Deciphering Complex New Testament Texts about Women Part Five: Colossians 3

Titian’s 1555 The Descent of the Holy Ghost from the Basilica Santa Maria della Salute in Venice. Above, shining light radiating from a dove represents the Holy Spirit descending on believers at Pentecost. Mary of Nazareth sits front and center, surrounded by male and female believers. The tongues of fire above each believer’s head represent the Holy Spirit. 

Image source: Shala Graham, Visual Museum of Women in Christianity

Colossians 3

Onto the second of the so-called “household codes.” I already wrote about Ephesians 5 at length here if you’re curious; it would be good background reading for this post. Colossians contains many parallels with Ephesians. There are three of these “household codes” passages in the New Testament, two written by Paul and one written by Peter. See my analysis of 1 Peter 3 here.

Historical Context

Household codes in the New Testament world were common and expected ways of being for all household members. In a world largely dominated by the male, elite patriarchy, men were considered socially superior to everyone in their households, including wives, children, slaves, and more.[1] While husbands were often the head of the household, many marriages at this time were sine manu, meaning wives were still under the authority of their fathers rather than their husbands.[2] Within this system, women (mostly elite) had pockets of agency, influence, and power. Class mattered alongside gender. For example, an elite woman had authority over an enslaved male.[3] Household codes were commonly discussed in Greco-Roman literature, with the expectation that husbands ruled over their wives and wives obeyed their husbands.[4]

Reading in Context of Colossians

In Colossians, Paul speaks at length on the themes of Christology (the study of Christ) and unity in the body of Christ. Paul begins chapter 3 with this thesis statement:

“Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:1-4).[5]

Paul continues by encouraging the Colossians to put to death their sinful natures, taking off the old and putting on the new, concluding that “Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all” (Colossians 3:11). Paul does not mean that distinctions of race, ethnicity, culture, and gender no longer exist,[6] but rather emphasizes that there is no hierarchy of these distinctions in Christ. We are all one body united with Christ.

Paul defines the new, united body in this way:

“Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.  Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity” (Colossians 3:12-14, bolding mine).

This passage recalls the Fruit of the Spirit from Galatians 5:22-23a (bolding mine): “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”

This is how Paul distinguishes the family of Christ from the world around them. The world around them values hierarchy, but the body of Christ values love, patience, kindness, gentleness, humility, and the like.

Now, let us turn to the passage in question.

Colossians 3:15-19, NIV

“15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. 16 Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

18 Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

19 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.”

First Things First

First, I’d like to point out something under-noticed in analyses of this passage. Paul addresses the entire congregation in this letter leading up to the “household codes,” which include men, women, children, the elderly, freed persons, elites, enslaved persons, etc. And to that entire diverse group of Christ followers, Paul clearly says in verse 16:

“Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.”

Everyone, without caveat, is to teach and admonish one another using God’s wisdom in the Spirit through poetic verse, including the Psalms of Scripture.[7] Everyone. One body, doing everything in Christ’s name with thankfulness to God.

Mutual Submission in the Codes

Now, Paul addresses wives and husbands directly, in that order. Note that verses 18-19 are part of a longer section where Paul proceeds to speak to fathers and children, the enslaved and the enslavers. We will analyze only his words to wives and husbands, as that is the focus of this series.

Wives are to submit themselves to their husbands. Husbands are to demand respect and obedience from their wives as the natural, God-appointed leaders. Wait, no. Husbands are to love their wives and not be harsh with them. Huh. No call to male leadership, no discussion of decision-making or tie-breaking, or the nature of men and women. Wives have the agency to submit themselves to their own husbands. Husbands show reciprocal, voluntary submission to their wives by treating their wives lovingly and without harshness. Shirley A. Decker-Lucke points out that the word used for “harsh” here means that husbands are not to “make themselves a bitter taste in their wives’ mouths,”[8] pushing beyond physical abuse to encompass the entire way of being a husband demonstrates towards his wife. He is not to create bitterness in her or be bitter towards her, but to lead love her.

