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Comment by m0llusk | Hacker News Reader

My own experience being raised mainline Protestant was a bit different which might be illustrative: My parents were not at all devout, but still took wisdom and moral lessons from the Bible, especially from the teachings of Jesus. At the same time the preachers in town leaned right in their beliefs and focused on reading and interpreting more obscure passages. This resulted in a modest ongoing tension about what exactly it all meant. Then one Sunday School a conservative leaning preacher taught the kids how to spot witches. That was the last straw and we never went back to Mass or Sunday School and gradually withdrew from everything else with Easter and Christmas being the final holdouts. So I drifted to atheism but still find wisdom in the Bible and dare to compare the passages that focus on Jesus to stories of the Buddha. Culturally there is still quite a bit of influence there, but the fundamentalist component is a massive division like a great wall.

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As a non-practicing Jew, I found the Jefferson bible very inspiring. Stripping the religious trappings from the teachings tempers the whole thing; I really like the humanity: it’s a story about a man with his own foibles, attempting to teach himself & others to be better people.

For those that are confused as to what a 'Jefferson Bible' is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_Bible

"The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, commonly referred to as the Jefferson Bible, is one of two religious works constructed by Thomas Jefferson. The first, The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth, was completed in 1804, but no copies exist today. The second, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, was completed in 1820 by cutting and pasting with a razor and glue numerous sections from the New Testament as extractions of the doctrine of Jesus. Jefferson's condensed composition excludes all miracles by Jesus and most mentions of the supernatural, including sections of the four gospels that contain the Resurrection and most other miracles, and passages that portray Jesus as divine."

https://uuhouston.org/files/The_Jefferson_Bible.pdf Free here

Yes, a surprisingly short read.

Reading it I couldn't help but see Jesus as something of a troll. Like in this passage:

JESUS went unto the mount of Olives.

And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them.

And the scribes and Pharisees brought in a woman caught committing adultery; and when they had set her in the midst,

They say unto him, Master, this woman was caught committing adultery, in the very act.

Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou?

This they said, to test him, that they might have cause to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground.

So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him be the first to cast a stone at her.

And again he stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground.

And they which heard it, began going out one by one, beginning at the eldest: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst.

When Jesus had lifted up himself, he said unto her, Woman, whither are they gone? hath no man condemned thee?

She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.

Jesus was the ultimate troll to the religious authorities, that's why they killed him.

Another great example of his trolling was when he was cornered by a bunch of people wanting to stone him to death:

>31 Again his Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him, 32 but Jesus said to them, 'I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?' 33 We are not stoning you for any good work,' they replied, 'but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.' 34 Jesus answered them, 'Is it not written in your Law, 'I have said you are 'gods''? (He's quoting the 82nd Psalm of the Old Testament here)[1] 35 If he called them 'gods,' to whom the word of God came--and Scripture cannot be set aside-- 36 what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, 'I am God's Son'? 37

[1]82 Psalm if the Old Testament: I said, ‘You are “gods”; you are all sons of the Most High.’

I brought this up in Sunday school at a baptist church and it didn't go over well...

I said we are gods on this Earth because of our power to initiate the creation of a new life and the power to end a life.

That's great hahaha. There are some who believe that's actually what Jesus was trying to say: the he was a son of god (there was no definite article "the" in ancient greek), and that everyone else is too (essentially what the Buddhists and Hindus claim); but that message was misunderstood, misinterpreted, censored, and modified to suit political ends.

There are a number of more esoteric quotes attributed to jesus like the one I posted above which make this case quite compelling

If you have that list, I would be very interested to see it! I've never heard of this interpretation, and my ancient greek is very poor. Not trying to be snarky, or clappingback, or anything, I am actually genuinely interested.

I first stumbled upon this theory in an Alan Watts lecture. Here is relevant clip from the lecture:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2DbsuzTt6g

There are many quotes where Jesus spoke about the union of all people within him and within god. This is basically the same as the Buddhist concept of Indra's Net: the divine unity and mutual interpenetration of all things.

>"There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus"

>"I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me."

>"For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ."

