TSM question: “taking in women’s beauty” instruction biblical?

HesZoinked · 2022-05-05T00:31:13+00:00

Don't take outside ideas and squeeze them through the bible to get a tick of approval.

Look at what the bible teaches and then interpret that. Read the Song of Solomon and you will learn that sex is a gift from God and what that looks like. You should find comfort in the beauty of your wife.

However, be on your guard about lusting over women that aren't your wife and live in a way that will prevent that temptation coming about. Reread the story of David and Bathsheba. David actually stayed home from the war and walked about on his roof looking about for opportunities to lust. Don't be like David in this regard, keep yourself from situations that might cause you to lust or commit sexual immorality.

Rifleshoot · 2022-05-05T02:56:47+00:00

So it’s a bit of a cop out answer, but it’s no less true: Asking whether or not something is a sin or not is a sign of immaturity in a believer. That’s okay, I was in the exact same boat just 3 years ago. At a certain point in your walk, you know whether or not something is a sin just based on the guidance of the Holy Spirit and the conviction that it gives you. So going forward, start trying to focus on walking well rather than simply “not walking badly.”

To give a more concrete answer to the question itself, appreciating a woman’s beauty is different than lusting after her. You can appreciate that a woman is beautiful in the same way that you can understand that another male is handsome, i.e. there’s no internalized desire to take her for yourself. Lusting tends to be when you are imagining her naked and imagining taking her for yourself. Appreciate the image that you are seeing and move on. Pornography has training a lot of us to instantly want to imagine taking a woman in our minds, myself included. It’s just something we need to train ourselves to get out of doing.

The way of the superior male has some good ideas, but it also has some silly ones as well. In particular, the imagining stuff and the weird stuff about auras and “penetrating her with your thoughts.” On the one hand, I understand the intent (training men to own and accept their desires as an extension of themselves and to be okay expressing those desires externally without fear of judgement), but the way it’s presented is pretty cringey and can mislead someone that doesn’t understand the intent. Just like all of the sidebar reading, take from it what you can and if it doesn’t jive with scripture, don’t worry about it.

Banned_On_Facebook · 2022-05-05T00:37:18+00:00

Men are wired to guage a woman's fertility at a glance. There's a fine line between noticing and lusting. We're also attracted to women genetically different from us. Boaz was attracted to Ruth and they were ancestors of Jesus.

Bruh-Nanaz · 2022-05-05T02:13:02+00:00

I've been working on this a bit, myself. Personally I think the best thing you can do is just spend time with women without goals in mind. Learn what they are like. Watch them in action. I think the trouble most men have these days is we spend so little time around actual women and so much in the sphere of media influence, we have some unrealistic expectations of females. This encourages objectification and abstractions of females, rather than forming relationships.

El0vution · 2022-05-05T05:41:59+00:00

In the book Deida talks about “softening your mid section” while you breath in and loosening this “mid-section” up. The “midsection“ is made up of the throat, chest and stomach area. He says this “mid-section” is the area you interact with the world most directly. I find this to be true. When a beautiful woman is in my presence I find the midsection is the area I can appreciate her beauty as I breathe in slowly, very slowly through the neck chest and stomach. Interestingly it often works best when I’m not looking directly at the woman. But I can nevertheless feel her beautiful energy and when you succeed in doing this the woman inevitable notices! She will then investigate like a cat after catnip.

WhereProgressIsMade · 2022-05-10T20:23:11+00:00

The more I've studied Mat 5:28, the more I'm becoming convinced the modern church has blown it out of proportion and made young men feel guilty for even perfectly normal, healthy, and non-sinful aspects of the male sex drive.

The Greek word that gets translated as lust has no sexual connotation in the Greek. The same Greek word is used elsewhere in the Bible, even in some position instances (not the version with negative connotation). I'm pretty sure the connotation for the English word lust originally did not have the sexual connotation it does now either. And it has gotten a much stronger negative connotation than the Greek as well.

Consider [this modern dictionary] entry where strong sexual desire is the #1 definition for lust. Here is the oldest dictionary definition for lust I found with just a quick search. It's still there in the 2nd definition, but notice that it clarifies it to unlawful carnal desire. Just a guess, but if you went back further in time to when the KJV was translated (the fist time the English word lust was used in that verse), it probably had even less of the sexual connotation is has now.

It also helped to understand that what made a desire (such as lust) wrong was desiring something forbidden (sinful).

Once I got this perspective fixed, the frequent question of "is it wrong to lust after memories of my wife?" became as backwards as the question "Is it wrong for me to desire righteousness?"

One thing that's interesting is that in pre-pubescent children, girls often express a desire to be married eventually, whereas boys scoff at the very idea. Perhaps it's just American culture doing it and nothing ingrained. Either way, it's really only the addition of the male sex drive that changes boys' minds and pushes them toward pursing women. Without it, there would be a lot less marriages and children being born.

If a young woman can look forward to her wedding day, why can't a young man look forward to the wedding night? Why do so many Christians embrace that young woman's desire but scold the young man's?

Or why is it wrong to read Song of Solomon and think, "sounds awesome. I want something like that." But we make young men feel guilty for it.

It's tough to really define where that line is between what is healthy, non-sinful, sexual energy, and what isn't. I really don't know. What I do know, is that there is in fact space for a single man to have a healthy, non-sinful, sex drive. If he channels it into propelling him toward developing the maturity and responsibility it takes to be a husband and father, seems like a win-win.

Title	TSM question: “taking in women’s beauty” instruction biblical?
Author	Visual_Pack_2206
Upvotes	6
Comments	10
Date	May 4, 2022 11:39 PM UTC (4 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/RPChristians
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/RPChristians/comments/uijt32/tsm_question_taking_in_womens_beauty_instruction/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/RPChristians/tsm-question-taking-in-womens-beauty-instruction.1115517 https://theredarchive.com/post/1115517

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