A dishonest response

[Norm]

Last evening in the debate, Huckabee received a question concerning the submission of a wife to her husband. He answered that marriage is a 100-100% partnership and that his wife was her own person in a relationhip with him. He touted the passage was about mutual submission of wife to husband and husband to wife. The evangelical base in attandance loved it, likely partly because it was a "repudiation" of those who wished to exploit one of his religious beliefs. Do they not realize that Huckabee betrayed his fundamentalist, evangelical supporters, thus, themselves?

The delivery was masterful. People were moved by the rhythms of his manifested thoughts.

It was, however, not about what he voted for.

An informed moderator would have asked a follow-up question.

Moderates pushed for a mutual submission statement, instead, but were defeated by fundamentalists that insisted on the submission of the wife in the marriage relationship.

He also decried that he was receiving a religious question.

Has he not made religion/theology a part of his campaign and touted such knowledge as one of his strengths and qualifications?

[Norm]

Last evening in the debate, Huckabee received a question concerning the submission of a wife to her husband. He answered that marriage is a 100-100% partnership and that his wife was her own person in a relationhip with him. He touted the passage was about mutual submission of wife to husband and husband to wife. The evangelical base in attandance loved it, likely partly because it was a "repudiation" of those who wished to exploit one of his religious beliefs. Do they not realize that Huckabee betrayed his fundamentalist, evangelical supporters, thus, themselves?

The delivery was masterful. People were moved by the rhythms of his manifested thoughts.

It was, however, not about what he voted for.

An informed moderator would have asked a follow-up question.

Moderates pushed for a mutual submission statement, instead, but were defeated by fundamentalists that insisted on the submission of the wife in the marriage relationship.

He also decried that he was receiving a religious question.

Has he not made religion/theology a part of his campaign and touted such knowledge as one of his strengths and qualifications?

[Prentice Fox]

Norm, you quote yourself quite well here! BUT, you must remember, that what you witnessed last night was a "meeting" in South Carolina (with an emphasis on the SOUTH!!); and that fact puts the whole statement in a contextual setting. As for me, I find NO fault in "Huck's" response. He will be tried and tempted and "set up", and "word-trapped", and ridiculed, many more times in the coming months; But I believe he is an honest and articulate man, and He Can Play That Guitar!!---- Both Blue Grass and Gospel. Prentice.

[Norm]

... BUT, you must remember, that what you witnessed last night was a "meeting" in South Carolina (with an emphasis on the SOUTH!!); and that fact puts the whole statement in a contextual setting.

He believes one thing in Arkansas and another in South Carolina?

[Prentice Fox]

Could you be more specific, Norm? What is it that he proclaims in one state and denounces in the other state? Could it possible be a matter of greater emphasis on a subject when "conditioned" by the immediate situation? Is there a preacher, alive or dead, who has not contradicted himself at some time? I'm hoping you do not claim personal infallibility here, Norm? And is this why you are faulting Mike Huckabee? Even Hillary displayed her "Humanity" the other day at her emotional interview. The reporters almost made it sound like an incarnation when "Hillary displayed Her Humanity." ---Prentice

[Norm]

Could you be more specific, Norm?

What don't you understand?

[Prentice Fox]

Norm, you remind me of my local Rabbi. He always answers a question with another question!!! Just like in "Fiddler on the Roof." Let us retain our separate but important evaluations of "Huck." --Prentice

[William Thornton]

Well, that's what Bruce Prescott said about it as well.

In fact, he said Huck "lies" but then, he admits that he didn't watch it. Did you watch it?

Reading both you and Prescott, it is unclear how Huckabee has endorsed the BFM. You say

It was, however, not about what he voted for.

"He" = Huckabee?

What do you mean by that?

[ET]

I think the "submission" question is the same as that old classic one asked of evangelicals in interviews by lefties: "Do you believe that a Jew that doesn't believe in Jesus as the Messiah will go to hell?"

It is not a questions asked out of anything but a desire to make the person asked look bad.

Huckster should have answered, "Look at the instructions as to how the husband is to treat his wife and get back to me later." The admonitions to the husband are far more detailed.

From one of the links provided:

(Eph. 5:22). Compounding these misunderstandings is their insistence on viewing the metaphor “head” (Eph. 5:23) as an image of a proud and powerful “military ruler” rather than as an image of a self-sacrificing and humble “suffering servant” who voluntarily sets aside power and glory and gives his life for his family (Philippians 2:3-8).

