My horizons are forever expanded!
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Makes one wonder what lessons we are supposed to learn from broadcast spawners.
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Some clams may do that too, but I don’t think they’ve been studied well enough to be confident of how they arrange things.
The “animals do this so it’s OK for me” argument is indeed remarkably bad. Many animals have no apparent concept of consent, for example. Bedbugs have traumatic insemination.
Scientifically investigating human behavior is extremely challenging. Besides ethical considerations, humans are rather complex in behavior, researchers tend to have biases, and people do not always answer accurately.
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By proxy sometimes.
IIRC some sea-slugs are ‘I’ll do it to you before you do it to me’.
Standard sea slugs are hermaphroditic and typically either have reciprocal fertilization or, in the case of sea hares, relative position determines whether an individual functions as male or female, with the possibility of a chain or ring of individuals. Some flatworms have more of the “I’ll do it to you before you do it to me” approach; banana slugs can have the “prevent you from doing it again with anyone else” approach.
John’s account of the woman at the well shows that cohabitation is not the most important issue, but also that Jesus doesn’t approve of cohabitation and it needs to be dealt with. D. L. Sayers cited someone saying “I didn’t know there were seven deadly sins; what are the other six?” An excessive focus on criticizing sexual misbehavior is common, mirrored by an excessive focus on promoting sexual misbehavior, e.g. Freudulent myths that underlie many popular current claims and the entertainment industry’s focus on what sells with minimal effort to create a well-crafted product. The myth of fulfilling one’s own “needs” to the neglect of considering the well-being of others is all too prevalent. Too often feminism endorses such claims, demanding that women can be equally selfish rather than criticizing the problem of self-centeredness. Not that it is at all exceptional in that, but that one would expect better than commending Shelly for dumping his pregnant wife for a teen mistress in someone claiming to promote women’s rights, for example.
In addressing the topic of marriage, Jesus opened a huge can of worms by declaring that the provision for divorce in the Law was an accommodation to the condition of the people. The Old Testament law largely casts marital issues in terms of father’s and husband’s rights, but that does not justify throwing out its dictates. In general, the Torah shows noticeable improvements in concern for women, slaves, etc. than other ancient Near Eastern law. The challenge is to understand the cultural context and what the underlying ethical principles are. As always, being very wary of finding what we want to find is prudent.
In the ancient Near Eastern culture, arranged marriages would be the norm. “Fiddler on the Roof” points out potential problems, but of course it was written by modern Westerners instilled with ideas about the supremacy of romantic attraction. Marriage for political or financial advantage is usually not considerate about the personal compatibility of the individuals, and picking up concubines or unofficial liaisons (e.g., patronizing Epstein) as a show of what a big shot you are is never considerate. But parents negotiating a good match among the neighbors would be considering the interests of the parties in question. Focus on emotional attraction often leads to treating a passing fancy as an imperative, rather than taking the time to get to know each other and wisely discern how good a match it might be.
Well-being of the children is an important reason for establishing a commitment before living together. Great-grandmother Ella was always ashamed of being illegitimate, despite it not being her fault; being raised by her father’s wife contributed to her turning out rather better than her siblings. Polygamy consistently causes problems in the examples in the Old Testament (although insensitive imposition of monogamy on an existing culture causes problems, also).
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I always rather liked the ironic discussion between Tevye and his wife about whether they actually loved each other, and whether it mattered.
I guess ignoring the “love” factor can be argued away by us supposedly loving everyone. (Not wishing to divert into the various forms of love)
It can become callous, which is where Tevye ended up.
When faith and doctrine starts to ignore the individual, perhaps it has crossed the proverbial line?
Richard
I put this in the same category as the question of whether it is moral to eat meat. Some religions proscribe eating meat and its members are all vegetarians. I don’t think science can answer such questions. These are a personal choice and that is all there is to it.
As for the Bible, I am not in favor of the whole legalistic approach. I favor a more advisory understanding of the Bible and our relationship with God. And thus if something is not good about some type of behavior then we should be able to find reasons for it in the well being of people and society – and not necessarily reasons which negate the role of choice either. I think many rules in the Bible are situational – specific to the conditions of Israel.
As for sexuality in particular, I see many dangers and problems with drawing lines. I see many engaged in predatory behavior and then we draw a line where people are suddenly fair game for such predation. We emphasize consent, but consent by the unborn/newborn isn’t possible is it? And then modern times have changed the equation considerably with introduction of birth control. I am not arguing for any particular answers here, but simply pointing out the inherent complexity – all food for thought in making decisions on how to handle these questions, even if they are mostly a matter of personal morality.
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And yet we are forced to consider the story of Mary and Joseph (and Jesus). We have no information that the two were intimate in any way. But then again, we also don’t have any information that could lead anybody to conclude that they lived in separate houses either prior to the donkey ride to Bethlehem.
They were betrothed…that might have had a different social dynamic in biblical times.
Another curiosity; it is also never mentioned that they were ever “married”. And “Joseph” does not seem to be quite a central character in the Bible, as Mary (all of them) were.
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