Let's Talk About "Traditional Marriage"

 

Let's Talk About "Traditional Marriage"

                    It is PRIDE MONTH. That means, among other things, that pundits like Ben Shapiro will seek to inform all the rest of us that even tolerating, let alone celebrating, a person being gay or trans, or acknowledging marital rights of persons in this community, is certain evidence that civilization is collapsing. Here is a recent Twitter post from Mr. Shapiro.

Any society that isn't normatively based on heterosexual family formation is definitionally doomed to collapse. Pretending that society ought to be apathetic about such matters -- or even worse, condemnatory of the presence of traditional norms -- is civilizationally suicidal.

                In other words, if Target sells Pride merchandise, Target is, as a corporation, somehow condemning the traditional norm of heterosexual marriage. It is no accident that Mr. Shapiro is a favorite of conservative, Evangelical Christians. That is because "God's design for marriage" is thought to be deeply rooted in Judeo-Christian teaching and scripture.

                I grew up Evangelical. I have read all of the Protestant Bible in several versions. I memorized scripture. I went to a small Bible College for one year. I was baptized. I went to camp. I dated a Christian girl and married her (we are still married). I am certainly a proponent of lifelong heterosexual marriage. I am a proponent of a marriage that features love, companionship, family togetherness, pooling of financial resources, and sharing of good times and bad times. I am in favor of asking forgiveness and giving forgiveness. I would also acknowledge that having an accepted institution of monogamous same-sex marriage is a stabilizing factor for society at large. However, the fact that one of our children is gay, and came out to us while in high school, made us realize personally and first-hand the depth of the church's discrimination against those who do not fit the traditional norms.

                Claiming that some people are "condemnatory" of "traditional norms" is an exercise in projection. I do happen to know many members of the LGBTQ+ community. I can honestly say that I have never met one who "condemns" heterosexual marriage. On the other hand, I have met plenty of people who condemn any marriage or union relationship that does not fit within the so-called traditional framework.

                Marriage, A History: How Love Conquered Marriage (2005) by Stephanie Coontz has a lot to say about so-called traditional marriage, or the "traditional norm" that is supposed to be under attack. Ms. Coontz constructs a history of how the norm of marriage has been under steady change for the history of humanity. Marriage for love, according to Coontz, is a fairly recent and Western innovation, only a few centuries old. Marriage has been used for many other purposes. Marriage has not, and in some cultures still is not, a matter of choice. Arranged marriage still exists and certainly existed in Western cultures not long ago. Marriage to unite business interests was, and still may be, not uncommon. Coontz herself does not condemn traditional norms. She simply instructs us to examine the norms to see if they are what we think they are.

                And one could say that marriage for love is not necessarily all it is cracked up to be. In our own society, divorce rates provide evidence that at least some people quit loving one another. Most of these people are heterosexual. In fact, divorce rates have fallen over recent years, as have marriage rates. But people still continue to get divorced. Christy Bieber tells us, in this 2023 piece in Forbes, that divorce continues to be quite common. That a lot of people are in bad marriages is evident. But if "lack of commitment" is a primary reason for getting divorced, is that not evidence that a large number of married heterosexual persons in our society are part of the tearing apart the norm?

                It is impossible to live in our society and not have friends and loved ones who have been married and divorced at least once. We really do not make a big deal of it, nor should we. Many people need to get divorced because they are in danger or their lives are simply awful. But the fact of divorce tells us that the gay couple living next door flying a PRIDE flag did not cause divorce in heterosexual marriages. The two heterosexual partners bear at least some responsibility for their own marriage.

                But. Those of us who "grew up saved" might have experienced a different reality. Divorce was, in fact, condemned, at least until it wasn't. A lot of us grew up under pastors who told us that marriage between one man and one woman for life is "God's design" and violation of that design, except for very specific circumstances (infidelity, violent abuse) was a sin. But, of course, if a person got divorced, they could go speak to the pastor or the elders. Perhaps they could confess their sin in front of the congregation. God forgives, but please do not get married again. Instead, live your life as an example of someone who has suffered the consequences of disobedience. Stay celibate. And all of that philosophy, which one will seldom find on display in today's megachurches, is supposedly based on the scriptures.

                Today's megachurches, complete with the Christian pop-rock music imported from some church in Australia, the casually-dressed pastors with attractive wives, the Power Point presentations and the other trappings, well, they are not going to apply the same condemnation to the divorced that the pastors of my childhood did. Why? Simply put, too many people get divorced. If you are going to go about condemning heterosexual divorce, then you are not going to fill the chairs in the multipurpose room. But whether it is the more restrictive environment of my youth, or the free-flowing hipness of a megachurch, one area of agreement is that the scriptures tell us how to live, and we should obey them. But, in both instances, parts of the scriptures that are difficult to handle are routinely ignored or explained away.

