21 June, 2007

Epiphany Ahead!

An epiphany not unlike my last one ("God is better than humans!").

From WilburBlog, a quote from Robert Capon's Bed and Board:

“The reason the headship of the husband is so violently objected to is that it is misunderstood…the Bible does not say that men and women are unequal. Neither does the Church. There are no second-class citizens in the New Jerusalem. It is husbands and wives that are unequal. It is precisely in marriage…that they enter into a relationship of superior to inferior—of head to body. And the difference there is not one of worth, ability or intelligence, but of role. It is functional, not organic. It is based on the exigencies of the Dance, not on a judgment as to talent. In the ballet, in any intricate dance, one dancer leads, the other follows. Not because one is better (he may or may not be), but because that is his part. Our mistake, here as elsewhere, is to think the equality and diversity are unreconcilable. The common notion of equality is based on the image of the march. In a parade, really unequal beings are dressed alike, given guns of identical length, trained to hold them at the same angle, and ordered to keep step with a fixed beat. But it is not the parade that is true to life; it is the dance. There you have real equals assigned unequal roles in order that each may achieve his individual perfection in the whole. Nothing is less personal than a parade; nothing more so than a dance. It is the choice image of fulfillment through function, and it comes very close to the heart of the Trinity. Marriage is a hierarchical game played by co-equal persons. Keep that paradox and you move in the freedom of the Dance; alter it, and you grow weary with marching (53-54).”

2 comments:

Kelly said...

I love that analogy - I first read in Doug Wilson's writings (of course). See also Henry Tilney's discussion with Catherine Moreland re: how the dance is a metaphor of marriage. I loved that scene.

Miss Puritan Chickie said...

Oh, yes. I loved that part- it's why I love Henry so much!

It's nice to see this concept laid out so clearly. There's usually too much other junk obscuring the point, because it's such an emotional issue.