Don't mind me. I am used to the more radical kind of egalitarian feminists who love to say that patriarchy is evil, and the cause of just about all the evil in the world! I like to remind them of the dangers of radical egalitarianism – esp. in its Maoist, Leninist, Stalinist forms.

Yes, you are correct. Extremes are not good things.
The problem is in the human heart, and a change of structure will not necessarily produce a nicer, kinder rule, as human history has proven many times over.

I like your “equality of opportunity” comment, which I would tend to agree with in many ways.

Even so, when a woman and a man decide to get married, and are both Christians, then there is a model that God gives us in His Word. It is a balanced model, where woman was made for man, but lest man get all proud, man is reminded that they came from a woman, their mother.

There is interdependence within a gender-based heirarchy.

I'm rambling, now.

Then, there's the idea of what women tend to do, not what they can or should be allowed to do. Women tend to get married, leave their professions, – or work part time – and raise children.

Men tend to get married, and work hard to provide for their families, even after all the attempts of the radicalism of the past decades to change that pattern. It sure seems to be a matter of nature over nurture.

Thank you for you comments, Andrew, and please take care,
Donna L. Carlaw

Contemporary egalitarianism typically takes the form of equality of opportunity; namely, that all persons should be equally free to compete on merit for offices and positions within society that we consider to be economic and social goods. This is obviously not socialism/communism, and it's also obviously not Biblical hierarchicalism.

Some people value contemporary egalitarianism; others — like Deborah and Amy — value hierarchicalism. All I was pointing out was that this is a real choice, and that you can't have both.

I think that there's a problem with us complementarians insisting that we are ontologically equal. We are not.

We are all fully human – male female, child, adult, embroyo, zygote, handicapped and even the brain dead are all created in God's image, and are fully human. Are we all equally human, as in male=female? No. Are we all the same? No, we are not.

The Bible never speaks in these terms of equality as post-modern society understands it. We are not all equal. We are all individuals. We are all created in the image of God. We are all fully human. We are not all equal.

Think of the snow flake. There are no two alike, yet they all share a common “snow flakeness”. Each one is unique. I don't see that God creates equality. He creates uniqueness, even within what appears to be sameness. He does not create redundancy. If men and women are equal, then one of us is redundant.

It is the “equally human” idea that can be downright dangrous to human life – as shown by the abortion laws in the US since Roe v. Wade. An unborn child was not viewed to be equal to its mother as far as humanity goes, therefore the mother can choose to get rid of that collection of cells growing inside her body.

I won't go into detail how secular egalitarianism – better known as socialism or even Communism – has been one of the most destructive forces that the earth has ever known. It is easy to document this, if anyone wishes. I won't go into detail about what I have observed myself in my visits to egalitarian societies. I was given a very cruel nick-name for pointing out to egalitarians where much of their thinking comes from.

Are we all human in the same way, IOW? Does male=female ontologically? I don't think that it does, but we all reflect God's image and are created for His purposes and glory.

We were not created for the same purpose. We were not designed to do the same things. Our gender is very much part of who we are. There is no such thing as a non-gendered human being. We are not evolving towards androgyny, the ideal of many egalitarians.

I AM a woman, a wife, and a mother – ontologically. A man is none of those things, even though we are both created in the image of God, and are both fully human. I was created to fulfill those roles – and more. Woman, wife, mother go way beyond what I do.

My husband IS a man, a husband, and a father. He was created to be those things, to fulfill those roles – and more.

This is a pitfall of these discussions. We dare not insist that men and women are equal ontologically, and then turn around and insist that we can't all do the same things.

So, we need to look at what we were designed for.

Yes, as far as our salvation goes, we stand on the same spiritual ground of the finished work of Christ as our brothers in Christ do. In that relationship there is no difference. In Christ, there is no male or female.

However, I did not quit being a woman when Christ saved me.

Anonymous Andrew made some good points, IMO.

Well, I'm harrassed you enough for now, Amy.

God bless, and please take care,
Donna L. Carlaw

Hank Hanegraaf, for instance, contends that men and women are “ontologically equal” but ordained for different roles. To me, that's either sweet-sounding nonsense (at best) or being deliberately disingenous. Of course being first flute is not equal to being second flute. That's not to say — as you do in your post — that people can't enjoy being second flute. But we shouldn't pretend that they're the exact same thing.

In other words: hierarchy and egalitarianism are incommensurate. Either the Bible spells out a different (and subordinate) plan for women that denies that they are ontologically equal to men; or it affirms their equality but does not prescribe particular roles. You can have one or the other, but not both

Thoughts?

My purpose is not to argue against CBE/egalitarians so much as it is to build my own case for what I believe from the beginning, so I wasn't meaning to imply anything about them specifically. But thanks for clarifying that point in case anyone misunderstood.

Even so, egalitarians do not have problems with heirarchy, per se, any more than the rest of us.

In the egalitarian marriage, both the husband and the wife are supposed to submit to one another. Sometimes the husband leads, and sometimes the wife, is the idea.

I'm not an egalitarian, BTW. Their mutual submission idea in the marriage bond is the least of their problems, IMO. There's a lot of error and outright heresy creeping into egalitarian circles. It is getting more blatant, as the CBE shifts to the left, along with prominent seminary profs and authors.

I'm just not sure if you are getting ready to set up a straw man argument, that egalitarians are anti-heirarchy.

No problem.

God bless,
Donna L. Carlaw

Your observations reminded me of another point: I think that leaving it up to the couple (in a marriage) to determine who is the leader leads to the same problem I mentioned about the band I'm playing in currently. If someone outside the relationship (the band director, or in the case of marriage, God) designates the leader, it's settled and people can respect the office and work well together. But if the people within the relationship have to decide for themselves, there will be no end of striving and competition between them–not to mention resentment that one has taken leadership when he (or she) has no more real authority than the other.

Outside designation (from someone with even greater authority) is very important for creating a structure that everyone can work well within.