I take accusations of sinning seriously, but not forever. I take them seriously enough to set aside my other practices (such as using pseudonyms) in order to address such claims. But after this, I will not speak on the matter again, no matter how many libelous repetitions follow.
This is an open response to Deti and any other witnesses. Unless you are Deti or a Christian witness—per Matthew 18—confirming or denying the claims made below (against myself or Deti), do not respond to this post with a comment of your own. I will delete any other commentary. This is about addressing claims of sin against another and that is the only purpose of this post. This is not something to gossip about. Either bring substantive evidence (one way or the other) or remain silent.
If anyone wishes to approach me privately to present witness testimony for (or against) myself (or Deti), email me at me@derekramsey.com. However, any private communications could become part of a future examination of the witness testimony by the church, so keep that in mind.
If I hear nothing after a week, I will close comments on this post and treat the matter as resolved.
Let’s begin by getting a couple of things out of the way.
He calls me “pseudonymous commenter” because I’ve criticized him; and he’s been criticized for criticizing me, so he won’t refer to me by name presumably to avoid calling my attention to his criticisms. It’s all transparently passive aggressive and childish.
The reality is that I got tired of the spurious personal attacks and libel against my person, especially after I pointed the errors out. Even I have limits. I use pseudonyms (and referrer hiding links) to reduce direct or indirect personal engagement while still addressing the ideas presented (and nominally citing my sources). While I occasionally find various ideas quite interesting, I am not even slightly interested in nearly-always hostile personal engagement.
Obviously I post criticisms here on a semi-regular basis. I just do so with reduced attribution. So, it’s patently absurd to conclude that removing attribution removes the criticisms themselves. But even if I was running away in quivering fear, that’s my call to make. I owe nobody a response to anything, especially not to those who regularly libel me.
While I have deleted comments and anonymized others (including some by request of their authors), I have never engaged in viewpoint censorship on this blog.
This kind of spurious libel is exactly why I anonymize comments and sometimes hide referrers. Some personal interactions are decidedly awful and should be avoided. The only reason I’m writing this at all is to clear my name once and for all.
He later claimed to “excommunicate” me even though he did not follow the Matthew 18 protocol and in fact could not.
I don’t believe Jesus demands of us things that are beyond our ability to perform. Back in May, 2023, I followed the Matthew 18 protocol—in accordance with the commands of Jesus—as maximally as was possible before bringing it to a conclusion. This included directly confronting him of his sin—albeit not privately as this was not possible (he only gave me his email address in February, 2024[1])—and the gathering and presentation of witness testimony to establish the truth of the matter. I also requested that the matter be formally adjudicated, but the request was refused.
Had I had the ability to do more, I would have done so. Moreover, if he wishes to fix my “lapse” by agreeing to bring the matter of his sin before his church, I will provide his church with the evidence and witness testimony that I have. And after they make a formal, public decision—whichever way it goes—I will prominently link to that decision from the articles that it pertains to as a matter of public record.
Now, let’s get to the accusation.
My criticism of him began when he lied about my insisting that “all women” submit to “all men” under Ephesians 5 even though going all the way back to Greek, it’s clear that the verses in question call on “women” to submit to “the own” (their own) men, meaning husbands. I have never once claimed that Eph. 5 stands for the proposition that all women must submit to all men because the text does not say that. I called him out for lying about what I had said. He doubled down.
I already responded to this false allegation in “Talking About Old Women,” but it was in a footnote. Here is the contested claim from the original version of that article:
After I wrote “Despair,” Deti published a piece entitled “The Covenant Cross” in which he continued to promote the subservience of women to men. I want to reply to the claims he makes, but but first let’s look at all the related stuff that has been going on.
And here is what I changed it to after Deti’s objection:
After I wrote “Despair,” Deti published a piece entitled “The Covenant Cross” in which he continued to promote the subservience of women to their husbands. I want to reply to the claims he makes, but but first let’s look at all the related stuff that has been going on.
After writing the original, Deti responded by claiming I made a false statement:
That is a false statement.
I promote the submission of wives to their own husbands. Because that’s clearly what Eph 5:22-24 states, quite unequivocally.
“Women” are not required to submit, serve, or be anything, to “men” other than to refrain from committing crimes or torts against men. A little politeness and common courtesy would be nice, but I don’t expect it, at least not in 2024 America.
Contrary to Deti’s assertion, what I said was accurate and correct. I did not double down on a lie, I maintained my innocence by directly refuting the false accusation made against me. Thus, I responded:
Deti,
I’m afraid that you’ve made an incorrect assumption here.
