I’m going to return to my previous discussions of the marital cross. In a decent traditional Christian society, there are be no grounds for divorce except for adultery or abandonment, because divorce is degenerate and harmful to society, but this does not mean there would be no recourse for the married but suffering.
For a woman (who is physically weaker) being abused,* the best traditional recourse is family. Having her father/brothers/cousins/etc. ‘pay a visit’ to an abusive husband and ‘demonstrate the error of his ways’ to him should be the most immediate course of action. If a visit or two doesn’t work, then the ‘he needed killing’ defence should be applicable. The widow is then free to remarry.
For the man being physically abused, the traditional recourse is to be a man and not let your weaker wife beat on you. There should be no need for more recourse in cases of physical abuse. Obviously, defending yourself from physical abuse is not abuse itself and should not be punishable by law.
In cases where family is not available/impractical to the woman or the man is being abused emotionally or through sexual withdrawal or restraint is not an option, the church has a traditional process of recourse given in Matthew: Bring it to your spouse, if that fails, bring it before a few brothers, if that fails bring it before the church, if that fails, then the abusive spouse should be expelled from the church. The marriage continues and the believing spouse should continue to love their spouse, but the expelled partner is no longer a believer and no longer a part of the church. If the now-unbelieving spouse, having been through the process of church discipline decides to the leave the beliving spouse, that is marital abandonment and is allowable grounds for divorce.
If the church fails do deal with physical abuse or the abuse is particularly heinous then the law should be employed. There is nothing more evil than a someone who abuses someone under their authority and the law should punish such abuse appropriately. The punishment** for a man who physically abuses his wife and/or children (or a woman who abuses her children and the husband is unable to restrain) should be a private whipping (not public so that he is not shamed before those under him); if a man has been whipped a few times and is still abusive or if his first offence is particularly heinous, then he should be executed as the criminal he is. The grieving widow is then free to remarry.
Sadly, we do not live in a decent traditional Christian society, so instead of a civilized response to abuse, we encourage more abuse through the dissolution of the family. Obviously, this is not all practical advice given our current degenerate laws, but this is how a traditional society should handle domestic abuse: family, masculine leadership, church discipline, and, if necessary, corporal/capital punishment.
****
* When I am speaking of abuse throughout this piece, I am not speaking of such things as the bitter, even mutually violent, arguments of a dysfunctional marriage or isolated incidences (unless the incident is unusually heinous). I am talking of a sustained pattern of cruel abuse. Isolated incidences and mutual dysfunction should be dealt with privately through forgiveness and love.
** Obviously, when I say punishment, I mean after a fair trial.
This is an eye-opening video of how non-white peoples get their women to stop disobeying and doing what they don’t want them to do. Generally, though, negroes do have a well-earned reputation for being surly and so I wouldn’t expect exactly the same situation to unfold regularly in white societies, but a roughly equivalent situation should happen on the occasion. It would happen especially in a recovery period as Feminism is so far gone at this point and white men have been so demoralised by it…
(the first 30 seconds is only Ameri-blacks antics and the part with the Orientals is most likely some kind of human trafficking video which is not so relevant as the other clips in the compilation which appear more domestic)
This doesn’t cover the most common form of abuse; wives who do not put out.
Sfcton, right!
“This doesn’t cover the most common form of abuse; wives who do not put out.”
Yes it does, he mentions that scenario in the 4th paragraph. One could also argue that in a traditional Christian society marriage is understood to include irrevocable consent to sex, so a man would be justified in simply taking his rights, but FN is right that it’s probably better to go through the proper channels so the wife understands that what she’s doing is wrong.
Traditionally the church was supposed to play a social role in helping to discipline its members who misbehave, with the ultimate threat of ejecting an unrepentant sinner entirely. This is yet another good reason not to marry an unbeliever; a genuine Christian spouse will be amenable to positive community peer pressure where an atheist wouldn’t give a damn.
How many men have written that women say, “No,” but mean, “Yes, take me?” How many wives are trying this, and their husbands do not realize? Women are not having rape fantasies because they want sensitive, permissive sexual encounters.
The Shadowed Knight
The church will do nothing to correct a wife’s behaviour.
A woman who consistently denies her husband sex is not looking for her being ravshed tingles meet.
