Man and Woman – different worlds, and a complete man

Interview with prof. Tomislav Ivančić, PhD
by Željka Kolar

On the threshold of life maturity and registering a growing longing to share life with an unfathomable man, I discover how much the “training” of independence, distance, and division into man and woman is a heavy burden. Surely most of my friends and acquaintances would agree with that, but we persist in building independence from the opposite sex; we observe a lot, and it seems to me that we see too little; as if we are guarding ourselves against each other…

Having recently found myself in the company of prof. Ivančić, I knew that I must not fail to ask him about that deep preoccupation. He took the subject seriously and uttered truths that made me almost dizzy. I sensed some of it, something surprised me, something was not easy to listen to, but that conversation greatly illuminated the ambiguities regarding male-female relationships.

Why do I still feel incomplete as a female being?

More important than that, this question seems to me, “Who is man?” While I look only at a man and only a woman, I do not see man. Individually they are only fragments, and only together man. The Bible says at the beginning: “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” Man is a whole only when man and woman are together. We are in danger of reducing the world only to a man or a woman, so it happens that women are rude, masculine, arrogant and aggressive in speech, although they are not aware of it. Women by force want to be equal to men in all affairs, and they do not have that strength, they are not born for it. On the other hand, men are required to be in the house, take care of children, wash, clean… to be like women, and they cannot. The result is that men are afraid of bonding so they run away to alcohol or drugs, or stay with their mothers, postpone marriage or do not marry at all, or run away to a career… So the woman feels lonely, abandoned and worthless, but also does not know hoe to value her husband nor to love him. But if man and woman remain two separate worlds, their nature cannot be complete and so man remains alien to himself. A woman should accept a man into her world, and he should introduce her to his.

How to accept the opposite sex?

Man and woman are two worlds and, first of all, one needs to understand the differences between them. Due to their differences, they never fully understand each other. They are different not only from the outside, in body and strength, but also in the colour of their voice, the way they listen and hear, how they speak, how they smell… On women, make-up and dresses are something normal and beautiful, but they do not suit men at all. Ten women can speak at the same time and understand each other, and only two men, if they speak at the same time, will not understand each other. A man thinks discursively, rationally; he needs to think first and then to say something, and when he hears something, he needs time, silence and peace to understand. The worst thing for me is when I start talking and a woman interrupts me…

A man thinks when he is silent, and a woman thinks while she speaks.

A woman is intuitive and thus understands everything. According to her psychic constitution, a woman is more focused on personal and mental life, and a man on objective life, and the environment around him. But a man can intuitively think through a woman, understanding her; and a woman can think and understand perfectly discursively, rationally, when she listens to a man. They fit perfectly into each other and must not be separated.

A woman is a heart, and a man is an exterior, a body. The man is centrifugal. He is the one who goes into the world and conquers it. He travels and constantly explores, and then tired, he returns to his centre, to the heart, where the woman is. A woman is his centre.

A man needs the tenderness of a woman to be brave, and a woman becomes brave when she has a man behind her. A man becomes gentle when he has a warm woman behind him, then he is safe and can rule the world. It is extremely important that we understand each other and stop judging each other.

If God created man in His image, does that mean that God is male and female?

Theologians and Scripture tell us that he is not. When it is said that man is male and female, it does not mean that he is two, but is, in fact, a triune, and this is the image of God – male, female and the possibility of a child coming from them.

The Old Testament speaks already in traces of the trinity of God. First of all, God – the Father, the Creator – created everything according to what he said, according to the Word. The Bible says that at that time, the Spirit hovered over the abyss and the waters. So, the Father, the Word and the Spirit, already in the beginning of the Bible. Furthermore, in the New Testament Jesus reveals to us that God is triune. The Father utters the Word, he knows himself, he utters himself and that knowledge is Jesus, the Son of God, and then the Father and the Son love each other immensely and the Holy Spirit is born, as the Spirit of Jesus and the Father. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are, as in marriage, father, mother, and children; that is, male, female, and the possibility of children. Wherever there are two, male and female, the third is already mysteriously present. Just as the Holy Spirit is a mysterious person.

The second chapter of Genesis interestingly describes the creation of man: God first created man Adam, and from his rib, he created Eve. So, just as the Son, his Word – Jesus, comes out of the heavenly Father, so from Adam, from his rib, that is, heart, God brings out his wife.

Observing Jesus, we see that he was miraculously close to women, he had something tender, warm. He knew how to cry, he defended women. He never rebuked or shouted at them, and they followed him, understood him deeply, and were with him as he was on the cross, and were the first on his grave.

