Talk politics.

"The facts may change but my opinions are unwavering" -Steven Colbert

The financial arrangement of marriage was generally under religious authorities.

Matchmaker matchmaker make me a match, find me a find, catch me a catch" -Fiddler on the Roof

When the dowry was paid and whatever other finances were finalized, it was religious authority that legitimized the contract. Think Napoleon and Josephine who during his coronation let it slip out to PopePius VII that his marriage to Josephine was only a civil wedding, not a church one, thereby she was only royalty by their relationship, as his wife, not by her own right. Had Napoleon a church wedding, Josephine would have been the Empress.

In other societies where there wasn't much commerce, such as American Indians, any marriages that took place were religious. I suppose it could be argued that the trading of women, or battles that stole and won women, was a transactional exchange of goods (services?) but I think that's stretching it.

From:

Nuh, uh. No, they weren't. Religion began as a civil transaction and didn't shift to a religious one until after Luther began his little happy fun show.

I'd think looking into African customs on weddings, as well as Jewish and Islamic customs might be called for. In none of those cases is marriage a religious transaction.

From:

As we learned in Fiddler on the Roof, marriage was a financial transaction, although when love interfered it was sometimes a bad/poor financial transaction. This is the way it was in the bible too, both old and new testament; a financial transaction but not always a profitable financial transaction (See the story of Jesus' parents)

Still, according to the Law of Abraham and in the Books of Moses, the authority governing marriage remains religious. Do you need biblical references?

The ten commandments is in Exodus 20. The very next chapter Ex21 deals with the treatment of slaves and wives. The authority is clear. God is making the rules, therefore religion is the authority governing this financial transaction. And therefore it is indeed a religious transaction.

From:

By that logic, isn't eating considered religious? After all, God made those rules.

From:

It is in Traditional Islam and Traditional Judaism, as well as with Hinduism. But aside from those three cultures (and with Islam and Hinduism that's a very big "aside").....not really.

(deleted comment)

From:

True, and in the case of Judaism, it's considered very important....to Traditional (that is to say, Orthodox) Jews. In more liberals sects its importance depends on the sect and individual (Reform Judaism effectively dropping Kashrut, Masorti somewhat keeping it, Reconstructionist dropping it also....)

From:

I know. Different sects of a religion are bound to view issues inherent in the religion differently. Not all Jewish people keep the eating restrictions, not all don't.

From:

Yeah. It's one of those things that at first glance looks clear-cut....then gets more and more complicated the more you delve into it.

From:

Well, I was refering specifically to Judaism, since that's where the conversation had gone. I know not all religions are as, erm, religious about their food as Abrahamic religions.

From:

Hinduism, the largest non-Abrahamic religion is very specific on the kind of meat you can eat (specifically, no beef, and vegetarianism is preferred). So....there isn't really that major of a difference....

From:

I was just trying to say some religions have eating restrictions, others don't. That's it.

(Also, a Hindi friend of mine wrote a book once, and I learned all about that :) Personally I find that belief beautiful.)

From:

I find Hinduism unappealing in some ways, it's very much a Pagan religion in that it's limited to a specific place and culture. If I were interested in Dharmic thought, I would have converted to Buddhism, as Buddhism is all-purposes, whereas Hinduism is the Nomezein Theos of the Indian peoples.

From:

underlankers is trying to convince me (us) that marriage was a financial transaction in all major religions. There is some truth to what he/she is saying, but is not the whole truth. Indeed marriage was a financial transaction. A family would receive property (land or goods, and rarely a service) in exchange for giving up their young women folk. This is almost culturally universal. The exceptions were cultures that would war into another tribe/village to steal the women. In all these exchanges the gene pool spread and thus were healthy gene pools.

What

underlankers is refusing to acknowledge is that the laws laid out under Abraham and later Moses (the source of 3 religions) is clear that there is more then just an exchange of women for property going on. The women are more then simple property. They are not to be discarded, even when they no longer serve a usefulness. They are to be cared for (loved). This is no longer a simple transaction. The old testament made it clear that marriage is a commitment. Even with a second or third wife, the first was to be cared for equally.

But still, even with such laws regarding marriage, it is not religious, until one considers the authority to which these laws are administered through. These are not man's laws, these were God's. And if you broke these laws it was God's judgement you would have to face.

These laws may have also have been the laws in your village or kingdom. But this being God's law, you would made to follow them, even if you ventured out into a villge/kingdom (like China or India) where the laws of Moses/Abraham had no relevance.

