A famous ordinance from Huntington, West Virginia permits *wife beating* on the courthouse steps - Sundays only. Notice that there is no mandate to *beat* one's wife - only that it is strictly legal on a certain day at a particular place.

The Huntington statute is an example of one type of law. It allows something to happen, but does not make it an obligation.

Other laws prohibit certain behaviors. Among the oldest and best-known laws of this type may be found within the *Ten Commandments*.

Actually, however, twelve statements comprise the *Ten Commandments*. Many people seem unaware that three of the rules to live by are of the *thou shalt* variety. The other nine - three-quarters of the twelve - consist of the more commonly known *thou shalt nots*.

Diverse faiths sometimes divide the twelve statements into slightly different groupings. Nevertheless, all twelve constructs are usually all present within the accepted text.

The above description of the *Ten Commandments* gives some insights into the nature of law. In other words, it is possible to write laws that either mandate or encourage certain behaviors while, at the same time, prohibiting others.

Those who oppose *domestic discipline* harp on either the compulsory or the explicitly permissive mode of law giving. This explains their continually demanding to know where in the Bible husbands are instructed to *beat* their wives. Of course, such commandment is not to be found within the received text.

At the same time, opponents of *domestic discipline* conveniently ignore the other side of law-giving. In particular, they never quite get around to pointing out that neither is there - in over six hundred biblical laws - a single *thou shalt not* concerning what was known half a century ago as *wife spanking*.

The truth is that - except for certain prescribed areas of life - believers are free from a rule-bound reality. This fact of life annoys the politically correct to no end. That is why opponents of *domestic discipline* wish to rewrite the Bible to suit their self-serving moral palate.

At the core of the New Age eclectic wizardry is a mandate for gender equality - something that is most certainly not to be found in any but the most curious of recent biblical rewrites. Thus, the politically correct place their emphasis on the age - dividing children from adults, as if were daylight and darkness - rather than in acknowledging rather obvious psychological and emotional differences that accompany the physical characteristics that separate men and women after a *certain age*.

The reason for the age emphasis is to divert attention from post-pubescent gender differences that make *domestic discipline* a realistic alternative to divorce and similar destabilizing outcomes in heterogeneous relationships. Age twelve is currently the *great divide* because, nominally, it is the last age at which the genders can be treated the same using that most common of disciplinary techniques.

With the onset of puberty these days comes a feminist-inspired *extended adolescence* that constitutes a moral no-man's-land in which social controls are inadequate, inappropriate, or frequently non-existence. Yet, because the teenaged brain is largely emotion-driven - seeking pleasures of the moment without regard to consequences - this chronological *wild card* causes much of society's ills.

So far as New Agers are concerned, God is dead. Science - often junk science - is the new religion and atheism is its new article of faith. Hedonism is tantamount to worship.

While demanding that practitioners of *domestic discipline* produce a Bible verse commanding husbands to *beat* their wives, they often behave as if the Bible commands women to usurp the natural authority of men! Of course, they will be equally hard pressed to find even one verse that specifically justifies their behavior!

The war waged by feminists is not only with God and biblical precepts; it is even with long established life processes and attendant social organization! Traditional families have long been prime targets of their assaults.

First wave nineteenth century feminists not only wanted the vote and access to birth control, they also wanted the freedom to divorce. Mid-twentieth century feminists accelerated the trend by importing no-fault divorce from the late and not quite great Soviet Union.

Divorce is a feminist-driven institution intended to put women in the driver's seat. For over a century, women have kept divorce lawyers in business. In the early twenty-first century, absent *domestic discipline*, marrying a college-educated woman in the United States is an almost certain invitation to divorce!

Yet, brains are no barrier to the effective administration of *domestic discipline*. Very bright women are often more aware of this than are men.

In reality, the proliferation of divorce represents the overwhelming rejection of passive males by females. This explains why weak men eventually become so despised by women.

Despite a facade of formal education, the factors that affect a choice of mate remain more primal than cerebral. There simply are times when a woman expects man to behave like a man and, when the man fails to live up to her expectations, she rejects him. Divorce is simply a formal manifestation of that rejection.

At the same time, men need to understand that the freedom to spank a woman exists within a relatively narrow spectrum of circumstances. Instead of being a self-indulgent orgy, it exists for a purpose.

*Wife spanking* is predicated on the assumption that marriage is preferable to divorce or perpetual bickering. Moreover, marriage is better for the society, the children, as well as the couple.

Because, *domestic discipline* is so effective in producing a bond between man and woman, those most likely to reject *wife spanking* are likely to be the same ones to regard marriage with either distain or indifference.

Make no mistake. Paul wrote in I Corinthians 11:19 that "there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you." While those opposed to *domestic discipline* think it a heresy, feminism is a godless heresy.

In feminism, "the works of the flesh are manifest." Among them are "adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like...which...shall not inherit the kingdom of God."

Conversely, within home practicing *domestic discipline*, there is more likely to be ""love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, [and] faith." That is why these marriages last so long, are so stable, and the children they produce are less likely to engage in the self-destructive practices that beset the children of divorce and single parenting.

In his infinite wisdom, God did not command *domestic discipline*. Neither did He forbid it.