Adrian Rogers, whom I'm sure would be regarded as part of that "Patterson-Pressler coalition" was my pastor for 25 years. In those 25 years, I heard him preach numerous sermons on marriage and the family, from when I was in high school until I had been married for 15 years. I NEVER heard him preach ANYTHING that could even remotely be construed as giving the husband any kind of role like a military ruler. It was ALWAYS a matter of "Wifes, your are to submit to your husband's leadership. Husbands, you are to love your wife as Christ loved the Church."

I can't speak for what others have said regarding this matter, but I know in my 25+ years in conservative SBC churches I have never heard anything that would fit the description in the quote above regarding an "insistence on" the role of husband as a "military ruler".

I say those framing the matter as one of dictator or military ruler are either misinformed, willfully dishonest or just plain liars.

[Big Daddy Weaver]

I have the transcript on my blogand a few thoughts.

1. Huck was asked to defend his 1998 USA Today endorsement of the Family Statement
2. Huck responded by embracing a clearly egalitarian, Ephesians 5:21 view of mutual submission. As virtually every critic back in 1998 noted, the Family Statement neglects Ephesians 5:21.
3. Everyone from Mary Mohler to Dorothy Patterson to Antony Jordan of the drafting committee rejected "mutual submission." One commenter named T. Leuze at my blog recalled that during the debate about the 1998 statement, a moderate Georgia Baptist pastor moved to add Ephesians 5:21 which speaks of mutual submission to the statement. Adrian Rogers spoke against the motion and said that inclusion of that verse would "turn the statement on its head."


If Huck sounds more like an egalitarian than a complimentarian with his "mutual submission" talk - why did he sign the USA Today ad back in 1998? Has his theology changed? Or does he realize that talk of patriarchy doesn't sell well even among Republicans in the Dirty South?

Nonetheless, Huckabee's response completely misrepresented what the Southern Baptist Convention intended for that Family Statement to mean and what the leadership believes it to mean.

[Ed Pettibone]

I have the transcript on my blogand a few thoughts.

1. Huck was asked to defend his 1998 USA Today endorsement of the Family Statement
2. Huck responded by embracing a clearly egalitarian, Ephesians 5:21 view of mutual submission. As virtually every critic back in 1998 noted, the Family Statement neglects Ephesians 5:21.
3. Everyone from Mary Mohler to Dorothy Patterson to Antony Jordan of the drafting committee rejected "mutual submission." One commenter named T. Leuze at my blog recalled that during the debate about the 1998 statement, a moderate Georgia Baptist pastor moved to add Ephesians 5:21 which speaks of mutual submission to the statement. Adrian Rogers spoke against the motion and said that inclusion of that verse would "turn the statement on its head."


If Huck sounds more like an egalitarian than a complementarian with his "mutual submission" talk - why did he sign the USA Today ad back in 1998? Has his theology changed? Or does he realize that talk of patriarchy doesn't sell well even among Republicans in the Dirty South?

Nonetheless, Huckabee's response completely misrepresented what the Southern Baptist Convention intended for that Family Statement to mean and what the leadership believes it to mean.

Ed: Aaron lets bring the Transcript over here. it is current news and therefore fair game for posting here.

CAMERON: Governor Huckabee, to change the subject a little bit and focus a moment on electability. Back in 1998, you were one of about 100 people who affirmed, in a full-page ad in the "New York Times," the Southern Baptist Convention's declaration that, quote, "A wife us to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband." Women voters in both parties harshly criticized that. Is that position politically viable in the general election of 2008, sir?

HUCKABEE: You know, it's interesting, everybody says religion is off limits, except we always can ask me the religious questions. So let me try to do my best to answer it. (APPLAUSE) And since -- if we're really going to have a religious service, I'd really feel more comfortable if I could pass the plates, because our campaign could use the money tonight, Carl.

First of all, if anybody knows my wife, I don't think they for one minute think that she's going to just sit by and let me do whatever I want to. That would be an absolute total misunderstanding of Janet Huckabee. The whole context of that passage -- and, by the way, it really was spoken to believers, to Christian believers. I'm not the least bit ashamed of my faith or the doctrines of it. I don't try to impose that as a governor and I wouldn't impose it as a president. But I certainly am going to practice it unashamedly, whether I'm a president or whether I'm not a president. But the point...... the point, and it comes from a passage of scripture in the New Testament Book of Ephesians is that as wives submit themselves to the husbands, the husbands also submit themselves, and it's not a matter of one being somehow superior over the other. It's both mutually showing their affection and submission as unto the Lord.

