Dear sister Elspeth writes:
The law, education system, and anti-family court system in this country
have removed every incentive for men to assume their God-ordained roles
as leaders and protectors, while rewarding and protecting irresponsible
female behavior.
Now I hope that our dear sister is suffering a little bit of hyperbole, but I suspect that instead of moderating the comment, I ought to add "church" at times to law, education system, and court system therein. So what hope does a man have who wants to live Biblically, or for that matter, what incentive can a Godly woman provide for her husband to lead as he ought?
Let us encounter the Wife of Bath's Tale from the Canterbury Tales. I am going to suggest here that a traditional understanding of her--as a loose woman--is less true than that she, more than most of those around her, understands the Biblical significance of marriage and the one flesh union. And what is her possibly Biblically feminine response to her husband's (or husbands') Biblical masculinity?
In wifehood wol I use mine instrument
As freely as my Maker hath it sent;
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4 comments:
I didn't read all of the prologue, but I think you're right. She definitely wants/enjoys marriage and realizes that she may be widowed again and that there is a remedy.
She knows the power she has over her husband and chooses not to exercise it through deprivation.
If the wife of bath is thought to be a slut, then those who thought so didn't read it well.
I wish I was suffering hyperbole, Bubba, but think about it with me for a minute.
Whether it's reproductive help equal pay for "equal" work, reproductive choice, no-fault divorce, or feminized education that rewards passivity and penalizes action and risk taking, the deck is stacked. Do you not agree?
That's why I added "church" to the list, dear sister. But at least my wife has the same attitude towards me as did the wife of Bath to her husband, and....suffice it to say that there is some incentive there to make my pathetic attempts to be Biblically masculine, if you catch my drift.
Mark-in defense of the "usual model" of the Wife of Bath, she is rebelling rather strongly against a medieval culture that elevated virginity and degraded marriage. So the other hypothesis is at least tenable--though given her knowledge of the Scriptures (rare for the time according to what we believe today), I have to assume that she may be Chaucer's vehicle for rebuking an un-biblical doctrine.
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