John Locke was a 17th century English philosopher who could rightly be called the father of individualism and by extension the modern age. It is difficult to overstate the influence he had on America’s founding fathers and all of Western civilization. The following phrase from the Declaration of Independence was basically a summary of Locke’s concepts from his “Two Treatises of Government” published in 1690:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Before John Locke’s individualism took over Western civilization, Patriarchy was the norm of society. Duty to one’s faith, family and country was paramount and overrode concerns for individual happiness. People saw themselves more as part of a collective whole, part of their family, part of their tribe, their faith and their nation rather than only as individuals.
The Origins of Locke’s Individualism
Many philosophies throughout history have been born out of a reaction to other philosophies and this was the case with John Locke. John Locke actually wrote his “Two Treatises of Government” in 1690 in response to Sir Robert Filmer’s “Patriarcha; or the Natural Power of Kings” which was published in 1680. The central thesis of Filmer’s book was that the divine right of Kings was derived from the natural authority of parents with Adam being the first parent and first King of mankind.
So, it would be correct to say that Locke’s Individualism was born out a response to Filmer’s peculiar brand of Paternalism as applied to kings.
But from a Biblical perspective, both Locke and Filmer were wrong.
Kings Are Not Fathers
Filmer was absolutely wrong in saying Adam was the first king of mankind. Nothing in the Scriptures teaches this concept.
The following passage which was used to try and support the divine right of Kings theory is found in the Apostle Paul’s letter to Romans:
“1 Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. 2 Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.
3 For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same:
4 For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.
5 Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. 6 For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God’s ministers, attending continually upon this very thing.”
Romans 13:1-6 (KJV)
Filmer and others interpreted this passage to mean that Kings had absolute authority over their subjects as a father has over his children. In effect, Filmer’s philosophy reduced all the rights of the citizens of a nation to that of children.
But Filmer was wrong in his understanding of Romans 13:1-6. This passage is speaking of God’s institution of civil government and his purpose for it. God created civil government to praise and uphold good behavior based on his law and to punish those who break God’s moral law. God instituted civil government to protect the rights he had given to man, not to infringe upon those rights as so many Kings had done for thousands of years.
The passage above from Roman’s actually tells us why we pay “tribute” or taxes to government. It is to pay for our government’s protection of our rights and property. The purpose of taxes is to pay for things like the salaries of our national, state and local leaders as well as our policemen, firemen, courts and our military. God did not intend for taxes to be for the enrichment of our rulers or the redistribution of wealth between the upper, middle and lower income classes. The duty of charitable giving to the poor was given to the churches and to individuals through free will giving. God never assigned this task to his institution of civil government.
How many rulers throughout history terrorized those who did good works? Many. How many rulers did not look out for the good of their people, but rather for their own selfish greed they stole and pillaged from their own people? Many. How many rulers violated the sacred rights of husbands and fathers over their wives, their children and their other properties? Far too many.
Jesus gave us the following statement regarding civil government:
“And he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar’s, and unto God the things which be God’s.”
Luke 20:25 (KJV)
The civil government does not have God’s absolute and unlimited authority. No human authority has unlimited power. Christ told us only to give to the civil government what belongs to the civil government. And when the civil government usurps its authority and steps outside God’s limits on it, we as Christians have not only a right, but a responsibility to practice civil disobedience to such encroachments. The Apostle Paul speaks to the Christian’s right and responsibility to practice disobedience to government laws which violate God’s law which would include his purpose for and limits upon civil government:
“27 And when they had brought them, they set them before the council: and the high priest asked them, 28 Saying, Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name? and, behold, ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this man’s blood upon us.
29 Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.”
Acts 5:27-29 (KJV)
So, as we have seen from the Scriptures, Filmer’s theory of the Divine Right of Kings and kings as fathers to their subjects has no Scriptural merit and actually violates the purposes for which God instituted civil government.
Locke Was Wrong in His Response to Filmer
But as wrong as Filmer was about his theory of kings being like fathers to their subjects, so too Locke was wrong in his approach to Filmer’s arguments.
Locke, instead of centering his attack on the false premise that kings are like fathers, instead chose to center his attack on the authority of fathers so as to limit the authority of kings.