I .married a believer, never again. To either. And to looking to the church/ Christians to address the bad behavior of women/ wives. I doubt the church was nay better at it 100+ years ago.
Don’t get me started on the modern Christian church.
The fact of the matter is that the law of the land is no-fault divorce. No matter how much you would like to think your spouse is a devout Christian who holds “God’s” law above civil law, there are way, WAY too many stories of that playing out the way that ends with a guy paying alimony and child support for me to even remotely consider it a possibility in my near future.
There are also some telling passages in the New Testament about marriage. Straight from “the horse’s mouth,” if you will, Yeshua blows the minds of his disciples by stating in no uncertain language that if you aren’t prepared to be shackled to one woman for the rest of the life you’d be better off to be a eunuch (for the uninitiated, this means, cut off your testicles). Paul also states in (I believe) 1 Corinthians that he would rather everyone were like him when it came to marital relations (i.e., not have them), but because he understood people would not be able to fully conquer their lusts (i.e. the flesh) he begrudgingly endorsed marriage.
I’ve actually thought on this some and I think the solution I came up with to avoid the no-fault divorce law of the land is to not even be legally tied to each other according to the civil law. In other words, get a marriage that the Church (but most importantly YHWH) recognizes and according to the Biblical provisions for marriage and relationships, but without the ability to end it for no reason through the civil courts.
But then again, good luck finding a woman who won’t want to legally own half your assets and yadda yadda. (It’s not that I’m opposed to tying my assets to my family – not that I have all that many assets to speak of – but more the fact that “no-fault” means she can walk away with her half at any time for ANY reason and it doesn’t have to be based in YHWH’s commandments.)
@John Donner
That is not a viable alternative. Most states provide for Common Law Marriage, which is subject to the same rules as an ordinary licensed marriage when the couple has lived together for so many years. There are a few states (I know Louisiana is one) that provide an option for “Covenant Marriage” whereby no-fault divorce is not an option. I wouldn’t depend on that, though: Who knows when some psycho-leftist will strike that down?
@John Donner
”Paul also states in (I believe) 1 Corinthians that he would rather everyone were like him when it came to marital relations (i.e., not have them), but because he understood people would not be able to fully conquer their lusts (i.e. the flesh) he begrudgingly endorsed marriage.”
I don’ think so. If God created man and woman. Then he is the one that gave each sex sexual desires and to enjoy sex within the prescribed bounds of marriage it is meant to be enjoyable and a gift. Sexual desire is not evil per se. There exists sexually perverse desires but that is the result of the sin nature not the good creation of God.
1 Corinthians 7 Names of God Bible (NOG)
Advice about Marriage
7 Now, concerning the things that you wrote about: It’s good for men not to get married. 2 But in order to avoid sexual sins, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband.
3 Husbands and wives should satisfy each other’s sexual needs. 4 A wife doesn’t have authority over her own body, but her husband does. In the same way, a husband doesn’t have authority over his own body, but his wife does.
5 Don’t withhold yourselves from each other unless you agree to do so for a set time to devote yourselves to prayer. Then you should get back together so that Satan doesn’t use your lack of self-control to tempt you. 6 What I have just said is not meant as a command but as a suggestion. 7 I would like everyone to be like me. However, each person has a special gift from God, and these gifts vary from person to person.
8 I say to those who are not married, especially to widows: It is good for you to stay single like me. 9 However, if you cannot control your desires, you should get married. It is better for you to marry than to burn with sexual desire.
Bonus relevant passage from Yeshua I mentioned earlier since why not (and I guess the burden of proof is on me?):
Matthew 19 Names of God Bible (NOG)
A Discussion about Divorce and Celibacy
19 When Yeshua finished speaking, he left Galilee and traveled along the other side of the Jordan River to the territory of Judea. 2 Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.
3 Some Pharisees came to test him. They asked, “Can a man divorce his wife for any reason?”
4 Yeshua answered, “Haven’t you read that the Creator made them male and female in the beginning 5 and that he said, ‘That’s why a man will leave his father and mother and will remain united with his wife, and the two will be one’? 6 So they are no longer two but one. Therefore, don’t let anyone separate what God has joined together.”
7 The Pharisees asked him, “Why, then, did Moses order a man to give his wife a written notice to divorce her?”
8 Yeshua answered them, “Moses allowed you to divorce your wives because you’re heartless. It was never this way in the beginning. 9 I can guarantee that whoever divorces his wife for any reason other than her unfaithfulness is committing adultery if he marries another woman.”
