Lesson video

Hello learners and welcome to our lesson on the nature and purpose of marriages.

My name is Mr Spence, and I'm very happy to be teaching you in this lesson today.

One fact about me before we begin, is that I am somewhat of a gamer.

I love RPGs and fantasy games in particular and they are games that I really, really love because of their religious nuances.

They often have religious narratives, religious ideas, religious characters and that's always very, very interesting to me particularly when they address big existential questions like where do we come from, why're we here, where are we going? Those things are really, really interesting to me.

And in fact, in our lesson today, we are going to be looking at some religious ideas and how they've shaped views and practises of marriage among different religions, and of course we'll also look at non-religious views.

So I hope you're ready for today's lesson.

When you're ready, let's begin.

Before we begin, for this lesson you will need a pen or a pencil, or something to write with.

You'll also need paper or an exercise book to write on.

It will helpful for you to have another coloured pen for corrections and we want to make sure that you are in a quieter space as possible.

Of course, also for this lesson, you need a curious brain because we are going to be asking lots of big questions and I want you to be thinking throughout the lesson.

If you are in an environment where you've got a TV playing or music , I'm going to ask you to take this off because we need you to remove any distractions in order so that you are able to concentrate without disruption throughout the lesson.

If you are using a mobile device for your lesson, please disable your notifications and end your conversations so that you are able to focus during your lesson.

If you're using a desktop we'll almost to advise you to keep your mobile phone on silent, just to turn it off and put it away, and also to close any desktop applications that you may be using, again, so that you will be able to focus and concentrate in the lesson and learn without disruption.

Now in this particular lesson on marriage we will talk about forced arranged marriages.

If this is something that is a sensitive topic to you, we recommend checking with your parents or a trusted adult or a carer, before starting the lesson.

Of course, you can also do the lesson with a trusted adult nearby.

If you are affected by anything that we discuss in this lesson, then speak with your parents or carers and also you can speak with Young Minds who will be able to offer you some further support.

Now I need to pause your video at this point and ensure that you are ready to learn.

That is to make sure you've got all of the equipment that you need and that you are in a quiet environment, as far as possible, so that you are able to concentrate.

So pause the video at this point.

I'm going to give you just five seconds, I'll give you a moment to pause and then we'll continue afterwards.

Brilliant, I trust now that you are ready to learn and you are ready to continue our lesson.

So let's begin.

In this lesson I said we are going to be talking about the nature and purpose of marriage.

In the last lesson we talked about the nature and purpose of families.

Today we're going to develop that by looking specifically at marriage and talk also about marital vows.

We'll look specifically at heterosexual marriage in this lesson.

We'll talk about same sex marriage in a later lesson.

We'll look at different views in monogamy and polygamy and of course we'll look at Islamic, Christian and Secular views on marriage.

I'm really, really excited so let's begin.

Let's start off by talking then about marriage.

And the first question we always have to ask when we talk about a key concept or key practise, is what is it? And in this particular case, what is marriage? I want you to think about it for a second.

You may have your own definitions based on your own experiences of marriages around you.

So what do you understand marriage to be? What is marriage? Think about it for three seconds.

I don't need you to write anything, just think about it for 3 seconds.

Brilliant, let's have a look at a definition then of the term marriage.

Marriage, which is sometimes also known as matrimony or wedlock, is the legally recognised union of two people as partners in a personal relationship.

So it's a legally recognised union between two people who are in a personal relationship.

I would like you to write this definition down.

So I'm going to ask you to pause the video at this point and write this definition down in your paper or in your exercise book.

Brilliant, I trust you have paused the video and that you have now this definition written down on your paper or in your exercise book.

Good, let's continue.

I'm going to tell you six facts about marriage.

Well, the first is that the term marriage was first used in about 1250 in the Common Era.

It was a middle English term but it derives from Latin.

Now, the concept or the practise of marriage was earliest recorded in, has it's earliest record rather, in 2350 in Before the Common Era and it was a question about the legitimacy of a child.

So a father wanted to make sure that his children were legitimately his and therefore the institution of having a legal contract between him and the mother of his children came into being.

Now, whether we're talking about religious marriage or civil marriage, consummation is also really, really important.

It's always really important.

That is because marriage is never considered fully valid until there has been sexual intercourse between the partners, between the two spouses who have been married.

