Submission in Context

New, published 17 October 2026. What else is new

A handful of verses have been used to tell women to obey men, to stay silent, to give their bodies on demand, and to remain where they are being hurt. Read in their paragraphs and in the Greek, those same verses call husband and wife to give themselves to each other, measure every husband by the cross, and give no one a licence to harm.

In one sentence: Every New Testament call to wives to submit is spoken to the wife herself, as service to the Lord, beside a call to husbands to love, honour and give themselves up as Christ did, so no text licenses control, coercion or abuse; husband and wife hold authority over each other's bodies equally, and where a text's reach is contested the church should say so and hold it with humility.

Key Takeaways

(This section follows the Key Takeaways format — see that page for what each part is for.)

Lessons about Jesus

• He forbade His people the world's kind of authority: "The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them ... But not so with you ... I am among you as the one who serves" (Luke 22:25-27).
• He is the measure of a husband: "Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her" (Ephesians 5:25). Headship in Ephesians is defined by the cross.
• He entrusted Himself to the Father when He suffered (1 Peter 2:23), and the Father judges justly. A wife who suffers wrong is never told to hide it from Him or from His church.

Memory verses

✝️ Ephesians 5:21, 25 (ESV)

21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ ... 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

✝️ 1 Corinthians 7:4 (ESV)

4 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.

Be Transformed

• Think. Read every verse about submission in its paragraph. Ephesians 5:22 cannot be read without 5:21 and 5:25, and 1 Corinthians 7:4 cannot be read in one direction only.
• Attitude. Husbands, hold your authority the way Christ holds His: spent for your wife's good. Wives, hold your submission as service to Christ, offered freely and never extracted by fear.
• Do. If anyone is being hurt in a marriage, act: make them safe, call the authorities when a crime is committed, and bring the church's care and discipline to bear. "Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them" (Ephesians 5:11, ESV). Silence protects the one doing harm.

Prayer

Father, your Son came to serve and gave His life for His bride. Make our marriages look like His love. Keep husbands from ruling as the world rules, and give wives the freedom of those who fear nothing but you. Where anyone is afraid in their own home, protect them, bring the truth into the light, and make your church a refuge.

In Jesus' name. Amen.

Study outline

1. The ground — How these verses get used · Genesis 3:16: a consequence. The test applied to every verse, and what the fall did to marriage.
2. Marriage — Ephesians 5:21-33: one verb for everyone · 1 Corinthians 7:3-5: neither body is your own · 1 Peter 3:1-7 and Colossians 3:18-19. Submission spoken to the whole church, the cross as the husband's measure, one flesh, equal authority over bodies, and the wife who need not fear.
3. The church — The contested texts. 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:11-15, with both readings.
4. Pastoral guidance — Where submission ends. What Scripture says to a wife, a husband and a pastor when there is harm.
5. Discussion questions. Six, for a group or on your own.

How these verses get used

The verses are familiar: "Wives, submit to your own husbands" (Ephesians 5:22), "he shall rule over you" (Genesis 3:16), "the wife does not have authority over her own body" (1 Corinthians 7:4), "the women should keep silent in the churches" (1 Corinthians 14:34). Quoted alone, each can be made to say that a woman's place is under a man's control.

This study applies one test to each: read the verse in its paragraph, notice who is addressed, and find the reason the text itself gives. That is how every passage of Scripture is read, and it is the test Jesus applied when He was handed a verse about divorce: "from the beginning it was not so" (Matthew 19:8). The companion study Jesus and Women shows how He treated women. Every reading of these texts has to fit with Him.

Genesis 3:16: a consequence

✝️ Genesis 3:16 (ESV)

16 To the woman he said, "I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you."

Before the fall God gave dominion to "them," male and female together (Genesis 1:27-28). Rule of a husband over his wife first appears here, after sin, in the same speech as pain in childbirth and the ground cursed with thorns (3:17-18). God is describing what sin will do.

