But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine...That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. " (Titus 2:4-5)
Sound Doctrine is not a dirty word, and to live by the word of God, and to rebuke, etc. based on it requires basic coherence in it on primary things, and the headship of the Father over Christ, and of Christ over the church, and of the man over the women is not a dark saying that of open to interpretation that denies it as meaning authority with a hierarchical structure, but is quite clear.
Arguments attempting to negate this such as by arguing it was simply cultural, or of the same class and basis as that which sanctioned or tolerated slavery, or that "head" simply means source, and the submission of the wife simply means mutual submission, requires such wresting or ignorance of scripture that they themselves are an argument against positional gender equality.
That's a real shotgun response.
a) Titus. That was a women's role in Roman society. Paul was advocating respect for marriage within that society. It is well attested that marriage was not widely held in honour in those times. An older man would marry a much younger woman whose principal function was to produce an heir. A wife would also have household responsibilities, which in a richer family would entail oversight of servants, hospitality, tradespeople, suppliers and merchants. In such households men would have a mistress (or more) sometimes living in the same house. Slaves were the sexual property of their male owners. Undefiled marriage beds take on a new meaning against this backdrop.
We have records from NT times of the contempt of some male citizens of Christians, their love for each other, most especially that of their wives. Jesus changed family life back then. But it is a cultural mismatch to assume or overlay a modern nuclear family onto those times and the biblical texts about households.
The headship thesis does not square with Scripture. Firstly in is theologically unsound, contradicting all traditional credal statement about the Godhead as Trinity. Then, Paul does not give a hierarchy, and he is most particular in both his logic and choice of words whenever he wrote. A hierarchy would be presented as
God-Jesus-man-Woman But in 1 Cor the order is:
Christ-man-God.
That order has no implications of 'chain of command'. If it did the Paul's teaching would be incompatible with the doctrine of the Trinity
Your final paragraph is a jumble of concepts that you simply declare "WRONG".
Simply cultural? No way. But Paul wrote within and to a cultural environment that was very different from ours, We cannot ignore culture (we don't wear sandals or robes when outside, we don't get water from a well for daily use, we don't live under an authoritarian single ruler and his army, we don't measure in cubits as examples). We must, as our first priority, attempt to determine the meaning as best we can of what both the original authors and their audiences would understand when they heard Paul's letters being read out to them. Only then we can draw out relevant applications for today that best reflect biblical principles.
The meaning of head is something that scholars have not reached consensus on. Therefore we must be cautious before affirming "This is the correct interpretation" of that word. Civil, respectful, informed dialogue becomes necessary.
John
NZ