Now there are some legal benefits to marriages and this is some of the reasons, one of the reasons why people get married.

For example, there is property rights and inheritance tax, life insurance, pension, tenancy, next of kin and of course the right to a divorce, which we will talk about in our next lesson.

So there are some rights that are inherent to being married.

Now marriage has changed over the course of time.

According with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which you'll also study, things have changed over time.

So for example, in the past it was not permitted for people of the same sex to be married and we'll talk a little bit more about how that's changed when we discuss same sex marriage later on and throughout, in a series of lessons.

And for example, with regards to race, in the past there have been anti-miscegenation laws in the US, in many states in the US, which prevented people of different races from getting married.

Thankfully, now today that's no longer the case so people of people of different races can marry and in the US all states no longer have this anti-miscegenation laws.

And of course there are some religious restrictions in marriage as well and those have changed over the course of time with each religion.

And we'll talk a little bit more about that when we talk about Islam.

But for example, a Muslim is able to marry a Christian, a Muslim man rather, is able to marry a Christian woman or Jewish woman, again we'll delve into the details of this a little bit later on in the lesson.

Final fact of a marriage is that there are only three ways to end a marriage.

You can end a marriage with annulment, with divorce or when your spouse or partner dies.

Those are the only legitimate ways to end a marriage.

So we've learnt six facts about marriage.

I hope you remember the facts because now I want to practise some of this information and make sure that you understand it well.

So let's continue now with a series of quick higher questions.

It's going to be some true and false questions and I want you to get, I'm going to give you three seconds to answer each question and I want you to try your best.

So point at the screen our shout out your answers as, after I read the question.

Let's look at question number one.

The word marriage was first used in 1250 in the Common Era? 1250 in the Common Era, true or false? If you said true that is correct, you're right.

It was used for the first time in 1250 in the Common Era and it was a middle English term then but of course derives from Latin.

Marriage is originally a religious practise, true or false? If you said false you'd be correct.

It was not originally a religious practise.

I can state the earliest record of marriage is dated to 2350, all the way Before the Common Era, so it's a very, very old practise and it wasn't because of religion, it was to legitimate a father's rights of parenthood to his child.

So it's not originally a religious practise.

Marriage needs to be consummated by sexual intercourse, true or false? If you said true, you are correct.

Both civil and religious marriage can be annulled, it can be ended if it is not consummated by sexual intercourse.

That means part of the definition, part of the requirements for marriage to be fully completed is for sexual intercourse to take place between the spouses.

There are three ways to end a marriage, true or false? If you said true, you're absolutely right.

There are three ways to end a marriage.

Remember that's annulment, divorce or the death of one's spouse.

Interracial marriage is illegal in some US states due to anti-miscegenation laws, true or false? That's false, remember I said in the past US states have had anti-miscegenation laws but all of those states now have removed those laws and it is legal to marry any people of any race, so it doesn't make a difference what race you are when you are getting married.

I think we have reviewed a lot of information so far so I'm going to ask one final question and then we're going to look at some more information.

It is illegal for a Muslim man to marry a Jewish woman, true or false? That is false, it's legal for a Muslim man to marry a Jewish woman and there I know illegalities based on a person's faith.

Good, so we've learnt some facts about marriage.

Let's learn a little bit now again about the different types of marriage.

So there are several types of marriage and they're based on things like choice, the nature of marriage, inclusivity or exclusivity of the relationship and of course sometimes the personal characteristics of the spouses.

So there are lots of things therefore that ultimately determine what type of marriage this is.

Let's have a look at some types of marriage.

There are four really, really important types that you need to know.

The first is a civil marriage.

Now a civil marriage is a marriage without any religious ceremony, that's not performed in a religious context, rather it's performed in a non-religious context.

It is a legal marriage and there is of course a registrar involved to register the marriage.

There are also religious marriages and the only difference is that a religious marriage takes place in a religious context with religious ceremony.

Not all religious marriages are sacramental but there are some branches, for example, of Christianity that consider marriage a sacrament.

For example, the Catholic Church and the orthodox branch of Christianity consider a marriage is sacrament, but that is not across all of Christianity, and of course is not across all religions.

The third type of marriage is a monogamous marriage.

