What Difference Would A Biblical, Matriarchal Society Make?

If, as God commanded in Genesis, a man should leave his own parents and cleave to his wife, it would seem that her kin, her homeland, her lineage, would be the familial reference point for our definition of "family." It makes sense -- in a post-Fall world, women were too easily victimized by men under the unGodly patriarchy that sprung to life after Adam and Eve were expelled from Eden. Locating the center of the new family's beginning with her family, under the protection, if need be, of her relatives, ensured that what we now call "domestic violence" would be far less likely to occur. It would also result in matrilineal and matrilocal societies that conferred status and security to their women.

Tragically, as God predicted, a woman's desire would be for oneness with her husband, but, because of the toxin of sin that entered the world after the Fall, he would "rule over her." It seems that the first step toward male rule and the establishment of patriarchy occurred the very first time a man violated God's command and took a wife from the protection of her people and set her under his rule, in his household, among his people.

The patriarchy thing hasn't worked well for women ever since -- even when practiced by loving Christian men comforted by easy readings of Scripture that appear to ensure their command and control over those in his family. I'm not advocating that every Christian man settle in his wife's hometown, with her family, after marriage. I am suggesting that Godly marriages should recognize the woman's vulnerability to male control and oppression -- oppression that often occurs in Christian homes under the seemingly benign labels of "male headship," "Godly masculinity," and "soft patriarchy." But from sinful sources come sinful institutions, and thousands of years of women's suffering at the hands of men powered by patriarchal privilege has confirmed it.

A good start, then, in honoring God's intent in marriage would be to enthrone Christ Jesus as the only head of two humble, loving, committed people who deny at every turn the unfair privileges and restrictions conferred by the Fall while outdoing one another not only in honoring their spouses, but honoring and submitting mutually to everyone God puts in their path.

So, if I were at Church and a man asked me to get him a cup of coffee, I would gladly do so -- not because he's a man, not even because he's a brother, and not with apologies to my husband, but simply because I'm empowered in Christ to cheerfully submit to others. It doesn't "honor" patriarchy for me to submit to a man. It honors patriarchy when I submit to a man out of compunction -- especially if that man is my husband, and especially if he were to presume it just because he's been taught it's Biblical.