Women and Obeying/Hearkening Covenants

[Anonymous]

Some deep thoughts I had in the shower this morning. 😆

It’s fairly well-known that up until 1990, the endowment placed women under covenant to obey their husbands as their husbands obey the Lord. Now the language has been softened somewhat; women hearken to their husbands and their husbands hearken to God. Setting aside the fact that the way the word ‘hearken’ is used, I don’t fundamentally think it means something different than ‘obey,’ what does this mean for women who were endowed pre-1990? My in-laws were sealed sometime in the 1960s; is she expected to spend the rest of eternity obeying her husband where I am only under covenant to hearken to mine?

What does this mean for women whose endowments were done by proxy? Say two women were born in 1770, married their husbands in 1790, and died in 1850. One of them had her temple work done in 1947, and the other one in 2001. Does Woman A have to spend eternity obeying her husband and Woman B does not? What happens if they run into each other in the CK and they get to talking. That’s going to be a mighty awkward conversation. 😮

It seems logical that the newer temple language supersedes the old – ie. all women are under the less harsh ‘hearkening’ covenant even if the word was ‘obey’ when they went through the temple. This makes sense. However… what does that say about our current temple covenants? The endowment can and does change, so is it possible that the current language can change, too? (One possible modification – and this absolutely is the low-hanging fruit – is to change it so that husbands and wives hearken to each other, and both hearken to God.) But… if the endowment can change in my lifetime, and for that matter can change after my death, then how do I know what I actually covenanted to? What will I actually spend eternity doing when it comes to my husband – obeying; hearkening (one-way street); hearkening (two-way street); something else altogether – and when do I find out what that is?

Trying to figure out what God actually expects of women is like nailing Jello to the wall, isn’t it? 😆

And see, it gets even more confusing when you throw God in there. The current language is that woman hearkens to man, man hearkens to God. So it’s at least very strongly implied that a husband is the intermediary between his wife and God. So… if I make it to the Celestial Kingdom, will I have a personal relationship with God, or won’t I? At least with my husband, there is some language describing what that relationship looks like (“hearkening” – whatever that actually means). I literally have no idea what my relationship will be with God in the CK or if I even have one, yet I’m supposed to make all my decisions in this life based on the idea of getting there? I’ve got to tithe 10% on gross and wear weird bunchy underwear and I don’t even know what I’m getting in return? :wtf:

And if, before I die, the temple language is changed to be more egalitarian (hearkening becomes a two-way street) should I be comforted by that? Or should I still be concerned that it can change again, even after I die, and I still don’t really know what I am agreeing to?

[Anonymous]

On a related note, here’s a BCC post about how we don’t really have a good working definition of the word ‘preside.’ I would humbly suggest that we have the exact same problem with the word ‘hearken.’

[Anonymous]

This is awesome. :thumbup: Seriously, this is awesome.

When I think about religion in the the shower it’s usually something like, “god I want to go back to bed.”

This is how you know the church is true though, right? You see, other churches took saving ordinances and changed them over the years, so much so that they ceased to be saving ordinances. We came along and restored them back to the way they… wait a minute.

To answer your questions, 2000 years from now a lowly fruit cloner on Mars will restore Christ’s one true church. They will restore the ordinances to what they were meant to be, and you will be proxy baptized into that church. Problem solved.

I really do like your line of reasoning. It makes me feel like the best course of action is for me to write my own covenants with god and to remember that my pencil has an eraser for those moments when my perspective changes.

[Anonymous]

I just don’t get how ALL women (or almost all) are not offended or troubled by this (“hearken” or “obey”). But then again, in my TBM’ish days, it only bothered me a little bit. But I think that is more typical of a privileged group not to see the inequities as bad as those affected by it.

[Anonymous]

The short version of my rant is this: 😆

If changes to women’s covenants are retroactive, that’s problematic, and if the changes are not retroactive, that’s problematic too.

Kind of like how giving black men the PH didn’t actually eliminate teh doctrinal problems caused by the ban in the first place. Even if the endowment is changed to have more egalitarian language between husbands and wives, the same questions still apply.

[Anonymous]

Joni wrote:

It seems logical that the newer temple language supersedes the old – ie. all women are under the less harsh ‘hearkening’ covenant even if the word was ‘obey’ when they went through the temple. This makes sense. However… what does that say about our current temple covenants? The endowment can and does change, so is it possible that the current language can change, too? (One possible modification – and this absolutely is the low-hanging fruit – is to change it so that husbands and wives hearken to each other, and both hearken to God.) But… if the endowment can change in my lifetime, and for that matter can change after my death, then how do I know what I actually covenanted to? What will I actually spend eternity doing when it comes to my husband – obeying; hearkening (one-way street); hearkening (two-way street); something else altogether – and when do I find out what that is?