Monogamy comes form two words, monos and gamous, which means alone or only and gamous means spouse or partner, husband or wife, so it means one husband or one spouse.

In this particular case therefore, monogamous marriage means a marriage where a person only has one spouse, one husband or one wife.

Polygamous marriage, I'm sure you can guess at this point, means many spouses or many husbands and wives.

So polygamous marriage is one where there are lots of husbands or lots of wives.

You see I put some challenge there.

Those are the four main ones but later on when we talk about Islamic views on marriage, we'll reference an arranged marriage.

Also, an arranged marriage is where parents are involved in finding a spouse for their child.

It's different from a forced arranged marriage because an arranged marriage, the person whose getting married, a child, has to approve their parent's choice, whereas in a forced arranged marriage the child does not have that choice.

That's different from what we find in the western cultures where we have self-selected marriages where a person, a child will select a partner and then that will be approved by their parents or their family.

So, there is a difference between self-selected, forced and arranged marriages.

I also talked about inter-faith marriages.

I mentioned it earlier on and alluded it earlier when I talked about a marriage between a Muslim man and a Jewish or a Christian woman, that's an inter-faith marriage, a marriage between people of different religions.

There four are things you need to note when we talk about Islamic views and marriages but the four main types that I want you to remember right now is the civil, religious, monogamous and polygamous marriage.

Again, quick higher questions.

Let's see how much you remember and make sure that you understand everything correctly.

True or false, religious marriages are always sacramental? Is that true or false? If you said false, you would be correct.

Religious marriages are not always sacramental that's because not all religions are actually, have sacraments and not even among Christians.

Not all Christian denominations or branches will consider marriage a sacrament.

So, religious marriages are not always sacramental.

Families have influence in self-selected marriages? What do you think, true or false? If you said true, you're correct.

Families do have an influence even in self-selected marriages.

Remember self-selected marriages is where a child chooses their partner and then their parents approve or their families approve.

So, the families still have an influence even though the child is the one who is making the choice.

What term is used to refer to a marriage in which the husband or wife has no choice whatsoever? Think about this.

The husband or wife has no choice.

What's the term for that marriage? If you said forced arranged marriage you are correct.

You remember, an arranged marriage does not have force.

An arranged marriage, the inner arranged marriage, the person, the husband and the wife, the child has a choice to get married and they select their partner, they approve their parent's choice.

So we've learnt a lot so far about types of marriage and some facts about marriage as well.

When we talk about monogamous and polygamous marriage there are different views in it and so I want to talk to you a little bit more about different types of marriage, particularly monogamy and polygamy.

So monogamy, I said earlier that monogamy means one spouse or one partner and therefore a monogamous marriage is a marriage where there is only one husband or one wife, you're married to one person.

A polygamous marriage is when you're married to more than one person and there different, two different types, two major different types of polygamy.

We have polyandry where polyandry means more than one husband and we also have polygyny, which means more than one wife.

So two forms of polygamy, more than one husband or more than one wife.

We also have polyamory and polyamory means more than one lover.

That means a polyamorous person may have a spouse who is a male and a spouse who is female.

Technically that is not legal in any country at this point and there are people fighting for polyamorous marriages, but technically we can't have a polyamorous marriage at this point yet.

There's also bigamy.

Now bigamy is the only word here that is a legal term.

It's not just a definition of a type of marriage.

Bigamy is an offence of someone who has practised polygamy in a country where polygamy is illegal.

So, if a man marries more than one wife, for example in the UK, he would become a bigamist.

He would have committed a crime, and the offence, the name for that offence, the name for that crime, is bigamy.

Of course we also have open relationships and marriages where, which is where two people are married but that marriage is not exclusive, is not monogamous, they can have relationships with other people but they remain married only to each other, even though they have sexual relationships with other people.

So, Christians and Muslims, religious people have got different views on polygamy.

Christians inherited a religious text from Judaism, so the Hebrew Bible is also known as the Christian Old Testament.

And there are examples of polygamy in the Old Testament, for example, Abraham was a polygamist.

But historically Christians have rejected the practise of polygamy because they, in fact they promoted the idea of monogamy as the ideal and it's primarily based in the teachings of Jesus that we find in the New Testament.

