Your boasting is not a good thing. Do you not know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Clean out the old yeast so that you may be a new batch, as you really are unleavened. For our paschal lamb, Christ, has been sacrificed. [1 Cor. 5:6-7, NRSV]
[L] Amnon and Tamar, by Jan Steen, c.1660’s. [R] The Banquet of Absalom, by Niccolo de Simone, c.1650.
As part of a module for scriptural reflection with couples, we speak about domestic violence – both physical and verbal – and encourage all to speak up against such abusive behaviour and to expose it for the evil that it is.
[1] Verbal Abuse
Between spouses, abuse may be of several types but the more hurtful type is verbal abuse. The abuser uses words to bully, to hurt and to demoralize. The abused is debased, made to feel small, and her dignity wounded.
Sometimes, the abuser may seem in other ways a loving spouse. In such a case, he may not realize that his sharp tongue is seriously wounding his spouse’s human dignity and sense of self-worth. It gets real bad when this abusing spirit plays out in public or in front of the spouses’ own children and grand children, before whom the abused suffers a loss of respect. If unchecked, this behaviour degenerates into a terrible habit, embarrassing even to others around. Once, at a dining table, a verbally abusive husband said something quite terrible to the wife in our presence. For us, this had happened one time too many. So we spoke to the man on the spot, also in public, pointing out to him what a terrible thing he had done to the wife and how embarrassing it was for the rest of us at the table. The wife cried, in relief, because someone noticed her wound and has finally spoken up for her. The man himself was stunned, because no one has ever pointed out to him how rotten he had become. Unchecked, his abusive streak had become his second nature.
Another lady was even less fortunate. She had been a tortured soul in her own home. Her husband, a very senior government officer and a respected personality in society, was a habitual verbal-abuser of her over an extensive period of time. Though, mindful of his public image, he had never behaved badly in respectable company, at home he was a real monster of a character, regularly degrading the wife even in front of their children. After a while, it settled down to a routine. Little did he know that his children had found him totally disgusting and quite unforgivable. Nobody at home had dared to speak up against him who thought of himself as a “big shot” and behaved like one. A humiliated and tortured soul, the wife finally ended her own life on a day when the man was in office. Of their several children, all grown by then, the only son, who had moved to another city to work, refused to come back for the mother’s funeral, all because he did not want to see his father’s face again, ever. The daughters are all married, and none would go home to visit the aged father, except for the youngest who would bring her own children to visit grandpa once a year out of pity for the old man. But even the grandchildren do not like to stay long, for grandpa is always grumbling that his children are an ungrateful bunch who neglect their father in old age.
- The truth of the matter is, a family is severely broken, because one member, the father of the house, has been verbally abusive. The sin of one man has caused irreparable damage to the entire family. The effects of domestic abusive can be and often are far-reaching.
[2] Physical Abuse
Physical abuse is a pervasive domestic violence society is plagued by.
Men need to know that women are children of God, sharing the same image of God bestowed by the Creator, the source of all lives in the universe. Domestic violence is an unforgivable trampling of the spouse’s God-given human dignity. It is ultimately an insult and violence against God.
In a case in Belgium, a long suffering wife was finally counseled by a Catholic priest-professor to file for divorce in a civil court. Only the legal remedy of a divorce brought her the freedom she desperately needed from the abusive man who, from the date of the divorce, had absolutely lost all legal right of visitation. It was a long awaited freedom from a long abusive, dignity-sapping, and spirit-trifling marriage. At the same time, at her age, she was not thinking of ever remarrying again. There would absolutely be no hindrance to her receiving Holy Communion. Given the facts, anybody would be seriously mistaken who would counsel the woman against seeking a civil divorce for her own protection, basing such counsel on some skewed argument of the “sanctity” and “indissolubility” of marriage. It would in fact be quite idolatrous, worshipping some “ideals” wholly detached from reality, ignoring the woman’s immense suffering, and sweeping aside her God given fundamental freedom and dignity.
In New Orleans, a priest was so sick of hearing sobbing complaints from a lady parishioner about the repeated beating by her husband that he sent another parishioner to visit the abusive man. This parishioner, huge in size, went to “speak” to the husband in the only language the latter could understand – physical violence. He went into the house, said something like, “I hear that you have been beating up your missus, you blanketi-blank.” And then he punched the husband a few times till the latter dropped to the floor. Towering over the man lying injured on the floor, he said menacingly, “Don’t make me come back, you blanketi-blank. Next time, I will break your f—— leg!” Much as we enjoyed hearing that story told by a priest, we do not think that is the solution we would recommend any time soon.
In another case, stunning still as we recall the episode shown on a television documentary, we had the immense pleasure of seeing an abusive husband sent to prison.
- Susan’s husband was convicted and sentenced to 36 years for accumulated incidents of physical violence against her. Caught on video by her son, her husband had repeatedly said to her during the beatings, “I have to teach you how to behave.” The prosecutor in turn asked the jury to teach him by an appropriate prison sentence and they gladly obliged! 36 years!
[3] Sexual Abuse
Sexual abuse, especially when it happens in the domus, is a severe crime against the member of the household who is being offended against. Furthermore, violent incest is a scourge in society.
In Scriptures, the rape of Tamar is written for our instructions. Despite the biblical prohibition on sexual relations between half-brothers and sisters [Leviticus 18:11], Amnon had an overwhelming desire for her. Plotting and scheming, including faking sickness, Amnon finally got Tamar to come to see him in his bedroom whereupon he raped her. Though he was very angry about the incident, King David could not bring himself to punish his eldest son. Here is the first failure in the family to speak up, to do something right for the abused member of the family. This failure would lead to serious consequences.
- Absalom, who was Amnon’s half-brother and Tamar’s full brother, would nurse a bitter grudge against Amnon for the rape of his sister.
- Absalom would also go on to plot and scheme, pretending to invite all of David’s sons to a banquet. And there, he would avenge his sister’s stolen honour, and have Absalom killed by his servant [2 Samuel 13].
Lest we forget, barely two chapters earlier in 2 Samuel 11, King David, Amnon’s father, saw Bathsheba bathing and used his power to have her brought to him so that he might “lay” with her. When David’s son did the same to his half sister, it was a case of monkey-see-monkey-do. The Word of God which is to uplift us, carries these stories to teach us to be mindful of the rape culture that is a scourge in many societies. India and South Africa readily come to mind when we speak of an evil “rape culture” that has run pretty much out of control, to a point one helplessly feels that the society has been “diseased” thereby.
- There is a desperate need to educate and empower both men and women regarding this issue.
- There is a need for governments, churches and families to confront the corrosive effects of pornography.
- There is a need to speak up against this violence against women and children wherever it happens – in society, at home and in the church.
Copyright © Dr. Jeffrey & Angie Goh, September, 2014. All rights reserved.
You are most welcome to respond to this post. Email your comments to jeffangiegoh@gmail.com. You can also be dialogue partners in this Ephphatha Coffee-Corner Ministry by sending us questions for discussion.