What?? Wives Submit is Now Mutually Submit?!
Did I Sacrifice Myself During 17.5 Years of Marriage Because Some Patriarchal Bible Editor Told Me To?
I came across something really disturbing when I was researching last week’s article on how I went from being a submissive Christian wife to a feminist.
(Feminist defined by Oxford Languages: “an advocate of women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes.”
That’s a no brainer, right? How can anyone actually be against equality?! We all have mothers, many have wives, sisters and daughters.
I digress.)
I was trying to pull up scripture for the story and noticed something very different between two versions of the NIV Bible.
See for yourself:
That text is from the 2002 NIV study Bible.
When read this way, mutual submission happens in Christian community / church.
Then there’s a heading “Wives and Husbands” before the next verse talking about wives submitting to husbands, so that implies in marriage, there is unidirectional submission.
Do you see that? No mutual submission in marriage in 2002.
But did you know in the original Bible there were no headings?
In the original Bible there were no headings
That means my Bible’s editors made it sound like in a godly marriage there’s only one-way submission, wife to husband - rather than mutual submission.
That is a misogynistic editorial choice.
I checked the front of my Bible and saw only male names for editors.
How convenient.
So for the last 17.5 years I’ve been thinking the godly, moral, Right Thing to do is for the wife to submit to the husband — NOT mutual submission.
But the very concerning thing is when I was researching last week’s article, the current NIV translations I could find on my phone (probably from 2011) read like this:
Did you catch that?
Now NIV editors are supporting mutual submission in marriage (!)
Now NIV editors are supporting mutual submission in marriage
Did I just try to unilaterally sacrifice my desires and dreams in 17.5 years of marriage because some patriarchal editor— not God— told me it was the right thing to do?
WTF
Why didn’t anyone ever tell me there were no headings in the original Bible -- headings are editorial choices?
Be very careful when studying your Bible.
I know a lot of Christians and churches take the Bible quite literally (and I used to, until I came across changes like this!)
We aren’t reading the original text so editors are making choices, like translating, adding headings and punctuation.
Reader beware.
As my Christian friends, an ex-pastor and his wife say, look at the big picture of the Bible, look for context and consistency.
Be very careful taking one or two verses out of context.
Think about the heart of God.
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I grew up hearing this chapter and sometimes chafed a bit at the way some men taught this. But years later this is one of my favorite books in the Bible. Ephesians is amazing. I always read the verse about mutual submission in this context and cheered inside. I took New Testament Greek and of course there were no headings or even verse numbers. So I also thought about how as we mutually submit, if men really love their wives as Christ loves the church and lay down their lives for us, arranging under them in some sense and showing respect to them is actually a joy. The design can bring harmony and fulfillment if the whole picture is lived out. There’s a verse in another chapter I love. Men are to grant women honor as joint heirs of the grace of God. That’s good news, too. Anyway, I enjoyed discovering your Substack today!