Now that said, there are some Christians who have practised polygamy in the past, for example Mormons in past have committed polygamy though now that's no longer the case.

So there have been some Christian branches or denominations who have actually practised or permitted the practise of polygamy.

And there still remains a debate among Christians today about whether or not polygamy, and specifically more polygyny, the marry of, a man marrying more than one wife, is really and ethical practise.

Now I talked, I referenced earlier the teachings of Jesus.

This is taken specifically from Matthew 19:4-5, where Jesus references an early story in creation.

And those of who studied Christian practises, Christian beliefs and practises, would have learnt some of this already while you learnt about the creation after.

And this is what he's referencing.

He's saying that in the beginning God created them male and female, so you can see that heterosexuality in terms of the Christian view point, and that man will leave his mother and father, source is father and mother, and he will unite himself with his wife.

So, you can see there again that heterosexual but also that leaving, that living together that we've got between a husband and wife.

We also see there that the two will become one, that refers to the sexual relationship between them but also for procreation, that they will be able to unite themselves by having children.

So this is why Christians got a view against polygamy.

They believe that a marriage should be between one man and one woman, which is why polygamy is not considered ideal.

It is sometimes permitted in some branches in some denominations but for the most part, Christians don't permit polygamy, they promote monogamy as the ideal.

What about the marital vows? What do we learn about Christian points of view from the marital vows? I want you to pause the video as this point.

You've got there on the screen, some Christian, the vows that Christians use during marriage.

I'd like you to tell me what they mean and what we can learn about Christian views on marriage from these vows.

So, pause your video at this point and complete the table by explaining the meaning of these Christian marital vows.

Good, I trust at this point that you have paused your video and you have completed your task, so welcome back.

Let's have a look at some of the potential things we can learn about Christian views in marriage from the marital vows that Christians use.

So, the first one says, part of the vow says, "To have and to hold from this day forward," and this is the point that you are entering into a exclusive relationship.

The man and the woman are no longer going to have relationships that are sexual or personal with someone else.

They're going to dedicate themselves to each other in a monogamous relationship.

"For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health." It means that despite the circumstances that you'll face in that marriage, it's a lifelong commitment that they're bound selflessly to each other, to love each other despite things, the difficulties or challenges that they're going to face in the marriage.

And this is one of the lovely principles that we find in Christianity is Agape love, this selfless love, this seeking the best interests of the other person and always having your spouse in mind.

"To love and to cherish," again that's Agape love, that selfless love for your partner and keeping that partner at the front of your mind.

This solemn vow is really, really important because it gives you this really religious dynamic.

This is a vow, a promise that is being made, not just before a vicor or a priest or before a registrar, this is a promise that's being made in the presence of God, and therefore you have this real religious dynamic to this vow we find among Christians.

It's something that's planned by God, it's a gift from God as well.

And marriage is lifelong and that's what we see from "Till death do us part." Christians never marry with the intent to get divorced or an annulment.

They marry with the intent to, for the marriage to last until they die and that's what we find in Christianity.

Christians view marriage as a lifelong commitment.

What about Muslims? What does Islam say about polygamy and polyamory? Well again, Muslims believe that monogamy is the ideal.

But Muslims permit men to have up to four wives, that because the Quran, of course, allows it.

But at the same time, it's a limited permission.

That's because they're made to treat each wife equally.

For example, if a man is, I remember in our lessons our understudy in the nature and purpose of families, we talked about in Islam Muslim men are considered the breadwinners of the family, the provider for the family, and in this particular case, if he marries more than one wife he has to provide for all of these wives and each of their children equally.

So for example, if he has an income of 10,000 and he's married two wives and that income needs to be split between, to provide for his two wives, so 5,000 each for the wife and their children.

That's the sort of division and equality that you're going to find with Islam.

And also the other wives have to agree to a man getting married to another wife.

Also, Muslims abide by, they tend to be law abiding citizens and therefore if the law of the land, for example in the UK, does not permit them to have a polygamous marriage, then Muslims will not marry more than one wife.

And therefore, Muslims don't tend to be bigamist, they don't tend to break the law in order to get married to more than one wife.

So, what do Islamic scholarships say about different forms of polygamy and polyamory? Polyandry is of course not permitted.

A wife cannot have more than one husband because it's unnecessary and considered unethical.

