Does God want us to live in a patriarchal society ?

QuestionQuest74 · May 31, 2024

Is that for God’s will or against it ?

Michael Snow · Aug 8, 2024

Does God want us to live in a patriarchal society ? Yes.

Our Father, who art in heaven...

St_Worm2 · Aug 9, 2024

I will say "yes"* as well, @QuestionQuest74 (we, men and women, are equal in Christ, and though we are to serve one another in Christ, we are also told to do so in different ways). So, as the Apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians 5 (as well the Apostle Peter, in 1 Peter 3),

Ephesians 5

21 ~Be subject to one another~ in the fear of Christ.

22 Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

23 For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body.

24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,

26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,

27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

28 So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself;

29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church,

30 because we are members of His body.

31 FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH.

32 This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.

33 Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.

God bless you!!

--David

*edit: My comments in this post (and thread) are concerned with a. family and b. the church, not with society in general (unless otherwise mentioned).

RileyG · Sep 2, 2024

2PhiloVoid · Sep 4, 2024

QuestionQuest74 said:
Is that for God’s will or against it ?

Perhaps, but since bad philosophies sow themselves into our culture in relentless fashion, it causes men to increasingly neglect their God-given places in society and then the ladies have to step up and go to bat for what men don't, won't, or can't do.

Rose_bud · Sep 4, 2024

No thank goodness it has changed and is changing.

JustaPewFiller · Sep 4, 2024

St_Worm2 said:
I will say "yes" as well, @QuestionQuest74 (we, men and women, are equal in Christ, and though we are to serve one another in Christ, we are also told to do so in different ways). So, as the Apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians 5 (as well the Apostle Peter, in 1 Peter 3),

Ephesians 5
21 Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.

22 Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.
23 For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body.
24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,
26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.
28 So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself;
29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church,
30 because we are members of His body.
31 FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH.
32 This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.
33 Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.

God bless you!!

--David

One issue that plagues patriarchy when it is implemented is that in chapter 5 of Ephesians, verses 22-24 are often the only verses in that chapter that men seem to remember or practice.

St_Worm2 · Sep 4, 2024

JustaPewFiller said:
One issue that plagues patriarchy when it is implemented is that in chapter 5 of Ephesians, verses 22-24 are often the only verses in that chapter that men seem to remember or practice.

Hello JustaPewFiller, assuming this to be the case, what do you think is at the root of this particular problem?

Also, is there anything that we can do to help fix the problem going forward (and what, if anything, does the Bible recommend)?

Thanks

God bless you!!

---David

JustaPewFiller · Sep 5, 2024

St_Worm2 said:
Hello JustaPewFiller, assuming this to be the case, what do you think is at the root of this particular problem?

Also, is there anything that we can do to help fix the problem going forward (and what, if anything, does the Bible recommend)?

Thanks

God bless you!!

---David

Hmmm... well as you pointed out your original post of Chap 5 of Ephesians the Bible gives additional guidelines for how men should treat women. Of course, those can be backed up by other scriptures telling men to love, honor and respect women.

But, that is often not the case in practice under a patriarchal system.
Why don't some Christian men do what the Bible says here?
If we claim to be Christians (regardless of gender) why do we stray from what God instructs?
You might as well ask, "Why do we sin?" That is what it boils down to when we do not follow God's teachings.

How do we "fix" people sinning? Its a good question. Seriously, it is. People have been trying to do it for at least a couple of 1000 years now.

Fixing the problem going forward - hmm again. From my experience, mistreatment of women is something most pastors seem to give men a "pass" on for whatever reason.

For example, Pastor Bob knows that Bill is a drunk. Pastor Bob also knows that Sam is treats his wife and his family very badly and they live in constant fear of him. Who is Pastor Bob going to speak about the error of his ways? Most of the time it is going to be Bob the drunk that gets the talking to while Sam the abuser gets a blind eye turned towards his actions. I admit, I do not know why that is, but I have seen it several times. I've witnessed a number of pastors themselves treat women badly. The effect of it is that men feel the behavior is ok. Do you have any ideas on why that happens and how to stop it?

ViaCrucis · Sep 5, 2024

Scripture itself doesn't provide us with a clear outline of how to organize a society. Under the Old Covenant Israel was a theocratic social welfare state. Originally a literal Theocracy which viewed God as the King. Israel later became a monarchy when the people demanded a king to emulate the nations around them. It was a social welfare state in the sense that that God organized the nation to provide aid to the poor and the hungry, including a divinely ordained wealth redistribution system.

