This is part of a series on patriarchy, headship, and submission. See this index.
There are two primary, but related, issues at the root of the biblical grammatical argument on submission.
The first issue is whether or not the Greek middle voice is equivalent to the English active voice.
The second issue is whether or not submission always refers to submission to authority. If it does always refer to authority, does that hold for all instances of the word, including the active, passive, and middle voices, or just some of them?
In part 5 we began our examination of all the passages in the New Testament that use the term ‘submit.’ We examined everything, except those used within the context of husbands and wives, which we will now discuss.
Husbands and Wives
The following passages are in a class where the word is used in the context husbands and wives. This forms the crux of the discussion on the meaning of ‘submission’. Unlike the above, most of these uses of ‘submit’ are in the middle voice when speaking of husbands and wives and in the active/passive voice when speaking of others (i.e. children and slaves). This is an important distinction because, in all cases above, when the middle is used, authority is not necessarily implied by ‘submit’ against Grudem’s claim to the contrary.
[1] Present Imperative Middle — 2nd Person Plural
There is only one other place where ‘submit’ is (possibly) used in the imperative middle: in Romans 13:1. We examined this in Part 1 and noted:
What this serves to illustrate is that meaning of the Greek imperative middle changes when translated into English as the imperative active “submit”. It is an imperative—a command—but the native Greek speakers hear a different command than the one that listeners in English hear.
This is why John Chrysostom—the native Greek-speaker from the late 4th century—says of this verse:
Chrysostom demonstrates the significance of the word being in the middle voice. In the active/passive voice, the command would naturally be to the husband, as due to a master. But because Chrysostom takes this in the middle voice, it is for God and not like that due to a master.
Recall what we said in Part 5 of Romans 8:18-21:
With this in mind, look again at what Chrysostom says. Contra Grudem, wives are not subject to their husbands (as to a master) here, but submit for God. The whole point of the middle voice is that the target of submission (i.e. not the husband) is different than that indicated by the active or passive voice (i.e. the husband). Just as in Romans 8, the type of submission that Paul uses here is notably different than the other uses we’ve seen, and Chrysostom—the native speaker—easily apprehends this.
This is also similar to Romans 13:1-7, which I’ve argued, in Part 5, that it should be interpreted in the middle voice (translators use the passive voice). Recall how I said that Christians pay taxes, not because they must submit to governmental authority, but for God.
Chrysostom, speaking on Romans 13:1-7 fails to mention that we pay taxes because of authority. Not only does he allege that we submit to authorities for God, he argues that we pay taxes because we receive an corresponding exchange of services from those who govern. Chrysostom could not make this claim if obedience to authority was always the inherent meaning behind ‘submit’, for Chrysostom would instead be obligated to say that we pay taxes because of their authority. But he didn’t say what he “must” say.
… In the same way, wives, submitting yourself[3] to your own husbands, in order that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won over without a word by the way of life of their wives as they observe your reverent, pure way of life. Your adornment must not be merely external—elaborate braiding of the hair and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on fine clothing—but let your adornment be the hidden self of the heart with the incorruptible beauty of a meek and quiet spirit, which is highly valued in the sight of God. For in this way in earlier times the holy women who hoped in God also adorned themselves, submitting yourself[4] to their own husbands, just as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him “Lord,” whose children you are when you continue to do what is good and are not afraid of any intimidation. In the same way, husbands, dwelling with your wife in a knowledgeable way as with a weaker vessel, showing honor to them as also being co-heirs of the grace of life, so that your prayers are not hindered. … In the same way, you who are younger, submitting yourself[5] to the elders. And all of you must clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. [1] Aorist Imperative Passive — 2nd Person Plural
[2] Present Participle Middle/Passive — Nominative Masculine Plural
[3] Present Participle Middle/Passive — Nominative Feminine Plural
[4] Present Participle Middle/Passive — Nominative Feminine Plural
[5] Present Participle Middle/Passive — Nominative Masculine Plural
As with the other middle voice uses, the focus is on the person doing the submitting, not the person being submitted to. The reason for the submission is not because of the target of submission, as in all the similar cases that we’ve examined (see the discussion of Colossians 3:18 above). In other words, the reason one submits to unbelievers (masters and spouses) is not because they are unbelievers with authority, but because the person submitting is a believer for the sake of God. That’s one good reason for Peter to use the middle voice here.
Notice how each participle and “in the same way” seems to reference back to the very first imperative. I discussed this at length in Part 1, concluding that:
Peter never once tells a Christian to exercise authority over another. Quite the contrary, he implores voluntary submission by all to authority, even at great personal cost, and even men to women (e.g. male slaves to their female masters; believing husbands to their ungodly wives).
Peter talks about submission individually, but ties them all together using “in the same way” because his conception of submission is “the same” in each case. Because Peter applies it to both husbands and wives in the same way, he is describing mutual submission.
Let’s repeat that. Peter describes wives submitting themselves to their husbands. He then describes Sarah obeying Abraham in everything, and as John Chrysostom notes, Genesis describes Abraham obeying Sarah in everything in love. Then Peter says that in the same way husbands are to “be dwelling with” [as in wedlock] with their wives. That “command” for wives to submit to their husbands and Sarah obeying her husband? Husbands are in the same way to “be dwelling with” their wives. In the same way. Peter’s talking about the same thing for both husbands and wives.
Peter applies the concept of submission to all Christians, especially those who are suffering unjustly. He applies submission as a general virtue to be given to those in authority and others as well (spouses; elders).
