Wives be submissive to their husbands.

In Jewish and Greco-Roman culture women were seen as secondary citizens. The male Jew could at any time for no reason write a letter of dismissal to divorce his wife. In fact, the devout Jew would recite a prayer daily thanking God that he was not a woman. Such behavior was well understood to Paul, who being a devout Jew himself. Paul begins his lesson on marriage by first stating that women are to be subject/submissive to their husband as an expression of their submission to Jesus. Paul does not say that they are to be just as submissive to their husband as they are to Jesus nor that women were to be submissive to all men nor that women were inferior to men. Submission does not mean inferiority or a loss of one’s identity it means giving oneself up to someone else. Our universe is an example of authority and submission; which is a natural necessity to maintain order: God has authority over man, man has authority over nature, husbands have authority over their wives, parents over their children, governors over which they govern, employers over their employees, and spiritual leaders over those they lead spiritually. I believe Paul is trying to show that submission leads to voluntary organization which leads to completeness and oneness in marriage. In Greco-Roman culture men had no responsibilities towards their wives, as wives had many toward their husbands. Paul summarizes the wives duty as submission and the men’s job as love (agapate) which means seeking the highest good for another person; just as Christ gave up his life for the salvation of mankind. He gave up his rights in order to fulfill his responsibilities, so must the man in relation to his wife. This love must consist of unconditional acceptance, sacrificial action, and self-denial of your passions when hers are at risk.

Abortion: Systematic Injustice

An essay I wrote for my English class.

         

            In almost all societies over the span of history, systematic injustice has always existed in one form or another. During those times in history, many groups spoke out against whatever they believed were systematic injustices, but were received as “radical” because these acts of injustice were culturally acceptable. Time proves most of these cultural norms to be inherently wrong. One of the most (at the time) culturally acceptable injustices to take place in recent centuries would have to be the Jewish Holocaust, in which five million Jews lost their lives under Nazi Germany. Tragic, as the Jewish Holocaust was, there exists an injustice even more culturally accepted today that is claiming even more lives. Abortion is the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo before fetal viability. Abortions claims more than 1.21 million deaths a year in the United States and are responsible for 50 million total deaths since it was legalized. Abortion is an injustice; as it intentionally deprives potential life of experience and enjoyment, the loss of one’s life is the greatest loss one can suffer. Pro-life and pro-choice supporters often debate and get distracted by the definition of life and the point at which it starts. The definition of when life begins does have a major role in determining whether abortion is an injustice or not in many people’s minds. Even if life is to be agreed to start at birth, it does not undermine all Pro-choice choice arguments that are readily available in the public realm.

            If anything, history teaches us that humans have a capacity for abusing other human beings. These abuses extend past an individual or a small group, to crimes against humanity. The concept of “Crimes against humanity” was created by Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin. Lemkin was influenced by the slaughter of the Armenians by the Turks in World War One. But, his proposals were not passed until 1943 when leaders of Nazi Germany were charged with genocide during the Nuremberg Trails. Genocide is defined as “The deliberate and systematic destruction of a national, racial, religious, political, cultural, ethnic, or other group defined by the exterminators as undesirable.”(Webster’s New World Encyclopedia)  Abortion is an act of genocide because it targets a very specific group of human beings: unwanted, unborn children. Americans in many instances tend to dehumanize a group of people who stand in the way of something we want or are working for, as do pro-choice supporters who dehumanize the fetus to justify its elimination. Many take offense to comparing abortion to other crimes against humanity because it reveals a scandal. Such was the case when Dr. King compared the abuse of black Americans to the Holocaust. It is easy to condemn crimes that happen in another time-period. It is much harder to condemn crimes when they are a cultural norm and are running swiftly throughout our society. Pro-choice supporters often argue that the unborn aren’t really people and cannot be compared to any atrocities committed against humanity; not realizing that this is exactly what Hitler argued against the Jews, and earlier when America said African-Americans were only three-fifths of a person. Abortion is a form of genocide, and is a form of systematic injustice that is presently taking place in the majority of the world’s superpowers, with the exception of Middle-East, islands in East Asia, and some South American nations.

            What if (for argument’s sake), that the abortion of an unborn fetus isn’t immoral, that it does not constitute as a human being and therefore the termination of it isn’t unobjectionably immoral? What if the actual taking of physical life isn’t what makes abortion wrong? Philosopher Don Marquis of the University of Kansas wrote an article, "Why Abortion Is Immoral," which appeared in the Journal of Philosophy.(Marquis 86:4) Marquis argues that killing is not wrong because it shows the killer to be barbaric, or because it saddens the state of the family and relatives. Instead, killing is wrong because it deprives the victim of life. The loss of a life is the greatest possible loss anyone can suffer. It eradicates all the experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments that one’s future self could have experienced. Injustice applies to any act that involves unfairness to another or violation of one's rights. Our government has passed laws supporting the view that it is morally acceptable to abort an unborn child. This, as have other events in the history of mankind, seems acceptable at the time; but in order to stop the deprivation of millions of lives every single year, we must fight injustice. If the death of three-thousand potential humans along with their memories, experiences, and their future accomplishments everyday isn’t enough to protest and act out upon; then nothing else is. If this is to be stopped; awareness is necessary; we need to direct our voices to the common citizen in public and private about this injustice, letters are to be written to the appropriate offices by the opponents of this injustice, and civil protest at the places of injustice is a must. To lay one’s freedom down for another’s, especially one without a voice, is one of the noblest acts of all.

            There is an injustice greater than any other injustice witnessed by mankind in today’s society. Even more upsetting, this injustice is culturally acceptable by the citizens of the government that made it legal, and ultimately morally acceptable. Though some argue concerning the morality of aborting an unborn fetus, it is apparent that aborting them robs them of any future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments in their potential life. Aborting is not just about the physical death of a fetus, but instead the possibilities of its potential future. We must stand firm against injustice and reveal the ugly truths that reside within our society, just as Lemkin and Dr. King have done. This systematic injustice is robbing others, as Lemkin puts it simply, “A future like ours,” (Marquis 86:4) and ultimately everything that makes up who each individual human being consists of, memories.

Works Cited

¹ Webster's New World Encyclopedia, Prentice Hall General Reference, 1992

² Marquis, D. "Why Abortion Is Immoral". Journal of Philosophy 86:4 (April 1989): 183-202.