So with all due respect, it has nothing to do with presidency. I just wanted to clear up that little doctrinal quirk there so that there's nobody who misunderstands that it's really about doing what a marriage ought to do and that's marriage is not a 50/50 deal, where each partner gives 50 percent. Biblically, marriage is 100/100 deal. Each partner gives 100 percent of their devotion to the other and that's why marriage is an important institution, because it teaches us how to love. (APPLAUSE)

Unlike your self and my friend Bruce Prescott I believe it is entirely possible that Huckabee holds and has always (even in 9-) held to Ephesians 5:21 meaning of Mutual submission of marriage partners and given the fill content of the Add where his signature appears, interpreted it to have the same meaning. Do you or Prescott have evidence that Mike Huckabee and his wife have not practiced such mutual submission? And where in his recent statement repeated here do you either of you find him purporting to speak for the SBC? Despite the SBC's covert methodology where in they have forced convention employees to sign the 2000 BF&M not the 98, no Southern Baptist can legitimately be assumed to follow the patriarchal model of their Ex board. And please keep in mind that I have not said who I am supporting, the fact is I am not positive. I doubt seriously that I will publicly state my preference until during the time the vote are being counted in November. As some drop out of the race I may comment on my feeling about them. Such as Richardson was never on either my short or long list.

[Stephen Fox]

Is Norm and Bruce Gourley to do their Homework on Garry Wills and get the larger picture here.
Don't get me wrong fellows, I'm on your side.

I would have the hubris to suggests it will take a secular reporter to get the story right and give it traction; for the whole world of Land and Rove is the subject at Hand.
Newsweek's Fineman's almost gets it right in his online column today where he concludes:

Privately, however, what worries the insiders is that Blue and Purple America will run shrieking from a fellow—no matter how media-savvy and just-plain-folks he seems to be—who does not believe in the science of evolution but who does believe that the Bible is pretty close to literally true.

And to them I say, let us turn to Paul's Letter to the Galatians, chapter six, verse seven, in which he writes: "For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." For the fact is, Huckabee's candidacy is nothing more or less than the logical result of the GOP's 30-year-long crusade to turn evangelical Christians into the shock troops of the party. After Jimmy Carter first lured some of them into the trenches in 1976—and won much of the South in the process—Republicans, under a Tennessean named Bill Brock, made this the core of their strategy, and figures such as the late Lee Atwater, Karl Rove and George W. Bush pursued it. The full fruit of their labors materialized in 2004. Twenty-seven million evangelicals voted by a four-to-one margin to re-elect the president; they formed more than a third of his total vote.

If they are that crucial to the GOP coalition, it only makes sense for them to want to eliminate the middlemen. Why rely on laypeople such as Bush when you can have the real thing? And that would seem to be Huckabee, if he is still willing to admit it.

© 2008 Newsweek, Inc.

But Huckabee stood up to Pressler and Land and Adrian Rogers and Ronnie Floyd in 88. We have to give David Montoya credit for getting that part of the story right.
And Huckabee has got the likes of Randy Brinson to nuance his campaign.
Huckabee I still believe is good for this cycles discussion because he has gotten to the Class differential; his economic populism intent is good. John Green picks up on that as I point out in the Huckabee at Furman thread.
And NY times DAvid Brooks pick up on that as well and that is a good thing.

But to park on BFM 2000--which as you know on any other occasion I would be glad to do--is to miss a larger point.
I am groping to make the point at my blog and elsewhere. Would be a great time to bring the Memphis Declaration SBC Reformers to this point; to see what Harry Dent's daughter Ginny Brant and Adrian Rogers son could bring to this discussion.
But again it is fun here, but meaningless elsewhere if not informed by Garry Wills.