This sacred secret is great, but I speak in regard to Christ and the church. In any case, each one of you also is to love his own wife as he loves himself, and the wife is to respect her husband. [1] Present Participle Middle— Nominative Masculine Plural
[2] Present Indicative Middle/Passive — 3rd Person Singular
I’ve written about this passage on many different occasions in many different articles. The issues are nicely summarized in Part 1, where I listed ten different major points. There is no need to repeat them here, you can just go read them.
Regarding Grudem’s contention…
…Paul mentions nothing about authority in this passage. The English word ‘head’ (which implies authority) is not like the Koine Greek word ‘head’ (which does not imply authority). Nor, as we’ve now demonstrated, does ‘submit’ always imply an authority.
Likewise, encourage the younger men to be sensible in all things. Show yourself to be an example of good works, with integrity in your teaching, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that those who oppose you will be put to shame, having nothing bad to say about us. Slaves are to submit[2] to their own masters in all things, doing what is wanted without being argumentative, not pilfering, but showing complete faithfulness in that which is good, so that in all things they make the doctrine of God our Savior attractive. [1] Present Participle Middle/Passive — Accusative Feminine Plural
[2] Present Infinitive Passive
It’s interesting just how many times Paul uses participles when discussing submission of wives. He does so in each related passage except Colossians 3. Even Peter does the same thing in 1 Peter 3! Yet, as in Ephesians 6, Paul often switches into the active or passive when addressing others (e.g. slaves; children). The impact of the choice to use the participle (or not) is often hidden in English translations. In Ephesians 5, it goes “be filled with the spirit…submitting” and in here is Titus 2 it goes “Speak only what is consistent with sound doctrine…submitting.” More than anything else, this grammatically sets the context—or framing—in which ‘submit’ is understood. And what does Paul do with this framing? He doesn’t associate submission with authority, but indeed uses the language to contrast it with those who obey authority (e.g. slaves; children).
Paul is obviously not associating submission with with authority because he mentions in the midst of a list of other virtues that have nothing to do with authority. Grudem’s claim…
…is really quite questionable when applied here. Paul does not call husbands an authority here. This is unambiguous.
Having now examined all the references, do you still agree with Grudem?
Have you tried contacting Grudem? I think you did recently with Foster or Tennant because you wrote about it.
I think our pastors have been able to get hold of him long ago.
That would be great if he was able to respond to two or three of the passages you disagree on.
I think Kevin DeYoung likes Grudem and I’d bet you agree that Kevin is knowledgeable about voices. If Wayne won’t respond, you might want to consider emailing a short excerpt of your critique, maybe this Part 6, and see if KDY responds.
i still don’t get how in later times Wayne Grudem who with John Piper-who they vehemently hateth- is some kind of hero to ”redpillers” when he is co-founder of one of the most hated of groups for ”redpillers” the CBMW.
Or just read this from a revered saint who years(when he was ”popular and successful ”-i might add) before this loved attacking the CBMW :
A big win for Grudem.
Posted on November 22, 2016 by Saint(for latter-day ”redpillers”)Dalrock
The Atlantic has a new article out on a change the ESV is making in their translation of Gen 3:16. From Rewriting the Biblical ‘Curse’ on Womankind:
Whereas the first half of that sentence formerly read “Your desire shall be for your husband,” it now reads, “Your desire shall be contrary to your husband.” It appears to suggest that women naturally oppose their husbands’ desires, and thus are responsible for marital conflict.
It turns out that Dr. Wayne Grudem, cofounder of the CBMW was a major driver of this change:
The ESV translators are known to mostly affirm complementarianism, the view that men and women should have different roles in the family and church. They include Christian leaders such as the prolific theologian and writer J.I. Packer; the publisher Lane Dennis; and the theologian Wayne Grudem…
I’ve only read a little on the argument for the change here, so I did some digging. Grudem argued for this reading of Gen 3:16 in a chapter he wrote for Biblical Foundations for Manhood and Womanhood*
The word translated “desire” is an unusual Hebrew word, teshûqåh. What is the meaning of this word? In this context and in this construction, it probably implies an aggressive desire, perhaps a desire to conquer or rule over, or else an urge or impulse to oppose her husband, an impulse to act “against” him. This sense is seen in the only other occurrence of teshûqåh in all the books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), and the only other occurrence of teshûqåh plus the preposition ’el in the whole Bible. That occurrence of the word is in the very next chapter of Genesis, in 4:7. God says to Cain, “Sin is crouching at the door, and its desire is for you, but you must master it” ( NASB ). Here the sense is very clear. God pictures sin as a wild animal waiting outside Cain’s door, waiting to attack him, even to pounce on him and overpower him. In that sense, sin’s “desire” or “instinctive urge” is “against” him. 20
The striking thing about that sentence is what a remarkable parallel it is with Genesis 3:16. In the Hebrew text, six words are the same and are found in the same order in both verses. It is almost as if this other usage is put here by the author so that we would know how to understand the meaning of the term in Genesis 3:16. The expression in 4:7 has the sense, “desire, urge, impulse against” (or perhaps “desire to conquer, desire to rule over”). And that sense fits very well in Genesis 3:16 also. 21
Grudem further argues that to characterize this as sexual desire would be incorrect:
Some have assumed that “desire” in Genesis 3:16 refers to sexual desire. But that is highly unlikely because (1) the entire Bible views sexual desire within marriage as something positive, not as something evil or something that God imposed as a judgment; and (2) surely Adam and Eve had sexual desire for one another prior to their sin, for God had told them to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 1:28), and certainly in an unfallen world, along with the command, God would have given the desire that corresponded to it. So “your desire shall be for your husband” cannot refer to sexual desire. It is much more appropriate to the context of a curse to understand this as an aggressive desire against her husband, one that would bring her into conflict with him.
