What Authority Does a Husband Have Over His Wife?

Photo by Євгенія Височина on Unsplash

I know I’m late in the game, but I just came across an article from Crossway Publishers by Jonathan Leeman (9Marks) about a husband’s authority over his wife, and the opening quote was a little troubling:

A husband’s authority is what I would characterize as an authority of counsel, not an authority of command. In both kinds of authority, there is the right to make commands, and the person under is called to submit. So wives are called to submit in the same way children are called to submit.

To be fair, Leeman is quick to add that a husband’s authority is one of counsel rather than command and he notes that there is no enforcement mechanism for discipline in marriage. He is heavily qualifying his view of male authority, but I still believe that such a view can have sinister results. That is because the underlying premise of male authority is based on the infantilization of a man’s wife!

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Let me be clear. In a healthy marriage, the husband has a different relationship with his wife than with his children.

Yes, to children, there is a sense of authority, but with one’s wife, there should be partnership not paternity or even patriarchy.

A wife should not see her husband as a “father” figure even if she is younger than him! Oh boy, that line of argument can get super-creepy very fast. I’m not my wife’s paterfamilias with the power of life and death over her as per a Roman household. No, I’m her soul mate, companion, supporter, cheerleader, confident, and counselor.

There are some aspects of marriage, whether by biology or by personality, that a certain spouse may lead in or take charge over. Which speaks to a mutual authority or agreed areas of delegated authority. In the case of my marriage, I tend to lead on our strategic finances, while my runs organizes our week to week finances.

My wife takes on certain roles and responsibilities as do I, but she does not command me, any more than I command her.

If the Bible presents a picture of authority, it is mutual submission to each other’s authority, for the betterment of the marriage. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians:

The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife (1 Cor 7:4).

A wife or husband offers their body, talents, time, and abilities in service of their spouse. No, the husband is not lording it over the wife and the wife is not submitting to the husband as the norm.

I’ve had enough experience with domestic and family violence to know that describing the marital relationship through the lens of male authority ultimately and inevitably leads to abuses of male power and powerful abuse of women.

To regard the wife as inferior in rank or subordinate and submissive is the sufficient condition to treating her as inferior in worth.

I have no doubt that Leeman would be sympathetic to that concern, but his infantilization of the wife I fear leads to such result.