"Desire" is תְּשׁוּקָה (tᵉšûqâ, teh-shoo-KAH, H8669), and "rule" is מָשַׁל (māšal, mah-SHAL, H4910). The same two words meet again in the next chapter, where God warns Cain: "sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it" (Genesis 4:7, ESV). Translators differ over the sense of the woman's desire. The ESV reads "contrary to your husband," a desire to master; the NLT footnote gives "though you will have desire for your husband." Either way, the verse describes a marriage bent by sin into a contest, with the husband ruling.

No one reads "in pain you shall bring forth children" as a command to withhold pain relief, or "thorns and thistles" as a ban on weeding. The rule of 3:16 is the same kind of statement: part of the sentence on sin, spoken beside the cursed ground (3:17). Readers who find an order of husband and wife already in Genesis 2 (the reading the ESV Study Bible takes) agree on this much: what 3:16 adds is rule bent by sin into domination. "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation" (2 Corinthians 5:17, ESV). The church's calling is to live as the new creation, and a husband who rules his wife by force is living out the fall.

Ephesians 5:21-33: one verb for everyone

Submitting to one another

Paul's household instructions begin with a command to the whole church: "be filled with the Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18, ESV). Five participles follow (5:19-21); the last is "submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ." In Greek, 5:21 reads ὑποτασσόμενοι ἀλλήλοις ἐν φόβῳ Χριστοῦ. "Submitting" is ὑποτάσσω (hypotassō, hoo-poh-TAS-soh, G5293), and "to one another" is ἀλλήλοις (allēlois, G240).

How far "one another" reaches is contested. Every other time Ephesians uses ἀλλήλοις it runs both ways: "bearing with one another in love" (4:2), "we are members one of another" (4:25), "be kind to one another" (4:32). On that reading every believer submits to every other. The ESV Study Bible reads it as submission "according to the authority and order established by God," because the examples that follow run one way: wives to husbands, children to parents, bondservants to masters (5:22-6:9). Both readings agree on what matters for this study: the household instructions grow out of a Spirit-filled church (5:18), and the wife's submission is one form of a submission asked of every believer.

Then comes 5:22, and in the Greek it has no verb of its own:

αἱ γυναῖκες τοῖς ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν ὡς τῷ κυρίῳ "wives, to your own husbands, as to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:22, NA28; this study's translation)

The verb is supplied from 5:21. The CSB footnotes it: "Other mss omit submit." Paul then states it in full: "as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands" (5:24, ESV). "In everything" is the text's own word and is not to be softened. Its limit is in the same sentence: as the church submits to Christ, and "as to the Lord" (5:22). A wife submits as service to Christ, so nothing Christ forbids can be part of it (see Where submission ends). Paul addresses the wife herself, as one who gives her submission. He gives husbands no instruction to make their wives submit, and no text in the New Testament does.

Headship measured by the cross

The husbands' instruction is longer (5:25-29, 33, against 5:22-24, 33), and it is measured by the cross:

✝️ Ephesians 5:25-29 (ESV)

25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church,

"The husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior" (5:23, ESV). "Head" is κεφαλή (kephalē, keh-fah-LAY, G2776). Paul shows what Christ's headship does in the verses that follow: He saved, loved, gave Himself up, cleansed, nourished and cherished. "Nourishes and cherishes," ἐκτρέφει καὶ θάλπει, are words for bringing up a child (Ephesians 6:4) and a nursing mother's care (1 Thessalonians 2:7). Every instruction Paul gives the head in this passage is a form of love and self-giving.

The study The Bride of Christ follows Christ's love for His bride in full. A husband may claim Christ's headship only on Christ's terms. Christ never forced His bride, never harmed her, and spent Himself for her good.

The mystery of one flesh

Paul closes by quoting Genesis 2:24: "'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church" (Ephesians 5:31-32, ESV). Two things follow from the text.

First, Paul builds marriage on Genesis 2, before the fall. The pattern for a Christian marriage is the one God made, and Genesis 3:16 is the pattern it is rescued from.

Second, "one flesh" is why a husband's love is the love of his own body (5:28-29). A man who harms his wife harms his own flesh. And because the marriage "refers to Christ and the church," a husband's conduct preaches something about Christ to everyone who sees it. Paul's last word holds both callings together: "let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband" (5:33, ESV).