Grudem offers the following in the notes for the chapter:
The understanding of Genesis 3:16 as a hostile desire, or even a desire to rule over, has gained significant support among Old Testament commentators. It was first suggested by Susan T. Foh, “What Is the Woman’s Desire?” in Westminster Theological Journal 37 (1975), 376-383. David Talley says the word is attested in Samaritan and Mishnaic Hebrew “with the meaning urge, craving, impulse” and says of Foh, “Her contention that the desire is a contention for leadership, a negative usage, seems probable for Gen. 3:16” (New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis, 5 vols., ed., Willem Van Gemeren, Vol. 4 [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1991], 341, with reference to various commentators).
*Not to be confused with the similarly titled book Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, which Piper and Grudem put together when they first created the CBMW. Also note that the excerpts I quoted are only pieces of what he wrote on the topic in the chapter. The link is to a pdf version of the book, and you can read the full section starting at the bottom of page 33 of the pdf file.”
Of course desire meant the woman would demand and lust for goodies at any cost(I knew stuff like that as a kid watching extended family females and their female friends.i know of many women whose entire lives revolve around going on cruise ships, to amusement parks, and eating at steakhouses. They always plead poverty(even though their boyfriends make 40k-70k a year, to get anyone male or female usually when they first appear at those places to give them goodies i.e. -ride tickets and food-too.
They like his stances on the Greek of ‘head’ and ‘submit’ even if they disagree on everything else.
This is ironic, because I’m often taken to task for citing John Chrysostom. Chrysostom believed in patriarchy, but his interpretations of scripture diverge wildly from the modern Red Pill conceptualization of Christian Patriarchy. His biblical exegesis is much closer to what I believe, indicating that my view is more ancient than theirs, despite the claim that I’m a modern feminist (lol!).
Another comment from the Saint theDeti that illustrates how the glowie(u thought that was funny and likable at spawnys and here when glowie sharkly said that about I, yes Surf Dumb?-yet then you tell us to be schoolmarmish here?-Tell Jack and sharkly to be better schoolmarms-to prevent further schisms-from their glowie -influence) ”redpillers” keep changing goalposts and causing schisms.:
thedeti says:
12 June, 2024 at 9:48 pm
Why Men STOP Dating Modern Women#17 – 96.7% Failure
All of these should be
“Why the top 5% of attractive desirable men who we want, f@ck us and won’t commit to us”
“The top 5% of men are the attractive and desirable men. All they do is f@ck us, use us, exploit and take advantage of us, and they won’t commit to us and do what we want. The reasons they won’t give us what we really want is because they don’t have to , because everyone knows we will still let them f@ck us and manipulate us, and because we aren’t valuable or “high value” enough to get commitment from those men.”
There. I have just given us all the information we need for the last 20,000 videos to come from women on this particular issue.”
Just as recently as April 2018(when GBFM was unbanned because Dal the he-Man butthext-supporter wanted to be popular and successful again-but it didn’t work as GBFM was mostly awol most of the time) Saint Dalrock was telling us that any married or otherwise guy could easily mix alpha and beta traits to keep women ”satisfied” &”comfortable” on their butt all day long.
Yet now under glowie -influence now were told only the top-20-5% depending on the day can be married or get a woman.Even though Vox=Ted(born rich narcissist) is an egomaniac and gamma-radiating dude he still preaches like Saint Dalrock that any guy can move on up(like George and Weezie did) women-wise , with just a little elbow grease and a shower of course!
Years ago at a prayer breakfast in Fresno. I was there with my Salvation Army Officer (pastor).
The speaker was Chuck Swindoll. The topic was “how can we get more men interested in church and the men already there to….you know…step up a bit more / mentor more / help more”
Chuck mentioned that a single man was more likely to get fellowship and a genuine welcome walking into a strange bar and ordering a beer than any church in the USA today. He also used the example of a barber shop “Guy is in strange town visiting a college friend, decides to get a haircut. He would get more laughs, fellowship, comradery than the local church in that town if he walked in as a stranger. Any denomination”
“The barber or bartender would chat. Want to know about him a little. No, not his life’s story. But some just guy basics on how guys just talk to each other. I’m not even talking about women and using cuss words here”
He then went on to how “we” (the church) forgot how to deal with and talk with and walk with men.
He mentioned also that men are needed in the younger ministry, especially for boys. He asked the room of a 1000 plus people “how many of you men in here run a youth program at your church for boys? Scouts? Royal rangers? Sunday school for the young ones…under 10? And, pastors / priests dont count. I’m talking the flock here!”
Only three hands raised in the entire room. One of them was mine.
“see, that’s part of our problem” he said while nodding.
He also asked ”
how much of your church is dedicated to praise on a Sunday…if its more than 20 minutes total of the whole hour or so service, that’s another problem”
“How many of your Sunday school programs involve singing? It shouldnt really have any, unless the youth will preform for a specific date or event. Another problem”
WHen boys hit teen years, they dont want to spend all Sunday singing. They dont want a “mommy” at church running every Sunday school class, and men dont want to spend most of the service singing. They want practical answers, some prayer a melding with their spouse on Scripture. Sure, praise is great…and needed but that appeals more to women and draws more women to a church than men.”
