
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Queen Gertrude famously says of a queen in a stage play, “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” By this she means that the queen’s excessive and insistent vows to never remarry betray quite the opposite: in reality, the queen very much wants to remarry. In other words, her perpetual claims to never remarry make the claims hard to believe. This phrase has been oft appropriated to show that people will excessively deny or affirm something to overcompensate for what they know the be true. I suspect that Queen Gertrude might say something similar about many claims to masculinity in our day: “The men doth protest too much, methinks.”
To be sure, I am most grateful for and encouraged by the resurgence of interest in biblical masculinity. It is most welcome and needed in our pulpits and in our pews. The concern addressed in this article is not that. Rather, it’s the concern of Queen Gertrude; namely, true masculinity does not incessantly and intentionally exalt itself. In other words, truly masculine men don’t walk around telling people how masculine they truly are.
Growing disillusioned with complementarianism and androgyny, some men have now become keepers of masculinity and patriarchy, sniffing out weakness in gentleness or cowardice in prudence. These men seem to have an obsession with pointing out what they deem as effeminate, although most of it would no doubt fall under the category of adiaphora. They rail against men who wash the dishes after dinner while they themselves are failing to lead their wives. They insist that all wives should wear a head covering while they themselves have an effeminate aura. They identify androgyny from a mile away while having little emotional fortitude. They say that everything is “gay” or effeminate while wearing skinny jeans and eating edamame. The problem is a sort of plank-and-speck issue: calling out perceived effeminacy while possessing it. But the godly man doesn’t walk around sniffing out effeminacy, fishing for characteristics that he thinks he can dunk on by declaring effeminacy. Those who sniff out effeminacy in others may find the trail leads straight back to their own home. An important virtue that men like this are missing, a virtue that all of us should continually cultivate, is the virtue of magnanimity.
The Puritan John Flavel described the Christian virtue of Christian magnanimity as the “conscience’s security.” He writes, “It is excellent and becoming a Christian to be able to face any thing but the frowns of God and his own conscience.” Magnanimity is a masculine virtue that is perhaps best defined by identifying its opposite: pettiness. The magnanimous man is not a petty man. As Merriam Webster defines magnanimity, it is a “loftiness of spirit enabling one to bear trouble calmly, to disdain meanness and pettiness, and to display a noble generosity.” The magnanimous man can endure and tolerate much opposition. Petty fights aren’t alluring to him. He isn’t searching for trifling battles. He is hard to stir up. This is why an elder is not to be quarrelsome (1 Tim. 3:3), craving and stirring up unnecessary strife. Elders are often on the receiving end of undue insults. They must be impervious without being calloused. They must be correctable without being peevish. They must give the benefit of the doubt without being naïve.
All Christian men, not just elders, look to Christ as our model of a magnanimity. As Peter writes, “When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly” (1 Peter 2:23). Paul warns against such fruit that demonstrate citizenship in the kingdom of darkness: “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God” (Gal. 5:19–21). Enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries—the magnanimous man isn’t given to these.
The godly, magnanimous man is unaffected by petty insults and vain arguments. He has a come-what-may attitude because his foundation is well-laid and thick. His heart and his home are stable. He isn’t unduly bothered by trifling or trendy opinions. He has a gravitas about him that is unshakeable. It takes much to wile him up. They don’t have buttons that can be easily pressed to draw out an internal defense lawyer.
Further, the magnanimous man doesn’t need to advertise his masculinity; he simply is masculine, godly, and virtuous. He doesn’t need to flex his muscles to show his own strength or to show the weakness of others. He doesn’t need to take gym pics in the mirror (either real or metaphorical) to prove his muscle. Here applies the Proverbs 27:2 principle: “Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips.” Additionally, he doesn’t need to criticize every man who doesn’t fit his particular mold (i.e., “Real men drive trucks”). This merely bears the fruit of dissension rather than the “peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by” Scripture-saturated, godly elders. One fishing for effeminacy is himself engaged in an effeminate endeavor, for the magnanimous man isn’t eager to demonstrate his own masculinity by pointing out its antithesis whenever and wherever it is perceived. The magnanimous man is too secure to “protest too much,” whether it be claiming manliness or pointing out its opposite.
We who care about cultivating biblical masculinity in our churches need to be on guard against such faux masculinity that has the appearance of godliness but lacks substance (see 2 Tim. 3:5). Real men don’t need to declare their manliness. A spirit of masculine magnanimity rises above the urge to broadcast itself. It is unaffected by petty insults. It is impervious yet correctable. It is firm but gentle. It is perceptive, but not unduly censorious.
This is what magnanimity looks like, brothers. Let us cast pettiness aside and pursue a Christian spirit of sincere magnanimity. May it not be said of us, “The men doth protest too much, methinks.”
Rev. Aaron L. Garriott is managing editor of Tabletalk magazine, resident adjunct professor at Reformation Bible College in Sanford, Fla., and associate pastor at Spruce Creek Presbyterian Church in Port Orange, Fla.
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