the church.

On what basis is authority in the world and in the church differentiated? On what basis are offices of authority withheld from women, if all have authority through their baptism.

We say that women have the same gifts of teaching but may not hold the office because they do not have authority. However, a gifted women who is baptized has both baptism and gift. She ought then to have the occupation, but simply lacks being appointed by men as an office-bearer. And where does it say in the scriptures that a woman shall not bear office?

Council for Biblical Hierarchy

I do earnestly appeal to you brethren to restore the people to their proper position in God's appointed and good hierarchical design, so that in God's will they may fulfill the submissive role under the leadership and authority of a unelected ruler. The following are matters of great concern to the church.

Puritans seek to retain an evangelical base while at the same time modifying Biblical interpretation to be sympathetic to the concerns of the people's movement. However, in order to embrace both, Puritans need to compromise the Bible. Puritanism therefore has become a theological crossing point between conservative evangelical theology and liberalism ... Puritanism and Christianity are like thick oil and water, their very natures dictate that the cannot be mixed.

We uphold as truth that men were created by God as equal in dignity, value, essence and human nature, but also distinct in role whereby one man was given the responsibility of loving authority over the other men, and the other men were to offer willing, glad-hearted and submissive assistance to the one. Gen. 1:26-27 makes clear that men are equally created as God's image, and so are, by God's created design, equally and fully human. But, as Romans 13:1 says , their humanity would find expression differently, in a relationship of complementarity, with many men functioning in a submissive role under the leadership and authority of one man.

Passages such as Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 exhibit the fact that God's created intention of appropriate absolute rulership and authority should now, in Christ, be fully affirmed, both in the state and in the church. Men are to submit to their ruler in the model of Christ's submitting to his father, leaving us an example, that we should follow in his steps. Monarchy, then, is seen to be restored in the Christian community as men endeavor to express their common humanity according to God's originally created and good hierarchical design.

Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as the supreme authority, 14or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right. 15 For it is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.

Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh. 19For it is commendable if a man bears up under the pain of unjust suffering because he is conscious of God. 20But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. 21To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. 1 Peter 2:13-21

1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. Romans 13.

Behold, this day thine eyes have seen how that the LORD had delivered thee to day into mine hand in the cave: and some bade me kill thee: but mine eye spared thee; and I said, I will not put forth mine hand against my lord; for he is the LORD's anointed. 1 Sam. 24:10

Therefore, the monarch is the LORD's anointed. This holds true not only for the monarch that belongs to Him, but any ruler which God himself has allowed to have authority over you.

Now royal unction gives no grace, but a just title only, in Regem, "to be king" that is all, and no more. It is the administration to govern, not the gift to govern well: the right of ruling, not the ruling right. It includes nothing but a due title; it excludes nothing but usurption. Who is anointed? On whom the right rests. Who is ununctus " He that hath it not? Suppose Nimrod, who cared for no anointing thrust himself in, and by violence usurped the throne; came in rather like a ranger over a forest, than a father over a family. He was no anointed, nor any that so cometh in.

But on the other side; David, or he that first beginneth a royal race, is as the head; on him is that right of ruling first shed; from him it runs down to the next, and so still, even to the lowest borders of his lawful issue. Remember Job, Reges in solio collosat in perpetuum. It is for ever. God's claim never forfeits; His character never to be wiped out, or scraped out, nor Kings lose their right, no more than Patriarchs did their fatherhood. Lancelot Andrewes, 1610.

We learn by this that although God has created all men to be equal in dignity, only one has the administration of government. It is not based on the gift of leadership but the role of leadership. The monarch has the role of authority, and men have the submissive role.

The monarch ruleth over other men, as a father over his family, that common human dignity shall be expressed in all men by their partaking in the submissive role of Christ. For if men are not in submission to an authority over which they have no control, they will not share in the suffering of Christ and so they will be saved, but as by fire. Their works will be consumed, for they have had no part in Christ on earth.

It is seen then that "rule by the people, and for the people" is a preversion of the image of God who created humans, in all ways, to reflect the hierarchy of God's design. For if men do not submit to hierarchy, then they miss God's perfect plan. "Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves." Rom. 13:2

Men need to be called to repentance and must place themselves under the authority of the servant leadership of a monarch whom God has appointed. Men must give up pursuing leaders of their own appointing and humble themselves before God's will. For if men serve only a leader which they can later depose, they make a mockery of the perfect design of hierarchy which God intended for mankind.