As Jesus is the word that the Father utters from the heart, that is, he is his heart, so the woman is the heart. The Holy Spirit, who is the love of the Father and the Son and unites them, is then like a child coming out of father and mother and uniting them so that in the child they see themselves as one, and the more children they have, the husband and wife, the father and mother, it is easier to understand themselves – how precious and beautiful they are. When we understand that a man is an image of God the Father, that a woman is an image of God the Son, that children are an image of God the Holy Spirit, then we will approach each other with deep respect.

Is marriage the only ideal union of a man and a woman?

Man is constantly, all his life, realizing himself as male and female. How nice it is to hear your mother talking, how she laughs, how she cries, gently calls you; but it’s just as wonderful to feel dad watching over you, brother, grandfather. We feel protected only next to each other. Only a man and a woman, a father and a mother, can give birth to a child and every child is both a father and a mother and there is no different man. A child cannot be brought up well without both a father and a mother; not even the most tender father can replace the mother, he can play the mother and be a gentle father, but can never be a mother; and the bravest, strongest mother, cannot replace the father. Today, attempts are being made to explain that one is gender and the other is sex, so it is as if being a woman is just a role and that two men or two women can be a marriage. This is ridiculous because we cannot change the laws of nature, they are there and by them, we come into the world. When we begin to change the laws of nature, then we corrupt and destroy them, destroying ourselves and nature. Legislation destroys marriage and the family. And when the family, the male-female relationship, begins to be destroyed, then man in an essential part of himself is destroyed.

There is a masculine and feminine element in each of us, for example, the masculine in me is what makes me what I am, and the feminine is my longing for the other side, for my mother, for my sister who can give me what I do not have.

A woman should help a man to go dive inside himself, to feel and touch his heart, to be weak and even to cry. The man again needs to help the woman get out of her inner views of reality and to view the world soberly, objectively, from the outside, calculatedly and calmly.

We would be perfect people if we allowed the other sex to change and enrich us. Marriage is not necessary for that and it should not be misunderstood that men and women meet only in marriage and that they are only one in marriage. Usually, married people are the most separated. While they are in love, it’s nice, but when they get married, they suddenly get bored. Marriage is not the only way for a man and a woman to be together, but marriage is one of the most beautiful schools of how to make man whole, a man and a woman in their element, naturalness and identity.

What is important for a marriage to succeed?

You should enter a marriage for the sake of giving to each other, and not asking for something from the other and expecting that the other person in the marriage fulfils your wishes. It is necessary for the spouses to be independent and for only love, and not interests, to lead them to each other. Marriage is not in identification but in the gift of diversity.

A real marriage is that the wife allows the husband to be silent, and the husband allows the wife to speak. This is possible only when love and trust are among them, when they understand each other and give priority to each other.

To let marriage change you, to let the other change you, to understand him, to understand that he does not think like you, does not feel, does not act or speak like you; he is different and needs to be listened to. It is like some wonderful news that you learn, that enters you and you become rich. Men should listen to how a woman is completely different and sometimes it makes them angry, but they need to understand that it enriches them.

No matter how different we are, by that, we are just richer and need to respect each other. Salvation is only in forgiveness and understanding.

If a woman remains astonished before a man for the rest of her life, and a man before his wife, then the marriage can succeed; constantly observing what a secret it is and trying to figure out how to love the other to the end. The communion of a woman and a man means lifelong research. There is a mistake at every moment, but nothing of it, we repent and move forward. It is important to know how to forgive and to understand over and over again.

Marriage and family need to be healed. A woman needs to be healed so that she can be gentle with a man, understand him and bear him. A man needs to be healed so that he can be brave and courageous, but also to protect and love his wife, to be to the end for her so that she is then healthy and so that the family is whole.

How to make each other happy?

To make a woman happy means to allow her to realize her competencies, to allow her to cry, to laugh, to decorate the house and be the queen there, to take care of the man and find everything in him. She is the perfect educator and gentle caregiver, doctor, teacher, and hundreds of other occupations, but the most perfect mother and wife; she is the heart. Without that heart, a man is lost and has nowhere to go. And every man, in order to be happy, needs to return to that heart, listen to his wife and beside her learn to be a man to the end.

He is happy when he feels that he is respected and needed by his wife when she tells him: “What a genius you are, how well you drive, you have arranged this very well.” Also, when he senses that a woman is for him and says to him that she will give him lunch he does not know how to prepare and that she will adjust his tie… Happy is only the man whom a woman deeply respects in his competencies and who does not criticize him because he is not like her and does not know how to do those jobs in which she is a master.

And a happy woman is the one who feels that a man will arrange everything that is his competence – to build a house, repair a car or an appliance.

It is necessary to serve one another; to praise your husband/wife; to see how much you need each other and to enjoy that.

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