Die Huwelik in Samelewingskonteks

Abstract

Although history teaches us that marriage (and the nuclear family) constantly experienced changes, this observation does not mean that the underlying structural principle of marriage changed. A brief overview is given of conceptions regarding the place of marriage (and the nuclear family) within society, from ancient Greece, the medieval era, early modern Humanism (contract theories) up to the period of Romanticism (by the end of the 18th century). Even in spite of the changing form of marriage in the Bible – from the Old Testament to the New Testament – the basic appeal to monogamy (one husband and wife for life) never disappeared. Rather we should follow the thrust of what Christ claimed in his discussion with the Pharisees who mentioned that Moses handed out a letter of divorce – to which Christ responded that this practice was the result of sin, for “from the beginning” it was not so. In other words, Christ made an appeal to the creational principle for marriage. Although every human person can fulfill diverse social roles within human society, no single one of them can ever exhaust human life. Furthermore, the basic equality of human beings precede every societal context such that neither the position of men nor that of women within society can be deduced from any particular role within marriage or any other social collectivity. The distinction between marriage and the nuclear family receives attention, as well as the implications of an acknowledgement of the principle of sphere-sovereignty for an understanding of the position of marriage within a differentiated society. The many-sidedness of marital life as well as the nuclear family serves as a further elaboration of a biblically informed theoretical view on marriage and its place within human society.