it to men and women in general. (Ibid. 175:24) The application is controversial,
and so we quote it here:
Many people believe that women can perform the duties of men if only they are
introduced into them from early age in the way that boys are. However, women can
be introduced into the exercise of these duties, but not into the judgment on which
the proper performance of these duties inwardly depends. Therefore, those women
who are introduced into the duties of men, in matters of judgment are bound to go
to men for advice; and then, from the men’s recommendations, if they are their own
mistresses, they choose what accords with their love.
The controversy centers on the exercise of judgment, and on the statement
that in matters of judgment women are bound to go to men for advice. How
many widows have not done just that? But more notable is the statement that
women can in fact be introduced into the exercise of duties typically exercised
by men, and that rather than blindly following the advice of men, they choose
from that advice what they will.
At the same time, we may advance the parallel argument that when it
comes to the exercise of duties typically regarded as the province of women,
men are bound to go to women for advice, not because they are in some way
compelled to, but because it is the wise thing to do. In the exercise of duties
typically regarded as the province of men, is it not also the wise thing to do
for women to consult men? May a woman entering the military, for example,
not expect to be trained by men? And a man entering primary education or
the nursing profession, may he not expect to be trained by women? This is not
sexism. It is common sense.
The difference between the sexes has broad ramifications for society
and the various occupations open to them. But as we observed earlier, more
than 40 years of social pressure to encourage women to enter occupations
traditionally male, and to remove any stigma to men’s entering traditionally
female occupations, have not changed the fact that there are still a number of
careers in which either one sex or the other typically predominates – in many
cases for no other reason than the exercise of personal choice.
Relation to the Church
When it comes to the sexes and the church, however, we find a unique
circumstance. And the circumstance is this:
We think of men paying court to women and imagine that they thereby
engender love in their beloveds. But the fact is that it is their beloveds who
inspire love in the men. For men on their own possess not a particle of the kind
of love found in a real marriage, nor even the kind of love that draws them to
women in the first place. Rather it is women and wives who inspire that love in
men and husbands. (Married Love 161:1,2, 223:1) It is, if you please, their gift
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