So…..for all this submission talk, perhaps it should be some relational talk as well. Not just with your spouse…but with Christ! It will take a special kinds of men to do this, and they are currently not in the Christian ‘sphere for the most part.
Those are excellent recollections about Swindoll. I used to hear his radio teachings.
I appreciate the point about singing. I hadn’t thought of it like that, other than noticing I count songs because I look forward to them ending each service. We have 5 songs usually, so probably around 15 minutes, but it still seems like too many. I would like to see two cut out, and have a pastor answer a question each week instead.
I really enjoyed seeing him speak. This was 2013? 2014? The breakfast started at 5AM and Chuck took the podium at 6AM.
What a Wednesday morning to wake up to!
I found him very personable. Worked and owned the crowd really well. Knew how to speak well. A gift I suppose.
What I liked was that he asked questions. Cracked some jokes. Any yet, brought it back to “what Jesus said and did” and still addressed some issues facing men in the church too many tip toe around.
I liked him.
”Those are excellent recollections about Swindoll. I used to hear his radio teachings.”
”What I liked was that he asked questions. Cracked some jokes. Any yet, brought it back to “what Jesus said and did” and still addressed some issues facing men in the church too many tip toe around.
I liked him.”
I mainly know him for his radio show around ’04-’09(I’ve barely listened to radio preachers since then as I was listening to about 3 or 4 hours a day back then after I stopped listening mainly to Rush Limbaugh and most ”conservative” talk radio like Hannity or wall -banger as Savage use to call him- other than Michael Savage & the Teddy Savage Nation of course.).
i thought he was only in his 40s back then not his ’60s as he’s 89 now.
Never heard his radio show. Never heard of him til that morning.
He was an old guy, but did have a vigor about him. His prayer was pretty moving too at the close of his speech.
He spoke basically that the men in the church now need to be inspired to lead, taught to lead, expected to lead. He also pleaded that “we must” be reaching out to younger single men, and not judging them for sleeve tattoos, and expecting every new man coming in to have a wife and kids in tow……..
“We have got to change this. Its not the world I came up in, nor many of you. Most men who do walk in or visit or come are not going to be married. Its an opportunity. Not a hindrance. The church needs them. That is the future that is going and is coming in.”
Paraphrasing “We cannot exclude leadership because a man isnt married and heaven forbid……a young pastor, truly called and is single cannot be immediately turned down by the board because he isnt married. Its going to be more common, and we have to focus on their heart, their mind, their potential…not just his martial status and pretty his wife should be”
” He also pleaded that “we must” be reaching out to younger single men, and not judging them for sleeve tattoos, and expecting every new man coming in to have a wife and kids in tow……..”
I know this is what you mean that the churches are 20-15 years behind the culture.The Christians in the crowd hadn’t seen all the girls that had noserings and tattoos by ’05-’08 ? Nor families were disappearing around the same time? Why do they think Toys R’ Us was in such big trouble by the mid-’00s?It is similar to the sphere ignoring younger MEN now and back around ’13/’14 saying ”don’t say MGTOW nor have that icky symbol of it that came out around ’04 by Rob Fedders/Ferdz, but instead say ”republican ‘traditional values red piller” Back then and now wondering ”what happened?”.Their ”blinders(& refusal to believe their eyes) to reality is ”what happened”
And not “Jesus would have played tackle football as a teen or young man / Jesus would have had a cool 1960’s car he restored if he was around today” kind of staements.
Stuff like this from Vox=Ted is why I don’t understand that MR guy(who said you are not to ”trick” or ”manipulate” delicate little women(who never ”trick” or ”manipulate MEN let alone murder babies gleefully)) lest they divorce you when they discover your ”real” SMP/MMP/SSH-u know the sacred gibberish and nonsense acronyms:
The Dark Herald shares a tale of utilizing a Gamma’s behavioral pattern for his own benefit:
Back in the 1990s when I was still in the game, there was a guy named Palmore… We all called him Poo-more which tells you just about everything you need to know about the dude.
Anyway, Poo-more would try to warn off any girl I was talking to with, “You should stay away from Jack. He’s just a player!”
He was doing this for free when I gladly would have been paying him.
Preselection is unbelievably powerful. What he was really telling those girls was, that a lot of other women have found this guy more than a little worth their time and attention.
Bottomline: If you can’t afford to pay a guy to do this for you, just find a Gamma Male and get him into White Knight mode.
Talk about the approach you are going to use with a girl he clearly has a crush on within his earshot.
His instincts will do the rest.
As I keep trying to tell people, usually to no avail, using the SSH to obsess about yourself is a complete misuse of a powerful tool. Using it to understand, anticipate, and utilize the behavior of others is a much more useful application.”
See? Just a little elbow grease and a shower of course and marriage and butthext for every guy!
More evidence of how the glowie ”fed pillers” have changed the meaning of ”redpillers” and discredited and destroyed the ‘sphere!
From another revered Saint the GodFather Rollo:
OCTOBER 2, 2012BY Saint(for latter day fed pillers) ROLLO TOMASSI
Up the Alpha
As expected the Alpha to Beta trait dichotomy was inferred from Last weeks post courtesy of commenter Ad (WTB-what the butthext)Fortitudo:
Do you disagree with Athol Kay that the best option for a woman in a fed butthext lust and greed is a man with both alpha and beta traits?
That is to say, wouldn’t a man with great genes/physicality/confidence as well as financial stability and kindness to the butthexting be the “perfect man” for a greedy,lusty woman of the fed ?