Christ's love made visible

This shows that God's design for marriage is Christ's love made visible. He asks the wife to serve Christ by honouring her husband, and He asks the husband to die to himself for his wife, as Christ died for His church.

1 Corinthians 7:3-5: neither body is your own

✝️ 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 (ESV)

3 The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5 Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

These three verses are balanced with care. Verse 3 says "likewise." Verse 4 uses the same verb for both partners, ἐξουσιάζει (exousiazei, ex-oo-see-AD-zay), from ἐξουσιάζω (exousiazō, G1850), "to have authority over," and joins the two halves with ὁμοίως (homoiōs, G3668), "likewise." Verse 5 says "one another" and "by agreement," ἐκ συμφώνου (ek symphōnou), from σύμφωνος (G4859).

Each gives his or her body to the other. The verse describes a gift each has made, and it gives neither a right to seize. A husband who demands sex against his wife's will reads 7:4 in one direction only: he claims her body, ignores her authority over his, and sets aside the "agreement" of 7:5.

ἐξουσιάζω occurs four times in the New Testament: here twice; in 1 Corinthians 6:12, "I will not be dominated by anything"; and in Luke 22:25, where Jesus describes the rulers of the Gentiles:

✝️ Luke 22:25-27 (ESV)

25 And he said to them, "The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those in authority over them are called benefactors. 26 But not so with you. Rather, let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves. 27 For who is the greater, one who reclines at table or one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at table? But I am among you as the one who serves.

Jesus forbids His disciples the Gentile kind of authority. Paul's only use of the verb inside marriage gives the authority to both, equally, as a trust held for the other's good.

1 Peter 3:1-7 and Colossians 3:18-19

Peter writes to wives whose husbands "do not obey the word" (1 Peter 3:1, ESV): believing women married to unbelievers. His aim is evangelistic: "they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives." He sets their conduct inside the example of Christ, who "when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly" (2:23, ESV); 3:1 begins "Likewise," Ὁμοίως.

✝️ 1 Peter 3:6-7 (ESV)

6 as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening. 7 Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

The wife who does not fear

Two details in the Greek protect the wife. First, "do not fear anything that is frightening" is μὴ φοβούμεναι μηδεμίαν πτόησιν. πτόησις (ptoēsis, PTOH-ay-sis, G4423), "terror, intimidation," occurs in the New Testament only here. It echoes the Septuagint of Proverbs 3:25, "you shall not fear πτόησιν," where the reason follows: "the LORD will be your confidence" (Proverbs 3:26, ESV). Peter commends a wife who does good and refuses to be ruled by fear. Submission that is extracted by intimidation is a different thing from the one he describes.

The weaker vessel, a fellow heir

Second, the husband's verse. In Greek it runs: συνοικοῦντες κατὰ γνῶσιν ὡς ἀσθενεστέρῳ σκεύει τῷ γυναικείῳ, ἀπονέμοντες τιμὴν ὡς καὶ συγκληρονόμοις χάριτος ζωῆς (NA28), "living with them according to knowledge, as with a weaker vessel, the feminine one; assigning honour, as also to fellow heirs of the grace of life." Three things in it are plain from the text:

• "Weaker" is a comparative, ἀσθενεστέρῳ (asthenesterō, G772). A weaker vessel implies another vessel. Scripture calls every believer a vessel: "we have this treasure in jars of clay" (2 Corinthians 4:7, ESV), the same noun σκεῦος (skeuos, SKYOO-os, G4632). Husband and wife are both clay; she is the more easily harmed.
• Two "as" clauses stand side by side. The weakness governs how he lives with her, "according to knowledge." Her standing as a fellow heir, συγκληρονόμοις (synklēronomois, G4789), the word Paul uses for believers as "fellow heirs with Christ" (Romans 8:17), governs the honour, τιμή (timē, G5092), he gives her. The ESV joins "weaker vessel" to "showing honor"; the CSB, NASB and LSB join it to "live with," as the Greek order runs.
• Peter draws only understanding from the weakness. Paul uses the same comparative of the body's members: "the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable," and on them "we bestow the greater honor" (1 Corinthians 12:22-23, ESV).

