Given the recent insanity of the "Empathy is Sin" movement {The folly of the "Sin of Empathy" - A self-inflicted wound to Christian Fundamentalism}, I've looked back a bit into recent history to try to understand the pieces of the pattern that led Pastor John Piper, who is well respected even by those who disagree with him, to put his weight behind the likes of Doug Wilson, Joe Rigney, and James White in this endeavor to pulverize empathy toward abuse victims. Which is where I came across a trend that I was previously unaware of: the use of Potiphar's Wife from Joseph's story in Genesis to insinuate that some (if not most) women (and others) who claim to have been sexually abused, secretly really wanted the sexual activity that was forced upon them.
It turns out this trend is fairly widespread. In a public letter to then SBC President J.D. Greer, Russel Moore, the President of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC, an SBC entity) wrote, "You and I both heard, in closed door meetings, sexual abuse survivors spoken of in terms of 'Potiphar’s wife' and other spurious biblical analogies. The conversations in these closed door meetings were far worse than anything Southern Baptists knew—or the outside world could report." In some circles, evidently, it is routine behind closed doors to treat the entire MeToo movement, and even the larger Clergy Sex Abuse scandal, as a nefarious plot. It should be little wonder then, if this is how those entrusted to lead portions of the Church are acting privately, that Rachael Denhollander was treated shamefully in public by many of these same people.
The use of Potiphar's Wife to defend those in power accused of sexual misconduct is both despicable, in that someone would use the Word of God for such an immoral purpose, and exegetically a very poor interpretation of the text itself. The balance of power in Joseph's story is the exact opposite of that when adult, males, in positions of power/authority, abuse others. Joseph has no power, he's a slave. The story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife is a cautionary tale on behalf of the powerless in society, not a defense of abusers. This analysis further examines the text: The Real Sin of Potiphar’s Wife:
The story of Potiphar’s wife and Joseph isn’t the story of an ordinary woman falsely accusing a man of assault and not suffering the consequences; it’s the story of a powerful person using her power to exploit someone weaker, and then bearing false witness against them to cause them to suffer even further in the midst of their vulnerability.
But most importantly, it’s the story of the good news that there is no human power so great that it can ultimately thwart the purposes of an all-powerful and all-loving God.
Another capable explanation of what the story of Potiphar's wife is actually teaching: STOP USING POTIPHAR'S WIFE TO DISCREDIT SURVIVORS BY JUSTIN COBER-LAKE
To be clear, it is true that Potiphar's wife made a false allegation. No one denies that false accusations happen but using this story to somehow discredit all women coming forward devalues holy text, turning it into a political bludgeon rather than a liberating truth. Doing so is a political error leading to dangerous eisegesis; the text isn't about the reliability of women, victims, or witnesses. Making that issue central misses the larger point of Joseph's story and the redeeming work of God.
That's not to say we can't apply the story to current events. What we primarily see is a person in power using that position to try to gain sexual access to a subordinate.
The Bible repeatedly speaks to this sort of abuse of power. The structural forces that landed Joseph in prison are largely the same forces that prevent modern assault victims from having a voice. Power oppresses individuals in multiple ways, and one of the most immediate is through enforcing silence. We have no knowledge of Joseph's response because he was likely allowed none.
I am reminded of the classic trope from The Princess Bride, revolving around the word Inconceivable. So it is here with the misuse of the story of Potiphar's wife, it doesn't mean what they think it means.
It isn't surprising that those who would attack victims to defend abusers would also twist the Word of God to that unholy purpose, but it is dangerous. In an attempt at satire, Pastor Doug Wilson in 2017 reimagined Potiphar's wife as a modern-day feminist, eager to destroy men: Potiphar’s Wife, Survivor
Then that fateful afternoon came when he tried to rape me. Yes, I am no longer afraid to use the word rape. If he been a little more patient, if he had groomed me for just another month, I might not have cried out. I had been almost completely absorbed into the rape culture that Joseph truly embodied. I was truly in a vulnerable place, which my therapist has really helped me to finally grasp. I still am in a vulnerable place, in so many ways. My therapist is so kind and gentle . . . not at all like Potiphar. He truly listens to me. He actually believes me when I dare to share my innermost thoughts. I am almost to the point where I can tell him what would really satisfy me.
What is the point of this sexually suggestive nonsense? Pastor Wilson uses the Word of God to suggest that (1) mental health professionals are part of the problem, (2) downplay real dangers from sexual abusers like grooming their victims, and (3) hint without much subtlety at the end that 'women really do want it'. This is, very much, a dark place, and one that fits fairly seamlessly with the more recent call to abandon empathy lest we identify with those claim to have been abused.
Dig further, and you find that Pastor Wilson views marital sex in terms of rape, in fact he believes that this is the God-ordained dynamic, as he wrote the following:
A final aspect of rape that should be briefly mentioned is perhaps closer to home. Because we have forgotten the biblical concepts of true authority and submission, or more accurately, have rebelled against them, we have created a climate in which caricatures of authority and submission intrude upon our lives with violence. When we quarrel with the way the world is, we find that the world has ways of getting back at us.
In other words, however we try, the sexual act cannot be made into an egalitarian pleasuring party. A man penetrates, conquers, colonizes, plants. A woman receives, surrenders, accepts. This is of course offensive to all egalitarians, and so our culture has rebelled against the concept of authority and submission in marriage. This means that we have sought to suppress the concepts of authority and submission as they relate to the marriage bed. -Douglas Wilson, Fidelity: What it Means to be a One-Woman Man (Moscow, Idaho: Canon Press, 1999), 86-87. - emphasis mine.
I don't have the proper words for how disgusting this attitude is, and how unbiblical. This is not two halves united as a whole, not a man treating his wife's body as his own for her betterment. Here is a similar response to the above quote from Rachel Held Evans: The Gospel Coalition, sex, and subordination
There is so much about this passage that I, as a woman, find inaccurate, degrading, and harmful that it’s hard to know where to begin. That Wilson blames egaliatarianism for the presence of rape and sexual violence in the world is ludicrous and unsubstantiated. His characterization of sex as an act of conquering and colonization is disturbing, and his notion that women are little more than the passive recipients of this colonization, who simply “accept” penetration, is as ignorant as it is degrading.
In addition, the Apostle Paul flat-out condemns marital sex that is one-sided in a passage full of mutual submission:
1 Corinthians 7:3-5 New International Version
3 The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 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. 5 Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.
Lastly, here is a examination of Wilson's view of marital sex from a fellow Complementarian, who also utilizes 1 Corinthians 7 to demonstrate how dangerous this viewpoint is: Does Doug Wilson endorse marital rape?
Pastor Doug Wilson is a central figure in the charge to abandon empathy (because it is helping the Libs). Even without the theological refutations of that argument, which are many, looking further at the overall worldview of the source is damning.
