Christian Attitudes to Wife Beating Have Changed...

This is a British newspaper cutting from the mid 1800s. Reverend Bird would have got feminist knickers in a twist. He believed the Bible allowed husbands to beat their wives. On that note, he was not contradicted by the big man, Luther centuries earlier: "Although he disapproved of wife-beating, he did not categorically condemn it if no other means of discipline sufficed" [p13 of Luther on Women]

DCCI Ministries' Lizzie Schofield: Theological Problem of Christian Domestic Violence