The Evangelicals Belief in the Gracious Submission of Wives to Their Husbands Is Quite Recent

Prominent evangelical leader Beth Moore, who announced in March 2021 that she was leaving the Southern Baptist Convention over its treatment of women, among other issues, recently apologized for supporting the primacy of the theology of “complementarianism.”

This belief asserts that while women and men are of equal value, God has assigned them specific gender roles. Specifically, it promotes men’s headship or authority over women, while encouraging women’s submission.

As a scholar of gender and evangelical Christianity who grew up Southern Baptist, I watched how complementarianism became central to evangelical belief, starting in the late 1970s, in response to the feminist influence within Christianity.

The Start of the Doctrine

In the 1970s, the women’s movement began to make inroads into a number of arenas in the U.S., including work, education and politics. Many Christians, including evangelicals, came to embrace egalitarianism and to champion women’s equality in the home, church and society.

In response, in 1977 evangelical biblical studies professor George Knight III published a book, “New Testament Teaching on the Role Relationship of Men and Women,” and introduced a new interpretation of “role differences.”

Other evangelical biblical studies professors, such as Wayne Grudem and John Piper, began to write about submission and headship in the mid-1980s and early 1990s, making the claim that women’s submission to men was not, as many Christians at that time believed, a result of the Fall in the Garden of Eden when Eve and Adam ate the forbidden fruit.

Rather, they argued, the requirement for women’s submission was part of the created order. Men, they explained, were created to rule and women were created to obey.

Southern Baptists Incorporate the Belief

Evangelical leaders began to hold secret meetings, conferences and evangelical associations to work out, and then promote, a fully developed framework for complementarianism.

In 1987, a group including Piper and Grudem met in Danvers, Massachusetts, to prepare a statement that came to be known as the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. It set out the core beliefs of complementarianism.

Among other things, the Danvers Statement affirmed the submissive role of women. It said, “Wives should forsake resistance to their husbands’ authority and grow in willing, joyful submission to their husbands’ leadership.”

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood was created at the same time. The goal of the council was to influence evangelicals to adopt the principles of complementarianism in their homes, churches, schools and other religious agencies.

Within a decade, the council and the Danvers Statement began to have significant influence among evangelicals, particularly Southern Baptists, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.

Entrenched Evangelical Beliefs

The Southern Baptist Convention soon incorporated these beliefs into its confessional statement – a document of generally shared beliefs. In an amendment in 1998 to the “Baptist Faith and Message,” the convention included the complementarian language.

The amended section on “The Family” stated, “A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ. She, being in the image of God as is her husband and thus equal to him, has the God-given responsibility to respect her husband and to serve as his helper in managing the household and nurturing the next generation.”

For some, the theology of complementarianism became so deeply entrenched in evangelical belief that they came to see it as an essential doctrine of the faith. As Piper said in 2012, if people accept egalitarianism, sooner or later, they’re going to get the Gospel wrong.

While Moore has not entirely renounced complementarianism, she has now decried its use as a first-tier doctrine. First-tier doctrines are the ones that evangelicals believe people must accept in order to be Christians. For some evangelicals, however, complementarianism remains a litmus test for theological faithfulness, right alongside belief in God and acceptance of Jesus.

Susan M. Shaw is a professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Oregon State University

This article was originally published in The Conversation. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/how-complementarianism-the-belief-that-god-assigned-specific-gender-roles-became-part-of-evangelical-doctrine-158758

Tags:

You May Also Like

Bolsonaro's at inauguration ceremony with Dragões da Independência

President Bolsonaro: The Perfect Storm That Might Steal Away Brazil’s Democratic Future

This week’s inauguration of Brazil’s far-right president-elect Jair Bolsonaro has dominated political analysis worldwide. ...

King Harald V of Norway with an indigenous group in Brazil. Photo courtesy of Rainforest Foundation Norway

World’s Religious Leaders Get Together in Norway to Rescue the Rainforest

Religious leaders from around the world are meeting for the first time with conservationists ...

President elect Jair Bolsonaro talks to the nation after his victory is announced - Social Networks

Will Brazil’s New President Rule as a Radical? Evidence from the US Says Yes

After the most polarized and divisive campaign in its modern history, Brazil has elected ...

The pandemic blew up some carefully constructed 'polycules.' Bilyana Stoyanovska/EyeEm via Getty Images

It Isn’t Easy Being a Polyamorous in These Times of Pandemic

A few years ago I started conducting interviews with over 100 people about their ...

Behind Free Koran Distribution in Brazil Is Islam’s Push to Win the Infidels

According to an article published here in Brazzil, on June 1, 2006, free copies ...

Expo should have extended till October 8, 2017 - Photo: Fredy Vieira/Publicity

The Moral Crusade of the Right Is Now Investing Against the Arts in Brazil

An art show has become Brazil’s latest political battleground. For those who didn’t get ...

The Alvorada Palace and its garden - Ichiro Guerra/PR

Priest Couldn’t Get Rid of Evil Spirit. So Brazil’s President Moved Out of His Palace

In an interview to weekly news magazine Veja, Brazilian President, Michel Temer, confided what ...

A painting of a woman lying in bed next to a man. Heritage Images/Hilton Fine Art Collection via Getty Images

Why Women’s Casual Sex Is Seen So Negatively by Male and Female?

F. Scott Fitzgerald famously called the Roaring Twenties – which happened on the heels ...

Brazil's president Jair Bolsonaro - Andre Borges/NurPhoto/PA Images

Brazil’s Bolsonaro Clownish and Incompetent Figure Is Also His Main Strength

The results of the recent municipal elections in Brazil were interpreted in distinct ways ...