Lest you forget - Paul was single. And celibate.

And regarding “Unto the woman He said… your desire shall be to your husband, and he shall rule over you.” Welcome to the first time women discovered the value of a headache.

OK, I know you were being snarky, but since I’m apparently the resident representative of orthodoxy, I suppose I should weigh in. I refrained from doing so in the abortion post to avoid sidetracking it.

I get my hackles up when this issue comes up because people on both sides of the discussion misunderstand what is meant my Submission in the biblical context. It’s used as a cudgel to subjugate women inappropriately, and it’s used as an excuse to dismiss the Bible as authoritative. And in both case, the conclusion is a result of either: A) Approaching scripture eith a predetermined conclusion already in mind and cherry-picking to support that bias; B) Misinterpretation of the scripture in question; C) Usually both.

So let’s take a look at the scriptures from a literalist but not fundamentalist POV:

Regarding Genesis 3:16 you do realize, don’t you, that God is describing one of the results of the Fall, and therefore what He’s describing there is the way an imperfect world will work, NOT the way he intends things to be? Using that as proof that men should “Rule Over” women overlooks the unspoken but obivous “And that’s a bad thing” that is part of the description of life after the Fall.

As for the Pauline exhortations, It’s important to remember three things:
1. Context
2. Context
3. Context

Some things to consider:

Cultural context:

Because most of the early Christians were Jews, most early churches functioned very much like Synagogues. In fact, many WERE synagogues, where all of the Jews of a particular Synagogue had converted to the Way. As such, the congregations would be separated by gender. It has been proposed that ONE of the issues that Paul was addressing here was overal disorder in the church’s meetings, one cause of which was chatter during teaching (as was people speaking in tongues out of turn, eating while brethren starved, etc). I’m not sure I accept this 100%, but it’s at least plausible.

Scriptural Context I:
When Paul talks about the Husband as the head of the wife, one of the most frequently misused scriptures, he makes it plain that this relationship is meant to serve as an object lesson — it reminds us that Christ is the Head of the Church. The relationship has nothing to do with men being inherently superior to women. In fact, like Grace itself or the Gifts, it has nothing to do with the individual believer’s credentials, and everything to do with God establishing it as so for reasons of his own — yet another reminder that It’s Not About Us. This also is true of his exhortation that women not lead the congregation — it’s not because women aren’t intelligent enough or wise enough or devout enough, it’s just the way God says it should be. It’s his creation, he can order it as he sees fit.

Scriptural ContextII:
All of the Pauline exhortations for women to submit to men (specifically the wives to husbands chapters) go hand in hand with exhortations that husbands love their wives and submit to God. For a man to use the scripture to expect his wife to submit to him, but fail to expect himself to submit to God and to sacrificially love his wife (put her needs before his own) is as unscriptural as it is to reject the scriptural pradigm altogether.

Yeah yeah yeah. Context schmontext. Let’s get back to da beyatches being submissive okay?.

Fine, Heretic. Enjoy your pimp hand. I’ll just be over heere gathering firewood.

The font of truth huh? I could have fun with that.

I Demand Specificity

That damn Smallholder. He seems to believe he’s the font of truth, and quite frankly, I would like more information.

Here are several samples to consider:

OR we could go with something a little more on the feminine side, which is probably the m…