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Meredith Sprunger's Synopsis of The Urantia Book
Synopsis of Paper 83
THE MARRIAGE INSTITUTION

1. It is because of the sex urge that selfish man is lured into making something better than an animal out of himself...Herein has sex been the unrecognized and unsuspected civilizer of the savage; for this same sex impulse automatically and unerringly compels man to think and eventually leads him to love.

2.  The human family is a distinctly human institution, an evolutionary development...Primitive marriage was primarily industrial; and even in modern times it is often a social or business affair ...marriage is slowly becoming mutual, romantic, parental, poetical, affectionate, ethical, and even idealistic.

3.  Primitive marriages were always planned by the parents of the boy and girl. The transition stage between this custom and the times of free choosing was occupied by the marriage broker or professional matchmaker. These matchmaker’s were at first the barbers; later, the priests. Marriage was originally a group affair; then a family matter; only recently has it become an individual adventure.

4. An early type of wedding ceremony was the mimic flight, a sort of elopement rehearsal which was once a common practice. Later, mock capture became a part of the regular wedding ceremony. A modern girl’s pretensions to resist “capture,”  to be reticent toward marriage, are all relics of olden customs. The carrying of the bride over the threshold is reminiscent of a number of ancient practices, among others, of the days of wife stealing.

5.  The ancients mistrusted love and promises; they thought that abiding unions must be guaranteed by some tangible security, property ... .Africans still buy their wives. A love wife, or a white man’s wife, they compare to a cat because she costs nothing.

6,  The idea of a dowry was to convey the impression of the bride's independence, to suggest far removal from the times of slave wives and property companions. A man could not divorce a dowered wife without paying back the dowry in full.

7.  Lucky days were sought out, Thursday being most favorably regarded, and weddings celebrated at the full of the moon were thought to be exceptionally fortunate. It was the custom of many Near Eastern peoples to throw grain upon the newlyweds; this was a magical rite which was supposed to insure fecundity. Certain Oriental peoples used rice for this purpose.

8. The teasing of newlyweds and the pranks played upon honeymooners are all relics of those far distant days when it was thought best to appear miserable and ill at ease in the sight of the spirits so as to avoid arousing their envy. The wearing of the bridal veil is a relic of the times when it was considered necessary to disguise the bride so that ghosts might not recognize her and also to hide her beauty from the gaze of the otherwise jealous and envious spirits.

9. This practice of one‑man‑at‑a‑time was the first step away from the promiscuity of the herd…The next step in mating evolution was the group marriage… The brother and sister marriages belonged to this group; five brothers of one family would marry five sisters of another.

10. Group marriages gradually gave way before the emerging practice of' polygamy—polygyny and polyandry—among the more advanced tribes.. .Usually, even with plural marriages, the home was dominated by the head wife, the status companion... Concubinage was the steppingstone to monogamy... Later on, as among the Jews, the legal wife was looked upon as the mother of all children born to the husband.

11. Truly, monogamy is ideal for those who are in, but it must inevitably work great hardship on those who are left out in the cold of solitary existence... always should the favored majority look with kindness and consideration on their less fortunate fellows.

12. Monogamy always has been, now is, and forever will be the idealistic goal of human sex evolution. This ideal of true pair marriage entails self‑denial, and therefore does it so often fail just because one or both of the contracting parties are deficient in that acme of all human virtues, rugged self‑control.

13. Monogamy is the yardstick which measures the advance of social civilization as distinguished from purely biologic evolution...It contributes to a delicacy of sentiment, a refinement of moral character, and a spiritual growth which are utterly impossible in polygamy...Marriage, which began in crude coercion, is gradually evolving into a magnificent institution of self‑culture, self‑control, self‑expression, and self‑perpetuation.

14. Among primitive peoples only about one half the marriages proved satisfactory. The most frequent cause for separation was barrenness, which was always blamed on the wife.

15. The new and sudden substitution of the more ideal but extremely individualistic love motive in marriage for the older and long‑established property motive, has unavoidably caused the marriage institution to become temporarily unstable ...The presence of large numbers of unmarried persons in any society indicates the temporary breakdown or the transition of the mores.

16. But just so long as society fails to properly educate children and youths, so long as the social order fails to provide adequate premarital training, and so long as unwise and immature youthful idealism is to be the arbiter of the entrance upon marriage, just so long will divorce remain prevalent…The great inconsistency of modern society is to exalt love and to idealize marriage while disapproving of the fullest examination of both.

17. Marriage which culminates in the home is indeed man's most exalted institution, but it is essentially human; it should never have been called a sacrament…Neither can marriage be truly compared to the relation of the Adjuster to man nor to the fraternity of Christ Michael and his human brethren ...It is also unfortunate that certain groups of mortals have conceived of marriage as being consummated by divine action ...the ideal mortal marriage is humanly sacred.

18. Young men and women should be taught something of the realities of marriage before they are plunged into the exacting demands of the interassociations of family life; youthful idealization should be tempered with some degree of premarital disillusionment.

19.Twentieth‑century marriages stand high in comparison with those of past ages, notwithstanding that the home institution is now undergoing a serious testing because of the problems so suddenly thrust upon the social organization by the precipitate augmentation of woman’s liberties, rights so long denied her in the tardy evolution of the mores of past generations.

Discussion Questions

1. Should premarital training be required by the State before granting marriage licences?

2. Why have husband and wife relationships been compared with divine relationships?

3. What is the most frequent cause of separation and divorce today?

4. Should there be different regulations regarding people who cannot find partners to marry?

5. Is the breakdown in home training primarily responsible for the high crime rate today?

6. Are the premarriage legal property agreements  conducive to a happy marriage?

7. What determines personality compatibility in marriage?


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