For well over a week I have been “chained” to a roll of toilet paper. Not for the purpose for which it is intended but because it is less expensive than boxed tissues and just as kind to the nose. A couple of days ago I was invited, by e-mail, to visit a certain blog which turned out to be authored by a Christian Minister using the study of the Bible for solving various domestic problems. The visit did nothing to placate my somewhat surly disposition, and all it took were the following words—somewhat paraphrased: Are you comtemplating changing your single status to that of a couple? Is your marriage in trouble? The writer than invites his visitor to a class discussing the virtuous woman and divorce.
The VIRTUOUS WOMAN AND DIVORCE? What about discussing the virtuous man and divorce?
I have a few comments of my own before going into anything the Bible has to offer in the way of advice when it comes to choosing a mate and marriage, particularly when it comes to the female of the species.
The physical, and all too often, mental abuse of women by husbands, ex-husbands, live-in boyfriends or even would-be boyfriends, is not new. Here, in the United States of America, often referred to as a “Christian” country, the physical abuse of women is so common an event that it often takes the murder of an abused and unfortunate woman to bring the barbarity to the public’s attention. Women were, and apparently still are, in the minds of many men, property to do with as they wish. How can this be when, since this nation’s founding, the Bible has been hailed as an infallible source of wisdom and the supreme authority in every aspect of our lives? Perhaps that has been part of the problem.
Pious Christians, anxious to turn society back to the past, quote the Bible as the highest authority one can turn to for counsel–all the way from fundamental family values to schooling and politics. There is much that is wrong in today’s society, but do we really want to turn to the Bible and the way things once were? Do we truly want to use the Bible as an example of family values?
1 KINGS 4:29-30 And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much , and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore. And Solomon’s wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt.
Let those who believe that Solomon is the last word in wisdom, think on the following:
THERE ARE IN THE BOOK OF PROVERBS… 31 chapters containing 882 verses. Approximately 100 of those verses single out women as sinful and the root of man’s sins.
Chapter 02:16-17-18-19-20-21-22
Seven verses singling out women as sinful.
Chapter 05:
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10-11-12-13-14-20-15-16-17-21-22- 23
Twenty one verses directly or indirectly singling out women as sinful.
Chapter 06:23-24-25-26-27-28-
Six verses referring to sinful women
Chapter 07:
5-6-7-8-9-10-11-12-13-14-15-16-17-18-19-20-21-22-23-24-25-26-27
Twenty-three verses referring to sinful women
Chapter 09:13-14-15-16-17-18
Six verses referring to sinful women.
Chapter 14:1 (A wise woman builds her house; but the foolish tears it down….)
One verse referring to a foolish wife.
Chapter 19:13
One verse refers to a contentious wife.
Chapter 21::9–19
Two verses referring to quarrelsome women.
Chapter 22:14
One verse referring to women as a deep pit.
Chapter 23:26-27-28…33
Three verses referring directly to women as a deep pit, one to strange women.
Chapter 25:24
One verse referring to a quarrelsome woman.
Chapter 28:15
One verse referring to a quarrelsome woman.
Chapter 30:20-23
Two verses referring directly or indirectly to sinful or contentious women.
Not one proverb warning women to beware of sinful men!
MISCELLANEOUS PROVERBS CONCERNING WOMEN
Chapter 12:4
A virtuous wife is a crown to her husband; but a wife who does evil destroys her husband…(No mention made concerning the evil done to women by evil men)
One verse referring to a wife who does not honor her husband.
Chapter 15:17
One verse referring to a house where love is.
Chapter 18:22
One verse refers to a man finding a good thing when he finds a good wife..
NOT ONE PROVERB COMMANDING A MAN TO BE A LOVING AND KIND HUSBAND TO HIS WIFE.
PROVERBS ON THE LOW STATUS OF WOMEN
Chapter 17:6 (Children’s children are the crowns of old men; and the glory of children is their fathers. Mother’s not mentioned.)
PROVERBS CONCERNING THE DUTIES OF WOMEN
Chapter 31:10 through 31 The duties of a diligent and virtuous woman.
Twenty-two verses inform men what to look for in a wife and mother. Not one proverb in the entire Book of Proverbs instructs a woman how to tell a good man from a bad man. Chapter 19:14 Women are the property of men and with no right to wealth of their own.
PS: Women were and still are, in many churches, considered under the authority of their husbands, and that includes the New Testament.
Proverbs castigating MEN for their sins and weaknesses.
Chapter 04:-14,15-16-17-19
Five verses refer to evil doings of men.
Chapter 05:18-19-20
Three verses counseling a man to be content with his wife.
Chapter 06: 29-30-31-32-33-34-35 Only seven verses warning men of the danger of adultery.
The Book of Proverbs give women little to no defense against the brutality of men.
Not In The Best Of Moods
April 11, 2009 by mary a. kaufman
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It’s true. There should also be a ‘Virtuous Man and Divorce’ class. Things like this do make my feminist blood boil.
Hope your cold clears up soon, Mary.
Good to hear from you, Selma. Marriage should be a 50/50 proposition, but seldom is, and nothing riles me more than to be up against the all, too often arrogance of men who think that for no other reason than I’m a woman, I don’t have the intelligence to think a matter through. Hmm, guess I’m still not in my usual good humor. Going to the doctor tomorrow to see what’s going on in my lungs. Sure glad I never smoked on top of all that hay, straw,sawdust and chicken- house dust my lungs took in for some thirty years.
Selma, A chest xray prove I’ve had what is commonly called, “walking pneumonia”. Meds should clear the situation quickly.
I’ve been worried about you. So, “walking pneumonia”, is it? Well, at least you know what it is and what can be done for it. I hope you are feeling better soon.
I came across this blog as I was doing research for a paper I am writing about Godly women in the book of Proverbs. I think that before you start attacking the Word of God this way you should understand that the book of Proverbs was not written to women. It was written to the Son of Solomon giving him wisdom for his life. Solomon was mearly trying to protect and warn his son about finding a good wife and staying away from the wrong kind of woman. The reason that this book doesnt give any advice to warn women against “the brutality of men” was because it was not written to women, although there are things for us to learn in it. The Bible does, however, talk about husbands needing to love their wife in other books. Ephesians 5:25-33. hope your cold clears up….
Haley, I merely quoted, word for word from the Holy Bible and you accuse me of attacking the “word of God”. While still in the folds of a fundamental church, I was led to believe that the book of Proverbs was as relevant today as when first written. I’ve a question of you: why did it take God all those centuries between Solomon’s words of wisdom written for his son and for the writer of Ephesians to come up with the idea that perhaps a wife should mean more to her husband than a piece of property that he could treat as he wished and dispose of her if dissatified? According to God’s Word, that was the lot of early Jewish women.
Does it say ANYWHERE in the Bible that a woman is a piece of property, or is that idea anywhere? I don’t think it is.
haley, yes, when an early Hebrew husband was free to force his wife—for no other reason than he suspected her of adultery—to drink a bowl of water into which dust, gathered from before a sacrificial altar had been mixed, a concoction that might have easily killed her, I consider that woman to have been nothing more than “a piece of property”. What else?
Why did God, through Moses, dictate that dust must be gathered from in front of a sacrificial altar? Because that dust, more than any outside the area, might well be contaminated with ANTHRAX, that’s why. Anthrax, if taken internally, can kill. I looked that up. I’ve done my homework.