Joy-Anna Duggar Disses Parents' Strict Modesty Rules, Claims The Bible Isn't 'Black And White' On Dress Codes

Joy-Anna Forsyth (née Duggar) opened up on her decision not to follow parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar's strict dress code after moving out of her childhood home and starting a family of her own.

While answering fan questions in a Saturday, March 18, Youtube video, Joy-Anna admitted she'd discovered there was nothing in the Bible that actually backed up her parents' specific guidelines — which include expecting their girls to wear loose-fitting dresses or long skirts rather than jeans.

"Austin and I prayed about this for a long time, and I think we had the first conversation within our first year of marriage," the 25-year-old explained, referring to her husband, Austin Forsyth, who she married in 2017.

"It wasn't something that I was super persistent about studying," she continued, sharing she searched for answers for three or four years before coming to a decision. "I'd always worn skirts my whole life, and so for me I wasn't in a rush."

"So really the last year we really prayed about it and felt like there wasn't anything in scripture — there isn't anything in scripture that's black and white on dress," she emphasized. "It talks a lot about modesty, but I feel like you can be modest and wear pants, and so that's kind of where we came to."

"I think basically we just looked through scripture for a long time and feel like this is okay for our family and where we are," she concluded.

Joy-Anna isn't the first of her siblings to abandon their parents' stringent views for something more relaxed. Older sisters Jill, 31, Jessa, 30, and Jinger, 29, have also all chosen to wear t-shirts and jeans as opposed to skirts and dresses in their day-to-day lives.

And while Joy-Anna searched the Bible for answers, as OK! previously reported, Jinger admitted Jessa's husband, Ben Seewald and his family were also a large part of what inspired her to adjust her own views on modest fashion.

"The Seewalds made an impression on me, specifically because they didn't dress the same way I did. The women wore pants. They listened to music I didn't," she wrote in her book, Becoming Free Indeed. "So much of their lifestyle and decisions didn't line up with how I thought Christians ought to live."

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