Outside of ancient Israel, under the Old Covenant, there isn't a whole lot to go on in the Bible as far as to how a society is to be organized. The New Testament operates under the assumption of the Roman Empire existing; the basic principles given to the Church are to be respectful, peaceable, law-abiding citizens. Pay our taxes, act honorably toward those in positions of authority, recognize that the state has the authority and the right to punish evil through the sword. That sort of thing.

There is no assumption made, for example, of what to do if Christians themselves have any kind of real authority in matters of the state. That simply didn't exist in the time of the Apostles and the New Testament.

The best, arguably, we can do is seek a kind of society that is just and equitable, which maximizes human prosperity. Now, what is the best way to do that? Well, at that point we are talking politics.

-CrptoLutheran

bèlla · Sep 6, 2024

There's a growing movement on this topic within pockets around the internet. Religious and otherwise. They're mobilizing men behind this theme and encouraging them to form communities and local networks. The one I observed while conversing with an acquaintance was well organized and a reference for information, legal advice, questionable ethics, and a confirmed belief that all iterations of the same are best avoided.

One such entity was recently the subject of a Sports Illustrated article and the founder runs a YouTube channel. What appeared as a church was actually a compound with dubious practices that warranted the piece. You'll hear suggestions along these lines or communal living but the end result is rarely as expected.

I don't believe man's idea of patriarchy remotely resembles the Lord's.

~bella

Paidiske · Sep 6, 2024

ViaCrucis said:
The best, arguably, we can do is seek a kind of society that is just and equitable, which maximizes human prosperity. Now, what is the best way to do that? Well, at that point we are talking politics.

I agree with this, but would add that "prosperity" is not just material but also about things like opportunities to fulfill one's potential, to participate in society, to have agency in one's own life, and so on.

My observation is that patriarchy systematically limits those things for women, and indeed for men of lower status. Therefore I cannot see patriarchy as compatible with the will of God, who took on flesh in order that we may have life to the full.

@JustaPewFiller, in response to why many pastors seem to be blind to mistreatment of women, you may find this interesting:

stevevw · Sep 13, 2024

I think 'hierarchy' is a baited word. As humans we naturally form social hierarchies and in fact most living things do in one way or another.

I think men and women are naturally better at some things and its got nothing to do with power relations. Its this injection of modern day politics about bascially all human behaviour and outcomes are to do with power that is the problem.

If a male or female are naturally better at stuff this sort of rises to the top because, well its better, its more efficent, its a benefit and more relatable and inclined. Males naturally dominate STEM because they think in more rational and spatial terms. Women on average are more social and we see that in the care industries. But none of this or very little, a lot less than being made out is to do with denying anyone.

This idea that males and females should be the same, that we can easily substitute gender or recreate each gender to be the same is unreal and an ideological belief that is itself just as much a problem that causes division.

Except in this case its pushing an unreal view of reality based purely on a narrow belief and assumption about who humans are, nature and reality itself and how we should order society according to social constructions and not GOds order.

So it may be that males were designed to suit certain roles and females other certain roles based on their fundemental nature, Gods natural order.

That doesn't mean its a hard and fast rule. But with most things theres a balance. Its neither hard and fast but its neither the same for both men and women. But we should recognise these differences and not make them political which seems to be the way we have been going lately political correctness.

okay · Sep 13, 2024

stevevw said:
That doesn't mean its a hard and fast rule.

But a patriarchal system basically does make it a hard and fast rule. Men hold the power, and women are excluded from it with few exceptions.

stevevw said:
Males naturally dominate STEM because they think in more rational and spatial terms

You make it sound so simple! But even if you limit the folks you are talking about to those that are very high performers on things like math assessments, men are still massively over-represented in STEM leadership. This is much more complicated than 'those that are better at STEM rise to the top'. There is a reason why trying to understand this is an active research topic.

One thing for sure is that the culture in some STEM fields is hostile to women. My wife and I are both engineers at different companies, and her experience matches my observations: a woman can propose a solution and it will be ignored, then a few minutes later a man will propose the same solution and it will get adopted and he will get the credit. Women are regularly talked over at meetings, and if they are more assertive, they get a reputation for being 'bossy'. Managers are more likely to push women into less technical roles and give the best technical work to men. Even someone like my wife, who earned a PhD from a top-10 university in her field, gets treated this way. So who do you think rises to technical leadership?