This idea seems to be the logical basis for many of his more commonly known teachings:

>"Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you."

>“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

>"whatsoever you do to the least of your brothers and sisters, you do unto me"

This last quote seems to indicate that when people realized all of the above, they would also realize their equality with jesus as children of god; which is essentially blasphemy to the modern day mainstream interpretation of the King James translation.

>"Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father."

Thank you!

"... But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes."

Great quote.

Funnily enough, this passage is generally considered a later addition to the Gospel of John: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_and_the_woman_taken_in_a...

Why is he a troll here? Seems like a solid message.

When he was asked about what to do with the woman who was brought in, he immediately started ignoring everyone and started doodling in the dirt, and then continued doing so as everyone slowly left. That's a little trollish (although not necessarily in a bad way!)

The stories have Jesus trolling the Pharisees and others. Imagining the reactions and situation behind some of these stories are strong LOL moments.

Seems like the scribes and Pharisees that are trying to troll Jesus and he trolls them back?

To be clear, I think Jesus is trolling the right way. :-)

Except that without the supernatural part, it was a wandering, homeless religious teacher who got himself killed at an early age teaching things which got his followers killed too, and end up being pointless.

"Blessed are the meek; for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven." Except there is no kingdom of heaven, after all; and the meek are not blessed but oppressed. The supernatural stuff was there to show that the oppressive nature of the world and its cruelty was not the only thing; there was hope beyond it in the world to come, which gave the strength to believe in something absurd.

Otherwise its just John the Baptist; a person preaching who ended up dead on the whims of the powerful.

This demonstrates the big flaw of Christianity. Even thought there are millions of sincere, loving and friendly Christians around the world, the whole thing is based around a book that espouses views that are exactly what you call fundamentalism. Sooner or later someone will be confronted with the fundamentalist ideas about women, non-christians, and sexual diversity (for example), and start spreading the hate ideas contained in parts of that book.

I would posit that the most fundamental idea in the Bible is that humanity has fundamentally continued to be selfish and prideful while God has continually chosen to extend grace and keep his promises to people (mainly covered in the Old Testament). He dis this to the ultimate extent by living with us and dying on the cross so that all of the promises could be fulfilled once and for all (new testament).

It is exactly the selfish and prideful that decide to leverage select words/passages/ideas out of context for their own power over others rather than their inward correction of self.

Lastly, I’d add that many of the passages/letters written were to the audience of CHRISTIANS. I bible doesn’t really demand that non-Christians apply any of this to their lives until the first foundational stone is set. Paul even writes to this effect in 1st Corinthians.

The fundamentalist interpretation is only one way to read the biblical text, and it tends to ignore the context the text was written for.

Women: Jesus' ministry was financially supported by women. Jesus explicitly did not condemn the woman caught in adultery like the Pharisees did although he did not condone her conduct, either. Jesus taught to women (e.g. Mary, Martha's sister) while the rabbis forbid it; one rabbi said he would rather burn the Torah than teach to a woman, and the Torah was so sacred that they put old unusable Torah scrolls in the walls of the synagogue rather than the trash. A woman dealing in purple cloth hosted one of the early churches (and probably led it after Paul left). A woman is mentioned with the title apostle.

Homosexuality: nowhere does the Bible hate homosexuals. It says that it is a harmful behavior and is not to be tolerated in God's people because it leads to death. It is not "hate" to consider someone's behavior unhealthy, or even to disapprove of someone's behavior. We don't "hate" thieves because we disapprove of thievery. In fact, most people hate thievery and think it is so harmful to society that it should be repressed, but it does not mean we must hate thieves. American LGBTQetc seem to require love to look like complete acceptance and consider anything else as "intolerance", but that is a false dichotomy.

Jesus might not have been anti-women, but the New Testament certainly is.

> A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.

In particular, Paul (one of the writers) was - take that as you will. Overall, it's generally extremely progressive (for its time and context!).

> for its time and context!.

The problem is that people are applying the morality of the Bible in the modern era when it's clearly outdated. Biblical morality is clearly not correct now on a number of issues (divorce, gay rights, etc, etc).