In his excellent commentary on Colossians, Scot McKnight notes the following:

“In our text, the emphasis is on the wife’s choice to order herself toward her husband. While the term can mean obedience, the grounding here is neither the husband’s authority nor some supposed creation order nor his role as leader – else the complementary command in v. 19 would talk about leadership… [instead] it is grounded in the Lord’s way of life. Hence, Paul provides an alternative to the status systems of his world, which also would have been heard in liberating and protective ways by slave women in the household. It needs to be noted again that the husband is not instructed to lead his wife but to love her sacrificially.”[9]

Indeed, N.T. Wright finds it

“extremely unlikely that Paul, having warned the young Christians against conforming their lives to the present world, would now require just that of them after all. Nor does he. …Paul bases his [teaching] on the law of the new nature: Christ releases you to be truly human, and you must learn to express your true self according to the divine pattern, not in self-assertion but in self-giving.”[10]

Paul’s Definition of Love

In a beautiful passage we’ve all heard recited at a wedding at least once, Paul defines love. All the kingdom work of believers is nothing if not done in love. Love defines and directs the body of Christ. What, then, does love look like?

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8a).

Echoing the Fruit of the Spirit and the language of Colossians 3:12-14, Paul defines love as kind, patient, sacrificial, humble, protective, trusting, hopeful, enduring. Love requires the laying down of selfishness for the good of the other. This kind of love must define the husband’s actions towards the wife, and the wife’s actions towards the husband. They are to show love and the willing submission of self to serve one another, mutually.

In a society marked by male privilege and power, husbands are to lay it all down in loving service to their wives. In the words of Dr. McKnight, “Christoformity[11] bids farewell to hierarchy.”[12] There is no marital hierarchy prescribed by Scripture. Both partners are to practice Paul’s definition of love, imperfectly, having grace for one another.

Conclusion

I love Dr. McKnight’s thoughts on a Christ-honoring marriage and will quote him at length as we conclude:

“Husbands who love like this, as 1 Cor 13 makes clear, do not make demands, do not overpower, and do not violate the integrity of a wife. Instead, the husband who loves like this encourages, empowers, and frees. The more emphasis that is given to love in Col 3:19, the less emphasis will be given to discussions about power and male dominance, leadership, and authority in 3:18, discussions that dominate so-called complementarian literature. The more emphasis given to love, the more Spirit-driven will be the relationship of husband and wife. The text, then, does not advocate sharing power; it advocates sharing life and love with one another as a new kind of power.”[13]

 
References & Notes

[1] In no way am I making an argument that marriage can only be between a man and a woman. Nor do I wish to define maleness or femaleness. I am simply using the terms “husband” and “wife” because they are the ones used here by Scripture.

[2] Lynn Cohick, Women in the World of the Earliest Christians: Illuminating Ancient Ways of Life (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009), 100.

[3] Susan E. Hylen, Women in the New Testament World (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2019), 95.

[4] Craig S. Keener, New Testament, 2nd ed. The IVP Bible Background Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2014), 578.

[5] All Scriptural citations in this article are from the New International Version (NIV).

[6] Dennis R. Edwards, “Letter to the Colossians,” in The New Testament in Color: A Multiethnic Bible Commentary, ed. Esau McCaulley, Janette H. Ok, Osvaldo Padilla, Amy Peeler (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2024), 493.

[7] Scot McKnight, The Letter to the Colossians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018), 332.

[8] Shirley A. Decker-Lucke, “Colossians,” in The IVP Women’s Bible Commentary, ed. Catherine Clark Kroeger and Mary J. Evans (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2002), 720

[9] McKnight, Colossians, 346.

[10] N.T. Wright, Colossians and Philemon, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries Vo. 12 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1986), 151.

[11] Becoming like Christ.

[12] McKnight, Colossians, 347.

[13] McKnight, Colossians, 350.