Does the Bible really say that? Excerpt from my book, 16

5 Must marriage ceremonies be conducted in church?
Most churches treat the marriage ceremony as a sacrament. That is, they believe, and act, as if the marriage ceremony should be religious, as well as secular, and can be specially blessed by God. Many persons desire to be married in a church ceremony. I have read that even in Japan, where most people never attend a Christian church of any type, many of them choose to be married in a church.

The marriage ceremony, in the Bible, was not an especially religious event.

In this chapter, I’m going to point out things that the Bible doesn’t say. There are detailed instructions to the priests, in Leviticus and elsewhere, as to how to prepare and offer sacrifices, how to deal with mold in houses, how to decide if a woman has committed adultery or not, what to do if someone claims to be healed from leprosy, and other matters. But there’s not a single instruction about how to perform a marriage ceremony. Jesus attended a marriage ceremony, but He seems to have attended as a guest, probably as a friend of the family. There is no suggestion that a priest or rabbi performed that, or any other marriage ceremony, in the New Testament. Paul has some instructions as to how to act toward a spouse, and suggestions as to whether or not to get married, but no instructions as to how to perform a marriage ceremony.

In New Testament times, there is no biblical evidence that marriage ceremonies were integrated with the worship of the congregation, and there is no such evidence in the Old Testament, either. Marriage ceremonies were a secular, social, civil event. So how did the marriage ceremony become a sacrament? I’m not sure. But my point remains. If God wanted it to be part of worshiping Him, the Israelites, and the early Christians, didn’t know it, and apparently didn’t expect it. It’s a later development.
The above is an excerpt from my recently published e-book, Does the Bible Really Say That?, which may be obtained free of charge, or purchased from Amazon for $0.99, which is the lowest price Amazon lets an author set. Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, public domain.

The previous post in this series is here. God willing, the next excerpt will conclude the discussion of this topic.

Thanks for reading!

Marriage ceremonies not religious in Bible times: musings

In a recent post, I concluded that marriage ceremonies, in Bible times, were not religious in nature, but were civil, social, and secular. (I also indicated that God is interested, deeply interested, in marriage!)

So what? What might happen if we went back to the way they did things in the Bible? Should we? Let me muse about this matter.

1) One disturbing trend is the number of young people who are living together, having children, but not marrying. I believe that one reason for an increase in such couples is economic. Weddings cost too much. They don't have to, of course, but they often do. So the couple decides to live together without marriage. Years ago, in the church I attend, a couple got married after the morning service. The pastor just said, to the congregation, something like, "You are dismissed. However, if you wish, you can stay for the wedding of X and Y, who will be undergoing their marriage ceremony right after the service." Most of us stayed. Some people were there for the ceremony, who wouldn't have been there otherwise. The pastor performed a simple marriage ceremony, and that was it. No big reception. No invitations. No florist. No photographer. The couple are now grandparents, and are still married. I don't know if they are part of a church now. The last I knew, they were. (My wife and I eloped, also getting married without any of the expensive trappings.)

(However, it seems that marriage ceremonies in Israel were also expensive, or at least often were, perhaps lasting several days, and requiring an abundance of food, and other preparations. See here for an article on marriage ceremonies in Bible times.)

I suggest that church wedding ceremonies should be short and simple. That way, people who want to marry and live together could do so, with the blessing of a church, without burdensome expense for the parents and themselves. Anyone who wants to could have a big party, with catered food, flowers, music, and photographer, but let that be separate from the church ceremony.

2) Consider how little time is spent on the religious part of getting married, compared to all the rest of it, in a "church wedding." The actual ceremony, conducted by a minister, is often considerably shorter than the time the guests have to wait for the family photographs to be taken. Throw in the showers, the rehearsal party, the reception, and other events, and the formal wedding ceremony, itself, becomes insignificant -- a minor appendage on a big event.

3) Churches, or pastors, or parents, often seem to hope that, if an unchurched couple is married in church, they will decide to become part of that church body. Perhaps that happens once in a while. I don't think it happens very often. In some respects, having an explicitly Christian ceremony for non-Christians seems like hypocrisy. On balance, wouldn't it better for churches and pastors to not encourage non-churched couples to get married in church, but rather to discourage it?

C. S. Lewis (who had never been married at the time) said this:

If people do not believe in permanent marriage, it is perhaps better that they should live together unmarried than that they should make vows they do not mean to keep. It is true that by living together without marriage they will be guilty (in Christian eyes) of fornication. But one fault is not mended by adding another: unchastity is not improved by adding perjury.

and this:
A great many people seem to think that if you are a Christian yourself you should try to make divorce difficult for every one. I do not think that. At least I know I should be very angry if the Mohammedans tried to prevent the rest of us from drinking wine. My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognise that the majority of the British people are not Christians and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives. There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the Church with rules enforced by her on her own members. The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not. both quotes from "Christian Marriage," pp. 96-103, in Mere Christianity. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996. Orig. published by Macmillan, apparently in 1952) Quotes are from p. 98

Thanks for reading.

Was marriage religious in New Testament times?

Most churches treat the marriage ceremony as a sacrament. That is, the marriage ceremony should be religious, as well as secular, and can be specially blessed by God.* Many persons desire to be married in a church ceremony. I have read, somewhere, that even in Japan, where most people never attend a Christian church of any type, many of them are choosing to be married in a church. I suppose that there is a fair proportion of homosexual couples who wish to be married in a church.

*disclaimer - my wife and I eloped, and were married in a civil ceremony. That's not why I'm writing this. Both of our daughters were married in a church setting, and we were happy that that was true.

The marriage ceremony, in the Bible, was not an especially religious event. I'm not good enough at church history, or at the history of the Israelite people, to know answers to some questions that I'd like to have answers for. So I'll stick with what I think Bible says.

Well, not really. I'll start with what it doesn't say. There are detailed instructions to the priests, in Leviticus and elsewhere, as to how to prepare and offer sacrifices, how to deal with mold in houses, how to decide if a woman has committed adultery or not, what to do if someone claims to be healed from leprosy, and other matters. But there's not a single instruction about how to perform a marriage ceremony. Jesus attended a marriage ceremony, but there is no suggestion that he attended in any other capacity than as a guest, presumably a friend of the family. Nor is there any suggestion that a priest or rabbi performed that, or any other marriage ceremony, in the New Testament. Paul has some instructions as to how to act toward a spouse, and suggestions as to whether or not to get married, but no instructions as to how to perform a marriage ceremony.

In New Testament times, there is no biblical evidence that marriage ceremonies were specially integrated with the worship of the congregation, and there is no such evidence in the Old Testament, either. Marriage ceremonies were a secular, social, civil event. So how did the marriage ceremony become a sacrament? I'm not sure. But my point remains. If God wanted it to be part of worshiping Him, the Israelites, and the early Christians, didn't know it, and apparently didn't expect it. It's a later development.

Does this mean that God is not interested in marriage? By no means. The Bible, from one end to the other, has a great deal about the marriage relationship. God spoke to Adam and Eve about this, early in Genesis, and Christ is presented as the groom of the church in Revelation. Christ reiterated what Adam and Eve were told. As mentioned above, Paul wrote about the marriage relationship, and how it ought to work. There is a whole book of the Bible which seems to be about matrimonial love.

In a later post, I'll try to consider some possible implications of the idea that maybe the marriage ceremony shouldn't, or at least shouldn't always, be connected with a congregational act of worship.

Thanks for reading.

See here for a related post, at a later date.