Paul

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The apostle Paul radically redefined marriage and attitudes toward it for the emerging Christian movement, although this is seldom recognized. Contrary to the popular impression, however, marriage, for Paul, provided the proper context for satisfying sexual desire and for providing erotic pleasure. Within the context of marriage, sex was something to enjoy on the basis of equality and mutuality.

To appreciate Paul’s radical redefinition of marriage, we must understand it against the background of contemporaneous Roman attitudes toward sex and marriage. We must also understand what Paul himself said in the full context of his discussion.

Paul’s most famous comment on marriage is in 1 Corinthians:

“To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain unmarried as also I do; but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to be consumed with the fire of sexual desire” (1 Corinthians 7:8–9).

A few lines later he counsels also divorced women to remain unmarried (1 Corinthians 7:11).

This is commonly understood as a negative 027view of marriage and an ascetic view of sex. Paul’s advice to the unmarried (including widows and divorced women) to remain unmarried, as Paul himself was, is, however, more a reflection of Paul’s eschatology than a negative view of marriage or an ascetic view of sex. Paul believed that the end of the world was at hand. In the same chapter 1 Corinthians, he says that “the form of this world is passing away” (1 Corinthians 7:31). He makes this statement in the context of his discussion of marriage and marrying:

“Now concerning the unmarried, I have no command of the Lord, but I give my opinion as one who by the Lord’s mercy is trustworthy. I think that in view of the impending distress, it is well for a person to remain as he or she is” (1 Corinthians 7:25–26).

The “impending distress” is the end of the world as Paul understood it. “The appointed time,” he tells us in this same paragraph, “has grown very short” (1 Corinthians 7:29).

For this reason, Paul believed that it is good for each person to remain as he or she is—which means that the unmarried should remain unmarried.

Of course, if people did not marry, they would not produce legitimate heirs. Paul would hardly recommend such a course if the world were expected to continue as it had in the past. The world would soon become de-peopled, especially of Christians. But Paul did not expect any future generations. The eschatological hope for the imminent end of this world made procreation irrelevant. It was only with this hope and expectation that Paul could afford to prefer the unmarried state.

Although Paul wished that “all were as I myself am,” that is, unmarried (1 Corinthians 7:7), he not only allowed for marriage but explicitly stated that it is no sin:

“But if you marry, you do not sin, and if a girl marries she does not sin. Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that” (1 Corinthians 7:28).

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Before examining Paul’s conception of marriage, let us explore prevailing Roman attitudes toward sex and marriage, for the Roman world was, after all, the world in which Paul lived and preached.

In Roman tradition, the purpose of marriage was the procreation of heirs who would inherit and continue the name, property and sacred rites of the family.¹ The legitimate object of marriage was expressed in the formula, liberorum quaerundorum (or creandorum) causa, to acquire (or produce) free-born children.² A man who divorced his wife because she failed to produce children acted in compliance with the oath the censors had compelled him to take, “that he would marry a wife for the purpose of begetting children.”³

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In 102 B.C. the censor Metellus Numidicus described marriage as a trouble or annoyance, as everyone would acknowledge, but it was nonetheless an obligation for the perpetuation of humankind:

“If we could get on without a wife, Romans, we would all avoid that annoyance; but since nature has ordained that we can neither live very comfortably with them nor at all without them, we must take thought for our perpetual preservation rather than for brief pleasure.”⁴

In Roman society, sexual desire was commonly sated by courtesans and other prostitutes, as is attested by such authors as Ovid and Martial, as well as by the graffiti at Pompeii and Herculaneum. Indeed, Ovid reflected a common Roman attitude when he denied that erotic pleasure (amor) can exist between husband and wife because that relationship is one of “duty,” which he contrasts with “pleasure.”

