August 28, 2010

From Abuse to Freedom: Barbara Roberts tells the story behind Maschil Press

Posted by Phil Groom under Publisher Profiles | Tags: , , , , , , , |
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Barbara Roberts

Barbara Roberts, Author and Publisher at Maschil Press

Regular readers may recognise Barbara Roberts’ name as an occasional commenter here — but she’s also an author and publisher. Here she tells us the story of her journey from abuse through divorce and remarriage to freedom and the tough decision to publish her own book when no established publisher seemed willing to take it on board…

Barbara writes: Maschil Press came into existence when I couldn’t find a publisher for Not Under Bondage: Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion (ISBN 9780980355345; I offer great deals for small booksellers)

The subject of Not Under Bondage is a hot potato to say the least. Domestic abuse is heavy stuff, and the doctrine of divorce is likely to raise contention, with personal experience tending to colour whatever is read.

Maschil Press aims to expose and advocate against sub-biblical views which have caused pain and grief to the Christian community and the wider population. Why Maschil? It’s a Hebrew word which is thought to mean prudent or insightful and I hope that’s what I’m doing: giving insight into the little-understood scriptural dilemmas of the victim of domestic abuse, and how those dilemmas can be resolved when the scriptures are rightly understood.

How did I get into writing about domestic abuse? I wrote Not Under Bondage because there was a gap in the market. When I  left my abusive husband for the last time, I couldn’t find a book that adequately answered my questions about divorce for domestic abuse.

Not Under Bondage

Not Under Bondage: Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion

Here’s the back story: I became a Christian in 1981 but for a long time had minimal biblical teaching and lingering confusion due to a swag of new age beliefs I had soaked myself in for years. Becoming sidetracked into other areas soon after my conversion, I didn’t get to church for nearly 14 years. I wouldn’t recommend taking such a long time in the wilderness!

Unaware that Christians should avoid marrying non-Christians, I married an unbeliever in 1989 and we had a daughter. The marriage gradually became abusive and I occasionally took refuge in a women’s refuge. My marriage was the most common type of abusive marriage (according to the research on abusive marriages) –  my husband was violent several times a year, but there was an undercurrent of emotional abuse from him all the time. There were also elements that I’d categorise as social abuse (isolation from friends and family) and sexual abuse.

In 1994 I left my husband with the help of a protection order from the courts, and started attending church and reading the Bible seriously. That was when I became a professing Christian. A family court battle eventually led to me being granted custody and my husband granted fortnightly access to our daughter.

After four years my separated husband made a profession of faith and we reconciled as a married couple. The abuse recurred, this time with the added element of spiritual abuse, because my husband learnt to twist scriptures against me. I separated for the last time in 1999, divorcing a few years after that.

In 2001 the stress in my household diminished markedly when access visits between my daughter and her father ceased. It’s a long story.

We have a few chooks in the back yard and a cute black dog who has a lot more emotional empathy than some Christians.

I am working on a second book – a companion volume to Not Under Bondage – that will deal with other scriptural dilemmas which Christian victims of domestic abuse face apart from the divorce dilemma. I live in Ballarat, Australia, and am now happily married to a wonderful man who suffered domestic abuse in a former marriage. We have a few chooks in the back yard and a cute black dog who has a lot more emotional empathy than some Christians.

After praying not to become a publisher, I’m rather glad to be a publisher because I have full control of my work. When not writing, I’m advocating for victims of domestic abuse, and trying to educate the Christian world so they are better equipped to respond to victim/survivors. My website has lots of links and articles that are helpful for anyone dealing with domestic abuse in a Christian context.

Previous Posts (most recent first)

Not Under BondageNot Under Bondage
Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion

Barbara Roberts
ISBN 9780980355345 (0980355346)
Maschil Press, 2008
£11.95

Trade Stockist: STL UK

 

July 23, 2009

Not Under Bondage: Update

Posted by Phil Groom under Bookshop Ramblings | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Not Under BondageThey’re there in every church, in every community, amongst your customers. Not aliens: abused women; but all too often they’re treated like aliens if not like animals. Most are silent: they’ve been beaten into silence, some verbally, some physically; but whether verbal or physical, it’s still abuse; and all too often, instead of becoming a place of refuge and safety for them, churches have become silent partners in their abuse, havens for their abusers.

