Marriage and the God of life

a reply to: ChesterJohn
That sounds like a very good example of partnership.

a reply to: DISRAELI
I wouldn't want anyone to think though that we don't have our problems or issues. Like all couples we do. I have learned over the years to heed my wife in certain matters and have been blessed because of it.

I don't oppress her in any way. She knows her Bible and knows what it says about her place and she respects Gods word in that.

I think what some are so ignorant about women speaking in church is the historical context of Paul's writing to Corinth on that issue. At that time women were interrupting asking questions which led to the proclamation of God's words being hindered. The instruction in context is for them to ask their husbands at home if they have any questions over what was brought forth by the man of God speaking that day.

And the instruction to Timothy for a woman not to teach over men in a church is as Paul noted, Eve was the one who was deceived of the devil. Tells us that they can be easily swayed in tuff issues and go against God's word and lead others to do the same. I don't really think that has changed much since then seeing women are still women.

Again the glory for our marriage goes to God as he is the one who guided and led to our union.

a reply to: DISRAELI

In other words, Darwinism now agrees with the Bible that an institution of the "marriage" type is important for the sake of the children.

The Bible isn't a history book. It's incorrect to assume that Adam and Eve were the first married couple, or that marriage itself stems from some spiritual ritual imitating god's relationship with mankind. Marriage practices are borne from practicality.

Anthropologists will tell you that, in early Paleolithic communities, the children were raised by the community, usually consisting of extended family. Biological parenthood wasn't as big of an issue, as men were often gone for extended periods of time, hunting or fighting or sowing their seed abroad. And, probably too often, they never returned. There were lot's of "unwed" mothers in those days! LOL

"It takes a village" to properly raise children, then and now.

No. Tikbalang is right, after we emerged from our caves, marriage was a matter of status, and more common among the "elite", or the leaders of the clans. In those early community, structured marriages were always political/business arrangements, made with other clans to form alliances and to solidify friendship, trade and protection. The common nuclear family lifestyle, is a luxury that came much, much later, in mankind's development of society and civilization.

originally posted by: windword
The Bible isn't a history book. It's incorrect to assume that Adam and Eve were the first married couple, or that marriage itself stems from some spiritual ritual imitating god's relationship with mankind. Marriage practices are borne from practicality.

My argument doesn't involve assuming an historic Adam and Eve.
I agree that marriage practices are born from practicality. The thesis of the OP is that the Biblical God is recommending them precisely because they are the most effective way of doing the job, with particular reference to the upbringing of children.
So I was not suggesting that the ritual was imitating God's relation with his people. If anything, my suggestion was the other way round. I meant that the marriage relationship was so important that it could be used as a metaphor about the relation between God and his people, and its use as a metaphor was illustrating its importance.

As for the class angle, I repeat the observation I made to Tikbalang, that laws about marriage covering the marriages even of ordinary people exist in other ancient cultures.

a reply to: DISRAELI

So I was not suggesting that the ritual was imitating God's relation with his people. If anything,my suggestion was the other way round. I meant that the marriage relationship was so important that it could be used as a metaphor about the relation between God and his people, and its use as a metaphor was illustrating its importance.

You don't have to make that suggestion, the Bible does it for you.

As for the class angle, I repeat the observation I made to Tikbalang, that laws about marriage covering the marriages even of ordinary people exist in other ancient cultures.

Not until tens of thousands of years later! The nuclear family that you're talking about is a social luxury that has only recently been realized in the history of mankind. The first marriages were not about the prudence of raising children. They were about the prudence of alliances.

All this time, we thought conservatives were the ones pining for the past. Turns out we didn’t look back far enough in time. The stone age, when sex came easy and all were equal, may just have been the halcyon era of liberalism.

Men and women in these hunter-gatherer tribes were the most equal they have ever been. Rich and poor were pretty equal too. With no property, there was no question of feeling hard done by when you failed to keep up with the Paleolithic Joneses…. people frittered away their time on three pleasures that the modern age does not encourage: chatting, playing with children and having sex with more than one person.
dailysignal.com...

originally posted by: windword
Not until tens of thousands of years later! The nuclear family that you're talking about is a social luxury that has only recently been realized in the history of mankind.

So the development of the nuclear famiy was an example of progress, and its abandonment must be a case of retrogression.
If the family system has been a more effective way of transmitting human culture, through the successive generations of children, then the possible effect of abandoning it might be the downgrading of human culture.
We may be finding out a few generations further down the line.

a reply to: DISRAELI

So the development of the nuclear famiy was an example of progress, and its abandonment must be a case of retrogression.

Maybe it was just a phase, because it doesn't seem to be working anymore. Not that there aren't happy families, but most families rely on public schools and babysitters; don't work in family businesses, but for huge global corporations. Children are raised to leave the community and move to big cities.

Family dynamics seem to be evolving backwards, with there being more and more single mothers than ever in recent times, looking to "it takes a village" mentality for their family's needs. People care less about parentage, marital status and gender roles, than ever before in recent history. We seem to be more comfortable, as a species, with the Paleolithic life style of social ease and equality, then rigid family structures of division and gender roles, any more.

