The expression “civil marriage” denotes an engagement brought about by the civil society; that is it presupposes the existence of a civil society which in reality is the state. It also presupposes that the state is of an organic social structure which is vested with a legal code that can produce groupings which the citizens can belong to and one of those groupings is the family. So the family exists not only at the emotional level but also systematically under the umbrella of what resembles a structure; and in that we must consider the society as an entity with a legal aspect.
And no grouping can have a legal aspect unless it is an entity that is self-standing, that is it is complete in itself. A whole community is that civil grouping that has no legal partitions. That means that the social entity exists in itself as a whole society and not one composed of parts like religious sects. The latter have their own entities; and groupings of religious sects together do not make a society in the social understanding of the word. And you belong to the social entity as a citizen, and not as one belonging to your religious sect which is grouped together with other sects in that society. Your sect does not give you the “passport” of belonging to the society.
In the Christian view, the subject of belonging is considered dealt with from the point that religious groupings do not make up the civil society. Of course my starting point in that is the Christian view since in Islam the view is different. In Christianity, the Church is not a part of the civil community; Her liaison is with Life Eternal. That is She is not linked to the community of this world. In the Islamic expression, we say that there is “this world” (Dunia in Arabic) and also there is “the hereafter” (Aa’khira in Arabic) and between the two there is no association.
In my Christian conviction I find it necessary to deal with the civil society in one way and with the Ecclesiastical society in another. We need to distinguish between the two levels to understand the problematic we are facing.
There is a civil society in which the religious identity has no consideration. That statement is a Christian statement of course. For me, that is the only view which helps us with a duality which is good and productive; the duality of the civil (this age) and the eschatological (the age to come) even though what is of the age to come is present in the current civil life. This is so because there is no one affiliation or belonging that is not associated with that of the other. You are of “this world” (the civil) and of the “coming world” simultaneously and you move through both of them though they are distinct from each other. “You are in this world but not of this world.” (John 17: 11-16). Those words are from Jesus of Nazareth and through those words He reveals to us that we are in this world, in its hardships and in its delights, and that in this sojourn we are called and drawn to the Kingdom of God. With all our abilities, understanding and strength, we work in this world with the rationale of this world; yet we do that in the expectancy of the world to come as our Holy Books tell us. We do not deny the worldly situation we are in, but we do not sink in it so that we can work for this world and the coming one at the same time. We have in this world the rationale of the coming one and the experience of its beauties and a yearning for them; and at the same time we have to struggle in this world without getting drowned in it. And this world has its systems and laws and we find in this world ways and life in the Holy Spirit through which we taste what is forthcoming of the KIngdom.
The civil society of this world yearns for the age to come but it follows the systems of this age. And speaking of this we understand that the logic of this age leads to the founding in it of institutions one of which is that of marriage. Marriage, though it yearns for the age to come, has foundations taken from this life we are in. Marriage, in Christianity and Islam, has a sanctity that is “managed” by God though the laws of marriage are different between the two religions. So at the start of Christianity, which used to favor forming a family through believer spouses, the Christians were few and mixing with the Pagans in marriage was inevitable; and marriage had no “crowning ceremony” till after the seventh century A.D. Also the Church did not require the Pagan party to get baptized in order to have the ceremony. That does not mean that the first Christians did not consider marriage holy when one of the spouses was not Christian. And it is known that at the start of Christianity marriage, though held as sacred by the believing party did not carry with it a condition for both parties to be Christian.
And it is clear from the letters of St. Augustine who died in 117 A.D. that marriage used to be held at times with a Pagan partner and what we have as the “crowning service” in weddings was not there at the beginning though it was necessary for the spouses-to-be to acknowledge, without a ceremony, before the Bishop their desire and willingness to marry each other; but it was necessary to go through some formalities of the Roman law. So the Church did not have any Church celebration or ceremony for marriage though the approval of the Bishop was necessary. People used to marry before the Roman administration according to Roman law. And that – with the blessing of the Bishop – was enough since the wedding itself was considered sacred. But what we call “the Crowning Ceremony” was used to be a Divine sanctification of the wedding. So the terms “civil marriage” and “religious marriage” were not in the “dictionary” of the Christians. If you loved a girl, whether Christian or Pagan, and married her according to Roman law, after asking the blessing of the Bishop, your marriage would be Christian. So, was that a civil or a Christian marriage? The question here does not stand. You hold a wedding before the civil authorities and then you go to Church to partake of the Eucharist; as such the Christian community knows and understands that your marriage is in the Lord.
So what is known now as the “Crowning Ceremony” did not exist before the Sixth or Seventh Century A.D. But the Christian wedding with the blessing of the Bishop (without a ceremony at the start but later) was the expression of marital willingness and love; and that is the Sacrament.
The early Christians saw marriage as having sanctity in itself; and the Bishop would express that presence of sanctity in the union of the spouses. And marriage starts with a covenant and continues through faithfulness. There is no difference whether it is called “civil” if it had no outer expression or “Ecclesiastical” because it is based on the eternity of love. Every marriage covenant is associated with the state (the Polis) and its systems since the marriage is of this world and it also is associated with the Church which is the Body of Christ. What is important is the covenant we make in marriage and the acceptance by God of that covenant.
We are not against the civil form that exists in the state, but he who sees himself as a member of the Church, we pray for him in his marriage and accept him in his marital love and we make of his marriage an offering; and we both rise through each other to that spiritual marriage that exists between Christ and His Church.
Translated by Riad Moufarrij
Original Text: “الزواج المدني” – An Nahar – 09-02-2013