What kind of weakness Peter means he does not say. The adjective ἀσθενής covers the body, "the flesh is weak" (Matthew 26:41, ESV), and low standing, "God chose what is weak in the world" (1 Corinthians 1:27, ESV). Nothing in the verse makes it a weakness of mind or of faith, since the same sentence makes her a fellow heir. Whichever is meant, the text settles the husband's response: understanding and honour. The warning is severe: a husband who dishonours his wife will find his prayers "hindered," ἐγκόπτεσθαι (enkoptesthai, G1465).

Colossians 3:18-19: do not be harsh

Paul's shortest version says the same: "Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them" (Colossians 3:18-19, ESV). "Be harsh" is πικραίνω (pikrainō, pik-RYE-noh, G4087), "to make bitter, to embitter." Bitterness, contempt and harshness toward a wife are named as sin.

The contested texts

Two passages restrict women's speech in the gathered church. Faithful readers who hold Scripture as God's word read them differently, and the honest course is to give both readings and to state what the readings share.

1 Corinthians 14:34-35

✝️ 1 Corinthians 14:33-35 (ESV)

33 For God is not a God of confusion but of peace. As in all the churches of the saints, 34 the women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be in submission, as the Law also says. 35 If there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

Three chapters earlier Paul assumes that women pray and prophesy aloud in the assembly: "every wife who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head" (11:5, ESV). Whatever 14:34 forbids, it cannot be all speech.

The chapter itself shows what kind of silence Paul means. "Keep silent" is σιγάω (sigaō, see-GAH-oh, G4601), and it occurs three times in 1 Corinthians, all in this paragraph. A tongue-speaker with no interpreter is to "keep silent in church" (14:28); a prophet is to "be silent" when a revelation comes to another (14:30); and the women are to "keep silent in the churches" (14:34). The first two silences are limited to a circumstance, and both serve the rule that closes the chapter: "all things should be done decently and in order" (14:40, ESV). The readings differ over the circumstance of the third.

• The first reading takes it from the verses just before, where the church is to "weigh what is said" by the prophets (14:29). The verb of 14:34, "should be in submission," ὑποτασσέσθωσαν, is the verb of 14:32, "the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets." On this reading wives are not to join the public weighing of prophecies, which could mean judging their own husbands.
• The second reading takes it from the verse just after: "If there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home" (14:35). "Learn," μαθεῖν, echoes 14:31, where prophecy is given "so that all may learn." On this reading the women's questions during the gathering were the disorder, and Paul answers it: learn, and ask at home.

One textual fact bears on both. Some manuscripts place 14:34-35 after 14:40 (NLT footnote). Every surviving manuscript contains the verses; some scholars read the displacement as a sign that they began as a marginal note, and others hold them to be Paul's in either position.

1 Timothy 2:11-15

✝️ 1 Timothy 2:11-15 (ESV)

11 Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14 and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. 15 Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

Four settled points

Four things in the text are settled.

• "Let her learn" is a command: μανθανέτω (manthanetō, G3129). Paul orders that women be taught.
• "Quietly" is a different word from 1 Corinthians 14's "keep silent." It is ἡσυχία (hēsychia, hay-soo-KHEE-ah, G2271). It can mean silence (Acts 22:2) or a settled manner of life (2 Thessalonians 3:12; the adjective in 1 Timothy 2:2).
• "Exercise authority" is αὐθεντέω (authenteō, ow-then-TEH-oh, G831). It occurs once in the Bible, here, and nowhere in the Septuagint, so its sense has to come from Greek writers outside Scripture. The ESV Study Bible cites over 80 examples there for the sense "exercise authority." Others argue for a stronger sense, to dominate or to seize authority, which the NLT footnote gives as "usurp their authority." The word alone cannot settle the question, so each reading rests its case on the context.
• Paul gives reasons, introduced by "for," γάρ: Adam was formed first, and the woman was deceived (2:13-14). Any reading has to explain why these are the reasons he gives.