What about the people who covenanted to “never cease to pray” that God will avenge the blood of Joseph and Hyrum Smith? Wikipedia says a committee was appointed in 1919 to look into changing this. They worked 1921-1929 and the elimination and formal revision was done in the early 30’s. I assume it’s NOT because the committee calculated that heaven contained enough people praying eternally for vengeance and the rest of us can be tasked with other things.

Like you say, the endowment can and does change. I can’t imagine that women won’t eventually have equal standing, but when? Before I stop going? Before my girls stop going? I hope so. I’ve never actually prayed for this, though, and maybe I’ll start.

Lost love for the temple tops my list of sorrows. I still have respect for it, I think, and gratitude for all the good people in my life who love the temple. Some days, that’s the best I can do.

[Anonymous]

nibbler wrote:

This is how you know the church is true though, right? You see, other churches took saving ordinances and changed them over the years, so much so that they ceased to be saving ordinances. We came along and restored them back to the way they… wait a minute.

😆 :wtf: :silent:

Quote:

… the best course of action is for me to write my own covenants with god and to remember that my pencil has an eraser for those moments when my perspective changes.

What else, really, is there to do? In our age, the changing ceremony is cached online. Maybe the thing that was really needful was the time and place set aside and consecrated for us to do this, and we have it.

[Anonymous]

I see the church as having the most truth of all the churches and/or philosophies I have encountered. I also see that it is organized to progress towards more truth and the correcting of falsehoods. We are all products of the cultures we grew up in. We have biases of things we are not aware of. I see modern revelation as a way to become free of the these falsehoods and sins in our generation.

I believe that the LDS church is the only organization that has the permission of God to perform ordinances that are required for us to progress to be like our mother and father in heaven.

I also believe that God works through whatever channel is offered to them. That women and men of good will offer their lives in service to their neighbors in myriads of ways. God works through all of them. God will continue to nourish his people according to the strength of the roots until we are all perfected in him through Christ their son.

The temple covenants will work themselves out.

[Anonymous]

richalger wrote:

The temple covenants will work themselves out.

I agree – the endowment will eventually be a 100% reflection of the will and mind of the Lord, with no artificial flavorings or preservatives – but that doesn’t really answer my question.

Changes to the endowment covenants either are, or are not, retroactively applied to everyone who went through the temple. But as I’ve explained upthread, either one of those answers presents complication.

It’s very likely that the perfected version of the endowment won’t exist within any of our lifetimes. It probably won’t exist until the Millenium. (One wonders why we don’t just wait, and do everybody’s temple work then! ) And yet… God requires that I make covenants, and He will punish me for breaking them, knowing that the current set of rules isn’t the perfect set of rules. In fact, some of the stuff in the endowment may be downright wrong. (It’s happened before… blood oaths and the aforementioned OBEY covenant for women.) Doesn’t it seem an awful lot like God is just moving the goalposts on us?

I choose to believe that I won’t have to spend eternity obeying my husband, and that I don’t have to spend eternity hearkening to him while he doesn’t have to hearken to me. But I have no foundational basis for this belief. I am under obligation to keep the current, sexist set of rules and God reserves the right both to punish me for breaking the rules and to change the rules later on. That REALLY seems unfair and un-Godlike. Doesn’t He have better things to do with His time than just mess with our heads? :wtf:

[Anonymous]

Joni wrote:

How does God make us beholden to a set of rules that might not even be written down for another 10 or 100 or 1,000 years?

I was joking around earlier but I was trying to make a point at the same time.

For the sake of argument let’s say the temple ordinance never changed and will not change. Maybe the ordinance for baptisms for the dead has remained fairly static over the years so I’ll hop over to that ordinance. Many members have ancestors that were baptized in other churches but members feel the need to have their ancestors baptized in the temple because they were baptized in a different manner than what god has restored.

The saints believed they had found god’s true path, a more perfect way than in times past. Once the saints found that better path they desired all of their deceased family to receive those same blessings. Of course the deceased are free to employ their agency to either accept or reject the temple ordinances. This is the narrative we’ve built up around the temple.

What happens when we step into those same shoes in which we have placed our ancestors? Do we become people that are missing something that may not be “restored” to us for another 10, 100, or 1000 years? How does god make us beholden to a set of rules that might not even be written down yet? There are lots of answers (and there are no answers) so I’ll only type out two: 1) in the temple. 2) god doesn’t.

What’s the purpose of temple ordinances? In my opinion there is no one answer but maybe it’s less about promising to follow a specific rule and more about communing with god, where we obtain a clearer view of god as we build faith in an ongoing restoration. Funny that, I suppose an ongoing restoration would call for a change or two to the temple ordinances to reflect what we see as our vision clears.

Life has enough challenges, I can only respond to what’s in front of me. I think god can get behind that concept.