Wouldn’t that satisfy both her short term and long term mating strategies?
I get the sense that it is in absence of men that have both traits that women seek out these different qualities in separate men under short and long term circumstances.
I covered this a long while ago in Schedules of Mating and as recently as Your Friend Menstruation. This want for the perfect amalgam of hot Alpha and parentally invested Beta is literally hard-coded into women’s brains and endocrine system. From the most rudimentary level, the conflict that *hypergamy instills in women is due to this want of fusing together the arousing Alpha with the attractive Beta in the same man. Thus was women’s pluralistic sexual strategy evolved.
The problem that confounds hypergamy is that the arousing Alpha and the attractive Beta rarely exist in the same male, at the same time and at the most opportune time for women to appreciate and capitalize on it. By this I mean that as women proceed through their peak SMV years, they place higher priorities and higher mating value upon predominately Alpha traits. These are the ‘fuck me now’ party years, and Alpha seed far out-values Beta need. As I wrote in Schedules of Mating, on a macro level this translates into a proactive form of cuckoldry. Even if it doesn’t result in a pregnancy, the latent urgency in a woman’s peak is to ‘get the seed first, find the provider later’ (i.e. protracted cuckoldry).
The fantasy for women of course is to ‘tame the savage Alpha’ and convert him into a parentally invested partner by encouraging Beta traits in him as he matures, and hopefully prospers. Many a thwarted single mommy knows the unfortunate outcome of attempting to ‘fix’ their Bad Boy Alpha into the Good Dad Father, but this is the emphasis assuming a woman pauses long enough to invest in one particular Alpha during her peak years. The base schema is to maintain that hot Alpha arousal in the hind quarters while developing him into a more attractive Beta provider.
As a woman approaches the downturn of her SMV that hypergamic urgency shifts to favor Beta providership traits as the prospect of long term security=greed alters the priorities of her +hypergamy lusts. Now the script changes to one favoring the nice, dependable, and necessarily resourceful man with all the attractive features she needs for a commitment to long term security. It’s not that she doesn’t still become aroused by the physicality and charisma of a predominately Alpha male (particularly in her proliferate menstrual phase), but she is more aware of the balance between her lessened ability to attract that man (post-Wall of butthext that is more ”Christian” for schoolmarms than walls of text it seems ) and the need to pair-bond with a man who can provide for her and her offspring. Women will mitigate this arousal-attraction imbalance with their own forms of pornography or self-initialized rationalization about their ‘deeper maturity’, but in essence the doubt that hypergamy seeds in them has to be held in check either through self-repression or by dread of loss.
The fantasy for women in this instance is the hope that their predominately Beta partner will “Man Up”, Just Get It on his own and develop more arousing Alpha traits as he matures his butthexting ways. The base schema here is to maintain the sweet Beta butthext provider attraction, while developing him into a more arousing Alpha as her needs=lusts demand.
Beta with a Side of Alpha butthext
The inimitable Geisha Kate then helps solidify this analysis of her ‘Perfect Man’:
Great point. That ^ is the true manicorn. That is what I mean when I say I’ll take a “greater beta with fries.”
Be careful what you pray for Kate, the women (and Manboobz) who kvetch about the ‘overly sensitive men’ they committed to probably wished for the same. In fact I’d argue that the majority of married men now looking to Athol Kay for insight believed they were Greater Betas with a side of Alpha butthext up the wazoo.
Kate’s in a stage of life when the Beta providership male makes far better practical sense to pair off with. Just like Aunt Giggles, her definition of attraction and ‘a good relationship’ is biased by the personal conditions of her present SMP valuation. She understands this from her age, SMV and necessity perspective, but this undoubtedly wasn’t her perspective when she was in the prime of her SMV years.
This is the ‘build-a-better-beta‘ paradox:
The overarching point is to create a more acceptable man for a female defined goal, NOT to truly empower any man. There is no feminine opposite to this; there is no counter effort to make women more acceptable to men – in fact this is actively resisted and cast as a form of slavish subservience. This is the extent of the feminine reality; it’s so instaurating that men, with the aid of “concerned women”, will spend lifetimes seeking ways to better qualify themselves for feminine approval in a butthextual way that fed piller schoolmarms deserve. That’s the better Beta they hope to create. One who will Man-Up and be the Alpha as situations and use would warrant, but Beta enough to be subservient to the feminine imperative. They seek a man to be proud of, one who’s association reflects a statement of their own butthextual quality, yet one they still have implicit control over.
Whether the reasonings are moral, entitlement or ‘honor bound’ in nature the end result is still feminine primacy. The sales pitch is one of manning up to benefit yourself, but the latent purpose is one of better qualifying for normalized feminine acceptance. What they cannot reconcile is that the same benefits that are inherent in becoming more Alpha (however you choose to define that) are the same traits that threaten his necessary position of subservience as a Beta. This is precisely why ‘real’ Game, and truly unplugging, cannot be sanitized. This social element wants to keep you plugged in; more Alpha, more confidence, more awareness, is a threat to fem-centrism. “It’s great that all this Game stuff has finally got you standing up for yourself, but remember who’s got the vagina.“
I have a lot of respect for Athol, and not so much for Aunt Giggles, but the problem I see with both of their approaches in balancing Alpha with Beta is that they begin from a fem-centric origin. Athol seems to have the better take of the two, but by and large the men seeking his advice are Beta men who’ve been red-pill enlightened to the fact that they need to up the Alpha – presuming they had an Alpha element to start.
