Cheryl Schatz

Mark,
I will take a stab at this one:

Why is it that wifes are told to submit? Why is it that husbands are told not to be harsh?

Husbands are told not to be harsh because this is their problem area that they need encourage to change.

Wives are told to submit because in the culture of the day they were forced to submit. When Christianity freed them from forced subordination many of them would love their freedom too much to want to serve their husbands. They needed to be reminded that submission is a Christian attribute so that we can be like Jesus and the husband is not exempt from our service.

Does this make sense?

Also I do believe that comps get their view from parts of Scripture. The problem is that the verses they use are taken removed from their complete context and also the verses are “filled in” with mounds of tradition. We can clearly see this from a couple of examples. Eph 5:21 is so often neglected entirely and in the book of Genesis a tradition of male leadership and a male “role” is imported into the text from the hallowed halls of tradition.

It is hard to do but I do think it is important to see what the Scripture says without the addition or subtraction of tradition.