Lin

The key word in your post is “worldly”. That is exactly what comp doctrine is all about. In fact, in the SBC I grew up in, before the backlash to the cultural upheaval of the 60’s in the church, women were much freer to exercise their spiritual gifts. My mom warned me of what she was seeing in the 80’s but I was too young to get it. And it has grown progressively more legalistic to the point the women need a Talmud to figure it all out!

It is nothing but a fleshly desire to have control, position and power. They lie to themselves and say it is about serving and protecting but it is not.

Actually, I think this is a good sign. The more dogmatic and oppressive they become, the more I realize we are winning the debate. They are using the only tools in their arsenal and the biggest tool is that they teach that it is a sin to take any instruction from women. Problem solved.

Not so fast.

They are becoming so dogmatic and oppressive that more and more comps are offended! And that is a good time to point to scripture interpretation. Guys like Phil sound more like Mormons in their view of women than Christians. (Be sweet, the Mormons tell their women). In fact, there are more and more parallels to Islam in their view of women than Christianity. (I often wonder what they do with Joanna…married to Chuza…who was traveling around the countryside with Jesus and supporting him financialy). The CBMW sounds more and more Mormonish every day. They are desperate.

Can they make the case that there is a prohibition to women teaching men or having authority over men in the OT? No. So why is there a more drastic rule in the NT? At this point, they start pulling extra biblical rabbits out of the hat and read into the Word what is silent. They are teaching sin as a virtue. Women are to look to Christ. Not their husbands. Women are full co heirs in Christ.

I think we are winning…little by little…as we see the slide right into blatent Patriarchy with these guys. Of course, there will always be women who do not want the responsibility that comes with being a full co heir of Christ. And they will go along with Patriarchy. We must pray for them.

As an aside: Anyone who parrots John Knox has a historical problem. Knox was a co-conspirator to the murder of Lord Darnley in the Name of Christ. He even wrote a sermon absolving the deed. He also married a teenager when he was in his 50’s which shocked many of his followers. The guy was a creep.

On the home school example —

We actually had a similar situation in our family. At the time, we were doing the complimentarian thing (we had never heard some Biblical passages explained any other way and were just trying to please God.) However, I had a very loving husband who respected my opinions and recognized that on some issues, I heard from God best and on some issues, he heard from God best. When you get down to it, he never had the complimentarian heart!

Anyway, this was back in 1982 and i wanted to homeschool my son (we only had the one at the time). My husband, however, noting that my son and I, being so much alike (lol) tended to conflict, thought this would not be a good idea at all. Also, his job at the time was very taxing and he did not have much flexibility to help with homsechooling, though he never neglected fathering. We discussed and discussed. We couldn’t agree. However, instead of deciding to exercise his “leadership perogative,” as we believed at the time he could, we decided, “Ok, we both feel strongly about this. He’s in school now. We know what that is like. Let’s try homeschooling him for this next semester and then revisit the discussion after that. ”

It is possible my husband expected we’d throw the towel in before the semester was up, even. But……homeschooling actually helped my son and i to conflict less. He never returned to school and our other son never saw the inside of a classroom until college.

Since becoming egalitarian (or perhaps admitting that we have been all along), we use a variety of ways to make decisions (who it affects most, waiting and praying, etc) – really, being locked in indecision just hasn’t been a problem.

Cheryl, I am at a loss of how you could think your comment was not personally offensive. I learned syllogisms in my 4 years of taking University Logic classes. I think they can be helpful when a topic becomes so detailed and confusing. It could be the premise is wrong and leads us to a wrong conclusion. But then, they do not work well when you continue to ‘change’ your views on certain points.

Such as this one:
“This is not what is claimed. God said that Adam will rule over his wife. His nature is not to rule – his nature is to sin.”

You have been claiming that men have a sin nature to ‘rule’. I think that is verifiable on the last thread. It could be that your view is being refined as you think this through.

I have not read Paula’s blog today so not sure exactly what you are talking about. Guess I should check it out. If she gives an opposing view, why would you consider that mocking? Do you consider my comments here mocking you? If you think that, you are very wrong. I simply disagree with you.

I have no wish to engage on this sort of personal attack level.

Cheryl, I have been known to use syllogisms before. Perhaps not here? In any event, I am teaching them to my daughter right now and this one was too good to pass up.

I find this last comment from you below the belt and unnecessary. I think it is best I bow out.

