Biblical patriarchy

Biblical patriarchy, also known as Christian patriarchy, is a set of beliefs in evangelical Christianity concerning gender relations and their manifestations in institutions, including marriage, the family, and the home. It sees the father as the head of the home, responsible for the conduct of his family. Notable people associated with biblical patriarchy include Douglas Wilson,R. C. Sproul, Jr., the Duggar family, and Douglas Phillips. Notable publications include Patriarch magazine and Above Rubies. The biblical patriarchy movement has been said to be "flourishing among homeschoolers" in the United States.

The "Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy" published by Vision Forum advocates such beliefs as

Michael Farris notes three examples of patriarchal teaching: that women should not vote, that higher education is not important for women, and that "unmarried adult women are subject to their fathers’ authority."

According to Rachel Held Evans, the biblical patriarchy movement is "committed to preserving as much of the patriarchal structure of Old Testament law as possible."

Some churches connected to Biblical patriarchy practise "household voting". For example, All Saints Church in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a congregation of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, states in its church's constitution: "Those members who vote in church elections are called electors. Electors are the heads of member households (whether men or women) and those granted voting capacity by the Session."

Biblical patriarchy is similar to Complementarianism, and many of the differences are only ones of degree and emphasis. While Complementarianism holds to exclusively male leadership in the church and in the home, biblical patriarchy extends that exclusion to the civic sphere as well, so that women should not be civil leaders and indeed should not have careers outside the home. Thus, William Einwechter refers to the traditional Complementarian view as "two point complementarianism" (male leadership in the family and church), and regards the biblical patriarchy view as "three-point" or "full" complementarianism (male leadership in family, church, and society). This issue was discussed during Sarah Palin's vice presidential campaign in 2008, when some adherents of biblical patriarchy stated that Palin, as a woman, was "biblically ineligible to run for vice-president".

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