Finally I leave you with my last response to Prentice in the Furman thread:

Prentice misses the point
by Stephen Fox on Fri Jan 11, 2008 3:55 pm

The strength of the Green Quote does not emphasize values as much as it speaks to class resentments and mistreatment the so called "values voters" have been played by Land and Rove the last 8 years.
Problem is Land and Rove have messed the semantics up for political advantage, taking their cue from a Lee Atwater memo as far back as 84.
Values as politically applied by Rove and Land are in reality dogma; and Frank Page, decent a man as he otherwise most likely is; apparently has neither the time nor the impication to take a good look at Garry Wills to get the strength of this point.
It is a significant point; one that David Gushee understands, and I have to believe Mark Olson and Daniel Carro of the Leland Center understand as well.
Huckabee is to be given credit for at least recognizing the ballpark this game should be played in; class differentials within the GOP. And I agree with Mark Shields of the GOP NewsHour, Huck did a masterful job conflating the idea of change as it effects economic disparities in the New Hampshire Debate.
Again, SC is a great place to talk about Land and Page and SBC and GOP when it comes to a virtuous discussion of class within the GOP and how Land has let the country club Republicans play SBC fundamentalists for fools the last 8 years to keep the tax breaks going toward the Upper Income.
That is where this discussion should park; not on the misnomered "values" discussion as you have, Prentice.

[Stephen Fox]

From the AP report you can click on at the Baps Today links:

Among the state's 700,000 Southern Baptists, support for Huckabee is mixed, but many now view him as an electable candidate who shares their evangelical values, said Southern Baptist Convention President Frank Page, a pastor in Taylors, S.C. "Baptists are pragmatists who support those who they believe to be electable and consistent with pro-family policies," Page said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

Some evangelicals are wary of Huckabee, believing he is too liberal on issues such as poverty, health care and the environment. Page, while not endorsing anyone, dismissed those criticisms, calling Huckabee a "caring, genuine, humble person."

[Big Daddy Weaver]

Ed: "Do you or Prescott have evidence that Mike Huckabee and his wife have not practiced such mutual submission?"

No. Nor do I care. The Huckabee's personal relationship is none of my business. I haven't made that an issue.

I have however pointed out that his signature on the USA Today ad is completely at odds with what he said at the South Carolina debate last night.

Ed: "And where in his recent statement repeated here do you either of you find him purporting to speak for the SBC?"

Ed, Huckabee was asked to explain his endorsement of the Family Statement (1998 revision) which called on women to "graciously submit." Huck then took that opportunity to explain that the issue of wives submitting was about "mutual submission." Thus, he was explaining what the Family Statement which he endorsed really meant. Huck buttresses his argument by alluding to Ephesians 5:21.

By doing so, he clearly misrepresented what the SBC intended for that Family Statement to mean and what the leadership believes it to mean.

Are you suggesting that the Family Statement is indeed a statement of mutual submission? If that's the case, why did so many missionaries and professors refuse to sign the BFM2000 on the grounds that the Family Statement subjugated women?

It's inconsistent to walk and talk like a complimentarian in 1998 and then sound like an egalitarian in 2008. And he's made no indication that his theology has changed.

[Big Daddy Weaver]

Baptist Press has written up an article on this issue with their own spin.

The pertinent bit from the Huckabee transcript is below:

the point, and it comes from a passage of scripture in the New Testament Book of Ephesians is that as wives submit themselves to the husbands, the husbands also submit themselves, and it's not a matter of one being somehow superior over the other. It's both mutually showing their affection and submission as unto the Lord.....Biblically, marriage is 100/100 deal. Each partner gives 100 percent of their devotion to the other and that's why marriage is an important institution, because it teaches us how to love. (APPLAUSE)

Now from Baptist Press:

Huckabee then explained his belief about the issue.

"The point, and it comes from a passage of Scripture in the New Testament Book of Ephesians, is that as wives submit themselves to the husbands, the husbands also submit themselves," he said, presumably meaning "to Christ."

The portion in red is the words of Baptist Press including TO CHRIST which is in parenthesis. Based on the Huckabee transcript above, I and many others have interpreted him to mean that wives and husbands should submit to one another in marriage out of reverence to Christ (Ephesians 5:21).

Baptist Press seems to acknowledge that such mutual submission is not what the Family Statement is calling for - that's why they write add the phrase "presumably meaning to Christ" at the end of the Huckabee quotation. They spin his remarks to presume that Huckabee means that the wife submits herself to the husband and the husband submits himself to Christ instead of both husband and wife submitting themselves to one another out of reverence for Christ per Ephesians 5:21.