Wives are women and husbands are men. If wives submit to their husbands, then women submit to men. This should not be controversial. Per DBD:
Ephesians 5:24 says word by word:
ἀλλὰ ὡς ἡ ἐκκλησία ὑποτάσσεται τῷ Χριστῷ οὕτως καὶ αἱ γυναῖκες τοῖς ἀνδράσιν ἐν παντί
But how the assembly obeys the Christo therefore also the women the men in everything.
The Bible says this quite literally and unequivocally, which is why it is usually translated in English as:
I have no more made a false statement than the Bible has made a false statement when it does the exact same thing.
Although it was clear that I was discussing husbands and wives, I have nonetheless edited the OP to make your viewpoint more explicit. As far as politeness goes, you will be afforded the same tolerance as that given to any non-Christian.
Peace,
DR
Deti did not respond to my comment.
At no point did I say that “all women submit to all men under Ephesians 5.” I’m not even aware of anyone who has ever even made this claim! I did not even use the word “all” in my response, and Deti has never shown me anywhere where I have ever made such a claim. I scanned my blog for references to “all women” and could not find any such match. Thus, given the evidence presented above and below that makes this explicit, he is further perpetuating another falsehood against me.
Thus, did I respond with both courtesy and politeness by making the alterations referenced above, even though what I had said originally was not wrong.
Contrary to the claim by Oscar, an English-as-second-language commenter…
ramman3000 falsely claimed that deti said that the Bible commands women in general to be subservient to men in general, then he deceptively changed his wording from “men” to “their husbands” without acknowledging that his original claim about what deti said was false.
…what I had originally said was factually accurate (see here and here) and did not require an update nor an apology. I choose to edit the OP out of politeness because Deti asked nicely. Getting accused of lying and deception for being nice is precisely why I avoid personal interactions these days.
Many comments (including this one) demonstrate a distinct lack of reading comprehension. I never said that women in general should be subservient to men in general, nor did I say that all women should be subservient to all men, nor did I attribute any of those claims to anyone else. The selfsame commenters who oppose putting words into people’s mouths responded by putting words I didn’t say into my mouth! That’s why the commenter there had to add the phrase “in general” because what I wrote does not logically or grammatically demand that meaning.
The context of what I my statement—husbands and wives—was completely obvious and explicit from the context in which I wrote it. Here is another snippet I wrote in my original, pre-edited version:
1 Peter 3:1-6 tells Christian wives to submit to their husbands.
…
Deti cites Ephesians 5, which as anyone who has read this blog knows, instructs both husbands and wives to submit to each other.
…
Deti is suffering, having been injured by the woman or women in his life. When he reads 1 Peter, a letter written just for men like him, rather than rejoicing in his suffering, he decides to spend his days working to make sure that women are made subservient…
The context of the “women” mentioned in 1 Peter and Ephesians 5 is obviously and explicitly referring to wives. Similarly, “men like him” refers to suffering husbands.
But even ignoring that fact, a simple grammatically analysis of what I said…
…is that some unspecified women are subservient to some unspecified men. The simple observation that wives submit—are subservient—to husbands is sufficient to illustrate some women submitting—being subservient—to some men. This is why the bible itself says literally:
Who are the women and who are the men? The context tells you! Paul’s context is husbands and wives. Paul did the same thing in 1 Corinthians 11:3-16. People have a problem with me using words in the same way the Bible itself does. How absurd!
Using “man” and “woman” is a way to semantically be less precise intentionally. The way I phrased it did not presume a particular concrete explanation because that wasn’t important for what I was saying. The whole point is that I don’t need to know the exact identities of whichever women should submit to whichever men. The details didn’t matter (and I frankly wasn’t 100% sure which it was anyway!).
In my discussion on subservience, the subservience itself is the focus, so making the identity of the persons ambiguous allows me to shift the emphasis where I want to place it (and why I didn’t use “wives” in my ‘correction’). This is a common rhetorical technique, as the Bible itself demonstrates. Indeed, far from putting words into anyone’s mouth, I refrained from doing so by the very way I structured the phrase.
Deti’s objection boils down to me not being specific enough for his tastes and not focusing on what he wants me to write about, which he has no right to demand of me as he isn’t my personal editor. I didn’t misrepresent him, I simply failed to be as specific as he would prefer, nor did I make it a point of emphasis to describe the fine-points of his personal theology. What I said was ambiguous and after reading it you might not know precisely what Deti believes, which is perfectly fine. Just don’t leap to unfounded conclusions, and everything will be fine.
