[446] World Scripture - Ethics of Married Life - 1. The Core Ethic

[대태양/김현수]

Part Four - Family and Society

Chapter - 19. Family

6) Ethics of Married Life

Love In Marriage is not unfettered emotion; it survives and thrives through the discipline of married life. The path of marriage holds special challenges to a couple committed to a lifetime together. It serves as a crucible for refining character and a school for perfecting love.

Scriptures spell out some of the traditional ethical rules that have informed marriages through the ages. They spell out different but complementary roles in the household. Husbands should honor their wives and wives should obey their husbands. Both spouses should be faithful, sharing everything together and never contemplating divorce.

While occasionally these traditional roles have been made to justify a double standard, when rightly understood they describe reciprocal and mutual responsibilities. (See Chapter 20: Women’s Rights for a discussion of equality between the sexes in the larger society.)

Father Moon teaches that the ideal of marriage is when the spouses live for the sake of each other, the husband respecting his wife as God’s daughter and the wife respecting her husband as God’s son. Love is the ultimate basis of the equality of husband and wife.

1. The Core Ethic of Conjugal Love: Spouses Are Subject to Each Other

World Scripture

Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. As the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, the he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no man ever hates his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it, as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is a profound one, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church; however, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. Ephesians 5.21-33

You wives, be submissive to your husbands, so that some, though they do not obey the Word, may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives, when they see your reverent and chaste behavior… Likewise you husbands, live considerately with your wives, bestowing honor on the woman as the weaker sex, since you are joint heirs of the grace of life. 1 Peter 3.1-2, 7

The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not rule over her own body, but the husband does; likewise the husband does not rule over his own body, but the wife does. 1 Corinthians 7.3-4

Your wife has rights over you. Hadith of Bukhari (Islam)

A man is forbidden to compel his wife to her marital duty. Talmud, Erubin 100b (Judaism)

Your wives are as a tilth to you: so approach your tilth when or how you will; but do some good act for your souls beforehand, and fear God. Qur’an 2.223

Teachings of Sun Myung Moon

The way of love is to exalt your spouse a thousand times above yourself. God went through a course of absolute obedience to humanity to reach the realm where He could love us as His object partners. A husband and wife married in God’s love desire to practice just such a high standard of love—the standard of love that God desires from His object partners. Each partner gives the other absolute obedience. Each continually gives and forgets what he or she has given. From that practice, the flower of love blooms between the husband and wife. (288:68-69, October 31, 1997)

You who were born as a woman should have the attitude that you will love your husband as God and as the representative of all humanity. Unless you love him more than anyone in the world, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Likewise, you men should know that unless you love only one woman, and love her as God and the representative of all humanity, you cannot love God or humanity. (97:321-22, April 1, 1978)

A wife who lives with true love attends her husband as God. Moreover, she attends him as she would attend Christ, the Lord. Christ is the King of kings; therefore she attends her husband like a king. When she rejoices in her husband as if she were beholding the Lord, she is lifted up to the value of God’s partner; and as God’s partner, she would manifest the value of God. Likewise, a husband with true love attends his wife as God, as the Bride of Christ, and as a queen. (March 9, 1978)

You should have absolute obedience, absolute sacrifice, and absolute love for God. But before practicing all this for God, first practice it for your wife or for your husband. (97:312, March 26, 1978)

What is the most valuable part of the human body? It is the love organ. What is the love organ? It is the reproductive organ. Does your reproductive organ belong to you? No, it belongs to your spouse. Who decided that? God. It is the way God created heaven and earth.

Everything in creation was created for love. Therefore, no creature has its reproductive organ for its own sake. Each achieves love by offering its reproductive organ to its partner. Connecting with your partner is the only way to complete love. This is the heavenly law. True love is absolute, unique and unchanging. Do you need true love? Only when you are connected to true love can you become an owner of love who is absolute, unique, unchanging.

What does this mean? It means that a man alone cannot be an owner of true love. He can perfect his love only through connecting with his counterpart, who is the owner of his reproductive organ. A woman can perfect her love only when she connects to true love; this means when she takes ownership of her husband’s reproductive organ, and her husband takes ownership of hers. (297:156, November 19, 1998)

A husband holds the key to his wife’s holy place, and a wife holds the key to her husband’s holy place. No one can enter it without that key, which is conferred by marriage.

Does a man’s sexual organ belong to the man, or to his wife? It was not created for the man, but for the woman. Do you understand? Since the male organ was created for a woman, it belongs to the woman. Therefore, you men cannot use it as you wish. Only your wife can use your organ as she wishes. This is the heavenly law. (130:126, January 1, 1984)

When all men and women recognize that their sexual organ belongs to their spouse and not to themselves, they will bow their heads and become humble when they receive their spouse’s love. Love comes to you only from your partner. If you do not live for the sake of your partner, what you are doing is not love. (279:123, August 1, 1996)

There is etiquette between husband and wife. A wife should not just walk about the house naked out of a desire to entice her husband. She should first ask him, “Is it okay if I do this?” Likewise, if his wife is fast asleep, a husband should not wake her up saying, “Honey, come here!” Even in bed the couple should be courteous and respectful of each other. (225:160, January 12, 1992)