Any genuinely healthy relationship involves give and take between two people who seek to live in one household as one flesh. submitting to one another involves many aspects of living together in community. What Paul asks of his well-loved children in community is equally important in the marriage between two well-loved children of God.

I would argue as does the original post that mutual submission is the more healthy and other-oriented interpretation and has the most potential for human beings to flourish and develop into mature people.

We think alike. Historically humans have constantly put others into a position where the others have to obey them. You can’t pick up a history book without finding that sort of behavior repeated over and over again. And when it comes to women, almost all societies have expected women to obey men, and live to their lives for men. This is where Paul is so different. He doesn’t expect wives to obey their husbands, rather he uses the word submit, and uses it in a manner that doesn’t imply obedience but rather respect. Paul is definitely revolutionary in his views towards women.

I was astounded when someone posted the vows put out by whatever group that was that included wives vowing to obey their husbands. And this is what I mean by off balance teaching. These people have gone off the deep end. And this is why I CANNOT embrace this complementary doctrine.

Whatever conclusions I come to concerning submission and headship as I study it, I can never agree to women vowing to obey their husbands. Then they would have two masters, God and their husbands. When their husbands gave the order to do something against God’s law, the woman would have to break either her vow to her husband or disobey God. Very, very bad position to be in.

No man would want to be put in that position. Therefore no man should feel entitled to pressure a woman into that position.

While I think the passage of Eph. 5 where Paul addresses spouses is a good guideline, I’d never go and call it “God’s blueprint for marriage”. As you said, there is a lot more. But if each spouse would read what is said to them, wouldn’t read more into it than what is said there, and read it within the context of the whole letter, then it’s a fine set of instructions.

But I agree with you, it is dangerous to base a whole doctrine on one or two verses pulled out of context. I hate that, to be honest.

Definitely, Jesus is who we should be looking at when it comes to how we should live.

I read the passages. Thanks!

33However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

In the summary he tells husbands to love their wives, and wives to respect (not obey) their husbands.

Now as far as your comment 85272 I would say this. I don’t mind headship teaching if it is clearly shown how God does His thing and men are encouraged to copy God.

The places I suggest to see how God treats His bride and her proper responses are Ezekiel 16:1-14, Hosea 2:14-23, and Proverbs 31:14-23 (Most people don’t look at the Proverbs 31 woman as an allegory of Jesus and the church. But I can’t help but see a few definate parallels).
Also, after Ephesians 5 comes Ephesians 6 – the armor of God that Jesus gives His bride to strengthen and empower her.

I don’t mind headship teaching if it is taught to promote and empower women to serve along side their men. But if headship teaching is used to make women weak and needy and remain in a permanent position of inferiority, I, again, suspect it.

Jesus told us to not choose the best seats in the house but rather take lower seats and let others promote us. The problem with much submission teaching is that when women take voluntary lower positions, many men are content to keep them there rather than promote them. Jesus teaches us that that whoever is faithful with a little bit will be given more. Many men in the “submission of women doctrine” camp refuse to copy Jesus in their dealings with women. Therefore, they are not exercising headship the way Jesus does.

I’ve dumped a bunch of my opinions on you tonight and hope I haven’t overwhelmed you. So I guess I must close with my bottom line. I seek God to know His love for me so that I can be filled with His love to the degree that His love spills out onto others. I must search the scriptures to understand God’s heart and God’s will for me. I do not want to overstep my bounds. But what a horrible thing to limit myself based on the traditions of men rather than the teachings of God. Therefore it is best for me to bring these questions to the table to be examined so that I don’t miss God’s best for my life on this earth. We have such a short time.

And I thank God for His patience and graciousness with me as I search these things out. Again, my questions don’t make Him nervous or impatient. As long as I’m respectful, He welcomes them.

Madame, If I could direct your attention to one thing that has helped me, it would be this. It’s something I stumbled on my own from observation.

There has been a huge emphasis on Ephesians 5 and like verses. It is asserted that they contain everything there is to know about marriage to the exclusion of all other verses. Any verses on relationships that don’t specifically speak about marriage including the words of Jesus Christ Himself are completely ignored.

People have placed the words of Peter and Paul as the foundation and chief cornerstone of marriage when really only the words of Jesus belong there. And by doing this, they have created a house with a faulty foundation.

Of course the words I believe that really belong as the foundation to all relationships are “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength and love your neighbor as yourself,” and “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you,” and “If you would be great in God’s kingdom, learn to be servant of all.”

It seems to me that Patriarchs and Complementarianist let Ephesians 5, the words of Paul, completely cancel out the words of Jesus.

The Lord abhors a false balance and false weights and measures. And I feel that Ephesians 5 et al have been falsely used against women.

Do I want to ignore Ephesians 5?

No.

But I refuse to look at it alone without balancing it against other words in the Bible.

Jesus came to set the captives free, all of them. He didn’t come to set men 100% free and women 59% free.
When submission is taught in a way that oppresses, I become very suspicious.

One thing I appreciate about Egalitarians is that they put first things first. They recognize the words of Jesus, the ones I mentioned above, as being the heart of God. Anything else said needs to line up with what Jesus says. Where there seems to be contradiction, I’m sure Paul would want us to study it deeper as well as pursue the words of Jesus over his own.

Somehow, I think submission makes sense. It fits in with the way Jesus lived.
I also believe that Ephesians 5. can be taken literally. I only really see a problem when we start adding extra meanings to “head” and “submission”, otherwise, it’s a good set of instructions on how to be Christlike in marriage.