Ok, I have a few random questions that are actually connected and I'm hoping anyone can possibly give some answers to them.

In the OT of the Bible were women required to marry? As a baptist I was taught they were because they could hold no jobs or have a future without a husband but I had a jew tell me they were no more required than we are today.

If marrying an unsaved person today is a sin why was it not then? I mean Esther was forced to marry the king and so many others married whoever but many times they were forced to. Is that why it wasn't sin?

There are a lot of songs and stories from the past (and even present) that share this view that the man of the house went out to the field or to the factory and earned the money and disciplined when necessary, while the woman made sure the kids were educated and taken to church and taught to pray. The baptists I was around taught that the man was to head up all of that, not the woman. Who's right? Or does it really matter?

Is it a bad thing for a woman to marry a good, but unsaved man? I mean, if he allows her to go to church, raise the kids with "religion", and cares for and really loves them.... For some women they desire nothing more than to be loved and to have kids. Isn't that a God given desire? Why do they have to suffer through life single? Sure, sometimes they can do other things but not always. Many times they just end up working their whole life and being the free babysitter.

I had some more but I need to remember them all...