To some degree, men dominate STEM because they have created an unhealthy subculture that keeps it that way.

I think this is a terrible remnant of patriarchy, not an argument for it.

I wouldn't be surprised if some other male-dominant fields have similar situations.

stevevw · Sep 13, 2024

okay said:
But a patriarchal system basically does make it a hard and fast rule. Men hold the power, and women are excluded from it with few exceptions.

Most of the areas people complain about as male domination have nothing to do with exclusion or abusing power. Take the building and construction industry which is dominated by males. Builders laborers are around 95% males. Thats because they are more suited.

Male primates dominate hierarchies do you think they are exclusing females. But then in some species females dominate. Do you think they are excluding males.

okay said:
You make it sound so simple! But even if you limit the folks you are talking about to those that are very high performers on things like math assessments, men are still massively over-represented in STEM leadership. This is much more complicated than 'those that are better at STEM rise to the top'. There is a reason why trying to understand this is an active research topic.

Most of the reason males dominate STEM is through natural and free choice. Studies done in Scandinavian countries who are the most egalitarian nations show that we there are no restrictions and equal opportunity for work males naturallt drift towards STEM and females the social care industries.

That is they choose what they relate to and feel inclined to want to do for various reasons.

okay said:
One thing for sure is that the culture in some STEM fields is hostile to women. My wife and I are both engineers at different companies, and her experience matches my observations: a woman can propose a solution and it will be ignored, then a few minutes later a man will propose the same solution and it will get adopted and he will get the credit. Women are regularly talked over at meetings, and if they are more assertive, they get a reputation for being 'bossy'. Managers are more likely to push women into less technical roles and give the best technical work to men. Even someone like my wife, who earned a PhD from a top-10 university in her field, gets treated this way. So who do you think rises to technical leadership?

I am not saying this doesn't happen but its made out far worse than it is. Besides women do the same even to each other and become very catty trying to outcompete each other. To some extent its inherent in the system. In a society that pushes careers and money over all else there is going to be competition.

You can get the same thing happeniong in female dominant industries like teaching and care work. Males are dismissed as untrustworthy and too brutish because these industries have become feminised and look upon male traits negatively.

okay said:
To some degree, men dominate STEM because they have created an unhealthy subculture that keeps it that way.

Like I said when everything is equal males end up dominating Stem. So most of this is natural and has nothing to do with anyone abusing people.

Its like ideology, where all differences in outcomes are blamed on race, sex and gender while ignoring the multitude of other factors that may cause these differences. Its a narrow way to view the world.

okay said:
I think this is a terrible remnant of patriarchy, not an argument for it.

I disagree and think that its overblown due to misrepresaentation of reality. Its also unhealthy that people blame what may be a natural inclination as being abusive. It denies nature, individual ability and undermines the merit.

okay said:
I wouldn't be surprised if some other male-dominant fields have similar situations.

So what about the teaching industry. Massively dominated by females. Is that an abuse of power and excluding males. Or does it only count when males are dominating.

We could go through all the areas of society, in work, public service roles, military, health, social welfare, sports, even social activities and we can find that certain sexes dominate. Society form natural and healthy hierarchies to be able to function.

People want the best person for the job. They want efficency, value for money, and whatever it is that will benefit them and society. They don't care about the sex, race or gender. If males are better ar the trade like hard and dirty work, plumbing, building, mining and logistics then they rise to the top because they are better at it. If women dominate the care and service industries like nursing, teaching, social welfare then its because they are better at it than males. They are more social, emotional. nurturing than men.

Not every differernce or even domination is because people are purposely being evil and have a secret agenda about abusing others. This paints a horrible picture of humans and is very cynical.

okay · Sep 13, 2024

stevevw said:
Not every differernce or even domination is because people are purposely being evil and have a secret agenda about abusing others.

Agreed. I never claimed there were no differences. But your original statement claimed

stevevw said:
Males naturally dominate STEM because they think in more rational and spatial terms.

I was simply pointing out that they dominate to a much higher degree than seems to be explained by ability to think rationally and spatially. It is much more complicated. Your last post seems to agree with me that it is more complicated.

stevevw said:
This paints a horrible picture of humans and is very cynical.

The stories I told about what I have seen and my wife has experienced in workplaces are just the truth. Not everyone at these companies is a bad actor (the overwhelming majority are not) and some of the ‘guilty’ don’t even realize they are talking over or ignoring women. Some of us try to speak up when we see things happen, but problems are pretty persistent. Some of my female colleagues have shared some of their bad work experiences with me, and they sound the same as what my wife experiences.

