When parents attempt to control their adult children
Jill Duggar Dillard of the famous Duggar family, who had a reality TV show on TLC for several years, recently released a memoir, Counting the Cost, which she co-wrote with her husband, Derrick Dillard, and Craig Borlase. I have not read the book yet (I only have so many hours in a day), but this is a book I actually intend to read. Even without reading the book, I feel as if I know the story, after listening to several commentaries on it.
A recurring theme was the fact that Jill’s father, Jim Bob Duggar, was very controlling. As a side note, since I never watched the show while it was on TV and knew very little about the Duggar family till fairly recently, when I first watched a YouTube video about the Duggars and the name “Jim Bob” kept coming up, I actually thought the speaker was poking fun at him! I didn’t realize that was the actual name he went by! (His real name is James Robert – but, I digress).
The umbrella of authority (protection)
The organization that the Duggars promoted, Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP), teaches about the umbrella(s) of authority. You can read more about the concept here.
Essentially, children submit to their mothers, who submit to their husbands, who submit to Christ. If you fall out of line, that means you are no longer under the “umbrella of protection” and bad things can happen to you. While it is perfectly reasonable to expect young children to submit to their parents, there are several problems with this theory, including the idea that you are guaranteed protection if you submit to authority. I have written about this elsewhere.
When considering Jill Duggar’s experiences with her father, additional problems come to light. If women are supposed to submit to their husbands, would that not mean that once Jill was married, she was now under her husband, Derick’s “authority”, and expected to submit to him? But evidently, Jim Bob Duggar expected his grown children to stay under his own authority, even after they were married! Where is the logic in that? Not only was Jill expected to continue submitting to her father, it appears her husband was expected to submit to his father in law, too. This was to the point that Jill and Derick had to return to the US – from El Salvador where they were doing missionary work – to be on the TV show! If Jim Bob really cared that much about ministry work, it seems like he should have been glad that his daughter and son in law were doing the Lord’s work in El Salvador, something they felt called to do, rather than insisting that they return to the States to be on TV. (And yes, I know he insisted that the show was a ministry, but we won’t get into that here). The point is that his daughter was grown and married and there was no justification for him to keep trying to control her.
The umbrella of protection falls apart
Even if Jill still believed in the concept of the umbrella of authority/protection, she should have been more concerned about what her husband felt called to do, not her father’s agenda.
Did Jim Bob ever consider that by forcing his will on his married daughter, he was taking her away from her own husband’s “umbrella of protection”, and thereby potentially putting her in harm’s way, according to the theory? What if Derick’s parents were just as controlling, insisting that Derick and Jill submit to their agenda?
Sometimes we have to wonder if people actually believe the things they teach. It’s easy to cherry pick verses from the Bible to support one’s personal agenda, whether or not the practice is consistent with the actual teachings of Christ.
I’m happy for Jill that she has been able to break free from her father’s control and that she is forging a life of her own with her husband, Derick. I know it couldn’t have been easy and wish her the very best.
“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”
Genesis 2:24
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