“You are exactly right. Mary was not without sin since she had a human father and the sin nature spreads through the father. This is why Jesus had to be virgin born. It wasn’t an option for the Son of Man, it was needed in order for him to be our Messiah that was the lamb without spot or blemish.”

So, even though Mary inherited the sin nature from her own father and carries it around with her, she cannot pass it on because she is a woman? She can have it…but cannot pass it on, right?

So when my daughter is naughty, I can thank my husband for passing on the sin nature to her. I am innocent. :o)

(Sounds like a reversal of what the comps do with blaming Eve. I blame them both for rebellion, deception and subsequent bad choices)

“It is important that Eve did not take on a sin nature of rebellion for it was her seed alone that would be without inherited sin in order for the Messiah to be born sinless and without the natural inclination to sin as a slave to sin. Eve was not taken from Adam after he sinned and thus Eve was the only woman who did not have Adam’s old man nature. She was the only one that the Messiah could come through her own lineage. If Eve sinned in rebellion there would be no one left for the Messiah to come through.”

But Mary, of Eve’s lineage and a virgin, carried the “sin nature of rebellion'” because she was born of both mother and FATHER.

We have to ask why the Septuagint used ‘turning’. This is the translation quoted quite a bit in the NT. Then we have to ask why Turning was used almost exclusively (except for the Latin Vulgate around 400 AD which translated it as “power”) until around 1300 when Pagnino translated it as ‘lust’ and lust it stayed up to the AV until it was then translated as ‘desire’ in modern translations.

I really recommend reading about the history of the translation of the word teshuqa and looking at what the oldest translations used. Bushnell, in her book, explores this word in depth and looks at the history if it’s translation. You can get most of her book online for free.

http://godswordtowomen.org/lesson%2016.htm

Sometimes Lexicons read our modern translations back into the meaning of an ancient word/idiom. I have noticed this when it comes to the word ‘head’ in Greek and even with Authenteo.

“Regarding Eve’s desire being ‘to her husband’ which is how the interlinear translates it, I would really like to hear a scholarly, knowledgeable person’s take on what it means to have a ‘desire TO your husband’. That is an awkward way of saying ‘desire for a husband’. I think there is a reason why it is ‘to’ and not ‘for’.”

This is because ‘desire’ is not a good translation and takes us into all kinds of error and problems on both sides of egal/comp. God warned Eve that she would turn to her husband and he, in return, would rule over her. Even though history of the translation of teshuqa is there for anyone to see, people still defend ‘desire’ as appropriate. I think it causes a lot of interpretation problems.

I also note that BEFORE God talked to them andright after they ate, Eve was hiding from God with Adam and covering her nakedness, too. Bad choice? Sin? Reaction to sin? The absolute horrible effects of bringing sin into the world?

Eve was caught up in it even though deceived. Her subsequent turning to Adam was not a good choice. I think some here have a comp view of turning to the husband as a good thing. OUr human relationships are nothing compared to our relationship with God. If we are both seeking God, we will have a great relationship. God does not come between humans who are both seeking Him.

Adam rebelled against God and dealt with Him treacherously. Yet Eve chose to turn to Adam. She enabled the sin of patriarchy with a bad choice. God warned her.

God is Soveriegn and could populate the Earth any way He wanted to. Not too long after, He flooded the earth and wiped out all mankind except a few. And Noah ended up drunk and naked!

The effects of the fall were horrible. I shudder to see them watered down here in order to prop up Eve as totally innocent for her choices.

Syllogism of your premise

P1a – Adam’s sin nature is to be prone to rule over women
P2a – All who have a human father have Adam’s sin nature
Ca – All who have a human father are prone to rule over women

P1b – All who have a human father are prone to rule over women (Ca)
P2b – All women have a human father
Cb – All women are prone to rule over women

These are the inescapable conclusions of your arguments. They are valid syllogisms whose conclusions flow properly from the premises. The only way to change it, is to change the premise.

If you would then object that P2a is not what you argue (though it plainly is, if males do indeed pass the sin nature, as you have insisted repeatedly), you must present scriptural support for claiming that women do not inherit this, or that only their eggs are sinless. Neither is supportable by scripture, or biology.

The only option left is to to abandon P2a completely, and then explain away women’s sin by claiming that we only sin because we choose to, while men sin because they are inclined to by their maleness. You have redefined “sin nature” to mean a uniquely MALE quality, which females obviously cannot inherit, and that makes women devoid of a sin nature. That is the obvious conclusion of your premise.

