There have been a couple of articles elsewhere on the interweb recently about the relationship between men and women in marriage, specifically on what Ephesians 5 has to say about headship and submission.
In this article, Andrew Bartlett has written a review of Kevin DeYoung’s book, Men and Women in the Church, a short, practical, Biblical introduction. I’m not going to engage with the whole review, partly because I haven’t read Kevin’s book. However, I wanted to pick up on a specific thing that Andrew says:
Andrew comments:
In Ephesians 5, Paul’s own indication of the meaning of his ‘head’ metaphor, as applied to the husband, is in Eph 5:23 (literally, “a husband is head of the wife as also the Messiah is head of the church, himself saviour of the body”). Addressing husbands, Paul spells out the practical content of the “saviour” idea in Eph 5:25-33a. It is all about humble, self-sacrificial love and care. Not one word telling a husband to exercise authority over his wife. But the spectacles screen this out. KD never quotes or even notices the critical words “saviour of the body”. He interprets the metaphor as if Paul’s explanation had been “lord over the body” [Chs 4, 5, 8]. Paul’s phrase “as to the Lord” (v 22) is not an instruction to husbands. If KD’s patriarchal viewpoint is correct, why is there no statement in Ephesians 5—or even in the whole of the Bible—that husbands ought to exercise authority over their wives?
I’ve got to admit that this is confusing because whilst Andrew has been dismissive of Kevin’s exegetical skills, I’m rather unconvinced by his exegesis here. It’s always a risky business to get into an argument about what a “literal” translation means because “literal” as in “formal equivalence” does not necessarily mean that it is the best translation/makes the most sense of the text. Furthermore, I think that we can be just as much at risk of filling our “literal translations” with our personal interpretations.
So, in Andrew’s case, I think he has skewed things a little. He is right to note that Paul talks of Christ as “head of the church” and as “saviour of the body” but to insist then that “saviour of the body” explains what “head” means and that this is further filled out by v 25 requires a series of eisegetical leaps. It seems more fitting to see the two terms as distinct. Christ is both head over the church and he is saviour of the body. There is a link between the two, Christ’s headship seems in some way to be connected to his act of salvation, we might say that he has won the right, he has paid the price. However, Christ’s headship is eternal and so, it was because he was the true head of his people that we are in him as we were in Adam, which meant that he was the one who could save us.
The problem with Andrew’s collapsing of “head” into “saviour is something I suspect was unintended on his part., I think Andrew has muddied the waters and taken us in an unhelpful direction, not one he wants to take us in but one that many seem to be heading into. There is a line of argument in some “patriarchal” quarters which in effect makes the husband his wife’s saviour. That’s territory we all want to stay well clear of.
Which leads me to the second article. Jonathan Leeman has written about the limits and purpose of a husband’s role in marriage, so he is dealing with the same issues that Andrew is. I suspect that Andrew would like much of what Jonathan has to say. He passionately insists that a husband doesn’t get to lord it over his wife, to boss her around. He also pays significant attention to what Paul says about what Christ does.
Jonathan would also want to insist that a husband is not his wife’s saviour. However, we have this paragraph from him.
“Yet a man who loves his wife as he should prepares her, in a sense, for the coming of Christ, her perfect and all-sufficient Savior. A wife should be able to watch her husband in order to learn what Jesus’s love and authority are like. It’s as if, when Jesus shows up, she’ll more easily recognize him because she’s been watching her husband imitate Christ’s patterns for years.”
I think I know what he is trying to say but I’m not convinced that this is as helpful or accurate as he would want it to be. The risk here is that it places the focus on one person in the relationship. It makes a husband his wife’s pastor. She looks to him to see the Gospel and that is getting a little bit close to husband as (kind of saviour) for comfort. To be sure, a husband can help point his wife to Christ but remember that in Genesis 2, God identifies man’s need for a “helper” and that is in the context of obedience to his command, we might argue that what the man needs is someone to help him obey God’s command and so be kept safe from sin. A wife as helper is also there to point her husband to Christ.
I think Leeman puts it better in the next paragraph where he says:
Husbands exist, in short, to show the world that Jesus Christ loves his people, the church, with a perfect, all-affectionate, and self-sacrificing love.
This puts the focus in a better place, the witness is not so much internal in the marriage, and this is important because the previous paragraph raised big questions about the implications for single people. Indeed, where Jonathan writes “husbands exist …” I think he would do better to say “Marriage exists …” It’s the husband and wife together who help point the world to Christ and the Gospel. I suspect that in fact, Andrew and Jonathan would both agree on this.
In conclusion, my advice would be that both egalitarians and complementarians need to tread carefully in their handling of salvation language in Ephesians 5.
Faithroots 