The two readings

The two readings:

• The first reading holds that Paul reserves the teaching and governing office of elder to qualified men. Its case: the first reason is from creation, before the fall, which no change of culture undoes; the two verbs "teach" and "exercise authority" describe the overseer's work, who must be "able to teach" (3:2) and who will "care for God's church" (3:5); and the same paragraph calls the overseer "the husband of one wife" (3:2). On this reading women teach women and children (Titus 2:3-5; 2 Timothy 1:5), pray and prophesy, and serve in every ministry outside the elder's office.
• The second reading holds that Paul is answering a problem in Ephesus. Its case: the letter opens with false teachers (1:3-7); they "forbid marriage" (4:3), and 2:15's "saved through childbearing" answers them; younger widows were "saying what they should not," and "some have already strayed after Satan" (5:13, 15, ESV); and in the same church false teachers "capture weak women ... always learning" (2 Timothy 3:6-7, ESV). On this reading the remedy is verse 11, teach the women, and Eve's deception (2:14) illustrates what happens to the untaught. Priscilla, who with Aquila "explained to him the way of God more accurately" (Acts 18:26, ESV) to Apollos, shows what taught women may do.

Each reading has a question to answer from the text. The first must explain Priscilla, and why Paul adds Eve's deception if the ground is creation order alone. The second must explain why Paul grounds the instruction in creation, "Adam was formed first," and not in the local trouble.

What both readings share

What both readings share is the larger part of the question. Neither forbids women to learn, pray, prophesy, serve, give, lead in the church's ministries, teach other women and children, or tell anyone the gospel. Neither gives any man in the church authority over any woman in it by virtue of being male. And neither has anything to say about control inside a home: 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14 regulate the gathered church. A church may hold either reading in good conscience; it may not use either to silence women where Scripture lets them speak.

Where submission ends

Every human authority in Scripture is limited by God's. When the council ordered the apostles to stop preaching, "Peter and the apostles answered, 'We must obey God rather than men'" (Acts 5:29, ESV). A wife's submission is "as to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:22) and "as is fitting in the Lord" (Colossians 3:18). Nothing that is sin is fitting in the Lord, and no husband can require it.

Scripture names harshness and violence toward a wife as sin. "The LORD tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence" (Psalm 11:5, ESV). Paul forbids a husband to be harsh (Colossians 3:19), Peter warns him that his prayers will be hindered (1 Peter 3:7), and Paul tells the church not to share a table with a professing believer who is a "reviler," a man of abusive speech (1 Corinthians 5:11, ESV).

Malachi 2:16 says the faithless husband "covers his garment with violence" (ESV), חָמָס (ḥāmās, khah-MAHS, H2555). How the verse opens is contested (NASB "I hate divorce"; the ESV, CSB and NIV make the husband the one who hates), and it is about a discarded wife, not physical abuse. God names what was done to her violence.

To a wife who is afraid

• You may flee danger. Scripture records God's servants escaping violence without a word of rebuke. Michal let David down through a window (1 Samuel 19:12), Paul's disciples lowered him in a basket (Acts 9:25), and Jesus passed through the crowd at Nazareth (Luke 4:30). "The prudent sees danger and hides himself" (Proverbs 22:3, ESV).
• Tell someone. Tell your pastor or elders, and when a crime has been committed, tell the civil authorities, whom God appoints for this (Romans 13:4).
• What is happening to you is sin against you. God's word does not ask you to hide it. "Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them" (Ephesians 5:11, ESV).

To a pastor or elder

• Hear her, and act justly. Scripture binds a church to two things at once. It must not dismiss a charge: "Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute" (Psalm 82:3, ESV), and "Open your mouth for the mute" (Proverbs 31:8, ESV). And it must establish a charge by evidence, as the Law and Jesus require: "Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established" (Deuteronomy 19:15, ESV; Matthew 18:16), for "the one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him" (Proverbs 18:17, ESV). "The judges shall inquire diligently" (Deuteronomy 19:18, ESV). Make her safe while you inquire; her safety does not wait for the verdict.
• Report crimes. Assault, threats and sexual violence are crimes. God appoints the civil ruler as "an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer" (Romans 13:4, ESV). Reporting is obedience.
• Hold the one doing harm to account. Follow the steps Jesus gave (Matthew 18:15-17) and Paul's instruction for a reviler (1 Corinthians 5:11). If he will not listen, "tell it to the church" (Matthew 18:17).
• Separation is allowed. Paul anticipates a wife separating from her husband: "if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband" (1 Corinthians 7:11, ESV). Reconciliation looks for what John the Baptist asked for: "Bear fruits in keeping with repentance" (Luke 3:8, ESV). Whether persistent abuse is grounds for divorce is contested. Some read it as a form of the desertion of 1 Corinthians 7:15, where "God has called you to peace"; others hold to the grounds Jesus and Paul name and no others (Matthew 19:9; 1 Corinthians 7:15). Decide it with the elders and with care, and never let the question delay her safety.