(“r” means revised):

P1r – Adam’s sin nature is to be prone to rule over women
P2r – All males with a human father have Adam’s sin nature
Cr – All males with a human father are prone to rule over women

So with the premise, the conclusion follows: all men want to rule over women. All of them.

But another conclusion follows as well: If “sin nature” is “inherited” toward ruling over women, then NO OTHER SINS can be attributed to the fall of Adam. That is, he did NOT open the door to anything but male rule over female. Yet there was Cain murdering Abel.

We must take a deep look at ‘inherited sin’. The Fall was horrible. It changed everything. Even for Eve.

Cheryl,

Come to think of it..what makes you think God saying to Eve: “He will rule over you” is bad? Does God SAY it is bad? No. We just know such a thing is BAD and part of the warning to Eve.

But some cannot see that her ‘turning’ to Adam is a bad choice? Some old translations interpreted it as ‘alliance’ after the interpretation of turning… as in Eve and Adam form an alliance after the fall. According to you, that is a good thing. But it is NOT. After all, in this alliance, he would rule over her and she would be a doormat and subsequently when Patriarchy is ingrained, women would revert to manipulation tactics for such things as having a male child.

Our human relationships are never to be more than our relationship with God.

Perhaps it would be good for us all to contemplate the horrors of what the fall brought us and exactly what changed after the fall.

‘It gave the foundation for why a woman with choices would choose what seemed like a bad choice for her own good. And Eve was not to think that just because she treated Adam in a respectful and loving way that she would receive the same treatment back. .”

Cheryl, I think this is reading into the text. God never says her turning to Adam is a good thing.

Eve’s turning or desire is not a consequence of the fall (her having once been deceived but no longer deceived and Adam having rebelled against God). Eve’s choice to turn to or desire her husband has no consequence since Adam’s choice to rule over her is solely his own problem (with his sin nature), not hers.

How can you believe that her turning is not a consequence of the fall? Her turning toward Adam produced Cain, for one thing. And how can Adam rule over her without her consent? The text says nothing about him dragging her out of the garden against her will.

You guys are starting to make Eve sound like the comp Eve, a ditzy woman, always easily deceived, who acted like a doormat and had no choices and made loyalty to Adam more important than God.

“When you put it this way, Lin it sounds like “This makes no sense in the context of when both sinned out of rebellion”. So I’d word it rather as “this makes no sense in the context after Adam rebels against God and Eve was deceived but came out of her deception. And then it can make sense, no?”

I am not sure how I can help what it sounds like. I never once said Eve sinned out of rebellion. She was deceived. We are talking about her actions after the warning from God when she followed Adam out of the Garden.

My point was why did God have to warn her about something she was supposedly already doing that was good?

“This isn’t a strawman answer at all. You quoted her as saying that “the sense of the passage must be the same”. If the sense must be the same, then the sinfulness must be the same as that is the sense is it not?”

The sense was the “turning”, Cheryl, since most translate it as desire which can take us down the wrong road completely.

The context tells us whether it is good or bad turning.

“Is the fact that Eve’s first child was a murderer her fault or was it the fault of her husband who passed his sin nature onto his son?

The continued state of affairs of mankind is stated in Scripture as our “old man” which came into the world through Adam. I really do not understand how you blame Eve for this.
”

Cheryl, I am NOT soley blaming Eve! It takes two to make a murderer. The only way he was born was for her to follow Adam! The bad choice. Are you claiming Adam dragged her out of the garden against her will?

I have to run out now…

“I can accept that the word can mean a turning toward, I leave the challenge where the word must mean a turning away from. I haven’t seen it and I challenge anyone to show me the evidence.”

Bushnell did. The ‘turning’ means back and forth. Away and toward. It is simple logic to know that turning means you turn away from something toward something. The sense of shuq is running back and forth.

“The hierarchical view is that the Eve is to blame. God doesn’t apparently agree with this as He gives no rebuke to Eve about any additional sin.”

I am not soley blaming Eve. I think that is where you miss it. To you it is either/or. Eve=all good. Adam=all bad. Eve was deceived and made a poor choice leaving the Garden.

I think God was WARNING Eve and I think she made a bad choice with DIRE consequences. I also believe Adam sinned willfully with his eyes wide open. You are teaching she made a good choice to turn toward Adam and this did not affect her relationship with God. I differ. Their first child was a murderer.

