Three Iowa professors in a joint op-ed have argued the Bible doesn’t mandate one-man, one-woman marriages.
Writing in the Des Moines Register on Sunday, University of Iowa assistant professor of religious studies Robert Cargill, University of Northern Iowa associate professor of history Kenneth Atkinson, and Iowa State University professor of religious studies Hector Avalos said they wanted to clear a few things up when it comes to marriage and the Bible.
“As academic biblical scholars, we wish to clarify that the biblical texts do not support the frequent claim that marriage between one man and one woman is the only type of marriage deemed acceptable by the Bible’s authors,” they wrote.
To back up their claim they cite several parts of the Bible, including:
In 2 Samuel 12:8, the author says that it was God who gave David multiple wives: “I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom. … And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more”
In fact, there were a variety of unions and family configurations that were permissible in the cultures that produced the Bible, and these ranged from monogamy (Titus 1:6) to those where rape victims were forced to marry their rapist (Deuteronomy 22:28-29) and to those Levirate marriage commands obligating a man to marry his brother’s widow regardless of the living brother’s marital status (Deuteronomy 25:5-10; Genesis 38; Ruth 2-4). Others insisted that celibacy was the preferred option (1 Corinthians 7:8; 28). …
This is not only our modern, academic opinion. This view of the multiple definitions of “biblical” marriage has been acknowledged by some of the most prominent names in Christianity.
For example, the famed Reformationist Martin Luther wrote a letter in 1524 in which he commented on polygamy as follows: “I confess that I cannot forbid a person to marry several wives, for it does not oppose the Holy Scriptures.”
They end their piece by referencing the social implications of it all:
Accordingly, we must guard against attempting to use ancient texts to regulate modern ethics and morals, especially those ancient texts whose endorsements of other social institutions, such as slavery, would be universally condemned today, even by the most adherent of Christians.
In other words, according to these professors, don’t cite the Bible when arguing against gay marriage. They don’t say it outright, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to connect the dots.
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(H/T: Huffington Post)
IMAGE: Jonathan Linczak/Flickr
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