2007-11-23 01:07:04 · 21 answers · asked by Anonymous in Family & Relationships ➔ Marriage & Divorce
To contradict so many of the previous contributors, there is unfortunately, absolutely nothing in either the Bible nor in any other form of Scripture to indicate that Adam and Eve were actually 'married'.
That Adam and Eve were a man and a woman is even pretty open to conjecture based on the actual verbiage of the world's existing 'scriptures.'
What exactly is a marriage? One man and one woman cleaving unto each other and forsaking all others for the rest fo their natural lives? Not according to ANY of the world's existing accepted 'scriptures.'
Nowadays, the minimums for a marriage are to have two witnesses and some sort of local official performing the marriage.
While it is 'comforting' to extrapolate a belief that Adam and Eve were 'married' according to today's standard, one simply has to ask: who were the 'witnesses'?
And who officiated? God? if so, why couldn't he come do my wedding? Why did it have to be one of my fellow mortals?
There are also some banned, censored, barred 'scriptures' that indicate that Adam was not alone in the Garden of Eden before God gave him Eve, and that his first 'wife' was named Lilith, and DIDN'T have his exact same DNA, but that Lilith didn't like to act like a 'helpmeet', and would completely abandon Adam for days or weeks or months or years or however long it was, at a time, causing Adam no small amount of grief, causing Adam to ask God to give him someone to help him be happy. And even then, these illegalized scriptures have nothing to say about any other possible solutions God might have tried to give Adam, just that God wound up giving Adam a feminized clone of himself, which STILL didn't wind up being all that pleasing to Adam, because Eve wound up breaking the law of Eden, and was exiled by God for her crime and Adam decided that he had to follow his sex-changed clone... because, after all, Adam was actually happiest tagging along after a copy of himself.
None of THAT spells anything akin to marriage to me, but rather infatuation, with a major tinge of narcissism.
The most ancient documented marriage was of someone mentioned in the bible, but the marriage wasn't actually documented in the Bible. The bible makes mention of "Nimrod, the great hunter of the Lord" being around when the tower of Babel was being built, and that's about all. There are, however several accounts by Persians, Babylonians, and Indians, how Nimrod, the king, was having a lot of trouble fathering an heir to his kingdom, and how there were a LOT of nearby nobility who were circling like vultures in the guy's old age. Nimrod, they say, went through marriage after marriage after marriage, and how none of his first however-many brides wound up impregnated by him, so all those marriages were what we now-adays would call annulled, so none of those marriages actually count as marriages. The most-ancient documented marriage, then, was Nimrod's marriage to Ester (after whom the age-old holiday now known as Easter is was named), who DID wind up being the first of Nimrod's brides to become pregnant (but there is a lot of speculation about whether or not she carried his biological child, since part of her marriage contract was that her father would provide Nimrod with all the Mead (a fermented drink containing honey) he could consume for the four or so weeks that it usually took to determine whether or not a woman was possibly pregnant, or began her next menstruation... which became thenceafter known as a honeymoon).
Nevertheless, that is the oldest DOCUMENTED unannuled marriage, with contracts and witnesses, and a honeymoon, and all the same stuff we now consider to be the most basic parts of a marriage.
Now, obviously, since that is the oldest kind of documented marriage, it is entirely likely that similar marriages were being officiated prior to that, but, unfortunately, there is no way nowadays for anybody to know for sure when the first marriage took place.
Just that the current convention of marriage has been around for at least five thousand years.
2007-11-23 02:06:59 · answer #1 · answered by Robert G 5 · 2⤊ 4⤋
Good questions. In many cultures and in the West unil 50 years ago, marriage was a way to subjugate adult women to the rule of men.
So coupling in some form has been around for centuries, marriage is continually redefining itself. Spurred on by the pill and people like Indira Ghandi.
2007-11-23 01:12:10 · answer #2 · answered by San Diego Art Nut 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
I've been married 32 years.
So for me, marriage has been around as long as I can remember.
2007-11-23 01:48:11 · answer #3 · answered by Flagger 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If every religion has marriage, How did Christianity create it?
2014-02-25 09:03:26 · answer #4 · answered by Trebor S 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Marriage has been around almost forever. Adam and Eve,the first people who walked the earth according to the bible, were married.
2007-11-23 01:10:24 · answer #5 · answered by luv 4 dogs 2 · 1⤊ 4⤋
Ever since the local government agencies realized that they could make money selling marriage licenses!
2007-11-23 01:09:33 · answer #6 · answered by SUSAN P 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Forever and ever since time began in some form or other
2007-11-23 01:09:24 · answer #7 · answered by Hencor72 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
hundreds of years. i think its used to control male hormones. population control as well. so there will be a lessened amount of pregnancies out of wedlock, stds, and such. i think marriage also helps with men and their sex addictions. lol. it seems like a lot of them have addictions. lol. its stupid. foolish too.
2007-11-23 20:12:19 · answer #8 · answered by crystal spring 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Ever since a fat, ugly, mean woman wanted to figure a way out to keep a man and torture a man forever.
2007-11-23 02:27:10 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
Since Adam and Eve.
2007-11-23 01:09:22 · answer #10 · answered by Aiden 6 · 2⤊ 3⤋