Deuteronomy 22:5
This is not prohibiting that men and women could
not wear clothes that had the same form such as shirt and a blouse and
is not prohibiting women from wearing pants, but rather this is a
forbidding of cross dressing or transvestitism. They were practicing
transvestitism and worshiping false gods, which is still an abomination
unto God.
Some also say the scripture may also be forbidding the
confounding of the dispositions and affairs of the sexes: men must not
be effeminate, not doing the women's work in the house, just as a women
should not be a strong manlike woman which would take us actually to the
woman usurping authority, 1 Tim. 2:11-12.
So, making
application for today……it would be sort of like, the man should be the
one "wearing the pants" in the family. (excuse the pun) hahahahaha! Only
I’m not talking literally, but it is speaking of the roles of the man
and woman, the dispositions and affairs of the sexes.
It’s kind
of like the very principle taught in I Cor 11. Teaching the principle of submission.
So
again, we must preserve the principle that women should look like women
and men look like men but the way in which this is, so varies from
culture to culture. If you are going to hold to the days of the Bible,
then we should all be wearing robes.
Cultures change and it is not wrong to dress in what is acceptable for
the culture you live in, providing it doesn’t break the Biblical
injunction of modesty.
Some state that women wearing pants
do not look feminine but what is funny is those who believe that pants
on a woman is not modest or feminine, usually have no problem in
prohibiting a man from growing a beard although it could be argued that
this subtracts from his masculinity. God intended for a beard to be an
obvious sex distinction but the Neo-Pharisee conveniently ignores these
facts when they don’t fit in with his set of standards.
Let me share
some points:
1. It is a fact that the word for "man" in this
scripture -- "geber" -- and what it means is not the word most generally
used in Scripture. Try and explain it away if you will but that is the
fact. You can't change that fact no matter how hard you try.
2.
It's a fact that "pertaineth" here is not talking about what we normally
associate with the word OR the normal usage of the word.
3. You
cannot take one scripture by itself with no supporting scriptures and
make a doctrine out of it. Other scripture MUST bear witness. There is
none in regards to Deut. 22:5
4. Jesus never addressed the issue
of outward adornment when He was teaching, preaching and evangelizing.
He covered a multitude of subjects but He apparently felt that what a
person wore was of little importance because He gave it no importance or
emphasis.
5. Why is it that many of those who preach and teach
that it's a sin for a woman to wear a pair of pants have
no problem with them being worn in the home and/or to bed? Very
inconsistent if you ask me. If the "pants" (men's apparel) -- long or
short -- themselves are an abomination to God - wouldn't He be
displeased no matter where they are worn? It makes sense to me.
6.
Pants do NOT make a woman look like a man. A woman - in 98% of the
cases - is very easily identified as a woman! It's very difficult in
most cases to get the two genders mixed up for very obvious reasons and
we all know what I'm talking about here. -- namely breasts, hips and
hairstyles.
7. Pants do NOT change women into men or make them
more masculine. Women may have the freedom to sit differently than if
they had skirts on, but that has nothing to do with nothing (excuse the
grammar )really and certainly does NOT masculate a woman.
8.
When men and women both wore robes, did that cause the men to act more
effeminate? I don't think so! It makes sense then that the opposite
would apply in
regards to pants on women.
9. Pants have nothing to do with
masculine/feminine mannerisms! What about men who wear pants but act
VERY effeminate and even cross their legs like a lady normally does?
I've seen many of them sitting like a woman on church platforms.
10.
A friend of mine had the privilege of visiting countries where men wear
robes and sarongs. She said that wearing a robe or a sarong does not
make those men effeminate any more than a woman wearing a pair of pants
makes them masculine.
11. Pants have nothing to do with
holiness, righteousness, salvation, spirituality or anointing. Neither
do they have anything to do with issues of femininity, gender
distinction, masculinity, rebellion, disobedience or submission to
authority. You can be "masculine", disobedient, unsubmissive, and rebellious in a skirt!
12. As to the "modesty" factor...if pants are immodest on a woman, they are just as immodest on a man. More so in fact,
because men have more to show in that area of the anatomy than a woman does.
You
never read in the Bible where God made a skirt for Eve and pants for
Adam. The fact is there was not a whole lot of difference in the dress
forms of men and women in Bible days. The women actually wore tunics and
cloaks like the men. They were just different in detail, not kind.
Today, the details of women’s pants are distinguishable from men’s
pants, therefore, our culture does not say women are wearing men’s
apparel when they put on a pair of women’s pants.
Here we pretty
much just have inconsistency that is obvious with regard to picking one
verse out of the whole Bible and misapplying it and creating an
unnecessary yoke. Unfortunately, the narrow and one tracked
interpretation of this verse has not brought forth good fruit but rather
it has brought judging, discord and a Pharisee spirit to many homes and
churches. If a woman has a personal conviction against wearing pants,
then we should respect her for that, but in rightly dividing this
Scripture we would say a woman should make her decision as to what to
wear as a woman and not on a basis of a "hairsplitting" inflexible law.
No comments:
Post a Comment