To a husband

Read Ephesians 5:25-29 as your job description. If your wife is afraid of you, you are not leading your home; you are living out Genesis 3:16. Confess it to God and to her, get help, submit to your church's oversight, and accept the consequences. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9, ESV).

This shows that God defends the vulnerable. He gave His Son for the church, He hears "the desire of the afflicted" and does "justice to the fatherless and the oppressed" (Psalm 10:17-18, ESV), and He has given His church the duty to protect those He loves.

Discussion questions

1. The language. In the Greek, Ephesians 5:22 has no verb and borrows "submitting" from 5:21, "submitting to one another." How does reading the two verses together change how 5:22 sounds?
2. The text in its context. Genesis 3:16 and 4:7 use the same pair of words, "desire" and "rule." What does the comparison suggest about what the fall did to marriage?
3. Christ. Paul defines the husband's headship by what Christ did for His church (Ephesians 5:23-29). List the verbs. What would it look like for a husband to do each one this week?
4. The language. ἐξουσιάζω, "to have authority over," occurs in 1 Corinthians 7:4 in both directions and in Luke 22:25 of the Gentile rulers Jesus told His disciples not to imitate. What kind of authority does 7:4 give a husband or a wife?
5. The hard part. 1 Corinthians 14:34 and 1 Timothy 2:12 restrict women's speech, while 1 Corinthians 11:5 and Acts 18:26 show women praying, prophesying and teaching. Which reading of the restrictions do you find more persuasive from the text, and what do both readings share?
6. Be transformed. Peter told wives, "do not fear anything that is frightening" (1 Peter 3:6, ESV). If someone in your church were afraid at home, what would you do, and who would you tell?

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Group study · 40 minutes

Submission in Context

Ephesians 5:21-33

The point Every New Testament call to wives to submit is spoken to the wife herself, as service to the Lord, beside a call to husbands to love, honour and give themselves up as Christ did, so no text licenses control, coercion or abuse; husband and wife hold authority over each other's bodies equally, and where a text's reach is contested the church should say so and hold it with humility.

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Ask: what comes to mind when you hear Submission in Context? Hear a few answers before anyone reads.

5–12minRead it aloud BSB

Ephesians 5:21-33 ²¹Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. ²²Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. ²³For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, His body, of which He is the Savior. ²⁴Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. ²⁵Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her ²⁶to sanctify her, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷and to present her to Himself as a glorious church, without stain or wrinkle or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. ²⁸In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. ²⁹Indeed, no one ever hated his own body, but he nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church. ³⁰For we are members of His body. ³¹“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” ³²This mystery is profound, but I am speaking about Christ and the church. ³³Nevertheless, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

12–25minLook closer

What does it say?

What did it mean to them?

What does it mean for us?

Submission in Context

The study in brief

1. The ground — How these verses get used · Genesis 3:16: a consequence. The test applied to every verse, and what the fall did to marriage.
2. Marriage — Ephesians 5:21-33: one verb for everyone · 1 Corinthians 7:3-5: neither body is your own · 1 Peter 3:1-7 and Colossians 3:18-19. Submission spoken to the whole church, the cross as the husband's measure, one flesh, equal authority over bodies, and the wife who need not fear.
3. The church — The contested texts. 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:11-15, with both readings.
4. Pastoral guidance — Where submission ends. What Scripture says to a wife, a husband and a pastor when there is harm.