I mean, comparing someone’s sexuality to thievery is almost exactly the point.

As you point out, we are intolerant of theivery as a society; treating homosexuals analogous to how we treat thieves is probably intolerant.

> the whole thing is based around a book that espouses views that are exactly what you call fundamentalism

But I think your degree of fundamentalism-ness is defined by your relationship to that book. If you see it as completely inerrant, then yeah, you're instantly in trouble because it can be trivially shown to be in self-conflict.

If you're willing to examine the book critically and in context, you do a lot better. Obviously the risk with this is that those doing that interpretation are entrusted with a lot of power over what people believe. But I think there's a middle ground here between the medieval Catholicism that the reformation reacted against (where the Word is obscured to the point that even the secondary texts like the liturgies weren't given in the vernacular) and the rugged individualism of modern evangelicals (where it's Bible-or-bust and writers like Rob Bell are excommunicated for daring to suggest that universalism might actually be consistent with the character of Jesus).

I would see this wide middle ground as a place where we agree on a very short list of actual fundamentals (something like the Nicene Creed, basically), and other than that people are free to study and believe what they want, as long as it isn't hurting others.

> If you're willing to examine the book critically and in context, you do a lot better.

Yeah, but in that case you have to concede that the Bible is not miraculous inspired, so why is it any better than other books such as the Vedas or the Iliad? This is the whole problem in the foundation of religion.

It also shows the blindsight of progressive Christians: they're following a religion that at the foundation goes against things they believe. For example, new testament writers say that Jesus came to save from the sin of Adam, but if no Adam and Eve existed, the explanation does't work anymore.

I don't think a literal Adam is necessary for the "sin of Adam" to be a thing, particularly if you're in a mindset already where the purpose of Christ's time on Earth was to establish a kingdom, rather than just to deliver some pleasant homilies and maybe troll a few pharisees on the way to his real intention, which was dying and being resurrected.

In any case, the Bible can absolutely be miraculously inspired and still be subject to critical examination. Looking at the history of how the individual books have been studied, translated, and selected, it's obvious that the text itself had always been very much interwoven with academia and tradition.

Are there clear examples of that in the Bible (New Testament) or is it just how people interpret it?

Edit. I’m not challenging or arguing any point. I was genuinely curious.

Eph 22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

Cor 33 For God is not a God of disorder but of peace—as in all the congregations of the Lord’s people.

34 Women[a] should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says.

Tim 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man;[a] she must be quiet.

I think those constitute clear sexism and/or misogyny?

Note: this is a bit cherry-picking out of context, which I'll admit sometimes happens in Christian circles as well. But I think understanding the context and culture of the time can make things a bit more clear. Yes, the culture of the time had a different handling of gender roles, and some of that persists in other cultures around the world to this day. These were letters written to the Christians in the churches of the day. Likely the content would be written slightly differently if it were written to a church in the modern day USA.

For example: Ephesians 6 goes on from what you clipped: 25 For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her 26 to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God’s word. 27 He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. 28 In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies. For a man who loves his wife actually shows love for himself. 29 No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. 30 And we are members of his body.

This seems to me to indicate that husbands should be self-sacrificing and putting their wives' needs above their own. All the submission indicated here is similar to the way that Christ (the Son) submits to God the Father. These would have been very strong and shocking words in that culture, that normally would have allowed for husbands to have complete "rule" over their wives, and instead is urging husbands to self-sacrifice for their wives. So if anything, it would have been improving the standing of women rather than "keeping them down."

If you're married, have you ever willingly given up on your own desires, instead following your spouse's needs/wants? Have they ever done the same for you? This seems to be what this passage is encouraging.

I'm not cherry picking out of context. The following lines don't make it any better to me. The text is ultimately still saying women should bow and submit to their husbands decisions in all things, as long as their husbands treat them well. Yeah, I get that this was 'progressive' for its time. I still find it absurd people follow text like this as holy.

Your interpretation is well and dandy but perhaps as a society we need to stop holding text that's so dated in such high regard, where many peoples interpretation is far less optimistic and charitable than yours.