This type of “I demand that you be more specific!” objection is very old. The Byzantine Text Type inserted the word ιδιοις (own) into the text of Ephesians 5:24 before the word ἀνδράσιν (men), presumably because the editor didn’t like the ambiguity in Paul’s text. Rather than leave Paul’s words as they were, they put words into his mouth that were not there. Deti even did this within his accusation:
By implication, my interlocutors want you to believe that ambiguity is a lie and a misrepresentation. This is a foolish stance. As I noted in “Lying to Combat Lying,” this ridiculous standard turns Jesus into a liar.
The objections I have received to this are essentially pedantic[2] and autistic—hyperfocus or persistence on a restricted explanation—in nature. Indeed, Deti’s own objection that I put words in his mouth is his way of forcing me to describe him using whatever language he deems. This is, ironically, him trying to put words into my mouth.
I did not lie.
If Deti wishes to obey Christ by bringing witness testimony against me, he is encouraged to do so. Then, if and when it is time to involve his church in this matter, I will be happy to subject myself to the its oversight, presuming that Deti also subjects himself to its oversight regarding the matter of his excommunication.
If he is unwilling, I encourage him to retract his false accusations.
Footnotes
[1] And made another false accusation in the process on two different sites (here and here). He ignored both of my explanations given here and here. This is just another example of leaping to judgment without having all the information and then refusing to correct the errors when they are pointed out. Two other examples—one from 2024 and another from 2022—are shared in “Habitually Being Wrong.” The one here from the series on Hypergamy is especially egregious and was what led me to using a pseudonym moving forward.
[2] Referring specifically to focusing on the distinction between man/women and husband/wife and Deti’s specific views in particular, which were (at most) minor points in the post “Talking About Old Women.”
Deti has responded elsewhere. Thanks to the anonymous reader who sent it to me. The following is his comment reproduced here for the record.
I did not sin. Or at least Derek Ramsey is not aware of any such sins.
If anyone has any evidence that I have sinned, they can bring it to me per Mt. 18 PRIVATELY. Derek Ramsey has my email address because I’ve posted at his site. If he has evidence that I have sinned, then he can bring it to me in private via email (which he has never done). If he is not satisfied with my response, then he can bring witnesses. If that still does not satisfy him, then he can bring it to my church. Derek’s post is an admission that he failed to follow Mt. 18.
If we are going to claim to follow Mt. 18, then both spirit and letter need to be followed.
He then proceeds to call me names like “autistic” and “pedantic” when all I have done is review the words in the Greek. (“Autistic” and “pedantic” is rich coming from someone who publishes 10,000 word novellas expounding on one or two biblical passages…)
I did not lie, and I did not sin. I confronted him for lying about what I had said.
I don’t consider him to be in fellowship with me because he’s lied about what I said.
I won’t be entertaining or making any further public or private statements about any of this.
Deti has stated that he will not be entertaining or making any further public or private statements about this. If he wishes to clarify how I can follow Matthew 18 more closely when he has stated that he will be making no further statements, let him do so here before I close the comments. As it stands, I have no additional statements to provide him—publicly or privately—beyond those already provided in 2023, although if necessary I can probably produce more witness testimony (although they might not want to testify and risk being subjected to being publicly lambasted for their witness).
If his intention is that he initiate the contact with his church directly and that his church reach out to me (instead of us interacting directly and him doxing himself completely), then by all means he has my permission to open that discussion (I don’t have the contact information for his church to even know if they’d be willing to entertain the discussion without his intervention). So, I will respond to this comment by providing the information required to proceed with the process already initiated.
In order to facilitate the execution of Jesus’ commands in Matthew 18 with Deti’s church—for the purposes of bringing to repentance and restoring fellowship—here is the required information Deti’s church will need.
Deti committed sin in his post here (which remains published):
Contained in the comment section are a number of witnesses calling him out. He did not repent. The process of Matthew 18 was followed as closely as possible. But since Deti had spoken aggressively about his need for absolute anonymity in the past and provided no way to contact him, there was no way to confront him privately and no one (to the best of my knowledge) did so. Nine months would go by before he even gave me his email. By that point, the matter had been closed and there was nothing more to be said.
The specific accusations and process that took place to witness them and carry out Matthew 18 are described here:
These two sources (along with the post here) contain the primary evidence, charges, witnesses, and the process enacted.
In accordance with the command of Christ, in May of 2023, Deti was confronted with his sin. He denied sinning and refused to repent. In keeping with the commands in Matthew 18, he was disfellowshipped and has since been treated ever since as one would treat a tax collector. The church awaits his repentance after which he will be welcomed back into fellowship.