Recently we have been getting DEI training that seems to be helping a little at my workplace, but the change is slow…

The Liturgist · Sep 14, 2024

QuestionQuest74 said:
Is that for God’s will or against it ?

That depends on what one means by Patriarchal.

If you mean male-dominated, in which women have no rights and no vote, or are otherwise the victims of discrimination, I think not. My mother served as the president of a major group of conservative women in the United States in my youth, and I loved those ladies, who were extremely conservative, and who loved me greatly and formed what was very much an extended family for me, in addition to the lovely elderly people of my extended family - I remember fondly from my childhood our family reunions in a small town in northwestern Illinois, with so many lovely men and women. I could count on being kissed on my cheek or forehead at least 50 by my various loving elderly aunts, and a few hundred more times by the elderly ladies of the Republican Women. It was a delight, as these women shared the values of my maternal grandmother, and were like additional grandmothers, and unfortunately my paternal grandmother died before I was born. Unfortunately I was born after the Baby Boom, so there were only a handful of second cousins who were close to me in age.

Indeed one friend of mine during my childhood was no less a woman than Evelyn Smith, who instructed me in my youth on human morality and sex education. Indeed left-wing members of the forum who know who Evelyn Smith was might be horrified but not surprised to learn that I received my education in sexual morality from her, but I feel greatly blessed by the fact, for it was she who taught me about the importance of human sexuality being confined to holy matrimony.

She was sued for refusing to rent an apartment to a couple that was unwed, and took the case to the Supreme Court on appeal, but since this was in 1996, a time when the US Supreme Court was dominated by sexist men of dubious morality, neither they nor the other judges in the case made the morally correct deicion of agreeing with her. Since obviously, if an unwed couple cannot rent an apartment, far less can a judge or other powerful man maintain an apartment in which to keep young men and women who they are in a relationship with - a relationship which I would argue, owing to the huge power disparity between a young person like, say, Monica Lewinsky, and their lover, such as the disgraced 42nd President who presided over the morally loose decade of the 1990s, which was an epoch that, like the period from 1965-1975, saw a rapid global erosion in sexual morality and the integrity of the family, with the nomralization of adultery (since even the president was doing it), arsenokoetia (since even the President of the United States was engaging in such indecent acts with Monica Lewinsky), and the punishment of virtue (since Evelyn Smith was sued for monetary damages, and lost, for seeking to preserve scriptural morality within her own apartment building, by refusing to lease an apartment to those persons cohabitating without being in a state of Holy Matrimony.

+

So no, I do not support Patriarchy, as meant by the OP, since men are evil. Neither do I support Matriarchy, since women are also evil. Rather, I support a culture of love between men and women, not lust, and sexual only in the context of marriage, but rather, humans should model their relations between each other on the Holy Trinity, an eternal union of three coequal, coeternal and uncreated persons, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, who are so closely united as to share in the unoriginate essence of the Father, from whom the Son is begotten before all ages, and the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds. Three persons, three hypostasis, one God, unchanging, unbounded, unconstrained, indivisible, inscrutable, incomprehensible except through the uncreated energies such as the Grace of the Holy Spirit and in the Incarnation of the Logos, the Only Begotten Son and Word of God who reveals to us the Father, who is otherwise unseen and invisible, since no one comes to God the Father except through His Son, our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ. And we come to Jesus Christ through faith, which is motivated and sustained by the salvific grace of God the Holy Spirit, who is everywhere present and fills all things, and who convicts us of sin, and gives us a knowledge of the truth, so that some people who were not fortunate enough to be baptized into the faith as children will still be moved to convert to Christianity in adulthood.

Unfortunately, it is the case that some sexist Christians have introduced new errors, and in some cases, gross heresy, that is triadological in nature (triadology is the theology of the Holy Trinity), in an attempt to bolster their sexist position. For example, the doctrine of the Eternal Submission of the Son is one promoted by some sexist Calvinists, and which in some cases is taught in such a way as to deny the Coequality of Persons, which is an integral aspect of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, and thus has resulted in some people effectively resorting to semi-Arianism or crypto-Arianism in an effort to discredit the Orthodox doctrine that we are to make ourselves an icon of the Holy Trinity, which presumes a coequality of persons, such as seen in the holy icon of St. Andrei Rublev, The Hospitality of Abraham:

The Hospitality of Abraham, which depicts three angels, and represents, symbolically, according to the typological prophecy often found in Genesis, the Holy Trinity.