10 The disciples said to him, “If that is the only reason a man can use to divorce his wife, it’s better not to get married.”
11 He answered them, “Not everyone can do what you suggest. Only those who have that gift can. 12 For example, some men are celibate because they were born that way. Others are celibate because they were castrated. Still others have decided to be celibate because of the kingdom of heaven. If anyone can do what you’ve suggested, then he should do it.”
Last I checked, 9 States have common law marriages, and those that do have much lower alimony levels for common law wives. In NC, we don’t have common law or putative marriages and the largest alimony like award I have heard of was $150 a month and centered around a common debt.
The churches here won’t marry you without the State licences, but I don’t recall the Bible mentioning a pastor being required for the Almighty to recognize a marriage.
@John Donner:
I think it’s a stretch to get from those passages the idea that marriage is bad. Just because in some circumstances it is a lesser good, doesn’t make it bad. In many cases, it can be the greater good. There are clearly advantages and disadvantages to both marriage and singleness, and the reasons Jesus and Paul allude to are pretty much common sense, I believe. The time when it is most advantageous to remain single is, granted, when the Church is in great distress. We are almost certainly entering a time of distress for the Church in our countries, so more and more should opt for singleness. I still think that will be a decided minority of those in the pews.
Hebrews (I believe also written by Paul) also tells us, “Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.” Marriage is honorable, no matter how much the government suborns sin through no-fault divorce and a generally decadent culture.
If you want to avoid no-fault divorce, then either stay single or marry a woman with good character and a solid Christian background and treat her well. However screwed up society may be, there’s nothing more pathetic than men who whine about how they did everything PERFECTLY but their BITCH WIFE just up and left them for NO REASON. Boo hoo. Manosphere whining aside, women are actually human beings and like men they strongly desire to have good relationships with the opposite sex. Marriages fail for all kinds of reasons but it’s almost always a team effort; the fact that women usually initiate divorce is mostly due to the fact that men are more willing to tolerate staying in a failed marriage and escape into porn/cheating/vidya games. Yes, there are some unprincipled women out there who make for serious divorce risks, and they are usually plastered in red flags that any sane guy can spot from a mile away. Even if men could change the laws however they wanted, if the courts are all that are keeping your wife from leaving you, your marriage is a miserable failure regardless of whether or not you divorce. Worry less about the legal system and more about learning to be a man and lead a woman so that she won’t want to leave you regardless of how appealing Hollywood makes divorce look.
Regarding Paul’s comment about wishing others could be celibate like him, that was clearly phrased as his personal opinion and not a church precept, driven by his expectation that Jesus was going to return in a matter of months or years. Obviously if everyone stayed celibate then the Earth would soon be depopulated, which is clearly not part of God’s plan. But Christian teachings on sexual morality are clear: either stay celibate, or get married and be faithful and don’t divorce. This isn’t easy for many people, but it’s based on an incredibly subtle understanding of both individual human psychology and the proper social organization of civilized society, and the various innovations humans have attempted have a long history of blowing up in our faces.
Re: “the church won’t back you up! You’re a fool if you think they will!” way to completely miss the point. First of all, the OP is talking about how things would work in a traditional Christian society, where churches definitely would play a role in disciplining rebellious spouses. Secondly, even here IRL it’s a good indicator of whether a church is worth a damn. The New Testament is clear that believers should confront one another with their sins, and those who remain unrepentant despite being chastened should be cast out. If modern churches stray from Scripture they are merely social clubs and should be shunned. Traditional churches do exist, so don’t whine about it if you join a lukewarm one and they won’t support you when you need them.
John,
That rendering of 1 Corinthians 7 is out of context and very poorly translated. Apparently it took a lack of clarity and some additions from the KJB and ran with it as far away from the text as a translational reasonably could (cause the author of that catastrophe certainly didn’t go do source materials.
Lets start with the context though, the context of the passage is ‘Now, concerning the things that you wrote about’. What did the Church of Corinth write to ask Paul? Without that letter the context of his reply is unknowable, and the reply itself is not useful for doctrine.
