Alison

Funny…my anti-spam word was “fall” and that makes me think that spousal abuse is the result of the tragedy in Genesis 3. It can’t be anything but. Both men and women, now that they know sin, are subject to a curse that was never God’s intention in the original creation: hierarchicalism, with the potential for abuse. God’s intention in Genesis 1 was that both the man and the woman, as cobearers of His image, would both be the caretakers of Creation. There wasn’t ONE WORD in that text about how the woman was “under the man’s leadership” or anything like that. When sin entered the world, the desire to dominate and exercise undue power over one another came into being, and that’s what God was addressing in Genesis 3. I don’t believe that the “he shall rule over you” clause in the curse addressed to Eve was EVER God’s intention. If it was, then why didn’t He say so earlier?!

Nope, spousal abuse (and other abuses of authority) come straight from one of Hell’s most pernicious lies: that in order for one person to “win”, another has to “lose”. I happen to think that comp theology, since it is so big on this one-up, one-down issue, really fails to address the kind of pain that it causes. It’s bought into the lie, and until it realizes that, it will fail.