- Mar 4, 2005
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And now your beginning to understand the subtle attack on the family from the other versions.
Not at all.
Firstly, if a word is in a number of versions of the Bible, especially the original Greek, that suggests to me that it should be there.
Secondly, women were not allowed to have more than one husband, so when Paul says "they should ask their husbands at home", it means that they should go home and ask their husbands. The word "own" suggests to me that women were asking their questions to the nearest available man in the meeting, whether he was her husband or not.
"Asking your husband at home" suggests that the time and place to ask questions was in private - your home - and to your husband; not calling out in the meeting. This actually fits with the idea of submission and man as head, if you think about it, although that is not the emphasis of the passage.
To emphasise "your own" husband, instead of just "your husband", is not an attack on the family.
. The King James is different than most other bibles.
Which doesn't make it the REAL Bible, implying that others are false, tarnished or misleading.
The family is very important to God and anything that makes women dominate or rule over their husbands and usurp their authority is false and dangerous to the church.
MAKES women rule over their husbands??
Firstly, the issue of women being called to preach, or lead a church, is not connected to the issue of male headship. For those who insist that a woman must be under male authority, it is likely that she would have a male vicar, senior vicar, dean, Superintendent, suffragan bishop, bishop, archbishop, President or Pope. So her "boss" or "superiors" would likely be male. But even if they weren't, a vicar or Minister cannot go into a church, tell people what to do, throw their weight around etc; decisions are referred to, and made by, the church council/PCC/leadership team/elders. The vicar/Minister chairs the meeting but cannot even vote, unless the vote is tied.
This has nothing to do with how a husband and wife make their own decisions about their family/future.
Secondly, in Scripture, women sometimes advised their husbands.
In Genesis, God told Abraham to listen to his wife.
Moses was apparently about to be killed by God, until his wife saved him, Exodus 4:25.
When Ruth lay down under Boaz's blanket she was, in effect, proposing to him.
Deborah had a husband. Whatever the relationship between the two of them, she was still called to lead the whole nation, Judges 4:4.
Pontius Pilate's wife had a dream about Jesus, and told her husband not to have anything to do with him. Pilate didn't listen, and has been known ever since as the man who washed his hands of involvement in Jesus' death - and who didn't listen to his wife.
Thirdly, there are Christian men who don't step up to their responsibility as head of the household - or maybe even agree that they should be. Husbands and wives, in my experience, make decisions together, before the Lord. True, if there is disagreement, the husband is maybe meant to have the casting vote, but this doesn't happen all the time. There may be areas which are the wife's responsibility, or about which she has more knowledge. Then the husband might willingly leave it to her.
You seem to be saying that if a woman is called to lead a church, family life will disintegrate and her husband will feel emasculated. That is not necessarily the case.
It also goes without saying that not all female clergy/preachers have husbands.
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