Now, I can make reasonable speculations as to what they asked him given the history of Corinth and what we know of his church, and none of those said reasonable speculations supports your interpretation any more than a reasonable reading of the text would, but it is speculation and again, not useful for doctrine.
I understand people like pet commentaries masquerading as actual translations of scripture but please folks, don’t build doctrine on them… Mainline serious translations already lose enough nuance by the nature of translation, these kinds of things just obliterate it.
Thanks for the replies!
I’m not saying that my interpretation is that marriage is bad and I apologize if that was unclear. Obviously, as Yeshua points out in the passage I referenced, mankind was indeed designed in the beginning with marriage in mind. As someone pointed out, Paul is also offering his opinion – not a “commandment” – that he would rather single people remain unmarried like him.
That being said, there’s often the view that (sometimes in the church, often times in the world) being celibate is something of a curse. I do not think so! Again we have the end of the passage I highlighted from Matthew, but moreover there’s a passage in Revelation (which I don’t have handy at the moment) which talks about when Yeshua comes the second time, part of the elite cadre he brings are virgins who have “not been spoiled with women” and who have consecrated themselves entirely to the Kingdom, and they sing a song which only they can sing. The implication is that there are special rewards/promises to those who take on and are faithful to a special calling.
Also to Prariepolyguy, you say that the translation used is quite bad. Here’s a link to 4 English translations I have used over the years (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Corinthians%207&version=NOG;NKJV;NLT;AMP) and the essential message of them isn’t changed by the translation. I am however very sympathetic to the fact that ANY English translation is flawed, so if you have specific helpful knowledge about what the original Greek text meant I would be blessed to receive it.
@NZT:
I totally agree that there is a lot of whining. Quite frankly, it leads me to only check out manosphere sites on rare occasions. I’ve seen plenty of happy, healthy couples who’ve stayed together over the years to get too pessimistic about the prospects of fulfilling family life for myself. Furthermore, of the divorces I’ve witnessed in my own family, most have been the man’s fault (at least mostly). That isn’t to say I’ve known other cases, such as the two most disastrous divorces in my family being cases where the woman was the one at fault. One thing I will say, though, is that the law can set a tone for society. I do think there would be more good outcomes in a society with proper divorce/marriage laws because there would be more incentive to do the right thing in the end, and that will encourage many to do it. However, you are correct that ultimately it is not the law’s fault for any particular marriage falling apart.
However, I must dispute that Paul wrote expecting Jesus to come at any moment. I know that’s the common wisdom, but he was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit here, and his advice is valuable to the Church in all ages. Whatever Paul’s personal state of mind, I don’t think that was what was intended to be communicated by the Spirit in any way. There is always a benefit to singleness, especially a celibate life dedicated to the pursuit of the Kingdom. The vast majority of the time, I think that is practically outweighed by the fact most of us simply don’t have the “gift of singleness” or however one might phrase it, and the family is the most common way God works to create more Christians. It’s simply a fact that the vast majority of us who are Christian are so because generations of our family have been Christian before us.
@John
I didn’t think you meant that it was bad. It’s just that this whole “celibacy vs. marriage” debate seems to swing back and forth in the Church, and I don’t think one can say either is higher than the other. Both have benefits and costs, even (perhaps) in what happens in the Resurrection. I won’t say that it’s entirely a matter of personal preference which is better, but individual circumstances are highly relevant to the overall picture.
@Nathan
Complete agreement with what you said to me!
I can’t believe what I am reading.
There is a church nowadays that is dishing out beatings and executions like the article recommends.
It’s called ISIS and currently doing quite well in the mid-east.
I know the article recommends the church goes first, then “the law” deals out the private beatings. And killings.
But that system means the church and state work together – when the church can’t correct the behavior with shaming and counseling they hand the victim over to “the law” for the beatings and executions. (happened to somebody we all know-what irony.)
Then the first comment shows “negro’s” throwing multiple uppercuts and body-slamming women and is approving of it and feels “whites” should act like that “on occaision.”
Well, now–go ahead and castigate me. I couldn’t hold any of you “Christians” here in more contempt.
It’s amazing-sad really- how supposedly religious people mouth off but seem to miss entirely that Jesus never came across like a huge idiot.
I know I can’t expect logic but I don’t get how your recommend beatings and executions for spouse beaters then admire “negro’s” beating their spouses and recommending us “whites” should do the same.