It’s worth noting though that all your quotes are from the various post-gospel letters, not quotes from Jesus.

It's all in the Bible.

Yeah but this subthread discussion is regarding "are those passages taken out of context by preachers?" And it is interesting to note that the quotes given are all examples of 1st century preachers attempting to apply Jesus' message out of the original context. Yes the epistles are part of the Bible, but they are a distinctly different category from the gospels or accounts of Old Testament prophets. The guys writing them are not believed to be infallibly writing from the hand of god, and even fundamentalists agree they must be interpreted within the context in which they were written and their intended audience.

Mind you I'm an atheist, albeit with an amateur interest in biblical scholarship and archaeology. I just find that period interesting. And I think there is plenty of bad things Jesus actually said or did to point to. But I do believe the most egregious moral flaws of the New Testament are in the epistles, not the the gospels.

I think you're committing a historical fallacy. What you're saying is like condemning Abraham Lincoln because he said things that today we'd find unsavory or unenlightened. Fact is, Lincoln was highly progressive in his days.

Yes, the scriptures include things that are problematic, especially in the context of today's mores. But in so many cases, understanding the norms of the times really helps understand the "why", which is important.

The historical fallacy would be saying that early Christians were reprehensible because of their views independent of the time they existed in. I never said that. What I am saying is that following the teachings of those people 2000 years later is what's foolish, as we've come quite a long way in moral development since then.

In the case of Abraham Lincoln, he deserves credit for being progressive for his time in his pursuit of abolition. Does that mean we should follow his views on the inequality of white and black people, because he was progressive then? No, we've come a long way since then.

I think we're more on the same page than not.

For Lincoln, celebrate his accomplishments and how he helped us progress. For the difficult things, understand they are artifacts of his time. They are important to understanding him and can further help color who he was.

Reasonable Christians do the same with the Bible.

Lincoln was a person. The Bible is meant to be the actual teachings of divinity. That's a key difference.

If we're meant to update for modern morality maybe we need a Newer Testament. Until then, the ambiguity of the words of long dead shepherds leave quite a lot to be misinterpreted, as well-intentioned your interpretation may be.

However, people don't go around claiming that Lincoln was God's chosen one and that his word is sacred. That's why we're fine in understanding that Lincoln was a man of his time and many things he said should nowadays be considered garbage. This is not how religion sees the Bible and the words of Jesus and other prophets.

My problem with this perspective is that, sure, the bible had some teachings that could be considered an improvement at the time. But if it really is a divinely inspired text, the teachings wouldn't be just a slight improvement of the norms at the time, but would consistently teach equal standing of every person.

And considering we have the old testament which was full of, let's be honest here, barbaric teachings but apparently were appropriate for the time. You would think by now we would have the New Testament V.96 that would contain teachings that are relevant today, not forcing you to pick and choose just the good parts.

There are many different ways to read the bible. Mainly, the bible is not a literal instructional manual unless you are a fundamentalist. And fundamentalists suck. For others, it's a written record of humanity's relationship with God. It's also a collection of writings from a number of different authors and genres - it has history, poetry, letters, and so on. The old testament was written by people thousands of years ago who had an imperfect understanding of God, nature, humans, society, etc.

In large part, the story of Jesus demonstrates how we should reject those archaic rules of our ancestors and act according to very simple principles; nonviolence, love for God, and love for all humans.

I have no real bone to pick with Christianity. The asking comment was for examples of sexism and misogyny in the Bible which I provided.

I’ll add this as a great overview and resource for the context around that letter(and all the others): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y71r-T98E2Q

Take out the writings of Paul (who never actually met Christ) and the whole thing becomes so much less problematic.

Paul claims to have met Christ on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:3-6) [1] and claims apostolic authority because of it (Acts 15:3-8) [2]. Furthermore, other apostles agreed that he had, or at least that he had the correct message (Gal 2:6-10) [3] and that his writings had the force of scripture (2 Peter 3:15-16) [4]. It is a letter from Peter, the head of the church in Jerusalem, claiming equating Paul's writing with "the other Scriptures", so you can't take out Paul's writing by claiming that that the original apostles did not believe what Paul wrote.

