Marriage and Virginity (continued)
Christ in the sky (1 Thes 4:17). So our understanding would be that the bodies of the first parents both were mortal in their original state and yet were not going to die unless they committed sin, as God had warned. It would be the same as if an injury was threatened, since the body was susceptible to injury, but this would not happen, unless something was done that God had forbidden. In this way, therefore, even through the sexual union of bodies like that there could be offspring. They would grow to a certain stage, but they would not approach or reach old age, nor death either, until the earth was filled by that multiplying spoken of in the blessing. For, if God maintained the garments of the Israelites in their original condition without any deterioration for forty years,†5 how much more readily would he maintain the bodies of those who obeyed his commands in a very happy and stable state, until they were changed into a better one not by the person's death, whereby the body is separated from the soul, but by a blessed transformation from mortality to immortality, from animal nature to spiritual!
Various Benefits of Marriage
3. To investigate and discuss which of these opinions is the true one, or whether even one or more other opinions can be carved out of those words, would take a long time.
3. We can say now that in that condition of being born and dying with which we are acquainted, and in which we were created, the union of man and woman is something of value. The divine Scripture is so much in favor of this union that it is not lawful for a woman put aside by her husband to marry another as long as the husband lives, nor for a man put aside by his wife to take another, unless the woman who has separated from him has died. As even in the Gospel the Lord confirmed that marriage is something of value, not only because he forbade divorce except for the reason of adultery,†6 but also because he attended a wedding as a guest,†7 so with good reason one asks in what lies its value.†8 It seems to me to be not only because of the procreation of children, but also because of the natural sociability that exists between the different sexes. Otherwise in the elderly it would no longer be called marriage, especially if they had lost their children or had not had any. As it is, however, in a good marriage, even with older people, although the passion of youth between man and woman has waned, the relationship of love between husband and wife continues strong, and the better persons they are, the earlier they begin by mutual consent to abstain from carnal union. So what happens is not that later on, by necessity, they are not able to do what they would like to do, but that beforehand, to their credit, they choose not to do what they are able to do. If, therefore, they are faithful to the duty of honor and respect of one sex for the other, even though their bodies are feeble and deathlike, the chastity of minds properly joined in marriage is so much more honorable for being more genuine, so much more secure for being more fully accepted.
Marriages also have the benefit that sensual or youthful incontinence, even though it is wrong, is redirected to the honorable purpose of having children, and so out of the evil of lust sexual union in marriage achieves something good. Furthermore, parental feeling brings about a moderation in sensual desire, since it is held back and in a certain way burns more modestly.
For a certain seriousness attaches to the ardor of the pleasure, when in the act whereby man and woman come together with each other, they have the thought of being father and mother.
The Mutual Fidelity of Spouses
4, 4. Furthermore, in performing their duty to each other, even if this is claimed somewhat excessively and without due restraint, husband and wife also have a duty of fidelity to each other. The apostle considered this duty of fidelity to be so binding that he spoke of it as a power of authority, when he said: The wife does not have authority over her own body, but her husband does; and likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but his wife does (1 Cor 7:4). A breach of this duty of fidelity is called adultery, when, either because of the urge of one's own sensuality or by consenting to the other person's, one violates the marriage contract by sleeping with someone else. In this way there is a betrayal of trust, and even in base material matters trust is a spiritual good of great value, and so it certainly should be put ahead of bodily well-being, including even our material life. Although a tiny straw is almost nothing in comparison with a large weight of gold, the trust that is dutifully respected in a transaction about the straw, just as in one about the gold, is not thereby a smaller thing because it is respected in relation to a smaller matter.†9
When, however, trust is invoked for the purpose of committing sin, it is a wonder it is called trust. Whatever its nature, however, a sin is worse if it is committed in breach of trust. An exception is when trust is forsaken in order to return to true and legitimate trust, that is, in order to rectify bad will and undo the sin.
An example would be the case of someone who is unable to rob a person by himself, but finds a companion in wickedness and makes an agreement for them to do it together and share the booty, and then, when the crime has been committed, goes off by himself with all of it. The other is certainly upset, and complains that his trust has been betrayed. Even while complaining, however, he ought to be thinking rather that if he feels how unfair it is that his trust was betrayed in a sinful association, then for life to be good human society should not have been betrayed in its trust that people would not be robbed. To be sure, the other one, who was untrustworthy on both counts, is a worse sinner. On the other hand, if he had regretted the wrong he had done, and consequently had refused to share the plunder with his accomplice in order to give it back to the person from whom it was stolen, then not even the untrustworthy one would call him untrustworthy. In the same way, if a woman violates conjugal fidelity but is faithful to the adulterer, she is certainly blameworthy; but if she is not even faithful to the adulterer, she is worse. If then she repents of her shameful conduct, and terminates the adulterous agreement and arrangement and returns to conjugal chastity, I should be surprised if even the adulterer thinks she is unfaithful.
What Constitutes a True Marriage?
5, 5. It is often asked whether one should call it a marriage when a man and woman, neither of whom is married to anyone else, form a union solely for the purpose of giving in to their desires by sleeping together, and not for the purpose of having children, though with the understanding that neither of them will sleep with anyone else. It is not absurd perhaps to call this a marriage, provided they maintain the arrangement until the death of one or other of them, and provided they do not avoid having children either by being unwilling to have children or even by doing something wrong to prevent the birth of children. On the other hand, if one, or both, of these conditions is lacking, I do not see how we can call these marriages. If a man makes use of a woman for a time, until he finds someone else more suited to his wealth and social standing to take as his partner, that state of mind makes him an adulterer, not with regard to the woman he is on the lookout for but with regard to the one he is sleeping with without being married to her.†10 As a consequence, if the woman is aware of this and still consents to it, then she too is unchaste in her relationship with the man with whom she is not united in marriage. Nevertheless, if she is faithful to him, and when he takes a wife she does not also think about marrying, but sets herself entirely against such a course