I do not believe in a female sinless gene line. Being deceived is a sin that is treated differently with mercy and grace once shown the truth and admitted, I agree with that. But it is still sin with DIRE consequences. Adam was worse. God warned her but she still looked to Adam.

“I do not agree with this at all. It is once again blaming the woman for what others did. I think that it is unhelpful to state that the woman turned her back on God when she left with her husband as if she couldn’t have both her God and her husband. The text doesn’t say this and if we add to the Scriptures we can have serious problems with what we believe.”

Cheryl, Lets look at the facts:
-Eve DID follow Adam out of the Garden. That is a fact.
-Her first child was a murderer, that is also a fact.
-Only a few generations (long) generations later, the world had to be flooded because of terrible wickedness

Yet, what would have happened if Eve had not turned to Adam and stayed in the Garden? (After all, Adam was willfully wicked)

To deny that Eve shares blame in the outcome of her choices is to deny the facts in the Word.

We rightly emphasize that those who teach women are to enable husbands by treating them as gods ARE chief sinners, but women who listen to such teaching are sinning too. Yes they are deceived in many cases, and we make egal known so they can open their eyes. But many are not; they know about us but hate us and call us names. They are in sin, oppressed or not, because idolatry is sin!

“God did not warn Eve that she should not leave the garden because it would be a turning away from Him. He warned her about what life would be like with her one-flesh husband”

Turning requires both ‘toward’ and ‘away’, it is impossible to turn toward Adam without turning away from God. Eve surely regretted it later, but if you want to argue from silence, then you must allow it for others too.

Bushnell: In fact there is no variety in the three sentences, excepting in the proper nouns implied in the pronouns used. The sense of the three passages must be similar.”

You responded: If what Eve did is sinful, (her desire or turning) then by implication all the three passages must have sin as a result. This would make the passage about Christ’s desire to be sinful too. It just doesn’t fit.”

That is a strawman answer, Cheryl! Bushnell never said that desire/turning was sinful in itself, but only derives its meaning (good or bad) from the context. You know that context gives the meaning!

Whether one calls this case sinful or only a bad choice, it had terrible consequences that you cannot deny. And the Song of Sol. reference is not at all about Christ, unless one wishes to highly allegorize the whole book, as many do. But the immediate and non-allegorical view does not see Christ even inferred, but only the ‘desire’ of a wife for her husband. That particular context is certainly about sensual desire, while Cain/Sin’s is about hatred, and Eve’s is about not wanting to be separated from her husband who was being driven out of the garden. All three are ‘desire’ or ‘turning’; that is Bushnell’s point. It is NOT that all must be positive or negative! And the major point of Bushnell and all egals is that this is NOT about lust or usurping authority, and that God did not command it but only predict it.

“n my opinion Bushnell fails in this part of her teaching because she assumes a sin on the woman’s part by her leaving God as if He is restricted to the garden.”

No, she assumes nothing like God being restricted to the garden; that is preposterous. That Eve turned from close, face-to-face, RECONCILED communion with God cannot be denied, for to leave with Adam was to reject that she herself would bear the Messiah. I thought I made it clear that I do not believe God was restricted to the Garden, especially when we remember that God Himself gave the reason for Adam’s expulsion: to keep away from the Tree of Life. But who can deny that people after Adam and Eve had a more distant relationship to God than had been the case inside the garden?

“As far as a spiritual connection – it just isn’t in the text. Eve isn’t turning to Adam as her Messiah or her Lord. I believe that attaching a charge of sin to a text that has no charge of sin is a big mistake”

Cheryl, this makes no sense in the context after the fall.

Basically, you are saying that God means: Eve you were turning to your husband before sin in the one flesh union and that was good and now you are going to do the same thing and it is still good.. Except for now, he is going to rule over you when you turn toward him.
Is that what you mean? (So how could her turning be good if this is what it means?)

All consequences of the fall are a RESULT of sin. Eve’s choice to ‘turn’ toward her husband has a bad consequence whether it is sin or not.

I hate to say this…but longing to be with our husbands MORE than Christ is a sin. It becomes idolatry. We must be careful because this is what comps teach. It is easy to take a good thing and turn it into an idol.

This is what happens when we affirm the translation of Teshuqa as ‘desire’ instead of the historical ‘turning’.