This book by Barbara Roberts breaks that silence and helps to break down some of the barriers that much Christian teaching and thinking has placed in the way of these women, trapping them in the prisons of their abusive marriages. In the author’s own words, from her post A Hot Potato:

Not Under Bondage differs from other Christian books on divorce in that it focuses primarily on divorce for domestic abuse. It explains the scriptural dilemmas of abuse victims, carefully examines the scriptures and scholarly research, and shows how the Bible sets victims of abuse free from bondage and guilt.

Maschil Press Returns Policy (pdf, 96kb)The book is now available to order from STL UK (albeit not actually in stock as I write) or can be ordered direct from the author herself, whose trade terms include an especially enlightened returns policy (pdf, 96kb). My experience at LST, however, suggests that you’re unlikely to need to make use of that policy: my stock has all sold through and I fully expect to be restocking for the autumn term. The book addresses an important topic that we cannot afford to ignore.

Previous Posts (most recent first)

More reviews and resources can be found on the Not Under Bondage website.

 

January 29, 2009

How ‘Not Under Bondage’ came to be written

Posted by Phil Groom under Guest Posts | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Not Under BondageIn November last year I featured John Wilks’ review of Barbara Roberts’ book, Not Under Bondage. I invited Barbara to tell us more about the book and why she wrote it. This is the second of two articles she prepared in response to that invitation.

Barbara writes:

In a previous post, I described my book Not Under Bondage: Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion. How large is the potential audience for such a book? In western countries, the research shows that for women who have ever been partnered, nearly one in four will experience violence from an intimate partner. Although we need more research to establish the relative prevalence for Christians as compared to the general population, we know from pastoral experience that many Christians experience this problem. And research shows that Christian victims stay longer in abusive marriages than unbelievers do.

One in four is an extraordinary figure. Why hasn’t there been more call on such books?

Towards answering this, let me tell you how I came to write Not Under Bondage.

I became a Christian in 1981 but for a long time had minimal biblical teaching and lingering confusion due to my former beliefs. Unaware that Christians should avoid marrying non-Christians, I married an unbeliever in 1989 and we had one daughter. The marriage gradually became abusive and I occasionally took refuge in a women’s shelter.

In 1994 I left my husband and started attending church and Bible study. Child custody was contested but eventually awarded to me, with my husband granted access.

In this first separation, the only book I read about divorce was Laney’s The Divorce Myth. He made no mention of domestic abuse. I was outside his universe. I sought advice from a female pastor who believed that divorce is never right. She said that whenever someone breaks a covenant (as Israel broke the covenant they’d made with the Gibeonites) they will come under God’s judgement. I did not want to disobey God, so I remained legally married (but separated) and thought I would have to stay that way for the rest of my life.

Many victims of domestic abuse have received hurtful and harmful counsel from Christians. This deters them from disclosing the issue of domestic abuse, and from asking for books on the topic. Comments like “What did you do to provoke the abuse?” or “You should try to be a better spouse” blame the victim. “You should pray more” tells the victim to keep quiet about the problem. “You must submit more” tells the victim to comply with whatever sins the other partner chooses to dish out. “God hates divorce” instils dread and guilt. “Adultery is the only ground for divorce” discounts the sin of domestic abuse and sidelines the victim’s dilemma. Such comments make the victims in our midst afraid of seeking counsel, in case it rubs salt in already aching wounds.

During access handovers, I told my husband about Jesus and gave him a Bible. After four years he made a profession of faith and we reconciled as a married couple. The abuse recurred and I separated for the last time in 1999, divorcing some years after that.

When the marriage broke down the second time, I had enormous scriptural dilemmas. What did the Bible say about domestic abuse? I read widely but found (remember this was 1999) no book that sufficiently answered my questions. A few Christian feminists had written on domestic abuse, but the theology did not sit right with me. Many conservative theologians wrote on divorce, but when they mentioned domestic abuse it was only a few sentences, parentheses, or footnotes. Moreover, what they said often displayed lack of comprehension about the scriptural plight of Christian victims of domestic abuse. Nobody seemed really to understand the scriptural dilemmas I had.

I eventually found myself writing a book which was to be called Biblical Answers to Domestic Abuse and would have one chapter in it about divorce. The divorce chapter became a book on its own – Not Under Bondage: Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion - which is now available worldwide. (The other book is yet to be finished.)

I trust Not Under Bondage will help victims, clergy and all Christians deal with the issue more biblically, which should help the problem be less hidden and stigmatised.

