Sherry takes the Bible out of context to justify abuse...

[Witsec6]

I know, surprise, right?

bealivingsacrifice.blogspot.com/2011/08/marriage-part-4-wife-are-you-really.html

The phrase “as unto the Lordâ€, in Ephesians 5:22, means “as if he is the Lordâ€. God is saying to submit to our husbands authority in the same way we would submit to Him, out of love and obedience to God, for the sake of our husbands position, not because he personally has EARNED IT.

Our society says that respect and subjection have to be EARNED, but God commands us to respect and submit to our husband's because of his position of authority, not because he has personally earned it by his behavior. Actually, this makes it so much easier to submit when our husbands are not having the right attitude.

First of all, Ephesians 2:21 says "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ"

Next, the whole letter to Ephesians is full of directions to men as well.

Why doesn't anyone write a blog post about how men should love their wives as Christ loves the Church even when their wives "are not having the right attitude".

THERE IS A DIRECT CONNECTION between our ability to submit to the Lord and our ability to submit to our husbands!

How about the direct connection between husband's ability to love and cherish his wife and his ability to love the Lord?

It's this horrible fucking double standard that makes me doubt almost anyone who calls themselves a "Christian" these days.

Edit: Added quote and fixed link.

[Joykins]

I memorized this in High School (Kate is such a fun role) and it always echoes through my head when I hear this stuff:

Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,

Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee,

And for thy maintenance commits his body

To painful labour both by sea and land,

To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,

Whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe;

And craves no other tribute at thy hands

But love, fair looks, and true obedience-

Too little payment for so great a debt.

Such duty as the subject owes the prince,

Even such a woman oweth to her husband;

And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour,

And not obedient to his honest will,

What is she but a foul contending rebel

And graceless traitor to her loving lord?

I am asham'd that women are so simple

To offer war where they should kneel for peace;

Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,

When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.

Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth,

Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,

But that our soft conditions and our hearts

Should well agree with our external parts?

Come, come, you forward and unable worms!

My mind hath been as big as one of yours,

My heart as great, my reason haply more,

To bandy word for word and frown for frown;

But now I see our lances are but straws,

Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,

That seeming to be most which we indeed least are.

Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot,

And place your hands below your husband's foot;

In token of which duty, if he please,

My hand is ready, may it do him ease.

It can be played many ways, from battered wife to fully ironic. Playing it straight is probably the least fun.

[Hane]

Joykins, thank you for posting that! Years ago, in a Boston used book store, I saw a book entitled "Shakespeare's Heroines, By An Actress," and I wish to hell I'd bought it. In the chapter about "The Taming of the Shrew," the author points out that Kate is both framing herself as a worthy and acceptable member of society--AND stating her demands: that a husband go out and work his tail off while she's comfortable at home. She also, in the scene in which they're traveling to her sister's wedding, puts him squarely down when he tries to play a prank at her expense.

I read this speech as ironic: Petruchio is a high-society playboy, and would have absolutely no occasion to "commit his body/To painful labour both by sea and land" or "to watch the night in storms, the day in cold."

[O Latin]

Not really on topic, but "The Taming of the Shrew" is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays. Our local Shakespeare Festival is doing a production of it this summer and I can't wait to go see it next week.

[kaetrin]

Ugh, I went to college with a girl who asserted that "Taming of the Shrew" was the best of Shakespeare's plays because it reflected the most godly Christian morals or something like that.

Also, that speech is included non-ironically in Beall Phillips' anthology "Verses of Virtue" along with much horrible didactic Victorian poetry written by men.

[Witsec6]

I would expect nothing less from Beall.