[1] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts+9&version=...

[2] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Corinthians...

[3] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Galatians%202&v...

[4] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Peter+3&ver...

The day Christians remove Paul's letters from the Bible, then your argument will make sense.

It's all in the Bible.

Have Christians all agreed to take out the gospel according to Paul?

I can't remember ever being in a church where women were required to stay silent. So not quite dropped but at least not enforced by most. Ask me again once everyone dropped miles for metric.

There are plenty of modern Christian sects where I'm certain men do get more of a voice than women.

Ah yes, the old 'ephesians is mysogyny' out-of-context quote, which always manages to completely omit the lines which follow:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.1 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 o“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

won't get into the others, i'm quite sure there are cohesive rebukes / contextualization elsewhere

How does saying a husband should respect and love his wife mean that wives having to submit to their husbands isn't misogynistic? Yes, treat them well, but women must bow to their husbands in all decisions. It's a clear reinforcement of a power dynamic that ultimately means men control all the power in society.

The husband is to love his wife as he would himself; moreso, actually, he is to love his wife in the way Christ loved the church--who sacrificed his life for the well-being of the church (namely so that we could have an intimate relationship with God). It is with this understand of what a husband is that the wife submits to the husband. Submission is not unquestioning obedience, unless you insist on taking the most fundamentalist interpretation. And a husband that insists on unquestioning obedience is failing to even love his wife as himself, and certainly not with Christ's self-sacrificing love.

Your interpretation is certainly kind and would probably lead to a great way of life - my issue is still this text can easily be interpreted to be far less charitable and imply that the power of household decisionmaking lies with the husband, so long as he respects and loves his wife. Respecting and loving your wife is really, really up to interpretation. There are plenty of people now and throughout history who would not interpret this text the same way you have.

The text unequivocally gives different instructions for men and women, and the instructions given to men imply having the power in a relationship. Your interpretation doesn't sway my reading of the text as it is.

It's hard for me to see how you're reading Ephesians 5 in good faith. Wives submit to your husbands, husbands sacrifice your lives for your wives (like how Jesus ya know, was crucified for his Church). And you read this as misogynistic?

This is not by far the most problematic Pauline passage in terms of male/female roles. Taken at face value this is some pretty deep advice for how to have a functioning marriage where two people need to make decisions for their family and don't necessarily see eye-to-eye on everything.

Your explanation doesn't make sense because the roles are unequal. The text requires sacrifice from men but subservience from women, creating a hierarchy of powers inside the family. Your interpretation would be acceptable if the text said that both women and men had to sacrifice and submit to each other.

Yes, the husband in a family making all the decisions as long as they respect their wife is for sure misogynistic.

Your interpretation of this being advice for a family to function even when they don't see eye to eye everything makes no sense to me. So if a man and woman in a marriage don't see eye to eye on an issue, the man makes the decision as long as he's kind to his wife? A wife may have her opinion, but really she has to submit in all things to their husband?

I'm all for husbands loving their wives, but maybe text that clearly says that men have the power of decision making in a household could be interpreted as meaning...men have the power in a relationship.

Perhaps we're working with two different definitions of misogyny?

"hatred of, aversion to, or prejudice against women" https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/misogyny

Where does power come into it exactly?

Power has everything to do with prejudice. Divinely ordaining men with the power of the household is prejudice against women.

'Power' in the Christian context is quite a lot different from your impression I think:

> And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Mark 10:42-45

To read Ephesians 5 without this in the background is totally misconstruing the text.

How does that contradict the idea that ultimately women are to submit to the will of men in the household?

I'm one of the fundamentalists everyone here seems to hate. My wife is a very strong willed person and she does submit to my decisions (never because I ask or demand it) but because we see Christ submit to the will of the father. Just as I submit to Christ.

For clarity, I in no way rule over my wife, and am in no way of more value than her. The Bible makes it clear that all people are of the utmost value because they are made in the image of God.