Aunt Giggles simply wants a Beta, who’s an Alpha of a woman’s convenience. Aunt Sue had a grand mal seizure orgasm when she’d thought Roissy was actually advocating that men genuinely become more Beta. She force fit it to comply with her build-a-better-beta narrative (CH suggests using Beta as an in-context Game tactic), but it only better illustrates her latent imperatives about a post-Wall, fem-centrically defined preference for Beta with a side of Alpha.
There is no side of Alpha. The conflict both Kate and Giggles don’t grasp is that Alpha demands dominance, and this doesn’t fit very well with the feminine imperative’s false religion of equalism. Athol understand this with his Captain and First Officer analogy; in any relationship one partner is the dominant personality, the other the submissive. Even homosexual couples recognize this order, but the women and men of the feminine Matrix resist this with the delusion of an equalist utopia amongst the genders.
So when I read about a desire for achieving some balance of Alpha to Beta traits in the ‘perfect man’ I realize that this is an extension of this feminine-primary equalist want for balance amongst the genders; which really equates to women wanting a perfected security. In their need for control (dominance) they want hypergamy definitively settled in the perfect man, for the perfect occasion, and at every stage of their SMV maturation. Men, mangina sympathizers or otherwise, are simply the means to that end. That end may be with the perfect husband, or via cuckolding or through fem-side pornography, or any other methodology women’s sexual pluralism will help her invent.
Up the Alpha
I’ve written this before, but it bears repeating: for men wanting to change their lives and relationships, working up from Beta to Alpha is a far tougher road to hoe that tempering Alpha dominance with a personalized touch of Beta. As bad as Hugo Schwyzer is in his abject feminization, have a read of a few of the female commenters in this article. How many of the simpering, socially conditioned, Betatized men these women seeth about would make for believable Alphas once they had a red pill epiphany? It is precisely because of this impressionistic, binary solipsism that women will never be happy with ‘fixing’ their Beta. This is why he has to Just Get It on his own.
It is a far better proposition to impress a woman with an organic Alpha dominance – Alpha can only be a man’s dominant personality origin. There is no Beta with a side of Alpha because that side of Alpha is NEVER believable when your overall perception is one of being Beta to begin with. This is why I stress Alpha traits above all else. It’s easy, and endearing to ‘reveal’ a flash of Beta sensitivity when a woman perceives you as predominantly Alpha. If your personality is predominantly Beta, any sporadic flashes of Alpha will seem like emotional tantrums at best, character flaws at worst.
Women may love the Beta, but they only respect the Alpha.”
*Hypergamy is fed code for ”Men” who can’t handle that women are sinners like themselves.
See what Saint Dalrock & pre-fed desouled & debased Saint theDeti used to believe before the glowie takeover of the ‘sphere?
This is why Dalrock had to leave the sphere to prevent his own fed butthexting and desouling that the glowie fed pillers want for every Man & woMAN on earth.
I’m still not buying it.
The Christian ‘sphere(the secular one preached ”always caution is to go heavy on alpha and barely anything on beta” as Roissy said-also said at one time he wasn’t alpha but learned to be it all the time) under Athol Kay and Dalrock said any husband could be more attractive to their wife and other women by just being 50% alpha and beta(maybe they said this just to look ”Christian” beside Roissy,Roosh and Rollo? Now it more or less says ”yep We were born better MEN than thou and good enough and only needed a little weight training in the gym to get women and be married.”-as the fed left-right oligarchy thinks of themselves as too.-i guess I see this clearly because I knew it was BS then and now for the most part. Some guys that were real redpillers said this ”women want their guy to be nice to them period and an @ssh@le to everyone else”(even now fed piller saint theDeti said that recently at Spawnys-which is very realistic for most women today-especially the brawling ones-they will beat the crap out of another woman-which(when you see it before your own eyes happen as I have at least a handful of times) makes one believe even more about the statics for lesbian ”intimate partner” violence is true.
Also more of what i’m talking about here by ”jack”:
What hope does a normal guy have for a marriage, if all he sees here is, a professor with all-night sex (Jack), cynical and super articulate lawyers (Lexet, NovaSeeker, Thedeti), a guy with 10 kids speaking a second language (Oscar), a book writer (Deep Strength)”
He forgot to mention that he had to do a lot of peeing in the bed and shower for that ”all-night sex ”.
LEX- I think he said he was just too ”churched’ and didn’t know enough of how most of life is beyond it.
Nova- admitted he was 5’6” or so and had to bodybuild a lot.
TheDeti- first found the ”redpill” by that ”aunt giggles”=susan walsh as mentioned by st.Rollo above – which got his wife under some control after he ”upped his alpha” like susan and Athol Kay preached & Dalrock believed(you know what post from 2011 of Dal -i’m referring to-the one where he admits Roissy is the one who restarted his red pill journey after his first playa mentor roommate in college?)- by saying ”if you don’t change, I’ll divorce you and go to Europe and hide out and you’ll get no alimony or child support.”
Deep Strength- said he had to get” better” i.e. bodybuilding like NovaSeeker.
Jack acts like the above is no longer true. Like they were alpha or something on day 1!
Professor,
I understand now that you were speaking by way of analogy, not literally.
It is like when I say that the Manosphere is leftist and feminine. It doesn’t mean they vote Democrat or advocate marrying feminists.
Peace,
DR
More evidence of hypricrosy and fed (by way of fed pillers) infiltration in the ‘sphere!