Check out the chart embedded in these lessons and lesson 140+ to look at the history of how desire came to our English translations.

http://godswordtowomen.org/lesson%2018.htm

“If we want to make Eve a habitual sinner, we are in danger of having no human parent that the Messiah could come through and have no inherited sin nature.”

But Mary had a human sin nature because she was born of both father and mother, if we take that view.

Mary was chosen…why? Because she found favor with God. We are never told it was because she did not carry an inherited sin gene. Where are we told this about women, anyway?

Cheryl, I believe we tend toward error when we do not translate Teshuqa properly. I think desire is a very bad translation that leads us into error. It is interesting to note that the word ‘desire’ was first introduced in a translation in the 1300’s. It is what led many to view it as only sexual. Some say that is good for propagation and some say it is Jezebel like control.

I do not think Eve is the heroine that you seem to think she is. I believe she was deceived and remorseful. I also think that when one “turns” toward something they also turn AWAY from something else.

I still find it odd that God tells Eve AFTER the fall she will turn toward Adam and you find that a good thing. I think it was a horrible thing with dire consequences. You have been teaching it is a good thing and the way to propagate the earth. This sounds Mormonish to me for some reason. This does not just blame Eve but again, I ask, how could Adam rule over her, even physically with God’s protection? Are you claiming that God withdrew any protection from her and she had no choice even after her choice to leave the Garden?

You say my interpretation reads into the text. I believe yours does too. I fear you are seriously watering down the absolute horrors of the fall. Sin has serious consequences whether one is deceived or sins willfully. The “consequences” are dire.

The bottomline for me is that Eve turned to Adam and away from God. This is based on the historical interpretation of Teshuqa. Many women in the comp world could take a lesson from this when they view their husbands as their spiritual leader instead of Jesus Christ.

I agree with Bushnell on this issue.

LESSON 16.
GOD’S WARNING TO EVE

122. The N. T. teaches us that “He that committeth sin is of the devil. . . Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin. . . . In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil” (1 John 3:8-10). Eve repented; but there is no inference that Adam repented at this time, for he was expelled from the garden. What must have happened, after this? Before Cain could have been born (Genesis 4:1) either Adam must have repented and become again the child of God, or Eve must have turned from God and followed Adam out of Eden. The fact that Cain was a murderer certainly argues that Eve followed Ad[am.

123](logos4:///Bible/Am 123). Eve was, then, the first woman to forsake her (heavenly) kindred for her husband. She reversed God’s marriage law,—”Therefore shall a man forsake his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife.” Had Eve remained steadfast with God, Adam might through the double influence of God and Eve, have returned to God. Marriage might have been consummated by Adam, the husband, forsaking the devil, his father, and cleaving to his wife, thus returning, like the prodigal he was, to the heavenly Father’s home.

124. God spoke warningly to Eve at this time, telling her that she was inclining to turn away from Himself to her husband, and telling her that if she did so her husband would rule over her. The correct rendering of the next phrase of Genesis 3:16 is this: “Thou art turning away to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee,”—not as it has been rendered, “Thy desire shall be to thy husband.” This assertion, as to the correct meaning of the phrase we shall now prove. As we have said before, a misinterpretation of a passage of Scripture can be proved by the misfit. The usual construction put upon the language of this verse fits accurately nowhere; the correct interpretation fits all around.

125. The original word used here is teshuqa, and as it only occurs three times in the Hebrew language, its sense must be fixed (1) by studying its relation to other words in the sentences where it occurs: (2) by studying its derivation and structure: (3) and by studying the way it is rendered in the ancient versions of Scriptu[re.

126](logos4:///Bible/Re 126). To study its relations to other words, we will leave it untranslated, but, write it in its proper sentences, inserting the noun equivalents for the pronouns used.

Genesis 3:16, “-and-to-Adam, Eve’s teshuqa.”

Genesis 4:7,11 “-and-to-Cain, Abel’s teshuqa”
(or perhaps sin’s teshuqa,)

Sol. Song 7:10, “-and-to-the-Church Christ’s teshuqa”
(as usually interpreted).

Now compare. No verbs are expressed. The conjunction is one for all and also the preposition. This is true of the Hebrew original also. In fact there is no variety in the three sentences, excepting in the proper nouns implied in the pronouns used. The sense of the three passages must be similar.

