The great marriage debate rages on.  In the time since we went to San Francisco on 2/14/04 to get married, the religious right has been infused with new energy and a clear mission:  Stop gays and lesbians from getting married or “marriage” as an institution will be destroyed forever.  The Defense of Marriage Coalition, the Christian Coalition, and Focus on the Family have risen to power in the name of keeping their ideal of marriage as law.  They claim that the Christian god made a sacred institution between a man and a woman, starting with Adam and Eve.  But, is that what the bible says?  What is the real tradition of marriage according to the book that they’d use to hit us over the head with?

What follows is research I’ve done, taking right out of the bible.  I’ve shown how the bible records marriage, and how different those records are from the claims of modern-day zealots interested in protecting the “sanctity of marriage.”

Let’s start with the first book and the first couple, Adam and Eve.

As Genesis 2:24 claims a man and a woman cleave to one another and are faithful to each other with god’s blessing, until death do they part, when married.  Therein begins the theoretical long-standing history of marriage as we know it today.  According to Christian interpretations and claims today, God made Adam and Eve to wed as one man and one woman, and that was the first marriage.

It is important to note that the first mention of “marriage” is in Genesis chapter 34.  The term “married” doesn’t appear until Genesis chapter 38.  The first mention of the term “marry” is from Genesis chapter 19, where Lot was giving warning to his sons and their brides-to-be when Sodom and Gomorrah were to be destroyed.

However, the first mention of a “wife” shows up in the above-mentioned Genesis 2:24.

Remember that Moses, who wrote the book of Genesis, was trying to recall the history of the creation of mankind and the earth, as well as the fall to disgrace that human kind took, when he was writing the book of Genesis.  Moses was from a culture that had already established traditions of coupling between members of the opposite sex.  He infused this tradition into his description of history as he interpreted it.  Naturally, as a man raised and schooled in the household of the Pharaoh of Egypt, would try to slant his writings in the most positive manner.  Egyptian writers, when recounting histories, battles, and family lineages, often left out things that would have reflected badly on the Pharaoh or his family.  Moses, in recounting the history of creation and the “first couple”, would have presented them in the most wholesome and positive fashion for his followers and believers.

Some of the most famous characters in the bible got married.  Here is how the bible records their marriages:
Genesis 4:19-22
:

And Lamech took two wives; the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah.

Genesis 28:9:

Esau went to Ish’mael and took to wife, besides the wives he had, Ma’halath the daughter of Ish’mael Abraham’s son, the sister of Neba’ioth.

Genesis chapter 30: 25, 26

25 When Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own home and country.  26 Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, and let me go; for you know the service which I have given you.”

Genesis 36:2, 3

2 Esau took his wives from the Canaanites: Adah the daughter of Elon the Hittite, Oholiba’mah the daughter of Anah the son of Zib’eon the Hivite,  3  and Bas’emath, Ish’mael’s daughter, the sister of Neba’ioth.

Judges 8: 30, 31

30 Now Gideon had seventy sons, his own offspring, for he had many wives.  31 And his concubine who was in Shechem also bore him a son, and he called his name Abim’elech

1 Samuel 1: 1, 2

1 There was a certain man of Ramatha’im-zo’phim of the hill country of E’phraim, whose name was Elka’nah the son of Jero’ham, son of Eli’hu, son of Tohu, son of Zuph, an E’phraimite.  2 He had two wives; the name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other Penin’nah. And Penin’nah had children, but Hannah had no children.

Let’s not forget about good ol’ King David, who seemingly was blessed by God to get his wives Abigail and Ahin’o-am, then scorned by “the lord” to get his umpteenth wife Bathshe’ba (don’t get me started on why the innocent child of David and Bath-sheeba was put to death by god for the sins of his parents):

1 Samuel 25:
39 When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed be the LORD who has avenged the insult I received at the hand of Nabal, and has kept back his servant from evil; the LORD has returned the evil-doing of Nabal upon his own head.” Then David sent and wooed Ab’igail, to make her his wife.   40 And when the servants of David came to Ab’igail at Carmel, they said to her, “David has sent us to you to take you to him as his wife.”  41 And she rose and bowed with her face to the ground, and said, “Behold, your handmaid is a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord.”  42 And Ab’igail made haste and rose and mounted on an ass, and her five maidens attended her; she went after the messengers of David, and became his wife.  43 David also took Ahin’o-am of Jezreel; and both of them became his wives.

2 Samuel 5:
12:  And David perceived that the LORD had established him king over Israel, and that he had exalted his kingdom for the sake of his people Israel.  13 And David took more concubines and wives from Jerusalem, after he came from Hebron; and more sons and daughters were born to David.

2 Samuel 12:
7-14, 24:  Nathan said to David, “You are the man. Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul;  8 and I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah; and if this were too little, I would add to you as much more.  9 Why have you despised the word of the LORD, to do what is evil in his sight? You have smitten Uri’ah the Hittite with the sword, and have taken his wife to be your wife, and have slain him with the sword of the Ammonites.  10 Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me, and have taken the wife of Uri’ah the Hittite to be your wife.’  11 Thus says the LORD, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.   12 For you did it secretly; but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.’”  13 David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the LORD.” And Nathan said to David, “The LORD also has put away your sin; you shall not die.  14 Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the LORD, the child that is born to you shall die.”  24 Then David comforted his wife, Bathshe’ba, and went in to her, and lay with her; and she bore a son, and he called his name Solomon. And the LORD loved him…

The bible, when examined, clearly shows that there is a strong and “blessed” history of bigamy and incest.  Genesis 19:37 shows that Moab (father of the Moabites) and Ben-ammi (father of the Ammonites) were born by the union of Lot and his daughters when, as the story goes, Lot’s daughters got him drunk and slept with him because they feared that there were no men left in the world since Sodom and Gomorrah had been destroyed.

Regarding the treatment of wives and children, the Law of that period had very specific instructions on dealing with disobedient women and children:

Deut 21:
10-23:  10  “When you go forth to war against your enemies, and the LORD your God gives them into your hands, and you take them captive,  11 and see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you have desire for her and would take her for yourself as wife,  12 then you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall shave her head and pare her nails.  13 And she shall put off her captive’s garb, and shall remain in your house and bewail her father and her mother a full month; after that you may go in to her, and be her husband, and she shall be your wife.  14 Then, if you have no delight in her, you shall let her go where she will; but you shall not sell her for money, you shall not treat her as a slave, since you have humiliated her.
15 “If a man has two wives, the one loved and the other disliked, and they have borne him children, both the loved and the disliked, and if the first-born son is hers that is disliked,  16 then on the day when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the loved as the first-born in preference to the son of the disliked, who is the first-born,  17 but he shall acknowledge the first-born, the son of the disliked, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the first issue of his strength; the right of the first-born is his.
18 “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son, who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they chastise him, will not give heed to them,  19 then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives,  20 and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’  21 Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones; so you shall purge the evil from your midst; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.  22 “And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree,  23 his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is accursed by God; you shall not defile your land which the LORD your God gives you for an inheritance.

So, if the Mormons, the Christian Coalition and various Defense of Marriage groups have things right, the history of marriages in the bible are far different than the ideal that they’re using to measure the validity of same-sex unions.  The history of marriage in the bible is anything BUT the story of wholesome unions between A MAN AND A WOMAN.  “Family values” were far different in the bible than they are today.  Just try to stone your children for disobedience.

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