That is because, remember, polygamy is a limited permission only because the man is considered the breadwinner and therefore he wants to, Islam men wants to make sure that all of the women are provided for and cared for, which is why polygamy's a limited permission.

Polyamory is considered unnecessary and in fact immoral because Muslims do not agree, which we will talk about later, with same sex relationships.

In polyamory you can have a man as a husband and a woman as a wife at the same time, so Muslims will not agree with polyamory.

Of course based on scripture as well, so our holy or sacred text.

So in the Quran in Surah 4:3 it says, "Then marry those that please you of [other] women, two or three or four." So we see this limit being placed on Muslims so they can marry up to four wives, Muslim men.

I want you to pause the video at this point and I want to compare the two views 'cause we've learnt now a lot about Christian views in polygamy and Islamic views on polygamy.

So I want you to explain for me two religious beliefs about polygamy and I want you to refer to a sacred text in your answer.

It's important for me to say at this point that you may be doing your GCSE where it's a different exam board.

I don't know which board you will be doing it with? This sort of exam question fits best fo AQA and Edexcel.

If you're doing Eduqas or WJEC, you may have a, be required to do longer answers and the style of the questions might be different for OCR, so it's important that you have a conversation with your teacher so that you are prepared for your exam in the best way that you can.

But what I would like you to do at this point is to try and show me your understanding of Christian and Islamic views on polygamy and polyamory.

So I'd like you to answer this question for me.

Pause your video at this point and complete the task.

Remember what you want to do is a point, evidence and explanation for your first point, then you want to do that same thing again, point, evidence, explanation.

So point, evidence, explanation for the Christian view.

Point, evidence, explanation for the Islamic view.

Remember the evidence is a quotation or a reference to the Quran or the Bible.

Pause the video at this point and complete the task.

Good, welcome back.

I trust you have now completed the task.

You've taken a few minutes and you've answered the question.

Let's have a look at some potential, a potential response to this question.

Now remember the response I'm going to give may not have been or may not be the response you have done, that's okay.

This is just an example of how you can respond to this type of question.

So remember we want to use point, evidence and explanation to answer and demonstrate our knowledge and understanding.

So let's say, for example, talking about a Christian point of view first, we can say most Christians believe that monogamy is the ideal relationship and what God intended.

Notice that word mostly, I'm not saying all Christians because not all Christians believe monogamy is the ideal.

Some people believe, some Christians believe monogamy is as legitimate as, or as useful as polygamy.

So there are different views here.

For example I'm going to give an, provide evidence now so I'm going to refer to a holy text or a sacred text.

So in Matthew 19, Jesus refers to the creation story and it says, "the two will become one." Now I'm going to explain it.

This shows that marriage is intended to be a union between two people as it was with Adam and Eve, therefore this is suggesting that they're, the text is suggesting that we can only have a relationship between two people and that's a monogamous marriage, it's not a polygamous marriage.

A different religious belief, Islam also teaches that monogamy is ideal but polygamy is permissible.

The evidence is in the Quran where Allah has given each a "mate" and marry.

He says, "marry those that please you of [other] women, two or three or four" but be "just", so you treat each of them equally.

So we see therefore that I can give two religious beliefs, one Christian, one Islamic or Muslim and I give it a reference to each of the sacred text and I've explained my reasons.

That's what you need to do with these sort of questions is show your understanding so make sure when you answer a question like this, that you walk through those steps.

So, what do Christians and Muslims think about marriage? Let's have a look more, in some more detail about their views on marriage before we finish our lesson today.

So, there are different reasons why people get married and there're different understandings between Muslims and Christians about what the purpose of marriage is.

And these are some shared things.

We talked about some of these in our lesson on the nature and purpose of families.

For example, we've mentioned purpose on procreation.

We've talked about rearing children before so we've seen some of these before.

But this purpose acronym will help you memorise the purpose of marriage.

So we've got procreation, that's the first one.

That is to have children.

Union, to bind two people together.

Rearing of children, so religious upbringing, giving children education.

Pattern for society, so it's an example to give back to society.

One flesh, to allow for sexual intercourse between a man and a woman.

It's also a sacrament for some Christians, so it's something that's blessed by God according to the Bible.

And we also have the endless, the E, because it's for Christians, that the many, people, for example Christians and Muslims marriage is meant to be lifelong.

