Monogamy and the Bible

It’s the Sabbath yet again. I asked Mr. Big and the Boy (whom I had an exhausting conversation with till 4 a.m. last night) about their take on pre-marital sex –they both agree to a number of Christian doctrines-. Interestingly, it’s always the same argument to protect their stand. That the whole idea of pre-marital sex is biologically unnatural and socially antiquated.

Strangely enough, The Economist has another article, The History of Sex, that supports the idea that monogamy is not a natural human state. I think that newspaper has something against the blind preaching of lifetime monogamy (as opposed to serial monogamy). The article essentially suggests that biological studies have shown that

‘a few men in each generation contribute the bulk of the Y-chromosomes to the next […] over the years, half as many men as women have passed on their genes […] (in this case) the old canard that males are actually, on average, more promiscuous than females cannot be true […] (however) in most species males want to be more promiscuous than females. What holds them back is that females are choosy. And females also tend to be similar in their tastes.’

So from time immemorial, it is a small group of men that are getting fucked a lot.

<>At least week’s sermon, the pastor briefly mentioned the very interesting point that there is no word for wife in the languages the Bible was originally complied in. According to him, Hebrew and Greek are two of humanity’s most expressive languages, yet, they never bothered inventing a word for wife. If people had actually bothered to translate the bible directly from those languages, What will read, in place of wife, would be woman. Or ‘your woman’.

What I rationalize from this is that, denying yourself sex for the sake of conforming to interpretations you don’t particularly understand is an unnatural state, but that people do it, because it gives them a sense of nobility. Along the line of this particular argument, I would think that as long as someone is ‘yours’ or you’re willing to give yourself to another individual, it is legitimacy enough for sex.

But of course when the pastor preached it, it was most certainly not for propagating promiscuous behaviour. I’m all for having sex for the fun of it, and being experimental, but I must admit that the noble intonations of the ‘your woman’ in the biblical context just might be far flung from mine. I’m serially monogamous in the emotional sense, with a time span between different people to love of about 5 minutes to a day. But of course, it didn't set a standard, a criteria for belonging to someone in the first place. (read: Every relationship is different) I’m not going to be promiscuous all the time, and I am absolutely convinced of my capability to be entirely absorbed in someone, given the right prospects.

There are a lot of things the bible is against, and most of them are not natural to the human state. Things like murder, or stealing something that belongs to someone else. Essentially, people are altruistic beings and there are some things that pertain to this aspect of human nature that would make actions against it unnatural. Under most circumstances, and in most societies (lets not consider war, famine or a heretical environment), people would tend not to do such things. But in the case of sex, it would seem that even if you’re stuck in a setting where all day all you see are pretty virgin boys with flawless skin and pristine, shapely asses… People desire it all the time and desire many people over the course of their life-times simply because it is natural to do so. So how can something that’s so human be against God, if we, indeed, really were created in his image?

That’s quite enough ranting for the day. By the way, I hate theological debates, so don’t send email regarding Christianity, unless it supports my stand. I grew up beliving sex was not biblical and an evil thing and have read just about every damn thing on that side of the fence, so don't bore me.

A good book to note would be Sense and Sensuality. Where Jesus Christ talks to Oscar Wilde about pleasure and pain. Most certainly not from where I'm coming from, but very well written at any rate, not antagonistic in its tone.

xoxox