Consider the following statement from John Locke’s “First Treatise of Civil Government” where he addresses the arguments of “our author” speaking to Sir Robert Filmer:
“For had our author set down this command without garbling, as God gave it, and joined mother to father, every reader would have seen, that it had made directly against him; and that it was so far from establishing the monarchical power of the father, that it set up the mother equal with him, and enjoined nothing but what was due in common, to both father and mother: for that is the constant tenor of the scripture, Honour thy father and thy mother…
The rule is, Children, obey your parents; and I do not remember, that I any where read, Children, obey your father, and no more: the scripture joins mother too in that homage, which is due from children; and had there been any text, where the honour or obedience of children had been directed to the father alone, it is not likely that our author, who pretends to build all upon scripture, would have omitted it: nay, the scripture makes the authority of father and mother, in respect of those they have begot, so equal, that in some places it neglects even the priority of order, which is thought due to the father, and the mother”
John Locke made what is perhaps one of the earliest arguments for feminism in this passage by making the father and mother equal in their authority over their children. Locke actually made a false argument that is easily refuted that the father has no more authority over the children than the mother. The following passage from the book of Numbers disproves Locke’s assertion of the equal authority of father and mother over their children:
“3 If a woman also vow a vow unto the Lord, and bind herself by a bond, being in her father’s house in her youth; 4 And her father hear her vow, and her bond wherewith she hath bound her soul, and her father shall hold his peace at her; then all her vows shall stand, and every bond wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand. 5 But if her father disallow her in the day that he heareth; not any of her vows, or of her bonds wherewith she hath bound her soul, shall stand: and the Lord shall forgive her, because her father disallowed her.”
Numbers 30:3-5 (KJV)
The context here is of a young adult woman still under her father’s roof. Nothing here is mentioned of the Mother’s authority to override the young adult daughter’s decisions. It is only the father that has such authority.
Consider also this passage from the book of Exodus:
“16 And if a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife. 17 If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins.”
Exodus 22:16-17 (KJV)
It is the father which must give permission for marriage and no mention of the mother is made.
The previous two passages prove Locke wrong in his assertion that there are no passages of the Scriptures where “obedience of children had been directed to the father alone”.
Locke goes on to make the following statement about husbands and wives in his “Second Treatise of Civil Government”:
“But the husband and wife, though they have but one common concern, yet having different understandings, will unavoidably sometimes have different wills too; it therefore being necessary that the last determination, i. e. the rule, should be placed somewhere; it naturally falls to the man’s share, as the abler and the stronger. But this reaching but to the things of their common interest and property, leaves the wife in the full and free possession of what by contract is her peculiar right, and gives the husband no more power over her life than she has over his; the power of the husband being so far from that of an absolute monarch, that the wife has in many cases a liberty to separate from him, where natural right, or their contract allows it; whether that contract be made by themselves in the state of nature, or by the customs or laws of the country they live in; and the children upon such separation fall to the father or mother’s lot, as such contract does determine.”
So here is John Locke’s argument about husbands and wives. Men and women have an equal say over their own lives, but because their wills sometimes are different on certain family matters it is necessary for one to have “the last determination” meaning somebody has to have the tie breaking vote. So, this falls to man as “the abler and stronger”. That last statement is one that causes some feminists to dismiss all of Locke’s writings, while many other feminists are willing to overlook Locke’s “sexism” for all the rest of the equality proclamations he makes.
But then he makes this statement which feminists absolutely love that “the husband no more power over her life than she has over his; the power of the husband being so far from that of an absolute monarch”.
So, in his first treatise Locke assaulted the God given authority of the father making his authority equal with the mother when God granted no such thing and now in his second treatise he attacks the God given authority of the husband over his wife.
Locke’s assertion that “the husband no more power over her life than she has over his” is easily disproven by the follow Scripture passage:
“22 Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. 24 Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.”
Ephesians 5:22-24 (KJV)
In no other human authority relationship is the one under authority told to submit to the one over them “as unto the Lord”. In no other human authority relationship is the one under authority told to be subject to that authority as the church is subject to Christ in EVERYTHING.
Locke was completely wrong in his assertion that “the power of the husband being so far from that of an absolute monarch”. But rather the truth of the Scriptures is that is a king’s power is so far from that of a husband.
Biblically speaking, the most powerful human authority God ever established was that of a husband over his wife with the second most powerful human authority being that of a father over his children and especially his daughters.
The civil government or king’s power comes after that of a husband and father Biblically speaking.
Now again we need to understand spheres of authority. A husband cannot encroach upon the sphere of powers God has given to government in the same way the government cannot encroach in areas God has given to husbands.
A practical example of this would be that I cannot tell my wife to break the speed limit. That speed limit comes under the authority of civil government. However, the civil government cannot tell my wife that she may disobey my order to vote for the candidate that I tell her to.
Before we can tie this all together with one more statement from Locke to show how he invented a new social class, we need to look at the social classes God designed.