It's mean to be an endless commitment.

So Christians and Muslims share this view.

Marriage is for life, it's planned by God and some Christians will even recommend premarital counselling because of this.

As I said earlier, for some Christians, for example the Roman Catholics and the orthodox branch of Christianity, marriage is a sacrament, it's an outward visible sign of an inward or inner blessing from God.

For Christians marriage is a monogamous and it's traditionally between a man and a woman and it's for procreation and the for upbringing of children.

Again based on sacred text.

Muslims agree and have the, share similar views with Christians on this.

Muslims actually say that marriage is the foundation for family life and they go even further.

In one of the hadiths, which is a collection of the saints of Mohammed , it says marriage is 50% of the responsibility of the Muslim.

So if a Muslim has got married and is looking after his family, he's done 50% of the things that he's meant to do as a Muslim.

They also believe it's a lifelong commitment and it enables sexual fulfilment.

Muslims also believe or practise more so arranged marriages, that's to say that parents have more influence in terms of deciding who a person's going to marry but a child, or the person who's about to be married, will approve that decision.

So if the person, if the spouse does not want to be married, then they will not be married.

Muslims when, don't agree with sex outside of marriage.

We'll talk about this later on when we, in our lesson on sex outside of marriage.

But because of that they dress modestly and man and woman are not allowed to be together alone because that protects them from temptation.

So modesty is something that's really practised in Islam so you may see them wearing a burqa or a hijab and even men may wear a garment to cover their knees.

Adultery is a very serious crime in Islam and if you are in an Islamic state or in a country founded in Islamic principles, not the Islamic state, but a country founded in Islamic principles, then it is a very serious crime and you can be punished for it up to 100 lashes if you commit adultery in an Islamic country or Islamic state.

It is a gift from Allah and it's, like I said, sex is restricted to marriage.

In fact Surah 24:33 says, "abstain [from sexual relations] until Allah enriches them." That's until Allah has blessed them with a spouse or a partner.

Marriage is expected by all Muslims. They don't promote celibacy but they do promote chastity, that is refraining from sex until you are married.

Muslim men are allowed to marry Jewish or Christian women but a Jewish or Christian man may not be permitted to marry a Muslim woman, so there are some differences or some rules with regards to interfaith marriages but for the most part I bet they can get married to people of different religious beliefs.

We've learnt a lot so far about marriage in Islam and in Christianity.

But let's talk now finally about different views, non-religious views.

So, humanist and secular people also think that marriage is important and it should be a commitment that two people make to each other.

They understand legal and financial benefits and they think that's one of the great things about marriage and it's also a great pattern for society.

So they agree that actually marriage plays a good role in laying a foundation for the rest of society.

And it also enables a secure and stable family.

So marriage is ultimately a good thing for humanists or non-religious people also.

What I'd like you to do now is pause the video and answer this question.

Explain two religious beliefs about marriage.

Last time we looked about two religious beliefs about polygamy, now I'd like you to look at two different religious beliefs about marriage.

Pause the video for me at this point and answer this question.

Good, I trust you've answered the question.

Let's have a look at some potential responses.

So, you could say Muslims believe that marriage is very important and that "no institution is dearer to Allah," that's a quotation from the hadith.

Therefore Muslims should marry and work hard to make their marriage a success.

You can also say that Christians believe that marriage is a lifelong promise made to each other and you can see there a quotation from Christian marital vow, "til death do us part." Therefore many Christians, particularly Catholics, believe that marriage should not be ended except by death so that divorce is not always allowed and Catholics do not allow divorce at all.

We've looked at a lot today.

We've explored marriage to a Christian, Islamic and non-religious point of view and we've learned about different types of marriage and some key facts about marriage also.

You've been absolutely brilliant today.

I've really enjoyed teaching you this lesson.

I hope that you will remember lots of the facts that we've learnt today and also the key quotes and information.

It's really, really important that you complete your End of Lesson Quiz, your exit quiz and please make sure to continue viewing your learning from time to time and of course revising so it moves from your short term memory into your long term memory.

For now, I have to say thank you for everything and I hope that we will meet again in our next lesson where we'll be looking at divorce.

So I look forward to teaching you then.

For now, take care and all the best.