Significant evidence suggests that at the turn of the era a considerable number of people, both men and women, chose to remain unmarried. In 18 B.C., for example, the emperor Augustus proclaimed the so-called Lex Iulia, which, according to Dio Cassius, “laid heavier assessments upon the unmarried men and upon the women without husbands, and on the other hand offered prizes for marriage and the begetting of children.”⁵ Apparently so many people were refraining from marrying and having children that the law had to encourage it.

But public opinion opposed the Lex Iulia. Dio Cassius reports that in 9 A.D. the Knights, one of the upper classes of Roman society, urged the repeal of the law. Augustus then assembled in one part of the Roman Forum the unmarried Knights and in another those who were married and had children. Much to his surprise and annoyance, he discovered that the unmarried Knights outnumbered the married.

Why were these Knights choosing to remain unmarried? It was not because they preferred celibacy or wanted to live alone. In a speech of Augustus, recorded by Dio Cassius, we learn the answer. Addressing the unmarried Knights, Augustus tells them:

“You talk … about this unencumbered and free life without wife and children … Nor is there one of you who either eats or sleeps alone; no, what you want is to have the freedom to run riot and to enjoy bodily desires.”

Here we get a glimpse of a “sexual revolution” that was affecting both men and women in the early Roman Empire.⁶ People were seeking and enjoying erotic pleasure, but not in the context of marriage, where they supposed it could not be found. Augustus was, in effect, admitting that people were remaining unmarried because of this pursuit of pleasure.

In the end, Augustus modified, but did not eliminate, the basic obligation to marry and procreate. The Augustan law remained in force until the acceptance of Christianity made the government set a higher value on the unmarried state.

For the most part, the moral philosophers of the Roman Empire supported the institution of marriage, the Cynics, represented by Epictetus, being the only notable exception.

One important group, however, while encouraging marriage and procreation, opposed sexual pleasure except for procreation. These were the Stoics. Musonius Rufus, a Stoic of the first century A.D., taught that “The husband and wife … should come together for the purpose of making a life in common and of procreating children.” But he opposed erotic pleasure as such. In his discussion of aphrodisia (that is, sexual desire, including intercourse) Musonius taught:

“It is necessary for those who are not wanton or evil to consider aphrodisia justified only in marriage and when it occurs for the purpose of procreating children, since that is lawful; but when aphrodisia is pursued eagerly for naked pleasure (hedone), it is unjust and unlawful, even in marriage.”⁷

Ovid, as we have seen, was of the view that, there could be no erotic pleasure (amor) between husband and wife because it was a relationship of duty; Musonius taught that there should be no erotic pleasure between husband and wife.

How far the teaching of moral philosophers like Musonius penetrated Roman society is questionable. If the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum with their erotic art and erotic graffiti and their uni-sex suburban baths are any measure, Musonius and his ilk did not represent the prevailing attitudes and practices.⁸ But neither did traditional marriage!

It is in this context that we can begin to appreciate Paul’s radical redefinition of marriage.

For those people in the days of Augustus who chose not to marry or re-marry, living instead a life of erotic pleasure, Paul’s advice to marry if you cannot control your flame of sexual desire would seem strange indeed, since it was precisely because of sexual desire that so many Romans had rejected marriage. Paul, on the other hand, recognizing sexual desire in some, counseled them to marry.

Marriage was the state in which one could 030satisfy one’s sexual desires.

Paul opposed prostitution, as we learn at the end of chapter 6: “Do you not know that he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her?” he asks (1 Corinthians 6:16). You cannot be one body with a prostitute and at the same time be one Spirit with the Lord (1 Corinthians 6:12–20). Hence, erotic pleasure was not to be permitted with the prostitutes. Paul, a Jew, probably regarded prostitution as an extension of idolatry, since common prostitution was associated with such gods as Aphrodite, Eros and Priapus; this could explain why prostitution was incompatible with union with the Lord—just as one could not partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons (1 Corinthians 10:21).⁹

“Because of the temptation of porneia (prostitution),” Paul wrote, “each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband” (1 Corinthians 7:2). In other words, instead of being consumed with the fire of sexual desire and instead of satisfying that desire in prostitution, Paul advised marriage as the context for satisfying that desire.