For additional context, yes my wife submits to me, but I make no decisions without her consent. I don't even buy a $5 item off Amazon without talking to her. My Biblical role is to serve my wife and family which I'm thrilled to do each day, just as we see Jesus serve his disciples when he washes their feet.

What I'm trying to get to is that please do not mistake a fundamental view of the Bible as misogyny. Any teaching or text can be cherry picked without context to make any view look evil and cruel.

Your description of the dynamic between you and your wife is incoherent. You assert that she submits to you, but then you say that you make no decisions without her consent. So when she does not give her consent, she doesn't submit to you? Or does she simply always gives her consent, because the submission to you is a predicate. But then asking for her consent is a complete sham, a pretense to give her some agency in your mind.

Irrespective of those contradictions however, a social dynamic in which the woman must axiomatically submit to the man is always inherently misogynistic no matter the justifications, be they religious or not.

Sorry, rereading my post doesn't really make the dynamic clear and I'm not sure I could do it justice without having a dialog, but I'll attempt it.

First, neither of us make purchasing nor time commitment decisions without checking with each other, my last comment made it appear there's a large imbalance in the relationship with her making all decisions.

Our natural dynamics are that I operate on a system of respect, and she operates on a system of love. Yet the Bible calls us to do the opposite, I am to act in love, and she in respect (basically showing each other care in the way we best receive it).

Earlier in our marriage, I was really bad at showing her love as she received it (acts of service and giving her verbal feedback to her opinions and thoughts --- sometimes I still fail, but I get better as we grow). She was bad at showing respect (when she didn't feel loved/heard she would yell).

Regarding her choosing to submit, it's a motivation/outlook more than anything. When we are discussing a decision, she most always asks what I think we should do first. She will then give her thoughts on the topic and then leaves the decision up to me. There have of course been times where I end up making decisions that don't end up being the best in hindsight, but she never comes back and throws it in my face, because she chose to submit to my decision.

Since it's easy to say something that is misconstrued in text, I do want to be clear I never lord over my wife. I never demand that she submit to me, she chooses to do that on her own.

Hopefully that helps a little, I'm sure it's still probably unclear, my mom (who is quite left leaning and a feminist) doesn't grasp the Biblical concept of submission (thinking it means being weak and timid) and doesn't feel women should submit. Although she admires my wife's and my relationship, even though it differs from her views and has zero concern that both my daughters are raised in a household where the wife submits because the leadership is carried out with love and patience.

I'm confused. You say your wife submits to you, then you provide examples of how that is not the dynamic in your home.

So your wife submits to you, but she also independently makes decisions which you come to an agreement on?

That's great for your family, does that mean a family where the wife makes all the decisions and controls the power is immoral?

The verses you mention don't negate the previous ones. Yes, they said the husbands should love their wives, as long as the wives are subservient to their husbands, i.e., both things are considered necessary.

Taking the scriptures literally and limiting yourself only to direct recommendations from New Testament (i.e. no backlinking to Old Testament), at the very least, treatment of women in New Testament is pretty old-school patriarchal[0].

It's interesting to observe the ways various Christian groups try to navigate their way around gender roles in their communities. You have a full spectrum here. From some fundamentalist US churches that will take everything super-literally, through groups like Jehovah's Witnesses[1] who sort-of take this literally, but make reasonable exceptions[2], through Catholics in Western countries, where most believers probably haven't even heard or thought about these passages, and any semblance of adhering to them is likely seen as more traditional than religious - all the way to lenient Christian groups that allow women priests.

In my experience, all Christianity is like this. Every group in every location[3] has their own specific understanding of which words are to be taken literally, which ones figuratively (and to what degree), and which ones to be completely ignored.

[0] - E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_Timothy_2:12, https://www.openbible.info/topics/head_coverings and related references - literally, women should not teach, not usurp authority of a man, should wear head covering when performing the subset of religious functions they're allowed to, etc.

[1] - If I seem to focus on JWs too much in this thread, that's because I spent 20 years being one.