+

I do support the Holy Patriarchs who are the presiding bishops of the Orthodox Churches, such as His Beatitude John X Yazigi, the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, His Holiness Mor Ignatius Aphrem II, the Syriac Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, His Holiness, Tawadros (Theodore) II, the Coptic Orthodox Pope of Alexandria, and His Beatitude Theodore II, the Greek Orthodox Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa, and His Holiness Abune Mathias, the Patriarch and Catholicos of Ethiopia, and His Holiness Ilia II, the Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia, who recently turned 91 (Orthodox bishops do not have a mandatory retirement age).

While Orthodox priests are usually married, with children, serving as the Presbyter and Presbytera of the parish, in a fatherly and motherly way to the entire congregation, Orthodox bishops are celibate - some are older men who are continent, but most are monastics who previously served as the Hegumen (Abbot) of a monastery or as a Hieromonk (monastic priest) either within a monastery or assigned to a parish, with most bishops in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, although I don’t recall this being a thing in Oriental Orthodoxy, that the Archmandrite is someone who is in rank equivalent to a Hegumen, having first been promoted to the intermediate rank of Archimandrite (which is kind of like a monastic Archpriest, although if I recall, and @prodromos and @dzheremi can hopefully confirm for me if I am right both in my recollection of the nature of this office, and the non-existence of archimandrites at present in the Oriental Orthodox church, although perhaps there is an equivalent office; there is an Ethiopian clerical rank the name of which I forget which strikes me as having a similar meaning). At any rate, bishops, both within the monastic setting and among parishes, usually either cathedrals or small mission parishes which cannot afford to support a married priest and their family, have experience with pastoral care.

However, even then, a further sacrifice is required in addition to the sacrifice required to become a monastic, or even a married presbyter, and that is that Eastern Orthodox monks who become bishops are inelliglble to receive the Great Schema, the attainment of which is the goal for most Orthodox monks, and which represents the highest possible monastic status within Orthodoxy. Indeed, I would argue that it is the schemamonks and schemanuns who are the most influential people within Orthodoxy. For example, the influence of leading schemamonks and schemanuns, such as Elder Ephrem, memory eternal, or Mother Mary, memory eternal, exceeds that of most bishops (despite the fact that in the case of Mother Mary, we know almost nothing about her, other than her work translating, with Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, memory eternal, the Philokalia and various liturgical texts such as the Triodion and Festal Menaion. Bishops have temporal power over the church, but not the kind of lasting spiritual influence of the schemamonks and schemanuns who serve as Gerons and Gerondas (male and female elders) large numbers of the faithful.

dzheremi · Sep 14, 2024

The Liturgist said:
the Archmandrite is someone who is in rank equivalent to a Hegumen, having first been promoted to the intermediate rank of Archimandrite (which is kind of like a monastic Archpriest, although if I recall, and @prodromos and @dzheremi can hopefully confirm for me if I am right both in my recollection of the nature of this office, and the non-existence of archimandrites at present in the Oriental Orthodox church, although perhaps there is an equivalent office; there is an Ethiopian clerical rank the name of which I forget which strikes me as having a similar meaning).

Eh...I don't know that this question is really answerable as asked, as it is not at all clear from the historical usage of the term in an Egyptian context that it referred to a specific rank as opposed to a title of sorts which may or may not have been attached to the organizational structure of monasteries/a monastery itself. At least that's how interpret historical overviews of the term like the one found in the Coptic Encyclopedia, which points out (for example) that St. Shenouda the Archimandrite (who is invariably referred to in this manner, whether in Coptic, Arabic, or any other language) certainly was the superior of the White Monastery in his time, but that this particular monastery was not further structurally organized, unlike in the case of Abba Jeremiah and others for whom the 'definition' is a bit more stable (as superiors of groups of monasteries; again, there were no further divisions into component structures within the monastery led by St. Shenouda, so if that were the definition meant to be applied to all, he would have never been known as "the archimandrite", since there weren't groups of anything under him beyond I suppose the natural division of the monastery's inhabitants into male and female monastics).