127. All the stress of teaching woman’s supposed obligations to man is in the “shall be,” which is supplied by the translators. The force of the mandatory teaching, then, rests upon a hiatus in the sentence. If it be contended that the context proves that this is an imperative, then the previous sentences must be imperative, or the following. Must woman bear children in sorrow, whether she wishes to rejoice or no? Must the serpent bruise the heel of the woman’s seed, whether he will or no? As to the following clause: Must man rule woman, whether he will or no? We think women have more liberty in Christian countries than heathen because man loses the disposition to rule his wife when a Christian.

If this be a commandment of God, and man must rule woman, the more carnally-minded a man is the better he keeps that sort of “law!” But the Apostle Paul says: “The carnal mind . . . is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7). Thus we see that the context does not prove that this “shall be” of the sentence translated, “thy desire shall be to thy husband” is imperative. We can assert positively that this sentence is a simple future or present, warning woman of the consequences of her action. So it is rendered in all the ancient versions; never as an imperative. As a prophecy it has been abundantly fulfilled in the manner in which man rules over woman, especially in heathen lands. But Jesus Christ said, as much of women as of men: “NO ONE can serve two masters.”

128. Compare again: The word teshuqa does not necessarily refer to the appetite between male and female, for it would then be out of place in the second sentence. And it does not necessarily imply the subordination of Eve to Adam, as the marginal reading of the A. V. puts it; for then, in the third sentence, Christ is subordinated to the Church, or according to the other interpretations of the Song of Solomon, the man is, at any rate, subordinated to the woman.

Nicholas Fuller, an eminent Oriental scholar, wrote an interesting chapter on this subject in a Latin work entitled Theological Miscellany, published in 1612. In reply to those who hold that the sense of the passage is, “the appetite of the wife is about to be in the power of the husband and subdued by him,” he says: “Just as if nothing would be longed for by the wife excepting what would be pleasing to the husband. Absurd notion! Others again wish the appetite to be understood as that by which a woman seeks marital dominion. And yet it is not very probable that this yoke is sustained by spontaneous longing for it. . . . This is not effected by longing, then, but it is suffered because not declined. Besides, Scripture saith not, ‘The appetite of the wife shall be inclined to the dominion of the husband,’ but ‘to the husband’ himself. Wherefore, if teshuqa is allowed to be translated ‘appetite’ certainly this appetite is common and by nature reciprocal, and bending each in like manner to the other. Therefore, it displays a more equitable condition of life than dominion. Nay, moreover, if this form of speech declares the appetite for a ruler, Christ would adopt the Church as His ruler, for in the same manner the Church speaks, when, of Christ as a Spouse, in Canticles 7:10 it says, ‘I am my beloved’s, towards me is His appetite,’ as indeed they would there translate.”

Lewis’ note in Lange’s Commentary declares: “The sense of this word [teshuqa] is not libido, or sensual desire.”

129. As to the structure, and derivation of teshuqa, apparently it is derived from the verb shuq, meaning in its simplest form “to run.” The prefix, te, gives the word an abstract sense, and it corresponds to our termination, —”ness,” in such words as “goodness,” “kindness,” etc. The ending a, is added to give the word the feminine form usual to Hebrew abstract nouns. If this word is taken from the intensive form of the verb, it would bear the sense “to run repeatedly,” that is “to run back and forth.” But to keep running back and forth would necessitate frequent turning, and hence the word might easily have the derived sense of “turning;” and an abstract noun be derived there from, not meaning a literal “turning,” but a quality of the character, a “turning,” The sense “desire” has come to us from the Talmud, in the “Ten Curses of Eve.” All the most ancient versions, this we will show in our next lesson, give the idea of “turning,” and that alone, for this Hebrew word “teshuqa.”

Chart on the historical translation of teshuqa

http://godswordtowomen.org/teshuqa_chart.pdf

If she had stayed close to God how could Adam have ruled over her unless God commanded it? Did she have a choice to leave or not? I gather from your teaching she had a choice. Did she make a wise choice?

I just cannot seperate the physical from the spiritual.

If the desire was good then why bring it up after the fall? It would have been part of the good of creation and natural. God would have simply said: “He will now try to rule over you”. But Eve had to do something for that to happen the way it did. She had to turn toward/desire Adam more than her relationship with God.

“Comps believe that her responsibility is to give up her independent life and to rely on her husband for all spiritual decisions.”

For the most part, that is exactly what happened after the fall throughout the OT except for a few wonderful examples that go against the ingrained patriarchal culture.