God’s Original Design of Four Social Classes
When God created humanity, he designed it with three primary social classes. These three primary social classes were Men, Women and Children. After the flood, God caused a fourth hybrid social class, the Citizen, to form from his creation of nations.
In the Old Testament we read that God set the man over the woman making him her owner and master.
“Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.”
Genesis 3:16 (KJV)
“6 And if she had at all an husband, when she vowed, or uttered ought out of her lips, wherewith she bound her soul; 7 And her husband heard it, and held his peace at her in the day that he heard it: then her vows shall stand, and her bonds wherewith she bound her soul shall stand. 8 But if her husband disallowed her on the day that he heard it; then he shall make her vow which she vowed, and that which she uttered with her lips, wherewith she bound her soul, of none effect: and the Lord shall forgive her.”
Numbers 30:6-8 (KJV)
“Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.”
Exodus 20:17 (KJV)
“If a man be found lying with a woman married to an [literally “owned by”] husband [“an owner”], then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel.”
Deuteronomy 22:22 (KJV)
And contrary to the false teachings of some Christians today, man’s headship over woman was not a result of the fall, but rather it was God’s design from the beginning before sin entered the picture and was meant to picture the relationship between God and his people or Christ and his Church as I showed previously from Ephesians 5:22-24.
The Bible does not get rid of the submission and ownership of wives in the New Testament, but rather it explains it more and calls women to emulate the obedience that Old Testament wives had to their husbands calling them “lord” which can also means “master”:
“5 For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands: 6 Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.”
I Peter 3:5-6 (KJV)
So, as we can see from looking at both the Old and New Testaments, God created a definite social class distinction between men and women. Even young adult daughters could have their decisions overridden by their fathers as I showed previously from Numbers 30:3-5 and Exodus 22:16-17.
Now that we have established the first two social classes God designed, those being Men and Women, now we come to the third social class that God designed which was Children:
“3 Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. 4 As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. 5 Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”
Psalm 127:3-6 (KJV)
“1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. 2 Honour thy father and mother; which is the first commandment with promise; 3 That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.”
Ephesians 6:1-3 (KJV)
So, as you can see from all the Scriptures presented, God created three primary social classes and those are Men, Women and Children. Men are the owners of their wives and children. Children are to obey their father and their mother with the father being the head of the home and having the ultimate veto over all decisions of both his wife and his children as well as his adult daughters.
Together the three social classes of Men, Women and Children form the family unit. But God wanted to create one more unit of humanity and that was the nation.
God’s Fourth Class of Citizen
The Scriptures tell us that God is the one who caused the spread of humanity across the globe and the first nations to form.
“6 And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. 7 Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. 8 So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.”
Genesis 11:6-8 (KJV)
“7 Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee. 8 When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.”
Deuteronomy 32:7-8 (KJV)
“24 God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; 25 Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; 26 And hath made of one blood all nations [Greek ethnos] of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;”
Acts 17:24-26 (KJV)
The “number of the children of Israel” from Deuteronomy 32:7-8 refers to the 70 people who went with Jacob to Egypt. So, what these passages are telling us together is – God separated humanity into 70 different ethnic groups (that is literally what the Greek word for nation means), gave these ethnic groups different languages and sent them across on the face of the earth determining where they would eventually settle.
In causing nations to form, God also caused the social class of citizen to form. A citizen is a member of a nation, a group with shared ethnicity and shared language. In the next social class we will discuss, we will see that God had different rules for how citizens and non-citizens could be treated in the theocracy of Israel.
God Allowed a Fifth Social Class Because of War and Poverty
Because of the presence of sin in the world which lead to poverty and wars, God allowed for a fifth social class which was that of a slave. He did not allow for citizens to enslave their fellow citizens, but only those who were foreigners. And there were two ways that the Israelite citizens were allowed by God to acquire slaves.
The first way God allowed for slavery was that he allowed the Israelites to buy children from their foreign parents either living in Israel or in the nations around Israel:
“39 And if thy brother that dwelleth by thee be waxen poor, and be sold unto thee; thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bondservant: 40 But as an hired servant, and as a sojourner, he shall be with thee, and shall serve thee unto the year of jubile. 41 And then shall he depart from thee, both he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto the possession of his fathers shall he return. 42 For they are my servants, which I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as bondmen. 43 Thou shalt not rule over him with rigour; but shalt fear thy God.
44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. 45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour.”
Leviticus 25:39-46 (KJV)
Standing where we are in 21st century America, we may not be able to fathom why a parent would ever sell their child as a slave. But the reason in most cases was simple and that was poverty. If you had four children and your family was starving and by selling one of those four children as a slave you could save the rest of your family this made perfect sense.