                The main verse that is used to justify the idea that marriage is between one man and one woman for life is this one: " He (Jesus) said, ‘That’s why a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife. The two will become one'" (Matthew 19:5). Jesus is quoting Genesis 2:24 here. This passage is repeated at least four times in the Bible: In Genesis in the Old Testament and in Matthew, Mark and Ephesians in the New Testament. And in the New Testament, Paul says that the qualification for the church office of deacon should have but one wife (I Timothy 3:12).

                To note that it was becoming more practical in the time of Jesus for a person to not practice multiple marriage does not make it God's design, it just makes it a good idea. Because if Christians accept the Old Testament, then they have to accept that the Old Testament seems to set up marriage as a multiple spouse institution, with the decision on who to take as a spouse being a decision that only men could make. A few passages might illuminate this.

                The Beginning. If one is to accept the story of creation from Genesis, one learns that Cain, son of Adam and Eve, who famously killed his brother in a jealous rage, married a woman (from somewhere) and she bore him a son. A few generations hence, Cain's descendants started having multiple wives. Some of the sons of both Adam (Adam had more children) and Cain and their descendants had multiple wives, and some did not. Either way, there was no condemnation of the practice. This continued throughout the Old Testament. Many of the notables of the Old Testament had multiple wives, many did not.

                But there is a problem with the Old Testament for Christians, and it is this: Christians sometimes accept its precepts, but only sometimes.  For anyone who grew up in the Evangelical church, you know phrases like "that is not in the current dispensation" or "that is not for today." If restrictions on eating shellfish as prescribed in Leviticus 11 seem irrelevant, you simply say "that is not for today." Or you quote Peter's vision in Acts 12 where God commands him to eat unclean animals as a sign that Peter is supposed to reach out to gentiles with the gospel. More often than not, however, Christians engage in a lot of cherry-picking. On any given Sunday, you can hear sermons based on Old Testament passages. But not the ones that are uncomfortable. 

                Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. These are "the Patriarchs" in the Jewish and Christian tradition. Abraham (also known as Abram) famously had two sons in his old age. The first was named Ishmael and was the product of Abraham's relationship with his wife Sarah's handmaiden, Hagar. By tradition, Ismael is father of the Arabs. The son of promise was Isaac, Abraham's son with Sarah (also known as Sarai). Sarah was a bit angry that Hagar had borne a son and she kicked Hagar out. However, an angel of the Lord appeared to Hagar in Genesis 16 and tells her that her son would be father of a great nation. But the Lord also told Abraham that Isaac would be father of a great nation. In either case, there was no condemnation, but perhaps some long-term consequences for the two branches of the family tree.

                Isaac and Ishmael are the most prominent offspring of Abraham, but there are many more, and many were born of "concubines" (the term used in Genesis). Abraham was, indeed, the father of many nations. Growing up in Sunday School, the two we mostly heard of were Isaac and Ishmael. Isaac had one wife--Rebekah, mother of Jacob and Esau. Jacob and Esau are the famous twins. Esau, the firstborn, was Isaac's favorite while Jacob was Rebekah's. The story in Genesis is of Rebekah and Jacob conspiring to make an aging and nearly blind Isaac bestow his patriarchal blessing on Jacob. The outcome of that is that Jacob becomes the father of the twelve tribes of Israel (the name God gave him).

                This is where is gets interesting. Jacob initially had two wives who were sisters. He fell in love with Rachel, but Laban, the father of Rachel, deceived Jacob into sleeping with sister Leah. Leah became mother of six of the twelve. Rachel, who as the story goes, was "barren," was eventually able to give birth to the two youngest of the twelve. Two more of the twelve were mothered by Bilhah, who was Rachel's servant (or "handmaiden"). Two were born of Zilpah, who was Leah's handmaiden. The Handmaid's Tale is, of course, a literary allusion to the fate of Bilhah and Zilpah, who really had no choice in the matter of being impregnated by Jacob/Israel. They bore children on behalf of their masters.

                Next to the Patriarchs, another set of notables in the Old Testament are the Kings of Israel, and in particular Saul, David, and Solomon. Saul had a wife and a concubine, both of whom bore children (I and II Samuel). David had several wives. Of course, David's most famous liaison was with Bathsheba, a woman married to someone else at the time. However, if you read the account in the two books of Samuel as well as in the Chronicles, you learn David had eight wives and at least 18 children.

             The story of David and Bathsheba is in II Samuel chapter 12. David impregnated Bathsheba while her husband was out soldiering, fighting David's wars. Later, David sent him to the front in hopes that he would be killed. But here is a little bit of the Biblical account that is misunderstood. The prophet Nathan came to David and condemned him for his adultery. That is what we learned in Sunday School. But the words of Nathan reveal another story:

"The LORD sent Nathan to David. When he came to him, he said, "There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had bought. He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children. It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to him. "Now a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who had come to him. Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him." David burned with anger against the man and said to Nathan, "As surely as the LORD lives, the man who did this deserves to die! He must pay for that lamb four times over, because he did such a thing and had no pity." Then Nathan said to David, "You are the man! This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: `I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master's house to you, and your master's wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more."