The sources above are complete and speak for themselves. There has been commentary since that point, but it may not be necessary to dig it all up at this time. What was presented there is sufficient. However, it might be useful to highlight a few subsequent comments made since 2023. Here is a typical one:
Persons “online” and interacting with me have no spiritual authority to subject me to correction, discipline, or excommunication according to any scripture including Matt. 18. None of you have any spiritual authority over me; and I claim none over any of you. I’ll call out error and correct it privately; but I have no authority to do anything about it nor can I ask for or demand Matt. 18 proceedings against any of you; nor impose consequences on any of you under that or any other scripture.
Deti has consistently rebuffed fellow Christian brothers from correcting him according to Matthew 18, and he has refused to repent. Furthermore, he has consented to the disfellowshipping because he views the corrective process—that had been attempted to call him to repentance—to be a lie:
I don’t consider him to be in fellowship with me because he’s lied about what I said.
…
I confronted him for lying about what I had said.
Deti has on a number of occasions accused me of being a liar, not just here. Never once did he “call out error and correct it privately,” despite my email—me@derekramsey.com—being available the entire time. The very public confrontations were not merely seeking to establish if a lie took place, but a judgment of that already presumed fact. If the church requires it, I can search for and document any additional cases here in order to establish the pattern of behavior for the record.
Deti has stated (with witnesses) that he does not agree with Christ’s prohibition on divorce for any reason at all given in Matthew 19:
I’ve told Mrs. deti point blank that if she ever takes sides against me and for someone else in public, I’ll divorce her.
If God gets to say “thou shalt have no other gods before Me”, I get to say “thou shalt have no other persons before me.”
Frankly, this presumptive analog of divine privilege borders on blasphemy.
In terms of demonstrating cause and establishing a motive, Deti has a history of leaping to judgment and making false accusations and mischaracterizations. He made a false accusation on two different sites (here and here). He ignored both of my attempts to correct him here and here. Two other examples—one from 2024 and another from 2022—are shared in “Habitually Being Wrong.” The one here from earlier this year is especially egregious.
Now, let’s briefly discuss Deti’s recent claims:
I did not sin. Or at least Derek Ramsey is not aware of any such sins.
…
I did not lie, and I did not sin.
I accused, documented, had witnessed, and sought repentance for a single specific instance of sin. What happened is a matter of public record and speaks for itself.
I have made no additional accusations of sin, including lying. However, I remain deeply concerned about whether his false accusations against me—including repeatedly calling me a liar—are themselves lies (intentional deceptions) as opposed to merely being incorrect. If the church wishes to pursue that matter, I will provide witness. That said, it would be very difficult to reconcile as long as such libelous accusations continue.
If anyone has any evidence that I have sinned, they can bring it to me per Mt. 18 PRIVATELY. Derek Ramsey has my email address because I’ve posted at his site. If he has evidence that I have sinned, then he can bring it to me in private via email (which he has never done). If he is not satisfied with my response, then he can bring witnesses. If that still does not satisfy him, then he can bring it to my church. Derek’s post is an admission that he failed to follow Mt. 18.
If we are going to claim to follow Mt. 18, then both spirit and letter need to be followed.
As the quote above shows, this is a sudden and dramatic change. Prior to today, Deti has rebuffed every attempt at correction and bringing the matter before his church. I’m pleased to see this change, but unsure as to what has changed. Perhaps he knows that his church will now side with him no matter what, but I’d rather try something to bring about a restoration than to try nothing at all.
Regardless, I hope that Deti will contact his church and provide this information. If he refuses or I hear nothing within a week, I will email Deti with a link to this page at the conclusion of the week-long response waiting period. It is perfectly fine if Deti wishes to keep his church and his identity secret from me, so long as an attempt at reconciliation is made.
It is a bit anomalous to have a “retrial” of a matter already settled, but we can set that fact aside for now given the special circumstances. However, if nothing comes of this offer to bring the matter before his church, I will consider the matter closed for good. The path to reconciliation is repentance and forgiveness, not forum shopping.
He then proceeds to call me names like “autistic” and “pedantic” when all I have done is review the words in the Greek. (“Autistic” and “pedantic” is rich coming from someone who publishes 10,000 word novellas expounding on one or two biblical passages…)
If he wants to think that I am a pedant—that what I focus on is unimportant—he is entitled to his opinion. But, I did not call anyone names. Just as when Deti said that I was “perseverating” because he falsely claimed “I” said “A and B” when “I” had actually said “A or B,” we have a simple problem of reading comprehension. The words “autistic” and “pendantic” have specific meanings and they are adjectives that I applied—quite accurately—to his objections (his ideas), not him as a person… in 2023.
I give my affirmation that the above is, to the best of my knowledge, a true account. It reflects what I believe to be true. Any errors are unintentional and my own and not the result of intentional deception. Any errors or inaccuracies I make here will be edited to repair them.