This money you would receive would help you and your other children to escape poverty and make sure that all your children were provide for. Even the child sold as a slave would have to be properly provided for and taken care of by their new master as God’s law demanded.
The second way God allowed slavery was to make prisoners of war slaves for Israel:
“But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee.”
Deuteronomy 20:14 (KJV)
But God did not allow slavery by kidnapping. Kidnapping is condemned in the following passage:
“And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.”
Exodus 21:16 (KJV)
The passages I have just cited prove God’s allowance for this fifth social class, that being a slave with restrictions of course. For more on this subject of slavery from a Biblical perspective see my article entitled “Why Christians shouldn’t be ashamed of Slavery in the Bible”.
The Creation of the Nobility and Royal Social Classes
John Locke was right about the fact that man in his natural state was designed to be free. But he was designed to be free within the limits of God’s law. And what freedom looks like for God’s social classes of men, women and children is very different.
Far too often though, men have willingly given up their freedom whether it be for security or to be like others around them. This is exactly what Israel did. They begged God to let them have a king even after he warned them that kings would encroach upon their freedom. You see before God allowed kings in Israel, the nation was ruled through prophets and judges. These prophets and judges did not take away the wealth of the people, or seize their sons and daughters, but rather they taught God’s will and organized the people for common defense. They settled disputes between families and they judged when people committed crimes. Israel only lost its freedom when God allowed other nations to invade because of the sin of Israel. But when they would regain their freedom, they were free indeed. The men of Israel were as free as they would ever be before they insisted on having a king so they could be like other nations.
So, before God allowed it, he gave them a warning of what kings would do:
“11 And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. 12 And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots.
13 And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers.
14 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. 15 And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants.
16 And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. 17 He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants.
18 And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the Lord will not hear you in that day.”
1 Samuel 8:11-18 (KJV)
Is this not a perfect description of what many kings have done throughout history? Kings and other nobility classes have consistently violated the property rights of men and when a man’s property is taken or violated by the government, his freedom is taken as well.
But the royal and nobility classes of men were never part of God’s original design. He meant for all men, male human beings, to be equal and free as his image bearers.
He meant for all men to share in the joys of owning all these things which he warns men not to covet of other men:
“Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.”
Exodus 20:17 (KJV)
And God actually calls the enjoyment of a man’s labor his gift to him:
“Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; this is the gift of God.”
Ecclesiastes 5:19 (KJV)
So, God only designed three primary classes of people – Men, Women and Children along with a fourth hybrid class of citizen. But in 1690 John Locke would take a hammer to God’s social class structure.
Locke’s Invention of the “Adult” Social Class
In his “Second Treatise of Civil Government” Locke makes the following statement regarding the authority of parents over their children:
“The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions…
Children, I confess, are not born in this full state of equality, though they are born to it. Their parents have a sort of rule and jurisdiction over them, when they come into the world, and for some time after; but it is but a temporary one. The bonds of this subjection are like the swaddling clothes they art wrapt up in, and supported by, in the weakness of their infancy: age and reason, as they grow up, loosen them, till at length they drop quite off, and leave a man at his own free disposal…
The power, then, that parents have over their children, arises from that duty which is incumbent on them, to take care of their offspring, during the imperfect state of childhood. To inform the mind, and govern the actions of their yet ignorant non-age, till reason shall take its place, and ease them of that trouble, is what the children want, and the parents are bound to; for God having given man an understanding to direct his actions, has allowed him a freedom of will, and liberty of acting, as properly belonging thereunto, within the bounds of that law he is under. But whilst he is in an estate, wherein he has not understanding of his own to direct his will, he is not to have any will of his own to follow: he that understands for him, must will for him too; he must prescribe to his will, and regulate his actions; but when he comes to the estate that made his father a free man, the son is a free man too.”
So, what was Locke saying? He was saying that all fully matured human beings, adult human beings, are in fact equal in their freedom. The subjection of children to their parents is only temporary until they come to full maturity and then when they are adults, they are all equal and free. When taken together with Locke’s former statement from this same treatise that the husband has no more power over his wife’s life than she does over his he believed that men and women possess equal rights and equal freedom.
So, Locke, with his invention of this new social class, the Adult, based on the maturity of a human being regardless of their gender, effectively eradicated the former social classes of Men and Women which God created in the Garden of Eden.
