In using man's wisdom (Rom 1:22 tells us what God thinks of that), this is just another example of equality gone amok. In a Christian world view, one sees the world from a holistic standpoint. Truth and reality are seen from a spiritual foundation as found in the Word of God. From there, one's world view is consistent with what is good, right and helps in the order and discipline of individuals and the society they live in. If a culture chooses to deviate from God's principles of life and how to live, there will be consequences. This axiomatic truth is found in all walks of our lives starting from marriage to finances to government.
Dr. Dick Mayhue in this months' "Shofar" journal reminds us of the spiritual foundation of why "women in combat" is not only a bad idea, but why it is wrong before a Holy and perfect God. As God judges our nation from deviating from His truth, we need to know what to do and where we as believers need to take our stand. This article will help us in our quest to fight the good fight. Reprinted with permission from Answers in Genesis (www.answersingenesis.org).
Daughters and
Wives in Combat?
Dr. Richard
Mayhue
Leon
Panetta, then U.S. secretary of defense, shocked the nation when he announced
in January that he had lifted the ban on women serving in combat. While I was
discussing when it’s okay for daughters and wives to fight, a friend reacted in
the same way many others feel, “I can answer in one word, ‘Never!’”
It’s
not a new question. The first known Christian scholar, Clement of Alexandria
(ca. AD 155-220), would have agreed wholeheartedly. “For we do not train our
women like Amazons to manliness in war; since we wish the men even to be
peaceable” (The Stromata, Bk IV, Ch
VIII).
Concerned
citizens have adopted multiple approaches to grapple with this vexing question,
appealing to morality, physiology, nature, tradition, emotion, history, politics,
and psychology. As a naval officer who piloted a hovercraft in the dangerous northern
waterways of South Vietnam, I could also speak from personal experience. But what
gives one person’s opinion greater authority than any other? God the Creator’s
perspective takes precedent over all others, so I have chosen to appeal exclusively
to the divine authority that resides uniquely in Scripture. Surely, the Bible has
an answer to such a pressing contemporary query.
While
we are not under the Law (Hebrews 8:6–13), the Old Testament provides a
framework for understanding God’s intentions. The military requirements for
Israel set a pattern that we should consider carefully. Has God revealed any
underlying principles about gender roles that reflect His higher purpose for
all nations?
1.
Only men were
counted to go to war.
This practice continued all the way from Moses’ time to David and Amaziah (Numbers
1:2–3; 2 Samuel 24:9; 1 Chronicles 21:5; 2 Chronicles 25:5).
2.
Only sons were
chosen for war.
Samuel reported this fact to Israel as the word of the LORD (1 Samuel 8:11).
Israel’s first king, Saul, did exactly this (1 Samuel 14:52).
3.
Only men went to
war.
God the Father is pictured as a warrior on behalf of Israel (Isaiah 42:13). The
military bodyguard that protected Israel’s king is referred to as “the mighty
men of Israel” (Song of Solomon 3:7–8). When reading through the historical
books (Genesis to Esther), we frequently encounter male armies but never a
mention or even veiled suggestion of women co-combatants. Pagan armies that fought
against Israel were male only (1 Samuel 4:9–10). God even prophesied that the
male Babylonian army would fight without strength as though they were women
(Jeremiah 51:30).
No matter what era one examines in the
biblical history of Israel, fighting units were exclusively staffed with men. When
Abram gathered a quick-strike force to rescue Lot from his kidnappers, he chose
men (Genesis 14:14–15). When Moses assembled an army to attack the Midianites,
he selected “men of war” (Numbers 31:3, 21, 49). When God elaborated on rules
for temporary absences from combat duty, the excused soldiers were men
(Deuteronomy 20:5–8). When the Jews marched around Jericho, the males marched
(Joshua 6:3, 7, 9). When Joshua attacked Ai, he did so with a male army (Joshua
8:3). Before Gideon went to war, God reduced his fighting force to 300 men
(Judges 7:7). Saul’s army proved to be only male (1 Samuel 11:8). King David’s
bodyguard was comprised of mighty men (2 Samuel 23:8–37). Jehoshaphat’s army
enlisted only men (2 Chronicles 17:10–19).
4.
Daughters served
in domestic roles.
Samuel reported this as God’s word to Israel (1 Samuel 8:13).
5.
Wives and
children did not go to war. While men went forth to conquer (Deuteronomy 3:18),
the women and children remained behind (Deuteronomy 3:19–20; Joshua 1:14–15). Additionally,
Deuteronomy 24:5 says that male soldiers in their first year of marriage were
to remain at home with their new brides in a domestic setting rather than go to
war with their fellow-soldiers. Nehemiah urged the men to fight for their
families and homes (Nehemiah 4:14).
6.
Women welcomed
men back from war;
never did they return with them.
Such was the case when King Saul and David returned from battle (1 Samuel 18:6–7).
“What about
Deborah and Jael?” many people ask. Deborah reluctantly went into battle with the
Israelite warrior Barak, not as a female combatant but as a judge of Israel,
possibly to shame his cowardice (Judges 4:4–9). The woman Jael killed the enemy
general Sisera, not in battle but while doing her domestic chores in a tent where
Sisera had retreated to hide (Judges 4:17–22).
While the Old
Testament says much, the New Testament is virtually silent on this specific question.
It does reiterate the distinction between women’s and men’s roles first
established in Genesis 1–2 (Matthew 19:4–6); and it confirms the scriptural authority
of the Old Testament (2 Timothy 3:16–17). It also speaks of unavoidable spiritual warfare for believers in
Christ, whether young or old, male or female (Ephesians 6:10–17; 1 Peter 5:6–9).
But, it does not directly address the question at hand. However, two texts urge
the New Testament reader to consider the instructions and examples of the Old
Testament: Romans 15:4 and 1 Corinthians 10:11. When done, the Old Testament
pattern speaks clearly and with divine authority. It does so both prescriptively
and descriptively to provide crucial scriptural guidance on this issue. Based
on Paul’s assertions, believers should employ the historical pattern found in
the Old Testament—informed by the New Testament and with the Holy Spirit’s
guidance—as the pattern for all their decision-making today with respect to the
possibility of women in combat.
The most
celebrated early-church Bible expositor, John Chrysostom (ca. AD 344–407),
apparently preached and wrote with these very same convictions in mind (Homily
V; see Titus 2:11–14): “Woman was not made for this, O man, to be prostituted
as common. O ye subverters of all decency, who use men, as if they were women,
and lead out women to war, as if they were men! . . . You suffer women to bear
arms, and are not ashamed.”
While I still
cannot answer with just one word the question, “Should our daughters and wives
serve in combat?” I can now do it authoritatively with three, “Never,
biblically speaking!”
Take courage, we
have the divinely authoritative Scripture and the testimony of Christian scholars
and teachers from the early church on our side as fellow-soldiers in the
ongoing battle for truth.
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