                Why did Nathan the prophet condemn David? Because David, a King appointed by Jehovah to rule Israel, essentially had everything he needed. He was the richest man in the land. He could take any wife he wanted, and routinely did so. But he took the wife of a poor man who could afford to have only one wife. He committed adultery, but he had already had several wives, and was not condemned for that. The real sin that Nathan pointed out was that he treated the poor man unjustly. He coveted -- he wanted more than he already had, and what he already had was a lot. In his greed, he took from the man who had only one wife.

                Christian commentators are quick to point out that David paid for his sins. If you read the Biblical account, you know that David's extended family was a mess. His son Solomon (son of Bathsheba), who became king, was a womanizer who had, according to II Kings, at least 700 wives and 300 concubines. David's son Absalom tried to assassinate David. And there is more trouble. Actually, the history of David's family reads a lot like the history of royal families in many cultures throughout history. But was all of this the consequence for him defying "God's design for marriage?" What we know is that in Jewish and Christian tradition, David and Solomon hold exalted positions as men who sought God. Their multiple marriages seem to pale in comparison to their reputation as Men of God. 

                Then there is "the law." Not simply the Ten Commandments, but the entire Levitical law. Christians routinely ignore much of the Levitical law,  unless they find things that help them make their arguments. Many a pastor has quoted Leviticus 18:22, which reads "Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable." (For what it is worth, Leviticus 18 also proscribes incest and bestiality, sexual practices that are forbidden in many cultures). Some pastors, from the pulpit, jump ahead to Leviticus 20, where the punishment for a man lying with a man is stoning to death. Some pastors get downright giddy about that prospect. 

                Of course, there are other offenses in Leviticus for which capital punishment is offered as the punishment. These include:

                A man having sex with his father's wife.

                A man having sex with his neighbor's wife (kind of what David did).

                A man cursing his mother or father.     

                A person being a medium. 

                Another passage of the law that many Christians would rather ignore is in Deuteronomy chapter 22. Why? Because if you read this literally, you will learn that if a betrothed woman is raped within the confines of a city or other populated area, and she fails to cry out or scream, both she and the man who raped her should be put to death. You can also read in this chapter that if a man rapes a woman who is not betrothed, and they are caught, then the man pays a monetary fine to her father and marries her. Deuteronomy 22 is an interesting read on other aspects of sexual relations and marriage between men and women. None of the chapter has much to do with the traditional idea of meeting the love of your life and getting married. My guess is that most Christian parents would not use this as the guide to love and marriage when talking to their children. 

                Back to how Christians treat the Old Testament. They quote Proverbs, but probably do not think that Solomon, the person who wrote those Proverbs, is a role model of how a powerful man should treat women, so they do not talk about that. They like that Jehovah condemns homosexuality, but they probably do not want their daughter's rapist to simply pay them off with 50 shekels of silver and then marry her for life. 

                Here is what I am NOT saying. I am NOT saying don't read the Bible. In fact, the Bible has a lot of interesting and important things to say to us. One of the problems with our society is that those who reject the claims of Christians do so in a belittling, and frankly, smartass way. Making fun of Christians by saying stuff on Twitter like "I don't believe in your magical fairy in the sky and I won't read your book of fairy tales" does not convince anyone. And if you are going to look for absolute consistency in everything you read, your reading list is going to be short. 

                My complaint is with the kind of Christianity that condemns others, while failing to engage in any kind of self-examination. It is almost as if some Christians have never read the Sermon on the Mount, or the parable of the Good Samaritan, or the parable of the two men praying in the temple, or the reference to rich men finding it difficult to come into the Kingdom of Heaven.  And when it comes to marriage, Christians are quick to point out those passages of scripture that prescribe lifelong monogamous marriage, but frankly ignore those passages that seem to indicate acceptance of polygamous marriage. The reason is that those passages are uncomfortable and need to be explained away. But those passages are in the same Bible that they quote. 

                So back to Mr. Shapiro's argument. He says that members of the LGBTQ+ community and their allies are "condemnatory of the presence of traditional norms." In fact, it would be hard to find a concerted effort by any group in that community to destroy traditional marriage. Is anyone, in any state, proposing laws that disqualify traditional marriage? No. The fact is that heterosexual couples do a good job of messing up their own marriages without any help from people waving rainbow flags. Acknowledging the personhood of persons who are not just like you is not going to destroy the sanctity of anyone's marriage. And acknowledging the personhood of persons who are not just like you is not going to destroy civilization.