Patriarchy and the Bible

When I became a Christian, I (Bill) was told the bible that I needed was the NIV, so I went out and got one. Little did I know then that 100% of the translators were male, and that this affected how they put together the Bible.

It would be many years later that someone (no doubt a woman) pointed out the irony of these bible translators who claimed ‘a high view of scripture’ intentionally set up various passages to be misread. The one I remember the most was from Ephesians 5.

The translators broke a sentence in half to insert the heading “Wives and Husbands.” Note that the heading was NOT in the original text - all of those are added in all our bibles. And in this instance, verse 21 and 22 are the same sentence. We know that because there is no verb in verse 22. The verb ‘submit’ in verse 22 literally does not exist in the original Greek.

The verb ‘submit’ in verse 22 is a carryover verb implied from the verb ‘submit’ in verse 21. But can’t you see it? Verse 21 says we should submit to one another! That’s the theme verse for this whole section of Ephesians, and it includes men submitting to women and women submitting to men. But the translators segmented it away, with the emphasis on the lead off verse, “Wives submit to your husbands,” when that’s simply not what the Bible says.  In this verse, the original manuscripts in Greek literally do NOT say, “Wives submit to your husbands.”

Get in touch with your thoughts, feelings and body and notice your reaction to these two lines leading off a section of the Bible about Christian Marriage:

• Wives submit to your husbands…

• Submit to one another…

Later translations shifted the heading back to the beginning of verse 21. So progress has been made. But this is just one of so, so many examples of how those who feel like they own the Bible translate it in ways that try to keep women submissive.

How has the Bible been used in your life to reinforce the submission of women?