[Mark]

It's inconsistent to walk and talk like a complimentarian in 1998 and then sound like an egalitarian in 2008. And he's made no indication that his theology has changed...

Exactly. Good stuff, BDiddy.

To everyone else:

-Yes, I saw the debate last night.

-No, this issue as raised by Norm is NOT nitpicking. It's huge. Could anyone have ever predicted that Baptist Faith & Message 2000 would someday make its way into a presidential debate? I loved it. I'm glad they called Huckabee on it.

-Yes, I mostly like Huckabee. What he said last night was probably closer to his actual position, both then and now. Sure, he's an opportunist, but as Fox (Stephen, not the network) said, he's really not a hardline Fundamentalist - which is why Judge Pressler, Rush Limbaugh, et. al., distrust and don't like him. When Huckabee signed the full-page ad in USAToday back in 1998, he was either pandering to the religious right, or didn't fully know what he was endorsing.

-No, in the debate last night Huckabee did not describe the same thing as what he signed in 1998.

-Yes, both in 1998 and 2000, dozens of secular and religious columnists alike protested the SBC's exclusion of the "mutual submission" verse - as they should have. I still have the clippings.

-No, Huckabee was not being picked on last night because of his religion. He was the only person standing up there in the debate who had ever endorsed such a statement. A Republican candidate's view of, and relationship to, the religious right is a legitimate campaign issue.

[Jonathan]

I lean toward's Norm's opinion that Huckabee might have been dishonest or maybe just misinformed (politicians live lives of vision and info skimming, leaving most of the deep ponderous stuff to subordinates).

The arguments from folks who suggest that the 5:21 "mutual submission" trumps the later directives to wives to submit themselves to their husbands miss the context of Paul's entire discussion. Marriage is described by pointing to the relationship between Christ (groom) and church (bride). To suggest that 5:21's mutual submission is that husbands and wives are to submit to each other with the husband not being the leader of the two is to suggest that Christ and the church are to submit to one another with neither being the clear leader.

The theology aside, my guess is that Huckabee, like many before him, had political office in mind long, long ago and has continually done what is expedient to further that goal. Ask him if he is a conservative SBCer, he'll say "yes". Ask him if he is o.k. with the BFM2K, he'll say, "yes". Ask him a detailed question and he'll tap dance.

Nothing new.

-Yes, I mostly like Huckabee. What he said last night was probably closer to his actual position, both then and now. He's an opportunist, sure; but as Fox (Stephen, not the network) said, he's really not a hardline Fundamentalist, which is why Judge Pressler, Rush Limbaugh, et. al. distrust and don't like him. When Huckabee signed the full-page ad in USAToday back in 1998, he was either pandering to the religious right, or didn't fully know what he was endorsing.

I can't speak to Pressler's concerns with Huckabee (haven't read it) but as for conservatives like Limbaugh, Will, and the like, fundamentalism has nothing to do with their disdain. Quite simply, Huckabee does not have the record of a Goldwater/Reagan/Gingrich type of conservative. Sure, on one or more issues, he talks like a conservative but the composite of his walk betrays him. For the same reason (but to a lesser degree because of things like tax cuts and judicial appointments), these commentators have had a problem with GWB.

[Mark]

The arguments from folks who suggest that the 5:21 "mutual submission" trumps the later directives to wives to submit themselves to their husbands miss the context of Paul's entire discussion. Marriage is described by pointing to the relationship between Christ (groom) and church (bride). To suggest that 5:21's mutual submission is that husbands and wives are to submit to each other with the husband not being the leader of the two is to suggest that Christ and the church are to submit to one another with neither being the clear leader...

That's reading too much into what critics of BF&M2K have said. Their concern relates to why a denomination already widely perceived as anti-women would promote a new "family" document that emphasizes Ephesians 5:22 (female submission), yet omits Ephesians 5:21 (mutual submission). How could any outside observer NOT suspect the SBC of having an agenda of gender discrimination?

I can't speak to Pressler's concerns with Huckabee (haven't read it) but as for conservatives like Limbaugh, Will, and the like, fundamentalism has nothing to do with their disdain...

That's partially true, but the major secular and religious issues important to social conservatives (many of which I'm sympathetic toward) frequently overlap. Phyllis Schlafly, who certainly runs in both circles, says that Huckabee "betrayed the conservative movement in Arkansas and left it in shambles."