Mom and pop families are nice. I like mom and pop families, but their social importance in over all scheme of survival of the species isn't what you're making it out to be. There will always be mom and pop families, but the religious and rigid mom and pop models of families are a passing luxury of a constantly evolving society.

a reply to: windword

when word that is where you are wrong. The preserved word of God does have history in it. that is why when studying it we must consider the HISTORICAL Context as well as the immediate context before trying to fit it into any other context.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

If you're going to cite Darwinian ideas associated with civilizations and social customs, then you have go back further than Bible records. And no, the Bible doesn't go back to "the beginning".

a reply to: windword

If you studied the Bible you would realize there are three beginning's in the Bible. One that has to with God exalting his son at His beginning, another that has to do with the original of the earth and one that has to do with the work to make the earth habitable for mankind after a flood of heavenly proportions (Noah's Flood came later and it was confined to the earth.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

It's really simple. Don't cite Darwinian evolution, which the OP did, if you're using the Bible as a history book, which it isn't.

a reply to: windword

Though you may deny it, the Bible does have historical facts in it that are verifiable historically.

Darwinism cannot be backed up historically by the scientist who claim evolution is fact and not just a theory.

At least Historically pre-Judaism and Christianity to the present can be backed up Historically by non-biblical sources as well as Biblical sources.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

Paleolithic cultures and societies are a fact. Those facts have bearing on how and when later societies and civilizations rose. When you omit that era from human development and superimpose "Garden of Eden" and "Noah's Ark" fantasy, you lose all credibility outside of your Bible group.

a reply to: windword

though many would like to deny it, there is evidence of a world wide flood event.

the problem is we use the 24/7 time quantum in using our radiocarbon dating system. The problem is the material used to make this earth is not based on the 24/7 but eternal. Until we know how to measure eternity we will always come up with exaggerated amounts of time like millions and billions of years.

a reply to: DISRAELI

So the development of the nuclear famiy was an example of progress, and its abandonment must be a case of retrogression.
If the family system has been a more effective way of transmitting human culture, through the successive generations of children, then the possible effect of abandoning it might be the downgrading of human culture.

Have you ever thought that:
"What therefore God has joined together, don't let man tear apart." (Matt 19:6)
had any connection to:

Ezra 9:1"The people of Israel, and the priests and the Levites, have not separated themselves from the peoples of the lands,
...
2For they have taken of their daughters for themselves and for their sons, so that the holy seed have mixed themselves with the peoples of the lands.
...
Ezra 10:2Shecaniah the son of Jehiel, one of the sons of Elam, answered Ezra, "We have trespassed against our God, and have married foreign women of the peoples of the land. Yet now there is hope for Israel concerning this thing. 3Now therefore let us make a covenant with our God to put away all the wives, and such as are born of them, according to the counsel of my lord, and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God. Let it be done according to the law.
...
and they sat down in the first day of the tenth month to examine the matter. 17They made an end with all the men who had married foreign women by the first day of the first month.
...
44All these had taken foreign wives; and some of them had wives by whom they had children.

So, by whose authority were these families torn-asunder?

As far as I know, widows and fatherless children were pretty much in the same category as were foreign residents. Their portion was the gleanings left in the field. Kind of like SyroPhoenician woman saying, "the dogs under the table eat the scraps."

a reply to: ChesterJohn

Oh, okay so, after Noah's flood, all the people of the world, in Africa, the Americas, Australia, China, Europe, etal, no longer lived as hunter gatherers, living as equals and having sex with multiple partners, all of sudden, people started performing ceremonies mimicking the destroyer God's relationship with man through a ritualized marriage with a woman.

Sounds legit! Carry on with that!

a reply to: windword

What?

No, all that you have in tribes since then is what you were saying smoking and free sex has continued after the flood just as it did before.

Marriage in the form of one man and one woman is exactly how God set it up to be from the beginning as quoting Jesus himself.. Then (after the flood) under Moses it was that way for the Jews. But sinful men want more than one sex partner and want it to be without accountability and judgement.

The Destroyer is Satan not Almighty God, Jesus Christ, Saviour of the world.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

What?

It's called sarcasm.

The Bible is NOT an anthropological history book. Please don't invoke Darwinian evolution if you're going to use the Garden of Eden and Noah's Ark as reference points.

a reply to: pthena
Yes, there is a good case that Ezra made the wrong call there. People do that from time to time. Jephthah did, in different circumstances.

At the same time, I can see the motivation that was driving him. He was fearful of the possible idolatrous influence of foreign wives. That's what lies behind the Deuteronomy command which he was trying to enforce.
There is a practical issue which is responsible for many harsh penalties in the Pentateuch. Is the society going to enforce these rules or not? And if the rules are going to be enforced, how else is THAT society going to enforce them?

So Ezra had to look for the lesser of two evils, viz. breaking up existing marriages or allowing husbands to live in a state of being tempted towards other gods.
We may well think that he chose the wrong one; but we may be wrong ourselves.

originally posted by: windword
Please don't invoke Darwinian evolution if you're going to use the Garden of Eden and Noah's Ark as reference points.

True, but bear in mind that "invoking Darwinian evolution" and "using Eden as a reference point" are being done by different people here. Chester John is not doing the first, and I am not doing the second.