[2] - E.g. over at Jehovah's Witnesses, there's a lot that would technically qualify as "praying or prophesising" where women are't required to cover their heads, and men are not required to uncover theirs. Also definition of "cover" is "with a hat or similar", probably not what the authors had in mind.

[3] - As I understand it, Catholics in the West and in Africa are essentially two different religions. The former, having lived with it for centuries, ignore or pay lip service to all the rules that the latter obey to the letter.

> treatment of women in New Testament is pretty old-school patriarchal

It reflects the mores of the times, which were different than ours. People 2000 years from now will certainly look at us and be aghast at some of our norms.

My denomination has had woman pastors since the mid 1800s.

Women shouldn't speak in church: https://biblehub.com/1_corinthians/14-34.htm

Homosexuality is unnatural: https://www.biblestudytools.com/romans/1-27.html

There are real issues there, but the homosexuality quote is one of the "big eight" anti gay quotes that come up often and turn out to be misunderstood or translation errors that don't hold up to serious scrutiny. Homosexuality as we know it today was not well known or named at the time that text was written, just to start. Searching for the "big eight" helps both with that specifically and the general business of understanding how ancient stories get misunderstood by our modern news clip processing habits.

The New Testament is often mistakenly touted as a "reformation" from the Old Testament, and cherry-picked apart into a more progressive form of Christianity, but, it's not all that different from the Old Testament in actuality. New Testament also defines dress codes for women and re-affirms a patriarchal family heirarchy.

> it's not all that different from the Old Testament in actuality

Um, have you actually read them? They are miles apart. Can you find me the reams of legal codes or origin stories in the New Testament, for example?

Agree completely. While both texts do largely focus on people of Jewish origins, there is not a lot of actual overlap on content. Some of the NT books are seen as prophetical, so that lines up to some degree - but even those read very different.

It's not just content that differs either - the literary style of the NT also deviates greatly, since it borrows much more from hellenized culture than the OT. Especially the synoptic gospels. For example, John, was composed using a layered "onion" type narrative structure which was popular in other greek texts.

They're even so different, that one form of heresy that was more common back in the day (Gnosticism), would sometimes claim that the OT deity was a false-god (the demiurge), because how else do you explain such a personality change?

There are, but it's worth noting that they are all quotes from Paul, not Jesus.

You mean, the same Jesus who appointed only men to be his disciples, while the women in his entourage were servants? It seems that Paul was just putting into words his practice.

Funny you mention that! Yes, the four gospels that were canonized by a patriarchal church organization do seem to paint a picture like that. But the Gospel of Thomas, and other ancient "heretical" texts tell a different story, where Jesus explicitly acknowledgd women as equals and Mary as the favorite disciple. So even some very early Christians would disagree with Paul here.

Why are you singling out Christianity? The same could be said for any of the book based religions.

I know, but the concern about Christianity is that it is a majority religion in the West, with strong political power. This has to be focus at least where I live.

Witches? Seriously? That's just looney crap.

I take it that "last straw" means the "straw that broke the camel's back". I just hope that stories like that won't be conflated with healthy practice of Christianity in people's minds.

I get your point, but isn't this the "no true Scotsman" fallacy? I know Christians like you exist and I like that most media portrays "good" Christians to look basically like the prototype you described. However, I have personally met only one Christian of this type and all my other interactions have been with the fundamenlist caricatures described elsewhere here. (Who is vocal about their Christianity might be skewing my observations, but this is a problem in its own: why are only the fundamentalists vocal around me)

> isn't this the "no true Scotsman" fallacy

You have a point. The definition of Christian is flexible, so how do you define "true"-ness? In my denomination, you'll find a wide variance of views on whether Mormons are Christian, for example.

> all my other interactions have been with the fundamenlist caricatures described elsewhere here

Like what you later intimated and what someone else said, I'll bet significant money that it's because they are so vocal. They are called capital-E evangelicals for a reason. The United Methodist church is lowercase-E evangelical; very much not in your face.

You've probably met a lot more, but only noticed the more intense ones.

This isn't an excuse, more curiosity, but did that take place during the mass hysteria about supposed satanic cults?

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