This shows that within the space of the contiguous lives of two saints of the same Church (St. Shenouda was born the same year that St. Pachomius departed: 348), it is already unclear how exactly the term is to be applied. Perhaps the cenobitic monasticism of Pachomius and others favored one definition, while hermitic monasticism of Shenouda favored another, but again, it's not really possible to substantiate that across the board, because it assumes a sort of overarching superstructure to entire regions or communities of monasteries which just isn't evident. Heck, the same article points out that there's no evidence of the term being used at all to apply to anyone in the monasteries of Nitria, which just so happened to be the home for a time of Palladius, writer of the Lausiac History that largely popularized the term "archimandrite" in the first place.

So I'm not convinced that this was a rank that used to exist that was more recently replaced with something else in the Coptic Orthodox Church (can't speak for the Syrians et al.), at least not if by 'existing' we would mean that it ever had such a cut-and-dry definition as to be referred to as a "rank", as I know the Eastern Orthodox refer to it.

The Liturgist · Sep 14, 2024

dzheremi said:
Eh...I don't know that this question is really answerable as asked, as it is not at all clear from the historical usage of the term in an Egyptian context that it referred to a specific rank as opposed to a title of sorts which may or may not have been attached to the organizational structure of monasteries/a monastery itself. At least that's how interpret historical overviews of the term like the one found in the Coptic Encyclopedia, which points out (for example) that St. Shenouda the Archimandrite (who is invariably referred to in this manner, whether in Coptic, Arabic, or any other language) certainly was the superior of the White Monastery in his time, but that this particular monastery was not further structurally organized, unlike in the case of Abba Jeremiah and others for whom the 'definition' is a bit more stable (as superiors of groups of monasteries; again, there were no further divisions into component structures within the monastery led by St. Shenouda, so if that were the definition meant to be applied to all, he would have never been known as "the archimandrite", since there weren't groups of anything under him beyond I suppose the natural division of the monastery's inhabitants into male and female monastics).

This shows that within the space of the contiguous lives of two saints of the same Church (St. Shenouda was born the same year that St. Pachomius departed: 348), it is already unclear how exactly the term is to be applied. Perhaps the cenobitic monasticism of Pachomius and others favored one definition, while hermitic monasticism of Shenouda favored another, but again, it's not really possible to substantiate that across the board, because it assumes a sort of overarching superstructure to entire regions or communities of monasteries which just isn't evident. Heck, the same article points out that there's no evidence of the term being used at all to apply to anyone in the monasteries of Nitria, which just so happened to be the home for a time of Palladius, writer of the Lausiac History that largely popularized the term "archimandrite" in the first place.

So I'm not convinced that this was a rank that used to exist that was more recently replaced with something else in the Coptic Orthodox Church (can't speak for the Syrians et al.), at least not if by 'existing' we would mean that it ever had such a cut-and-dry definition as to be referred to as a "rank", as I know the Eastern Orthodox refer to it.

Thank you for this very interesting reply!

I had a very good copy of the Lausiac History, in print, but since it is available online, I gave my print copy to St. Anthony’s to sell in their bookstore.

stevevw · Sep 15, 2024

okay said:
Agreed. I never claimed there were no differences. But your original statement claimed

I cannot see how this is the case. I was pointing out that there are natural differences as to why males and females don't end up in the same place.

okay said:
I was simply pointing out that they dominate to a much higher degree than seems to be explained by ability to think rationally and spatially. It is much more complicated. Your last post seems to agree with me that it is more complicated.

OK well I am only going off what you said. You seemed to be emphasizing male abuse of power out of all the possible reasons why males may end up dominating STEM.

okay said:
The stories I told about what I have seen and my wife has experienced in workplaces are just the truth. Not everyone at these companies is a bad actor (the overwhelming majority are not) and some of the ‘guilty’ don’t even realize they are talking over or ignoring women. Some of us try to speak up when we see things happen, but problems are pretty persistent. Some of my female colleagues have shared some of their bad work experiences with me, and they sound the same as what my wife experiences.

Recently we have been getting DEI training that seems to be helping a little at my workplace, but the change is slow…

Like I said there is a small minority that will engage in dominating behaviour but ideologues make out its the majority when its not. But women will engage in the same behaviour.

In some ways its natural. Humans can become very competitive. What do you expect from a society that places so much importance on having a career and getting to the top. Both genders and all humans engage in competitive behaviour and will push to keep competitors down as it is a threat to their position.

As women have become more dominant in certain industries they display the same behaviour as males. Its not just a male thing. But males are made out to be the evil ones.

Does God want us to live in a patriarchal society ?

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