Mennonite Weekly Review

Domestic violence is shockingly common and can too often be found in the church. Even more distressing is how the Bible is misused to justify domination and abuse.

One of the most widely misread verses is Eph. 5:22: “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” This is seen by some as a mandate for women to do whatever their husbands demand. Thus, when a wife refuses to “obey” her husband, he sees it as his job to make her “get in line.”

This misreading does injustice to the text and to the victims of domestic violence. Eph. 5:22 is preceded by verse 21: “submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” The apostle Paul has in mind a magnificent sign to the world of God’s transforming work — people giving of themselves freely and mutually.

Paul goes on to admonish husbands to love their wives as they would love their own bodies (Eph. 5:28). In fact, Paul insists that mutual submission to his spouse compels the husband to love sacrificially, even as Christ loved the church and died for it (5:25).

Regarding the book’s context, readers must consider the cultural realities of Ephesus, where the Temple of Artemis played a prominent role. First, Paul wrote his radical instructions in an ancient, patriarchal world that accepted the kind of abuse that, after two millennia of Christian reflection, we no longer tolerate.

Second, some scholars suggest that the Artemis followers, likely women, were causing problems in the church by suggesting the supremacy of women over men; women were the source of life as taught by followers of “the Great Mother-goddess,” Artemis. It is tragic irony that Eph. 5:22 is used to justify violence and abuse against women since Paul potentially intended it to stop women from abusing men. Certainly we know Paul was chased from Ephesus for stirring up the Artemis cult (Acts 19).

I hope denominations will equip ministers to educate their congregations about domestic violence; that pastors will preach sermons that denounce violence in the home; that churches will develop plans to protect women and children and truly rehabilitate abusers; that members will intervene when they see abuse happening; that the world might see that we really do take the Bible seriously.

Quentin Kinnison is a professor of Christian ministry and leadership at Fresno (Calif.) Pacific University.