Submission in Context

12–25minDiscover

1The language. In the Greek, Ephesians 5:22 has no verb and borrows "submitting" from 5:21, "submitting to one another." How does reading the two verses together change how 5:22 sounds?

2The text in its context. Genesis 3:16 and 4:7 use the same pair of words, "desire" and "rule." What does the comparison suggest about what the fall did to marriage?

3The language. ἐξουσιάζω, "to have authority over," occurs in 1 Corinthians 7:4 in both directions and in Luke 22:25 of the Gentile rulers Jesus told His disciples not to imitate. What kind of authority does 7:4 give a husband or a wife?

25–35minWrestle

4Christ. Paul defines the husband's headship by what Christ did for His church (Ephesians 5:23-29). List the verbs. What would it look like for a husband to do each one this week?

5The hard part. 1 Corinthians 14:34 and 1 Timothy 2:12 restrict women's speech, while 1 Corinthians 11:5 and Acts 18:26 show women praying, prophesying and teaching. Which reading of the restrictions do you find more persuasive from the text, and what do both readings share?

Submission in Context

35–40minBe transformed

6Be transformed. Peter told wives, "do not fear anything that is frightening" (1 Peter 3:6, ESV). If someone in your church were afraid at home, what would you do, and who would you tell?

• Think. Read every verse about submission in its paragraph. Ephesians 5:22 cannot be read without 5:21 and 5:25, and 1 Corinthians 7:4 cannot be read in one direction only.
• Attitude. Husbands, hold your authority the way Christ holds His: spent for your wife's good. Wives, hold your submission as service to Christ, offered freely and never extracted by fear.
• Do. If anyone is being hurt in a marriage, act: make them safe, call the authorities when a crime is committed, and bring the church's care and discipline to bear. "Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them" (Ephesians 5:11, ESV). Silence protects the one doing harm.

Memory verse

submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ ... 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

Ephesians 5:21, 25 (ESV)

Pray together

Father, your Son came to serve and gave His life for His bride. Make our marriages look like His love. Keep husbands from ruling as the world rules, and give wives the freedom of those who fear nothing but you. Where anyone is afraid in their own home, protect them, bring the truth into the light, and make your church a refuge.

In Jesus' name. Amen.

Notes

The whole study, with every verse a tap awayhttps://the-way.lewy.au/christian-life/submission-in-context/

References & Recommended Reading

• ESV Bible (Crossway) — the translation quoted throughout, per this site's conventions. All quotations were verified against the ESV text rather than reproduced from memory. See Copyright for the full notice.
• Novum Testamentum Graece, 28th edition (Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft) — the Greek of Ephesians 5:18-29, 1 Corinthians 7:5, 1 Peter 3:1, 6-7, Colossians 3:19, Luke 22:25-27 and 1 Timothy 2:11. The translation of Ephesians 5:22 is this study's own.
• MACULA Greek Linguistic Datasets (SBLGNT) and MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets (Westminster Leningrad Codex), Clear Bible — Strong's numbers and counts, including the four uses of ἐξουσιάζω and the single New Testament uses of σύμφωνος, πτόησις and αὐθεντέω.
• Brenton's Septuagint (eBible.org) — Proverbs 3:25, πτόησιν; Malachi 2:16.
• ESV Study Bible (Crossway) — consulted after the exegesis, as a check. Notes on Genesis 3:16 (an order of husband and wife before the fall, distorted by sin), Ephesians 5:21 (submission "according to the authority and order established by God") and 1 Timothy 2:12 (αὐθεντέω outside the New Testament).
• CSB, LSB and NLT footnotes — Ephesians 5:22 ("Other mss omit submit"), Ephesians 5:21 ("Lit being subject"), Genesis 3:16 (NLT, "though you will have desire for your husband"), 1 Corinthians 14:35 (NLT, verses 34-35 placed after 14:40 in some manuscripts) and 1 Timothy 2:12 (NLT, "usurp their authority"). Malachi 2:16 is compared in the ESV, NASB, LSB, CSB and NIV.

Related studies on this site: Jesus and Women · The Bride of Christ · Sin and Sexual Immorality