In any event, I cannot seperate the spiritual from anything else. Following him out of Eden had no spiritual componet for Eve?
Eve was also told to be fruitful and multiply BEFORE the fall.Now she has increased pain but she was also given some good news from God of bringing forth a child who would crush the serpent. She had motivation to endure the pain.

As gengwell said earlier, it takes two to tango. Eve wrongly turning toward Adam instead of God, gave Adam the power to rule over her in the first place.

It is ironic in many ways. Comps teach that now, in the NC, the husband’s ‘rule’ is good. (They describe it as leadership but it is really rule). They also describe her ‘desire’ in Genesis as usurping his authority which they say makes his rule a bad sort of rulership.

You describe her ‘desire’ as good and his rule as bad.

I say they are both bad. I have explained before I believe it is actually more like turning toward Adam and away from God. (Or her depending on Adam for needs that only God can meet)

If her desire/turning is good then it is the same as the desire/turning that comps NOW think a woman should have for her husband as in his being her leader or authority. That is her role…to turn toward her husband as the leader. They teach this as Christian virtue. This ‘desire’ or turning actually puts him in the role of prophet, priest and king.

“2. I said: “As suspicious as I am of “desire” or “turning” as a virtue, I find the thought of it being relatively inconsequential blather on God’s part to be unfathomable.” ”

I agree. I cannot believe for one moment her desire/turning is either good or neutral. I believe Eve was deceived, admitted it and was remorseful. I also believe that one of the consequences to her being deceived was that she would turn toward Adam and in return he would rule over her. We can see the consequences to this with the sin of patriarchy right away.

Cheryl, Do you realize that her turning to/desire for her husband as a good thing would result in the fact that comps are right about roles/patriarchy. It kills the one flesh union concept. We see this very problem all throughout the OT with so much sin as in polygamy, etc.

“This interlinear breaks down each phrase into it’s component parts so you can see that the “yet” and “and” are the same word when they are broken away the attached words. They are both the Hebrew word “w”.’

Cheryl, I am seeing two things from your comment. One is that you do not understand what I wrote about the about the words having the same ROOT and that you have to “break down each phrase into it’s component parts” to get the meaning you want. This is ignoring context and trying to make the words identical just because they share a root. Your own quotes of the interlinear prove this; they are identical because they are NOT of the WORDS but only the ROOTS.

Have to run but I will address the other item later

“It is a good time for me to say that I do not necessarily agree with other egalitarian sources. The reason is because I value truth more than a particular position. I do not hesitate to test egalitarian views the same as I test complementarian views. I believe that we should all want God’s truth no matter where it takes us. ”

Cheryl, I totally agree. I value truth as well.

For one thing, I am not seeing the word “yet” used twice in the Interlinear. The first conjunction indicates movement toward or with someone/thing (desire toward…), while the second indicates emphasis. The first is “and to” while the second is “and he”. So they may share a root, but they have different connotations.

Eve certainly did give up the closeness to God she and Adam had in the garden; how could it be otherwise?

That Eve later hoped her child would be the promised one in no way means she had EXACTLY the same closeness to God as before. She certainly had a different attitude toward her sin than Adam, but we can’t say more than that– especially when we’re claiming to not be reading into the text.

And she DID have to choose between staying in Eden and staying with Adam as only the one made from dust was driven out. I am not saying she had NO relationship with God outside of Eden, but that the relationship was changed.

I think the subsequent Patriarchy is proof of that change in relationship.

“I am just not sure why people have to add a turning away from God in order to have her turn towards her husband. Thoughts?”

Wouldn’t that be the natural consquence of turning toward her husband for her needs… whether spiritual or emotional? She will, in effect, give up part of her personal intimacy with God.

I think we hang a lot on ‘yet’ when other translations render it ‘and’.

If Bushnell is right and the original said “a snare has increased your suffering”, then the YET would give me this impression: “Eve, though you were tricked into this and you did not rebel against me, you’re going to make the wrong choice, which will result in Adam ruling over you”. In other words, I see God saying that in spite of the fact that He was not throwing her out since she had been deceived, she would throw her personal intimacy with God away by turning toward her husband for those needs and he would, in return, rule over her.

The bottomline for me is that our relationship with our Creator/Savior is to be much more than our relationship with our spouse, even in a one flesh union. This is where I think comps make an idol of the husband.