This was the first time i had ever heard of current ”red pillers” ”ally & friend ”(”Jack” you
are such a fed piller joke that makes guys like SurfDumb zlolzzlzz too much) Matt Walsh from a link at Dalrock’s ”Soothing words for the unrepentant baby mama.” post on November 26, 2013 by Dalrock
The following is especially funny in light of what the supposed ”leaders” of the ‘sphere have said and done over the l;last few years-yet they support the guy who wrote this now -not then lest ye face Dal’s ”godly wrath”:
Married men: your porn habit is an adultery habit
Posted on November 25, 2013by The Matt Walsh Blog
I know a guy who cheats on his wife. He cheats on her every day. He cheats on her multiple times a day. He’s a husband and a father and a serial adulterer.
I shouldn’t know this fact about him, but it came up in conversation a few days ago. We were talking about the divorce rate; both of us gave our theories as to why the statistics are so high. I mentioned in my diagnosis a few studies that show pornography to be a root cause in over 50 percent of divorces annually.
He laughed. “People don’t get divorced over porn.” He went on to explain that porn isn’t a “big deal” to most people. It’s not “like it’s cheating or something.” He told me that he looks at it multiple times daily. His wife, he insisted, might be a little peeved if she knew the extent of it, but only because women overreact about “that kind of thing.”
What kind of thing? Their husbands spending all day obsessively plunging through the darkest regions of the internet for graphic sexual images of rape, abuse, perversion, exploitation and other forms of filthy depravity previously unknown to mankind?
Yeah. That kind of thing. No reason why any wife should be too upset about that, apparently.
Listen guys, I know this is an uncomfortable conversation. But it’s time we man up and get real about pornography. First things first: if you’re married and you look at porn, you are cheating. Period. From a Christian perspective, this can’t be debated. Christ laid it out very clearly: if you lust after another woman, you have committed adultery. When we look at porn we are choosing to succumb to that lust; we are indulging it, fertilizing it, giving it respite in our minds. We are diving into it headfirst and soaking in it like a sponge. We are lessening ourselves, betraying our wives and participating in the violent exploitation of women (and girls). Or minds and our bodies belong to the Lord and to our wives; (does this sound dare I say like ”mutual submission” to ”red piller” or even ”fed piller” ears?)
pornography, therefore, intrudes on their domain. If we look at porn, we are adulterers. We are adulterers in all the worst ways.
We don’t even need to refer to Scripture to figure out the simple equation that porn equals adultery.
Why wouldn’t it?
Because you aren’t physically in contact with another woman?
So what? That’s merely a matter of semantics and circumstance. The absence of physical touch doesn’t automatically free you of the scarlet letter — if it did, ‘sexting’ with other women would be fair game, I suppose. How would you feel if you looked through your wife’s phone and found racy, sexually graphic text messages she’d sent to a man at her office? Would you be alright with it as long as she could prove she never had any physical contact with him? Or is that totally different because she knows the guy, whereas porn is anonymous and impersonal? See, we find ourselves constructing many arbitrary lines of distinction when we are determined to rationalize behavior we instinctively know to be immoral and wrong.
But, OK, what if she didn’t know the guy? What if she was engaging in “fantasies” with men she never met? Imagine that, in your cyber travels, you stumbled upon a porn site featuring pictures and videos of a particularly alluring young female: your wife. How would that sit with you? Your wife selling digital sex all over the internet — how would you like that? It might cause a bit of a marital dispute, wouldn’t you say?
If you wouldn’t want your wife being a porn provider, you ought to understand why she wouldn’t want you to be a porn consumer. If you wouldn’t want her to invite and encourage other men to violate her in their minds, you ought to understand why she wouldn’t want you to accept the invitation to violate other women in your mind.
I don’t mean to concentrate only on married men. Porn is poison for everyone, married or not. And I’m not here to castigate you if you’ve stumbled. We live in a society that preys upon a man’s weaknesses, shoving sex into his face at hyper speed every day, all day, all of the time. This isn’t an excuse; just an attempt to put things into context. I won’t yell at a guy who fights a porn addiction anymore than I’d yell at a guy who fights a crack addiction. But at least the crack addict likely won’t encounter very many people (besides his dealer) who will tell him that it’s actually healthy to smoke crack. If he ventures outside of the abandoned shack where he scores his dope, he probably won’t find any respectable people who will say, “hey, crack isn’t a big deal — it’s totally natural to smoke crack, man!” In that way, the crack smoker has a leg up on the porn addict. The porn addict, by contrast, has to fight both the compulsion itself and the myriad of creeps who will try to convince him that it’s all just a bit of innocent fun.
That’s a lie, of course. It’s not innocent. It’s not fun.
I could cite for you the mounds of psychiatric research proving the detrimental effects of pornography on the brain. But you can do that research yourself.
I could tell you about sex slavery, human trafficking, drug abuse, and child molestation, and I could explain how the porn industry wouldn’t exist without these necessary ingredients. But these are conclusions you can draw on your own, if ever you take even a moment to think about it.
I could remind you that these women you find on your porn sites might not be women at all — they could be children — and there’s no way for you to know for sure. I could then point out that any avid porn customer has most likely at some point been a child porn customer, whether he knew it or not. But this is, indeed, an obvious and inescapable reality.
I could tell you that many children view graphic porn for the first time before the age of 12. I could tell you that we haven’t even begun to reap the atrocious fruits that will come from an entire generation raised on the heinous perversions of internet pornography. But it’s probably too late for these warnings.
