Is There Really Such Thing as a “Biblical Marriage?”
from Center for Faith:
In my previous blog, I argued that the debate about same-sex marriage is not a secondary issue. To be clear, I didn’t thereby say that it’s necessarily a “gospel issue” (the phrase can be sloppy) or even a “primary issue,” since I don’t think primary and secondary categories are very helpful and I would rather explore viewing such doctrines along the lines of a spectrum of significance. But if we assume some sort of primary and secondary model (which most people do), I don’t think the debate about same-sex marriage in the church is simply a secondary, disputable matter that Christians can agree to disagree on. In short, there is strong evidence for seeing sex-difference in marriage as a signficant aspect of the architecture of the biblical story of creation and redemption. I stand by that claim, but it does raise several questions, one of which I’ll focus on below.
The question is actually a veiled accusation and it goes like this: Can the Bible really be trusted to tell us what marriage is? After all, the Bible sanctions all kinds of marital practices that we’d consider, or should consider, abhorrent today.
This argument is typically enshrined in atheistic attacks on the Christian faith. Curiously, it has resurfaced through the pen of some Christian writers who want to mock the idea that the Bible can actually teach us about marriage—given all its shady statements that advocate for dehumanizing marriage practices.
So, what do we do with all the weird verses about marriage in the Old Testament? And should these cause us to throw up our arms and scrap the whole idea of using Scripture to shape our view of marriage?
Related Posts
Tags
Share This
