146 FEMINIST VIEWS THAT UNDERMINE SCRIPTURE
the point of Peter’s reference to Sarah is that wives in the new
covenant can learn from their spiritual ancestress... who lived in the
“dark side” of the old-covenant compromise, when she had to
“obey” her husband.... Sarah obeyed Abraham, but Christian wives,
her spiritual daughters, are never told to “obey” their husbands nei-
ther here nor anywhere else in the Bible.^2But this is just turning Peter’s words into the opposite of what he
says. Peter uses Sarah as a positive example for Christian wives to imi-
tate, but Bilezikian uses her as a negative example showing what
Christian wives are not supposed to do. Peter tells wives to act like “the
holy women who hoped in God... by submitting to their own hus-
bands” (1 Pet. 3:5), but Bilezikian says this was on the “dark side” of
the “old-covenant compromise,” implying that it should not be a pat-
tern for women today.
Peter tells wives to act like Sarah, who “obeyed Abraham” (v. 6),
but Bilezikian says that this verse does not tell wives to obey their
husbands.
We should note carefully the result of Bilezikian’s analysis of 1 Peter
3:1-7, because at several points he ends up denying what the text says
and affirming what the text does not say. Peter says that wives should
be subject to their husbands, but Bilezikian says that the motivations for
a Christian wife’s behavior should “have nothing in common with sub-
mission defined as obedience to authority.”^3 Peter does not say that hus-
bands should be subject to their wives, but Bilezikian says that husbands
should undergo a “traumatic role reversal” whereby “now it is husbands
who must show consideration for their wives and bestow honor upon
them, much like a servant to his master.”^4 Peter says that Sarah obeyed
Abraham, but Bilezikian claims that Abraham obeyed Sarah. Peter says
that wives should follow the example of Sarah, who obeyed her hus-
band, but Bilezikian says that wives are nowhere told to be obedient to
their husbands.
Bilezikian teaches just the opposite of what the Bible teaches regard-
ing Sarah and Abraham. Under the guise of saying that Peter had a
(^2) Ibid.
(^3) Ibid., 190.
(^4) Ibid., 192.