Holy Matrimony - Teklil #

The Correct Understand on what is Marriage #

The love that exists between a man and a woman is an important theme in many books of the Sacred Scripture. The Book of Genesis, in particular, tells us of holy and pious couples, such as Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Rachel. A special blessing, bestowed on these couples by the Lord Almighty, was made manifest in the multiplication of their descendants. Love is praised in the Song of Songs, a book which, in spite of all allegorical and mystical interpretations in patristic tradition, does not lose its literal meaning.

The very attitude of Almighty God to the people of Israel is compared in the Old Testament with that of a husband to his wife. This imagery is developed to such an extent that unfaithfulness to God and idolatry are paralleled with adultery and prostitution. When the Holy Apostle St. Paul speaks about marital love as the reflection of the love which exists between Christ Jesus and the Church (Eph. 5:20-33), he develops the same imagery.

The Mystery of Marriage was established by Almighty God in Paradise. Having created Adam and Eve, God said to them: ‘Be fruitful and multiply' (Gen.1:28). This multiplication of the human race was to be achieved through marriage: ‘Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh' (Gen.2:24). Marital union is therefore not a consequence of the Fall but something inherent to the very nature of human beings. The Mystery of Marriage was further blessed by the Incarnate Lord when He changed water into wine at the wedding in Cana of Galilee. ‘We state', St Cyril of Alexandria writes, ‘that He (Christ) blessed marriage in accordance with the economy (oikonomia) by which He became man and went… to the wedding in Cana of Galilee'.

There are two misunderstandings about Marriage which should be rejected in Orthodox dogmatic theology. One is that Marriage exists for the sole purpose of procreation. What, then, is the meaning of Marriage for those couples who have no children? Are they advised to divorce and remarry…God forbid! Even in the case of those who have children: are they actually supposed to have relations once a year for the sole purpose of ‘procreation'? This has never been a teaching of the Holy Tewahedo Church. On the contrary, according to our holy father, St John Chrysostom, among the two reasons for which Marriage was instituted, namely ‘to bring man to be content with one woman and to have children', it is the first reason which is the most important: ‘as for procreation, it is not required absolutely by Marriage…' In fact, in the Orthodox Tewahedo understanding, the goal of Marriage is that man and woman should become one, in the image of the Holy Trinity, Whose three Persons are essentially united in love. To quote St. John Chrysostom again, ‘when husband and wife are united in Marriage, they are no longer seen as something earthly, but as the image of God Himself'. The mutual love of the two partners in the Mystery of Marriage becomes life-giving and creative when a child is born as its fruit. Every human being is therefore to be a fruit of love, and everyone’s birth is a result of love between his parents.

Another misunderstanding about Marriage is that it should be regarded as a ‘concession' to human ‘infirmity': it is better to be married than to commit adultery (this understanding is based on a wrong interpretation of 1 Cor.7:2-9). Some early Christian heretical groups (such as Montanism and Manicheanism) held the view that sexuality in general is something that is unclean and evil, while virginity is the only proper state for Christians. The Orthodox Tewahedo tradition opposed this distortion of Christian asceticism and morality very strongly.

In the Orthodox Tewahedo Church, there is no understanding of sexual union as something unclean or unholy. This becomes clear when one reads the following prayers from the Orthodox rite of Marriage: ‘Bless their marriage, and vouchsafe unto these Thy servants… chastity, mutual love in the bond of peace… Preserve their bed unassailed… Cause their marriage to be honorable. Preserve their bed blameless. Mercifully grant that they may live together in purity…' Sexual life is therefore considered compatible with ‘purity' and ‘chastity', the latter being, of course, not an abstinence from intercourse but rather a sexual life that is liberated from what became its characteristic after the fall of Adam. The mutual love of man and woman in Marriage becomes less and less dependent on sexual life and develops into a deep unity and union which integrates the whole of the human person: the two must become not only ‘one flesh', but also one soul and one spirit. In Orthodox Tewahedo Christian Marriage, it is not selfish ‘pleasure' or search for ‘fun' which is the main driving force: it is rather a quest for mutual sacrifice, for readiness to take the partner’s cross as one’s own, to share one’s whole life with one’s partner. The ultimate goal of Marriage is the same as that of every other Mystery - Sacrament, deification of the human nature and union with Christ Jesus. This becomes possible only when Marriage itself is transfigured and deified.

In the Mystery of Marriage, the human person is transfigured; he/she overcomes his/her loneliness and egocentricism; his/her personality is completed and perfected. In this light Abba Alexander, a notable contemporary Orthodox Priest and theologian, describes Marriage in terms of ‘initiation' and ‘mystery', in which ‘a full transformation of the human person' takes place, ‘the enlargement of his/her personality, new eyes, new perception of life, birth into the world, by means of it, in new fullness'. In the marital union of two individuals there is both the completion of their personalities and the appearance of the fruit of their love, a child, who makes their dyad into a triad: ‘…An integral knowledge of another person is possible in Marriage, a miracle of sensation, intimacy, of the vision of another person… Before the Sacrament of Marriage, the human person glides above life, seeing it from outside. Only in a Sacramental Marriage is he/she fully immersed into it, and enters it through another person. This enjoyment of true knowledge and true life gives us that feeling of complete fulness and satisfaction which renders us richer and wiser. And this fulness is even deepened when out of the two of us, united and reconciled, a third appears, our child'.

Christ is the One Who is present at every Orthodox Tewaheo Christian Marriage and Who conducts the Marriage rite in the Church: the Bishop or Priest’s role is not even to represent, but rather to present Christ Jesus and to reveal His presence, as it is also in other Mysteries - Sacraments. The story of the wedding in Cana of Galilee is read at the Christian Marriage ceremony in order to show that Marriage is the miracle of the transformation of water into wine, that is, of daily routine into an unceasing and everyday feast, a perpetual celebration of the love of one person for the other.