 

November 25, 2008

Not Under Bondage

Posted by Phil Groom under Book Reviews | Tags: , , , , , , , , , |
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Not Under BondageNot Under Bondage
Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion

Barbara Roberts
ISBN 9780980355345 (0980355346)
Maschil Press, 2008
£11.95

Category: Family and Relationships
Reviewed by: John Wilks

This review – to be published in Evangelical Quarterly, April 2009 – is reproduced here by kind permission of John Wilks, EQ Reviews Editor.

I don’t doubt for one moment that divorce is there as a recognition of our weakness. The Bible’s overall approach to the value and importance of faithfulness within and to marriage is easy to see, and divorce is not something that Christians should ever enter into lightly. Readers of this journal will undoubtedly be aware of approaches to this topic ranging through the debate between the schools of Shammai and Hillel, the texts from Deuteronomy, Jesus and Paul, and their own denomination’s position on the topic. The prominence given to divorce on the restricted grounds of adultery or desertion will no doubt be familiar. This latest offering comes from the context of separation and divorce as an escape from an abusive spouse. Is this also a biblical ground, or only a cultural one?

This book adopts a no nonsense approach to the topic. There is little preamble as the author launches directly into her topic. Each chapter moves rapidly into tightly argued evaluation of the issue to hand. The text is not ‘softened’ with case histories or anecdotes; this is an intense read. That is different from being a heavy read, though; I had no problems with the style.

The urgency of a person with a mission comes across very readily. The author is up front about the fact that she is ‘a survivor of an abusive marriage’ (15). That might make some people wary: how can she be objective? But to dismiss the book on these grounds would be, I suggest, entirely inappropriate. The style is far from inflammatory, nor is it impassioned or unbalanced. After all, we should all be aware that there’s no such thing as a neutral viewpoint; the position of this author is clearly laid out without intruding on the content.

So what about the content? Abuse in its many forms remains a challenging topic for the church to grapple with. The idea that Christians could be so, bluntly put, unchristian is clearly beyond the ability of some to accept. Yet the evidence is increasingly clear to see. ‘No temptation has overtaken us that is not common to everyone’ Paul wisely writes (1 Corinthians 10:13), but that means that we in the church must deal with the worst of sins as well as the ‘easiest’, and that within our own ranks. It also means that church members married to non-Christians may face challenges and problems less common among the churched. So the book starts by explaining the style and patterns of abusers, the ease with which they present a reasonable public face, and the insidious nature of the treatment they hand out to their victims (chapter 1).

If divorce can only be contemplated for adultery and desertion how, then, if at all, can a victim of domestic abuse seek divorce and still be a faithful, Bible believing Christian? At the core of this book is a distinction between ‘treacherous divorce’ and ‘disciplinary divorce’. The former is defined as divorce on inappropriate grounds, the latter as divorce occasioned by unacceptable behaviour by a spouse. Aware of the need to attempt forgiveness or public rebuke, eventually the only possible action is separation and divorce (chapter 2 in particular).

There is extensive analysis of the expected biblical texts on the subject (chapters 3 to 11); the analysis of Malachi 2:16 (chapter 8 and appendix 7) deserves particular attention. But analysis is not restricted to these passages. Roberts also draws on narrative texts that describe marriages in various stages of failure and disarray. So this is not a book that argues purely from experience. The author’s marriage clearly was horrendous; but her argument does not depend on that. The book is a thorough look at the key biblical texts in order to establish the case for divorce from an abusive spouse on biblical grounds. (There are also 35 pages of appendixes giving detailed supporting information for the most technical parts of the analysis.)

A wide audience is suggested for this book, ranging from the ‘victim of marital abuse’ to anyone ‘who seeks to give biblical guidance on divorce and remarriage’ (15). In fact, I’d suggest this book be restricted to the academic end of that spectrum. There’s too much time spent on establishing the grounds for justified divorce following abuse. And that is good and proper, and we need this book. However, just as David Instone-Brewer has produced two books on divorce for two different audiences (Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Literary Context, Eerdmans, 2002; Divorce and Remarriage in the Church: Solutions for Pastoral Realities, Paternoster, 2003) so I suggest that a less technical version of this book (and a less relentless one?) needs to be written with the victim in mind, not the scholars. This should be a very valuable addition to the market. But don’t get me wrong: this book deserves widespread attention, with a positive acceptance and affirmation from the academy and the pastorate. This is the book to be on the shelves of every reader of this journal, and we look forward to the one that we can give to any victims that we are called upon to support.

John Wilks, November 2008

Dr John G F Wilks is the Director of Open Learning at London School of Theology, Reviews Editor for Evangelical Quarterly and author of Scripture Union’s Deeper Encounter Study Series.

Maschil Press

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