Gender Equality

 Gender Equality

Ephesians 5:22-33

            One of the most profound documents ever written is the United States Constitution.  The framers of the Constitution were in many ways wise beyond their time.  Nothing like this had ever been tried before.  There was no model for creating this kind of government, nor for a document that would guide the fledgling country into the future.

            The wisdom of these men can be seen in the endurance of both the democracy and its guiding star.  Not only has the Constitution stood the test of time (more than 200 years in existence), but the number of amendments remains amazingly low.  Our founding fathers couldn’t think of everything (it says nothing, for instance, about the internet), but they gave us a framework which we have used to successfully solve the problems of an ever-changing nation. 

When we think of how much the culture has changed in the past 200 years, we can understand that our founders could not have anticipated everything that has occurred.  Thanks to their wisdom we haven’t had to throw the document out and start over; but we must constantly reinterpret it to meet the needs of our country as we continue to move into the future.  Documents such as our Constitution are written within the confines of a particular time, place, and cultural orientation.  Its genius is that its construction makes reinterpretation possible and avoids the need to replace or drastically modify it.

So it is with the Bible.  The major difference is that it was composed over a much longer time, in many more places, and in a very different culture.  It is impossible to completely understand the Bible without understanding the culture (actually cultures) from which it comes.  How can we accomplish this?  How can we understand enough about biblical cultures to catch even a glimpse of what it meant to those people—and what it might mean to us today?

Gender relations provide a good example.  In the early days of humanity, the important quality for survival was strength—strength to ward off enemies, both human and animal; strength to do the major work of the farm or shop; strength to build the structures for living and working.  To a great extent, that quality is not as necessary as it once was.  With machines to do much of the heavy lifting, women can perform as well as men in such fields as factory work, auto mechanics, flying planes, driving trucks—even soldiering.  As long as a woman can use her brain as well as a man (some would say that’s not difficult), she can do the same work.

Sexual ethics have also changed drastically.  In the days before DNA testing it was necessary for a woman to remain her father’s daughter until she became her husband’s wife.  It was necessary for her to stay at home unless accompanied by a male relative.  This was primarily for economic reasons.  If a woman could not prove that she was a virgin when she married, and then remain faithful to her husband, the inheritance of his property was subject to challenge.  She had to be able to assure everyone that she could not possibly have given birth to another man’s child.  To insure this she had to be virtually imprisoned in her own home.  She was always under male domination, with no possibility of equality.

When we read injunctions such as Paul’s to the Corinthians (or Peter’s in 1 Peter 2:1-7) we must remember the cultural setting in which they were written.  Compare their words with Genesis 2:24.  “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.”  There doesn’t seem to be any domination here.  This sounds like pure equality.  It seems to me that God ordained both members of a couple to be equal partners in the union, both with the same rights and responsibilities—and benefits.  Perhaps we should look carefully at these passages to see what they might mean for us in light of new scientific knowledge.