The founding fathers took a more limited view of Locke’s equality ideas rejecting his views of equal freedom for women. In fact, John Adams said that giving women the right to vote and total equality with men would lead to “the Despotism of the Peticoat”, in other words the complete domination of women over men. He told his wife Abigail Adams, one of America’s early feminists before feminism became very fashionable, that many men were already the subjects of their wives in their homes and were “Masters” in name only.
And John Adams was absolutely right. Giving women the right to vote and fulfilling the Lockean vision of society did lead to “the Despotism of the Peticoat”. In most cases, women have complete control of male/female relationships whether they be dating, cohabitation or marriage. And women have made great strides in the business and political world and have been exhibiting huge amounts of influence to the point that most men are absolutely terrified to stand up to this “Despotism of the Peticoat” that has now been fully realized with the last 50 years.
It took a little more than a century for America to fully dismiss the warnings of John Adams of what would happen if women were given total equality with men, but eventually America did. And now we have reaped the consequences with the destruction of marriage and the institution of the family.
Practical Application for Christian Male/Female Relationships
Whether it is a father with his daughter or a husband with his wife this modern notion of “I am an adult” is something we as men will be confronted with on a regular basis. Many Christian men have no idea how to respond to the following types of statements from the women in their families:
A daughter to her father:
“You can’t tell me who I can see or not see or who I can marry, I am an adult!”
“Stop treating like a child! I am an adult! I make my own life decisions!”
“It’s my body, I can do with it as I wish. I am an adult!”
A wife to her husband:
“You can’t tell me what to do. You are not my father. I am an adult!”
“Stop treating me like one of our children! I am an adult!”
“It’s my body, I can do with it as I wish. I am an adult!”
So how do we as Christian men address these “I am an adult” statements that we may hear from our wives and daughters?
Suggestion Response for a Father to his Daughter
“I recognize that you are a fully formed postpubescent human being, or an adult human being, but you are still a woman and I am still a man. The fact that you are an adult does not change the fact that I am your father and God has given me a special responsibility to love you by leading you, protecting you, providing for you, teaching you, correcting you and preparing you for your future husband. Sometimes protecting you means protecting you from your own bad decisions. I have the very serious and important tasks of helping you to maintain your sexual purity and giving my blessing to the man that I believe God would have you to marry. So no, I am not treating you like a child, but rather I am treating you like a woman and a daughter according to God’s Word.”
Suggestion Response for a Husband to his Wife
“I recognize that you are a fully formed postpubescent human being, or an adult human being, but you are still a woman and I am still a man. The fact that you are an adult does not change the fact that I am your husband and God has given me a special responsibility to love you by leading you, protecting you, providing for you, teaching you, correcting you and helping you to be the wife God has called you to be to me. Sometimes protecting you means protecting you from your own bad decisions. God has given you and your body to me for my use and my pleasure. He also has commanded that I not deny sexual relations to you as well. So no, I am not treating you like one of our children, but rather I am treating you like a woman and like a wife according to God’s Word.”
The War on the Citizenship Class
Our modern society is truly looking to eradicate all social classes except that of Adults and Minors – they even want to eradicate the social class of Citizen. This is the battle that has been playing out over immigration policies in America. On one side you have nationalists who want to protect our culture and the sovereignty of our nation and on the other side you have globalists who want to eradicate the concept of nations and the concept of citizenship is actually evil in their view because it treats a citizen different than a non-citizen.
Conclusion
Do I think John Locke was an evil man and that everything he taught was wrong? No. He and the founders were imperfect men just as all men are imperfect. But they were absolutely right “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”. All men, male human beings, are created equally in God’s image to be his image bearers, but women are not created equal to men.
“For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.”
1 Corinthians 11:7 (KJV)
Merriam Webster’s online dictionary defines “unalienable” as:
“incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred”
And that really is a perfect description of our God given rights. The men of America’s past had no right to surrender or transfer their rights to women. They sinned against God in doing so. And we as Christian men have no right to surrender our God given rights either. In fact we must fight to reclaim what we have lost.
Each of us has our part to play. It starts in our marriage. Then in our teaching to our sons and daughters in what it means to be men and women of God. It means getting out and voting for candidates who support Biblical morality.
It will be a long fight for many decades to come, but it can be won. It more than a century for America to turn against God’s design in gender roles and social classes and it may take a century or more to return to them.
The questions for Christians reading this are these:
Will you accept what the Bible teaches and reject the false “Adult” social class constructed by John Locke?
Will you return to and accept God’s social order of Men, Women and Children?
Will you stand with those who say it is evil to follow God and his ways and his social classes? Or will you stand with God and serve him?
The choice is yours.
“15 And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Joshua 24:15 (KJV)
Biblical Gender Roles 