Those who practice domestic discipline often mention scripture texts that call a woman to be submissive to her husband.
However, there are many who follow a submissive marriage belief without beating their wives into submission.
The Convention of Atlantic Baptist Churches has written a document entitled, Harmony in the Home in which they state:
"The issue of headship, which is sometimes stressed and promoted on the basis of this passage of Scripture, is a source of confusion unless one understands that the Greek word which is translated "head" in verse 23 means "source" (as in head water) rather than denoting authority. Women are to submit to their husbands; husbands are to submit to their wives out of reverence for Christ.""The difficulty with the traditional view of headship is that it has been misused to keep women subservient and in some cases to justify the emotional and/or physical abuse of women within the couple relationship."
"This is far from mutual submission and is not as God intended for the couple relationship. Mutual submission means that a husband and wife care about each other, respect each other, and allow each other to think, feel, and choose as persons in their own right."
"There are not attempts to dominate and control. With mutual submission there is respect and love, as each one regards the other's needs."
The chaplain for the metro-Detroit Retrouvaille, Rev. Al Blonigen, wrote,
"I do not believe that there is one husband who is so perfect that he would be justified to use that kind of authority (spanking).Besides, nowhere in Scripture did Jesus use physical pain on anyone.
And wives who accept such discipline - much less to desire it - cannot be mature adults. Such a desire indicates to me that they are suffering from codependancy. They need counseling, not spanking."
From "Domestic Discipline at Odds With the Word of God":
"I can find no statement in scripture where God tells, or allows, husbands to physically discipline their wives (odd, because He doesn't seem to have forgotten to tell parents to discipline their children). I also find no reference to Christ physically disciplining His disciples or followers (the Christ/church and husband/wife analogy). I do see that God uses hard circumstance to build righteousness in us (the "chastisement" of Hebrew 12:5-11), but it seems clear to me that any reference to physical discipline has to do with young children (including v.10 that speaks of fathers disciplining us for a short time (childhood) and, of course, Proverbs 13:24). If physical discipline is only for children the whole DD philosophy falls apart, so this is a significant battleground for the DDers. I think their arguments lack significant scriptural support, including the fact that a lot of the discipline scriptures are either not gender specific, or speak of the discipline of men (Proverbs 10:13b)."
Why do Adult Women Agree to Domestic Discipline Punishment?