Mind if I add a question to the list of your initial questions (which I love). If a living sister went through the temple for her own endowment and promised to obey her husband would she have to receive her own endowment again, this time promising to hearken? Does this mean we have to redo all the work for people that has already been done?

[Anonymous]

LookingHard wrote:

I just don’t get how ALL women (or almost all) are not offended or troubled by this (“hearken” or “obey”). But then again, in my TBM’ish days, it only bothered me a little bit. But I think that is more typical of a privileged group not to see the inequities as bad as those affected by it.

Oh, it bothers me. Plenty. And always has. Women have a few key ways to deal with it: 1) they don’t notice it. That is only possible for older generations who always saw wives as subordinate to husbands anyway. 2) they hear all the things said for the men and assume they apply to both men & women which is easy since as a woman, most of the things said to men are meant for both sexes anyway. 3) they hold their nose and go anyway, assuming it will all work out in the end and the sexism isn’t from God. 4) they avoid going to the temple.

I posted on this problem here: https://bycommonconsent.com/2015/02/25/temple-prep-for-daughters-brace-yourself/

[Anonymous]

I know the marriage relationships vary considerably, but I think there are a ton of men that are suffering from being too wimpy. When I say wimpy I mean they have been trained to always defer to the wife’s preferences and feel they need to make sure they never burden their wife for anything they might want. I have read a few studies that say women are not turned on by this lack of a backbone – even if they can’t articulate it. I think through most of my marriage that was me and it for me it feels like that is what I was preached would bring the most happiness into marriage. So I kind of have to laugh at the fact how it has been 100% the opposite in my marriage.

So nobody misunderstands, I am not talking about being a domineering husband. Now like so many things, it is a balance and I do feel I was taught in a way that was not near the right balance. Maybe it was because the teachers were men a generation or two and that generation of men needed to be corrected to become more “equal” in marriage. Plus they counseled with many women that had jerks for husbands, but when men are super-meek, they generally don’t go whine to the bishop or SP. They just try and keep doing the same, but more and more of it.

I am trying to find some blog that went and compared an early 1970’s GC talk on “wives obeying husbands” and compared that to a more recent such talk. The differences were quite stark.

hawkgrrrl wrote:

I posted on this problem here: https://bycommonconsent.com/2015/02/25/ … -yourself/

Is there anything you have not already done a blog post on? :lolno:

[Anonymous]

Looking Hard: I often wonder that myself. It seems every discussion rings a bell. Weekly blog posts for 8 years will do that I guess.

[Anonymous]

I hate the wording of it and wish it was different…always have. As a man listening to it and seeing the aisles split…and everything else not equal…bugs me. Doesn’t feel godly, and distracts from the more important messages.

I think there can be attempts made by well intentioned people to try to soften it or make it sound better through some justification…but in my mind…it doesn’t work.

I focus on the symbolism, and when it doesn’t make sense, I choose to ignore it. Ignoring it is not a sufficient answer for me to tell any woman. So I hold my tongue, but do not do it happy and content. It’s problematic until changed.

All I can do is not take it literal back into my home, but choose the good things to bring back into my life. I would never ask my wife to subordinate herself. Whether she is comfortable with it or not is her journey…but I am not comfortable with it and will not bring it into my home.

Quote:

I’ve got to tithe 10% on gross and wear weird bunchy underwear and I don’t even know what I’m getting in return?

I think what I focus on is trying to have the ideal of an eternal family as the return on investment and sacrifice. If both my wife and I are committed to the eternal family, it helps me see beyond this world and the imperfections…such as the church. My faith is in a perfect loving God who makes these things right for us in the end. Such a God knows my heart, and knows where I place my faith and focus on temple wording and practices, which will change according to leaders with keys, but won’t change as I want them to be. Humility and faith will help my family be eternally together. Whatever that means.

[Anonymous]

hawkgrrrl wrote:

LookingHard wrote:

I just don’t get how ALL women (or almost all) are not offended or troubled by this (“hearken” or “obey”). But then again, in my TBM’ish days, it only bothered me a little bit. But I think that is more typical of a privileged group not to see the inequities as bad as those affected by it.

Oh, it bothers me. Plenty. And always has. Women have a few key ways to deal with it: 1) they don’t notice it. That is only possible for older generations who always saw wives as subordinate to husbands anyway. 2) they hear all the things said for the men and assume they apply to both men & women which is easy since as a woman, most of the things said to men are meant for both sexes anyway. 3) they hold their nose and go anyway, assuming it will all work out in the end and the sexism isn’t from God. 4) they avoid going to the temple.

I posted on this problem here: https://bycommonconsent.com/2015/02/25/temple-prep-for-daughters-brace-yourself/

From the comments section of the BCC post:

Quote:

“… nothing will change as long as most of the women of the church don’t have a problem with what is going on.”

It’ll be interesting to see how long it takes, and what happens in the interim.

[Author]

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