"Peace on earth, revolution, and the end of the world as we know it."
Who invented marriage? As a society, do we know that Marriage is the right way to proceed? In order to create Peace on earth, we need a different mythology.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge", Albert Einstein.
Who invented Marriage? Marriage is the central element of society. The two parent (one man,one woman) patriarchal nuclear family system, is common throughout the world. In most Marriages, a man and a women, enter into a Marriage contract. Who invented Marriage? Was it God who invented Marriage,or was it Mankind? Whose idea was it? What circumstances necessitated the creation of Marriage? What system was in place before the advent of Marriage? What language did they use to make clear the conditions of the Marriage contract? Is the patriarchal nuclear family system, with Marriage as it's central element, the best we can do for our children? Is the patriarchal nuclear family system still relevant today?
Women invented Marriage. During the hunting and gathering period of our society, Women needed to guarantee that the Men from their clan (group,family,village,gang) would return to their group, after the long and arduous hunting trips. These Men might have stayed at the first friendly, attractive, and attentive group of Women that they came in contact with. I believe that, in the earliest Marriages, the Men were married to the clan, not to individual Women. These Marriages did not exist for the purposes of romantic love. The Men were valuable to the clan, and were not easily replaced. The Men provided protection (not that the Women were entirely defenseless), food from hunting, and most importantly, they were needed for reproduction. The Women would create elaborate rituals and celebrations before long hunting trips to convince the Men, that they were Married to their particular clan. It was necessary that, the Men would return to their group.
The Women of this time period were strong, intelligent, and courageous. These Women understood the cycles of life. They understood the menstruation cycles, and they knew how the babies were made. They understood that strong, healthy, and resourceful Men, would provide the seed for strong, healthy, and resourceful children. Pregnancy and childbirth (as they are today) were a life and death proposition. The young pubescent females constituted the most precious resource that the clan possessed. They were the givers of life, and were needed to ensure the continuation of the clan(race). The Women could not recklessly risk the lives of the young females by allowing them to have unregulated intercourse with the males. These young females needed time for their bodies to become large enough, and strong enough to bring a baby to full term. If the young females were to become pregnant too early, it would almost certainly be a death sentence. In ancient mythology a young "virgin" would be sacrificed, to appease the fire breathing dragon. I suggest, that anytime, one of these young females had intercourse, her life would be at risk. She would in effect, be sacrificed, for the continuation of the race.
In order to protect the young females, I believe that, during this time period, Men and Women lived separately. The Women and children lived together in the center of the village. While the Men lived together on the out-skirts of the village. The men were not allowed free contact with the children. The Women were responsible for protecting, and raising the children. Other duties of the Women, included food preparation, food preservation, food gathering, and some agriculture. In between hunting trips, the Men would play soccer and wrestle. This separation of the males and females was to ensure that none of the precious young females would become impregnated while they were too young, and have their lives put in mortal jeopardy. Without this separation, many of these young fertile females, and their babies, would have died needlessly during risky pregnancies. Without this separation, there may have not been enough young fertile females, who survived, to ensure the continuation of the race. For this reason we owe a debt of gratitude to Women for protecting the young females. These beautiful, brave, and brilliant Women, ensured the survival of our species. This is the great untold story of all time. Thank you, Women.
Women need to take responsibility for this momentous contribution to society. Women have existed, here on this planet, for just as long as men have, and they shouldn't let Men accept the credit, for everything.
The worst problems of our society, war, ethnic hatred, and violence against women and children are rooted in the system. The system is the patriarchal nuclear family system. Marriage is the central element of the system. Children learn fear, prejudice, and hatred in the isolation of the nuclear family system. If Women did, indeed, invent Marriage, then the unintended result, is a system where war, ethnic hatred, and violence against women and children thrive. It is the isolation of the patriarchal nuclear family system that fosters generational pathologies, such as prejudice, ethnic hatred, incest, child neglect, misogyny and spousal rape. Women invented Marriage. This is not a statement of blame, but it is a statement of Hope. I believe, that Women will lead us into a period of true Peace, when they can accept their participation in the creation of the situation.
Is Marriage still relevant? Some of the worst crimes in our society (spousal rape, incest, child neglect) happen, with the greatest frequency, in the isolation of the patriarchal nuclear family system. The fears and prejudices of the Father are readily passed on to the Sons, in the isolation of the patriarchal nuclear family system. The scourge of our society is "family secrets".
Wikipedia defines "paradigm paralysis" as, the inability or refusal to see beyond the current model of thinking. It says in the Bible, for all things a season. Is the season of marriage coming to an end? Is it time to rethink the system? Who invented Marriage?
Richard E Cleary
cleary54@yahoo.com