[Bill]

That Huckabee would personally support Eph. 5:21 and also personally support Eph. 5:22 is not problematic for most Christians. We would lean to think he supported the Bible and what it says, not what the culture says it says.

Now who here as cut one of these verses out of their bible, as Truth? Why?

[Mark]

That Huckabee would personally support Eph. 5:21 and also personally support Eph. 5:22 is not problematic for most Christians...

To my knowledge, no one here has suggested otherwise. Huckabee can support anything he wants to support. You've missed the whole point, which is that Huckabee 1998 contradicts Huckabee 2008. If he's changed his view, fine, but in the debate he sounded as if he's trying to have it both ways.

We would lean to think he supported the Bible and what it says, not what the culture says it says...

Once again, who is suggesting otherwise?

Now who here as cut one of these verses out of their bible, as Truth? Why?...

I have no idea what that means. But I don't think anybody's done that, either.

[cowboymatt43]

Just a note here. I have two blogs yesterday about this issue. One deals some with Huckabee (Submission, Mike Huckabee, and the Bibliobloggers); the other deals more with Ephesians 5 (Submission, Jim West, and Linguistics). Check them out if you have time!

I should be posting one more blog on this issue either later today or tomorrow. In it I hope to explore in some depth the metaphors in Ephesians 5, namely submitting as to Christ and loving as Christ loves the Church, as a man loves his own body.

[Jonathan]

Just a note here. I have two blogs yesterday about this issue. One deals some with Huckabee (Submission, Mike Huckabee, and the Bibliobloggers); the other deals more with Ephesians 5 (Submission, Jim West, and Linguistics). Check them out if you have time!

I should be posting one more blog on this issue either later today or tomorrow. In it I hope to explore in some depth the metaphors in Ephesians 5, namely submitting as to Christ and loving as Christ loves the Church, as a man loves his own body.

As much as I'd like to skim cowboymatt43's blogs on the subject, I am working in a country that has essentially closed off access to blogs (mostly those with the term "blog" in their url (blogspot, etc...).

[Timothy Bonney]

If you can read a little Greek look at 5:21 and 5:22.

5:21 has the word submission in it but, the word isn't in 5:22. Why? Because the paragraph starts with 5:21 "submit yourself to one another..." And 5:22 actually says "and wives also to your husbands." The verse 5:22 gets the word submit from 5:21 and, without 5:21 it isn't a complete sentence.

So, grammatically any time you present 5:22 without 5:21 you are violating the context of the paragraph. But, unfortunately, many are more interested in telling the women to submit than actually dealing with the fact that in a partriarchical society, Paul actually called for mutual submission.

[Ed Pettibone]

If you can read a little Greek look at 5:21 and 5:22.

5:21 has the word submission in it but, the word isn't in 5:22. Why? Because the paragraph starts with 5:21 "submit yourself to one another..." And 5:22 actually says "and wives also to your husbands." The verse 5:22 gets the word submit from 5:21 and, without 5:21 it isn't a complete sentence.

So, grammatically any time you present 5:22 without 5:21 you are violating the context of the paragraph. But, unfortunately, many are more interested in telling the women to submit than actually dealing with the fact that in a partriarchical society, Paul actually called for mutual submission.

Ed: Tim, you might mention also, as some seem to forget, the early extant manuscripts have no chapter and verse numbers.

[Timothy Bonney]

If you can read a little Greek look at 5:21 and 5:22.

5:21 has the word submission in it but, the word isn't in 5:22. Why? Because the paragraph starts with 5:21 "submit yourself to one another..." And 5:22 actually says "and wives also to your husbands." The verse 5:22 gets the word submit from 5:21 and, without 5:21 it isn't a complete sentence.

So, grammatically any time you present 5:22 without 5:21 you are violating the context of the paragraph. But, unfortunately, many are more interested in telling the women to submit than actually dealing with the fact that in a partriarchical society, Paul actually called for mutual submission.

Ed: Tim, you might mention also, as some seem to forget, the early extant manuscripts have no chapter and verse numbers.

Thanks Ed, I should have. And, as I'm sure you are pointing out, that invites a lot of users of scripture to take things out of context. How can anyone suppose to argue for the authority of scripture who is willing to make a doctrinal position by starting in a letter in the middle of a paragraph leaving out the first sentence in order to make their point valid in violation of the grammatical context?