A comment by Hank on The Way I need Jesus got me thinking. Is there such a thing as a “biblical notion of husband and wife?” What notion are we talking about? Pre-Israel marriage? We gonna pattern it after the marriages in Genesis? Ancient Israel? 2nd Kings? Isn’t that what got us good US citizens up in arms against the Mormons a hundred or so years ago (poly-what?)? Are we gonna talk about the Jewish ideas of what marriage is in the time of Jesus? Are we gonna talk about marriage as it was practiced by the Romans (i.e. baby factories = wives)? Are we going to talk about those writing in the name of Paul when they are giving advice on how to be a couple of equality under the yoke of the empire?
The more I look at actual marriages in the Bible the less I am enamored with the monolithic notion of the so-called “biblical notion of husband and wife.” We need to realize that marriages in our Holy Scriptures are described (not prescribed) in different structures with different power realationships between the parties involved.
We see in the myth of Genesis 3 the consequences of the fall in marriages – women and men will try to dominate each other. This arragement (both women looking to dominate their husbands and husband dominating their wives) is unnatural; God teaches us this in Genesis and He confirms it in the writings of Paul.
It gives me great pleasure to see people attempt to justify our culture’s (or rather the 1950’s) version of marriage where one party dominates the other.
With the coming of the Kingdom of God, we must work to restore the equality inherent in the “two becoming one flesh” by means of our practice and our teachings. What we need to do is rediscover the the pre-fall power relations between husband and wife and make those relations real in our lives. It is up to us to enact the Kingdom of God on Earth – now.