So what is left? Perhaps nothing, really. Pornography is evil, empty, deadening, dirty — this is something we all know. That’s why, unless you are either psychotic or utterly despicable, you wouldn’t want your daughter to get into the porn business. That’s why most people hide their porn habits. That’s why it still isn’t considered acceptable to browse “adult” websites at your desk at work or at a table in Starbucks (although people still do, in both scenarios). That’s why you only find porn shops and strip clubs in the slummy, rundown parts of town. No matter how hedonistic and “open minded” we become, we still recognize porn as something that ought to be stowed away in the dank, dark corners of our lives. This is Natural Law, and we can’t escape it. We have an innate understanding of right and wrong, whether we want it or not.
Married men: I think we should be spending our free time with our families, or reading interesting books so that we can sharpen our minds, or building things, or exercising, or doing anything else that will make us better men. Porn will not make you a better man. It will make you smaller. It will make you a liar. It will kill that instinct inside you that calls you to protect and honor women. It will turn you into something you never wanted to be. It will turn you into a sneaky, shameful pervert. It will turn you into an adulterer.
Real men don’t look at pornography. ”
That was anathema to most ”redpill” Real MENtm back then & now!
But after Matt like Carlson and a few others discovered how popular certain ideas from” the conservative underground” with most ”Conservatives” were they started being ”red pill-lite” and were encouraged by those who set themselves up as ”leaders”(thanks mainly to their submissive drone followers) in the ”red pill” movement to be admired by all ”MANosphere variants and descendants”-there wouldn’t even be a MANosphere or ”redpillers ” or especially ”fed pillers” without the proto-MGTOW in the mid-late ’90s or the first wave of ”official” MGTOWS in the early-mid 2000s. We are now supposed to salute Matt and Carlson or be ready to face ”moderation” like Derek has at a certain hypocritical blog or supposedly ”akismet”-intiated WordPress-wide ”moderation” like was given me by the same hypocrites of ”individualism &muh independence”-but demand their ”individualism & much independence” to supposedly ”help” others in the ‘sphere.
I won’t ask for citations, but I’m not aware of blogging red-pillers liking or even referencing Grudem. I think it was Dalrock who did some posts on the CBMW. What red-pillers like him?
Surfdumb,
Deep Strength, Jack @ SF, and Full Metal Patriarch have all cited Grudem positively in the past. Jack specifically did so in an attempt to dismiss my presentation. Grudem’s academic view that both kephale (head=headship) and hypotassø (submission and subjection) connote authority is very appealing [to them].
I have not reached out to Wayne Grudem and have no intention to do so. He’s a legitimate bona fide scholar, I am a rank amateur. I don’t harass people, especially when they have no reason to take me seriously. He is also 76-year-old and has Parkinson’s disease. As for Foster and Tennant, I’ve only occasionally interacted with them and didn’t reach out to them for comment either. Should I reach out to KDY? I think I should maintain my policy of leaving people alone to live their lives in peace.
Did you notice how, in my examination above, different Bible translations make different decisions on what specific words to use? That’s because in Greek the mediopassive form covers both the middle and passive voices. In many cases, whether a word is considered middle or passive depends entirely on the context of the passage, not on the form of the word itself which is spelled exactly the same. While I’d like this determination to be deductive and deterministic, it requires educated inferences instead. This means that different, competing, translations are all hypothetically grammatically justified in their translations.
Grudem’s problem isn’t that he is wrong, per se, but that he is overconfident and dogmatic. In saying that the word ‘hypotassø‘ is always used to connote authority, he’s overstated his case and, in some cases, engaged in faulty circular reasoning. It is unclear why he didn’t just say this:
But he didn’t, even though it would be much harder to refute a statement like that. My guess is that he wants an exclusive, absolute, dogmatic statement so he can dismiss other viewpoints without having to consider them. He can’t achieve that with a nuanced stance.
What I’ve done (and will continue to do) in this series is prove that his extremely ambitious “always” statement is incorrect (and thus any conclusions he has made that rely on it). I do not—and need not—prove that his overall conclusions are logically impossible or even unlikely.
It is enough just to take the easier route and merely prove that his statement is incorrect. I’m not trying to accomplish more than that. If readers remain undecided on the issue, that’s fine, so long as they can see the errors that Grudem has made. After all, I have yet to respond to the post that Jack @ Sigma Frame made regarding Grudem, so I can hardly fault others for taking their time!
If you want to best understand my frustration with translating this term, you can read Mike Aubrey’s frustration in this short explanation.
Peace,
DR
”I won’t ask for citations, but I’m not aware of blogging red-pillers liking or even referencing Grudem. I think it was Dalrock who did some posts on the CBMW. What red-pillers like him?”
i don’t just call myself a historian-i’am one!
You do know Full Metal Patriarch? You’re not saying like Derek as Sharkly thought he’s not a genius, are you?
”This titled post of his:”Wayne Grudem Destroys ‘Mutual Submission’”
For some reason I never got around to posting any quotes from Wayne Grudem’s book “Biblical Foundations for Manhood and Womanhood”. It’s not the same book that he co-authored with John Piper called “Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood”. Chapter 7 is titled “The Myth of Mutual Submission as an Interpretation of Ephesians 5:21,” and the whole chapter is a must-read. I will post the best of the best here, but really, it’s best to read through the entire thing. (You can download the entire book in PDF format for free straight from the Desiring God website here.)”
Check the likes section for the schismatic Schoolmarms Jack and Sharkly.
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