By Ehud Would

So someone has dredged Gary North’s broken hayfork out of the stablemire in hopes of selling it to random passersby. And clutching the fractured instrument in soiled hands, brother J.B. Aitken leans into his ballyhoo, assuring us “Baptised Patriarchalism” is a service ready refutation of Rushdoony’s Familism.

Well, now.

For the sake of economy, I’ll only address Mr. Aitken’s points rather than the whole scope of North’s book.

Firstly, there’s the matter of the title. Baptised Patriarchalism suggests that Patriarchy — father rule — is innately malevolent somehow and that any validity or solemnity imputed to it in Christian thought is merely pretext to arbitrary tyranny. Impugning Patriarchy in this way can only make sense inside the assumption that male headship is categorically illicit. But such an assumption is at loggerheads with Federal Theology, the Fatherhood of God (which is to say, Trinitarianism), and the whole of special revelation. Because God’s Word was spoken chiefly to, and entirely through, male figureheads — fathers over family, church, and state. Christ’s election of only men to the office of apostle is not inscrutable. For it accords with the pastoral epistles which specify eldership as appropriate to fathers alone, and only those who rule their houses well. read more