"The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality."
What 1 Corinthians 7 REALLY says about sex in marriage
Have you heard a sermon on 1 Corinthians 7 before? Often this passage is used incorrectly to demand “duty sex” from wives (or even to support marital rape). But actually, Paul was taking a surprisingly feminist perspective in a time when women were literally considered property.
Today we will celebrate the value of mutuality and see what 1 Corinthians really says about sex in marriage. We’ll also cover some common problems in sex caused by purity culture that lead to inequality, and ways to pursue mutuality instead.
This follows the theme of our book club on The Marriage You Want by Sheila Wray Gregoire and Dr. Keith Gregoire. If you want to join us, here is this month’s schedule for our reading and Substack content:
April 4: Mutuality in sex
April 11: Book club on Affection: Chapters 3 & 4 (paid)
April 25: Book club on Responsibility: Chapters 5 & 6 (paid)
To join our book club and receive this month’s exclusive content, be sure to upgrade your subscription! It’s just $5 per month of $50 for the year, and includes access to all the current and past paid content plus a live book club meeting in May!
Mutuality in 1 Corinthians 7
Take a look at the NIV version of 1 Corinthians 7:3-4:
The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife.
This passage seems to suggest that the wife (and husband) literally have a duty to each other. It also seems to eradicate the concept of consent, for when we “[do] not have authority over [our] own body” but “yield it” to our spouse, what need do we have for consent?
Instead, look at The Message translation of this passage:
The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to “stand up for your rights.” Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out.
So while the NIV or ESV translations have been used incorrectly to erase consent, demand duty sex, or even support marital rape, Paul was taking a surprisingly feminist perspective in a time when women were literally considered property.
In The Marriage You Want, Sheila and Keith Gregoire explain that this passage…
“doesn’t describe one spouse unilaterally fiving to the other but both experiencing the exact same gift from each other. It is not saying not to deprive each other of one-sided intercourse. It is saying do not deprive each other of the fullness of what God intended sex to be in marriage.”
The Problem of Inequality
Purity culture, particularly the Gatekeepers Myth, weaves an intricate web of inequality that keeps us from reaching the mutuality I believe God wants us to enjoy in marriage.
From my book, Recovering from Purity Culture, here are some of the ways that inequality shows up:
Obligation: In The Great Sex Rescue, the authors found that the “obligation sex message” was correlated with increased rates of vaginismus, lower orgasm rates, and lower marital satisfaction.
Lack of consent: Boundaries and consent are important before and after marriage. Women (and men) have to be able to give consent and say no. And with that, they have to experience saying no as safe. As Gregoire says, “Without the ability to say no, we can never truly say yes.”1
Desire and pleasure: Purity culture sets up arbitrary gender rules about desire and often ignores the typical way women experience desire and pleasure, prioritizing what is typical for men.
Narrow definition of intimacy: Purity culture often teaches that sex is a biological “need” for men and the primary, if not only, way they feel loved. This can lead to obligation for women, entitlement for men, and both partners discounting other forms of intimacy.
Celebrating Mutuality
This is what I say about mutuality in my book, Recovering from Purity Culture:
In a Christian marriage, we are supposed to treat each other’s bodies as our own. Her feelings matter. So do his. Her body is shared with her husband. His body is shared with her as well. There is no double standard; both sexes are given exactly the same command.
Great sex requires a balance—a dialectic, if you will—of selflessness and selfishness. It is selfless in that we consider our spouse’s comfort, needs, and feelings above our own. This occasionally means prioritizing our spouse’s desires or pleasure in sex (but never in a way that demeans, disrespects, or objectifies our personhood). It is selfish in that we take personal responsibility for our own bodies, sexuality, and experience, and we assertively communicate those with our spouse and advocate for our own pleasure. In my sex therapy practice, I want my clients to move from sex as “give and take” to sex as “sharing.” You’re not giving her an orgasm; he’s not taking from your body. You are sharing an experience—sharing pleasure, time, and your bodies together. It is mutual.
You can find more on inequality in Chapter 6 of my book, and mutuality in Chapter 11.
I hope this opened your eyes to the beauty of mutuality in sex and gives you some starting points for practicing that in your marriage!
Which aspect of inequality affects you and your marriage the most? How does The Message translation of that verse change the meaning for you?
See you next week as we cover The Marriage You Want, Chapters 3 & 4 on friendship and passion!
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Warmly, Dr. Camden
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Gregoire, Lindenbach, and Sawatsky, The Great Sex Rescue, 161.
I feel like the content of this article aligns with my op-ed from this morning well enough that it may be worth sharing here. I hope you agree:
https://thequillandmusket.substack.com/p/marriage-a-partnership-not-a-prison?r=4xypjp
Gosh this is needed, thank you friend! Sharing with my girls. My marriage has the need for mutuality and allowance for either of us to say no thank you to sex and any given day. If things become negatively patterned, we know we can explore without animosity.