Jesus' View of Marriage

St. Mary Roman Catholic Church

New Britain, Connecticut

flower

It’s a man’s world. The male sex has always had an unfair advantage over the female. Sometimes Christian teaching has been misapplied to reinforce that unfair advantage. But it’s also a historical fact that no group, no person, no organization has done more for women’s rights than the Church. The first battle the Church ever fought for woman was survival. In the dark ages when barbarian tribes roamed the land, female babies were killed or thrown away. Enough females were kept for breeding, but the rest were disgarded. Only male babies were prized, because the males would be the warriors. But when Christianity became the law of the land in the Roman Empire, then that barbarous practice was done away with. A second battle was education. It was the custom to educate men, but not women. At the church’s insistence, women were sent to school and taught to read and write. A big step forward. A third battle was monogamy. One man with one woman in a permanent marriage that lasts until death. Aside from Christianity men had no incentive or reason to limit themselves to one woman when more than one were available as wives or concubines. It’s because of Christianity that monogamy replaced polygamy. The roots of the Christian teaching on marriage woman are found in today’s first reading from the book of Genesis. We read : "So the Lord God cast a deep sleep on the man, and while he was asleep he took out one of the ribs and closed its place with flesh. The Lord God then built up into a woman the rib that he had taken from man."

So the Bible teaches woman was made from the rib of man. No. That’s what the Bible says, but it’s not what the Bible teaches. The Genesis creation story is a poem. Poetry. If we were able to read it in Hebrew it would be clear that it is a poem. But unfortunately we read it in its English translation and it seems like history to us. But it’s not meant to be history, or science, or philosophy or theology. It’s a religious poem, meant to teach a religious truth. And a poem makes its point by means of imagery and symbols. What is Adam’s rib a symbol for?

Equality. Woman is not made from the man’s feet. She is not less than him, or under him. She is not made from man’s head. She is not over him, more than he is. She is made from his rib to show that she is to walk side by side with him through life, as an equal partner.

Why did God create woman in the first place? Lets backup. "I will make a suitable partner for him." Suitable partner. Some translations say "helpmate." God’s intention is to take care of man’s loneliness, give him somebody he can relate to. A suitable partner.

So what happens next? "So the Lord God formed out of the ground various wild animals and various birds of the air, and he brought them to the man to see what he would call them. Whatever the man called each of them that would be its name. The man gave names to all the cattle, all the birds of the air, and all the wild animals; but none proved to be a suitable partner for the man."

Then comes the quotation we read first: the deep sleep, the rib, the woman. God make the woman out of the very substance that man is so that he’ll have somebody on his level.

And man’s reaction shows he recognizes this: "When God brought her to the man, the man said, This one, at last, is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. (At last, thank God I don’t have another animal.) This one will be called woman for out of her man she has been taken.) Adam is not a name. Adam simply means ‘the man’ and Eve is not a name either. Eve simply means "from the man" in Hebrew, or another way to say it would be "also human", "of the same substance", "of the same nature", as the man. Finally the man has a suitable partner, a cure for his loneliness.

The reading concludes: "That is why a man leaves father and mother, and clings to his wife, and the two become one body." What’s the reason why? Because the man recognizes in her his equal, a suitable partner, someone he can share his life with.

This is the verse Jesus quotes in today’s Gospel when the Pharisees ask him about divorce. Notice please how the Pharisees phrase the question: "Was it permissible for a husband to divorce his wife?" According to the law of Moses, it was. A husband could divorce his wife because the law regarded her as his possession, something he owned.

A wife however could not divorce her husband. A table doesn’t get rid of its owner. Jesus does not say, "From now on a woman has the same right. The wife can divorce the husband just as the husband can divorce the wife." That would have shocked them and surprised them to some degree. But what he does say is so unexpected it leaves them with no words in their mouths.

He tells them, "Never mind Moses. Lets go back further, to God. To God’s plan at the beginning when he made man and woman, to what God had in mind. What God had in mind was a permanent union when he gave man and woman to each other. He did not give the woman to the man as an animal or as a possession, but as another self, a suitable partner for him for always.

"At the beginning of creation God made them male and female". They are both human beings, persons, not animals that can be treated as pets, not things or possession, but persons.

"For this reason a man shall leave father and mother, and the two shall become as one." They are one, first of all, in the act of love. That act unites them permanently because in the act of making love, he is surrendering himself to her, and she is surrendering herself to him, the act of love implies a commitment, it is a way of saying that now the two of them belong to each other. By giving their bodies, they’re giving their whole selves, they’re committing their lives to each other.

Jesus concludes "Therefore they are no longer two, but one flesh." After that surrender of themselves in the act of making love, they’re not two separate individuals anymore. They belong together. "So what God has united, man must not divide." Divorce goes against God’s plan. Divorce goes against human nature, against what man and woman are, against their dignity and worth as persons. It goes against the unity that exists between them, the commitment, the mutual surrender, the permanent love. Divorce makes each one unimportant, disregardable. That’s why Jesus is against it. He believes in a permanent marriage where husband and wife are faithful to each other. Divorce says that they are throw away items of no real value. But a faithful love says they are precious and irreplaceable. That’s how man and woman are to love one another.

Top

[ Home ] [ Up ] [ Weekly Bulletin ] [ News ] [ Gospel ] [ Prayer ] [ Sacrament ] [ Religious education ] [ Gallery ]