Throughout pre-history, most cultures practiced monogamy if not marriage. We know of marriage in ancient Egypt, the Inca, China, Japan, most of North America, African, etc. Marriage was business conducted generally under some religious authority.

Food? The books of Moses tell us what we can eat, what we shouldn't eat and sometimes when to eat. But I don't know that there's much of a contract going on.

From:

It is. Try looking at the Jewish or Muslim wedding documents and telling me they're "religious." God is mentioned in neither religion's documents, and marriage is a definite transaction of money and kinship that links a society together no more, and no less.

Did I say women were property? It doesn't require the hand of God to make them not-property, and to pretend otherwise is insulting to the large numbers of non-Christian societies that are attested to in the historical record.

Actually, people broke the laws on a semi-regular basis without getting smited from On High.

And LOL....evidently the customs of certain Native tribes in America and Australia and even in the Muslim world have escaped your notice. The Puritans were scandalized by the rife polygamy amongst the Algonquian tribes. African tribes are chock-full of polygamy. Japan may be somewhat different. China was like Europe: marriage for the rich, to hell with the poor.

And as for food: the Laws of Kashrut, Hallal, and Hindu food rituals regulate diet.....but I wouldn't exactly want to follow Orthodox Judaism and Traditional Islam and Hinduism.

From:

Like I said, you're telling half-truths.

The Rabbi performs the ceremony, ensuring God's will is being done. He blesses the union, ensures that it is consummated and then participates in the celebration. The ceremony is for God. God might not be on the document in name, but he doesn't have to be. God is everywhere. God doesn't need to be in the paperwork.

No, I mentioned the value of women. The books of Exodus and Leviticus often mention slaves and wives in the same breath. Being without the labour of a daughter is a hardship that should be compensated for with an appropriate dowry. There is a transfer of ownership from father to the husband. In this sense it is a simple transfer of ownership.

We'll never know what happens to lawbreakers. Smited, judged, these things occur after they passed on.

In many cultures Marriage doesn't exclude Polygamy. Nor does promiscuity. Loaning your wife out to a visitor might have just have meant being a good generous host. But this doesn't take anything away from the marriage.

From:

Except above you said all prehistoric cultures were monogamous. Which is it? Did some practice polygamy (in reality, it was most of them)? Or did all of them follow 20th Century sexual practices in 25,000 BC?

From:

No, I said most cultures practiced monogamy, which has a distinction from being monogamous.

Monogamy
mo·nog·a·my (m-ng-m)
n.
1.a. The practice or condition of being married to only one person at a time.
b. The practice of marrying only once in a lifetime.
2. Zoology. The condition of having only one mate during a breeding season or during the breeding life of a pair.

From:

And the dictionary is not a perfect rhetorical tool (http://www.amptoons.com/blog/archives/2008/12/29/things-you-need-to-understand-10-the-dictionary-is-not-a-perfect-rhetorical-tool/). How are you saying these two things differ, in your own words?

From:

American culture practices monogamy, or serial monogamy, in that we take one wife/husband at a time. It doesn't mean that we are monogamous. JFK and Bill Clinton's monogamous relationship is tarred with speculations. In reality there are affairs and other "blue dress" incidents which would suggest they were not faithfully monogamous. But in legality, on papers filed with the IRS and whatnot, infidelity is not entered into the data banks. Same as how every King in Europe, Egypt, etc had one Queen, not several Queens, although we know that both Kings and Queens had many sordid affairs, often bearing children out of wedlock. But the practice wasn't to take several wives at once.

I know it takes a whole other meaning in Cree culture. Marriage does not surround itself to sexual duties as much as it does in Western cultures. The duty of faithfulness had much more to do with the chores then sex. The fur trappers from HBC found that a Cree wife's sex could be offered in friendship or even bartered for. But not her labour for chores. This duty was for her family.

The trappers found that they could not make the Cree into slaves for they would only labour for their families. I believe the same was found elsewhere in Canada and in the USA, where they brought in slaves from Africa to pick cotton and other chores. In Canada we brought in Chinese to build the railway. All while the native manpower was right there, seemingly available. None of this was because the natives were lazy, but because their commitments meant not labouring for those outside of their family.

From:

So... you're saying (serial) monogamy is one partner at a time, while monogamous means you stay with one person but aren't limited to just that one person for sex.

From: