With All Due Respect to John Piper...
Ahem. Actually, no they don't....
At a conference this week, John Piper was talking aboutmasculine Christianity. And he made the above statement, which caused me tosquint. Huh?
Now, I should probably qualify my thoughts by saying I lovemuch of what John Piper has to say. I'm thinking specifically about hislife-changing teaching about loving God.
But when it comes to his views on gender, he has made somestatements that I must respectfully question. Why? Because he makes subtlechanges when he quotes the Bible. The quote above is one of them.
We all know there's a difference between a statement and animperative, right? And there's a difference between literal speech and ametaphor.
In the passage Dr. Piper is quoting, husband and wife form ahead/body picture of oneness. They share the same blood and breath and life.The wife is the body; but she is not commanded to "be" the body.
In the same way, the husband is the head, but he is notcommanded to "be" the head. Jesus is the Door, but he doesn’t “become”the Door. In a metaphor, one thing stands for another. And in the marriagemetaphor Paul lays out in Ephesians 5, he uses a beautiful metaphor of a headand a body.
Think of how interconnected a head is with a body--two shallbecome one. The phrase shows up in Genesis at the creation of marriage, andPaul refers back to that phrase after laying out his metaphor for marriage as ahead/body interconnectedness.
Again, the husband is not, in fact, ever told to be the head. Howcan a human become a body part on a literal level?
To do that some make "head"a synonym for leader. But if we do that, we not only turn a unity picture intoan org-chart picture. We also leave the word "body" without asynonym. How does a wife demonstrate a corresponding bodyship to her husband?
Paul actually uses an equative verb: X= Y. The head is somethingthe husband is. It's not what he does. But that's not to say Paul leaves outreference to what a husband should do. He does include an imperative—love. That's it...he commands thehusband to love. And Paul has in mind something different from feeling-orientedlove. He does not, in fact, use the word for friendship love. He uses the word (root: agapeo)for self-sacrificing, lay-down-your-life love...the kind Jesus showed for Hisbride, the church. That’s not to say husband and wife aren’t best friends. Theyare in this ideal. They are one.
Paul never pairs head and submission in Ephesians. He pairshead and body; and he pairs sacrificial loveand submission—because they are the actions that fit the head/body metaphor, especially inthe Greek world. And they still have ramifications for us today.
The goal of marriage is not a well negotiated powerstructure; it's oneness that leads to the upbuilding of the entire body inlove. The thing the apostles taught that the husbands should "be" was (Paul:) full of sacrificial love, like Christ. And (Peter:) respectful and honor-granting, lest their prayers be hindered.