As has often been noted, Paul did not mention the procreation of children when he wrote of marriage. This is consistent with his eschatology, since the question of heirs would be irrelevant in the face of the imminent end of the world. But it is also clear that Paul did not share the view of a moral philosopher like Musonius that sexual intercourse should be practiced only for the purpose of procreation.

Paul’s advice to a married couple was:

“Do not refuse one another except perhaps by agreement for a season, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, lest Satan tempt you through lack of self-control” (1 Corinthians 7:5).

That husband and wife should not refuse each other except for brief moments of prayer is hardly sexual intercourse only for procreation!

Moreover, Paul regarded husband and wife as fully equal partners and mutually responsible in their sexual relationship: “The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband” (1 Corinthians 7:3).

Paul does not condemn husband and wife for their “lack of self-control” (akrasia); indeed, marriage is for those who cannot exercise self-control (1 Corinthians 7:9). In this context, self-control is not a virtue to be practiced (as it was for Musonius and other moral philosophers), but a gift (charisma) given by God to some and not to others (1 Corinthians 7:7¹⁰).

Nor does Paul describe the husband as the paterfamilias. This too is in contrast to the teaching of Roman philosphers like Musonius. Musonius regarded the husband as a paterfamilias and the wife as housekeeper, that is, one who serves her husband.

The better parallel is not with Musonius, but with Ovid. To be sure, Ovid’s advice was not for people married to each other. But what Ovid taught was that erotic pleasure is best when pursued mutually and equally. Speaking of 031experienced women, Ovid wrote, “They need no spur to enjoy their pleasures: let both woman and man feel what delights them equally.” He advised the man, “But neither do you, spreading too full sail, leave your mistress behind, nor let her outstrip your speed; haste side by side to the goal: then is pleasure full, when woman and man lie vanquished both together.” He advised the women, “Let the woman feel the act of love to her marrow, let the performance bring equal delight to the two.”¹¹ What Ovid taught can be paralleled in other sources of the time, including the graffiti and art of Pompeii and Herculaneum.

For Paul, there is neither male nor female in Christ (Galatians 3:28). This fundamental principle resulted in equality and mutuality in marriage, as well.¹²

It is true that Paul preferred the unmarried state. But his arguments against marriage are not aimed against pleasure, as if sexual pleasures were shameful. Those who remained unmarried presumably abstained from sexual intercourse because they had the gift of self-control, and prostitution was ruled out. But the thrust of Paul’s advice and argument for remaining unmarried is not anti-sexual.

Perhaps Paul’s teaching on marriage can be compared with his teaching about lawsuits (1 Corinthians 6:1–8). Paul taught that grievances by one brother against another ought to be kept within the church, rather than going to pagan courts. In like manner, he taught that sexual desires ought to be kept within the church, that is, within marriage as he defined it, rather than going to pagan prostitutes. For Paul, it was important to establish the boundaries between the holy community and the world. He could oppose prostitution and the passion of desire characteristic of the pagans who do not know God (1 Thessalonians 4:3–5), but within the church he recognized that some did not have the gift of self-control; to them he advised, “It is better to marry than to be consumed with the fire of sexual desire.” Marriage was the union in which mutual sexual desire could properly be fulfilled.

The apostle Paul radically redefined marriage and attitudes toward it for the emerging Christian movement, although this is seldom recognized. Contrary to the popular impression, however, marriage, for Paul, provided the proper context for satisfying sexual desire and for providing erotic pleasure. Within the context of marriage, sex was something to enjoy on the basis of equality and mutuality. To appreciate Paul’s radical redefinition of marriage, we must understand it against the background of contemporaneous Roman attitudes toward sex and marriage. We must also understand what Paul himself said in the full context of his discussion. Paul’s most famous […]