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I attended a wedding recently, and it was a reminder of how much women are considered inferior based on the traditions in the marital celebration ceremony. From the bride’s transfer from the father to the groom, the name change, the exchange of chains—sorry, rings—and the “you may kiss the bride” without the bride’s consent, it shows how the notion of marriage is rooted in male ownership of women. Beyond that, the religious concepts that guide most marriages and weddings further place women as subordinate to their male counterparts.
A case study of Christianity’s view of genders drawing from its religious book is examined below:
1 Corinthians 11:2-9 : On male leadership
The chapter states, “The head of the woman is the man… and what is more? Man was not created for the sake of the woman, but the woman was created for the sake of man.”
If women were created to be men’s complements or helpers, and God gave men free will, where is free will for women? If free will for women includes the freedom to serve God or not, but serving God also entails serving men, then there is no true free will. If women cannot live as independently as they should but must exist as servants to men, there is no free will. If I was created to serve someone, I am a born slave, and he is my master, with no freedom of choice.
Colossians 3:18– On women’s subjugation
“You wives, be in subjection to your husband as it is becoming in the lord.”
This chapter expects women to obey their male counterparts based on marriage. It does not confer women power, freedom, independence, or autonomy in the institution. This is quite disrespectful to the woman who is an adult in her own right and possibly married for love and not because she lacks the capacity to make her own decisions.
The chapter also expresses an underlying sentiment of how a woman cannot exist as a whole and complete person without the presence of a man in her life. It assumes that she needs someone to make her decisions and tell her how to live and what to do with her life because she cannot do so alone. It regards the woman as a person inferior, smaller, insignificant, or less important and who is created to answer to someone else. Again, there appears to be no form of agency whatsoever in the confines of a Christian marriage.
Leviticus 12:1-5 – On childbearing
In marriage, having a child is regarded as “the fruit of the union.” However, the chapter of the bible demeans a woman, especially if she bares another female.
The chapter states, “If a woman gets pregnant and gives birth to a male, she will be unclean for 7 and 33 days. But if she gives birth to a female, she will be unclean for 14 and 66 days.”
Are female people such bad omens that giving birth to one would make them unclean twice as much as their male counterparts? Even if one is to overlook the creation of women in which female people are regarded as an afterthought, the chapter regarding women as twice unclean if they birth their species is unignorable.
Not only does it show that the bible discriminates against women, with such passages, it shows the bible does not even regard the need for children of the opposite sex to be treated with mutual respect and equality.
Overall, marriage is a recipe for slavery, servitude, and bondage for a woman, wrapped carefully as a brightly coloured gift. The “fruit of marriage” is also one where girls are discriminated against right from birth. Unfortunately, many women do not realise the injustice until much later. It’s similar to when I shockingly discovered the bitter taste of kola nut when I was younger, after admiring it for years on the trays of mallams hawking them on the road, especially the pink ones.
It’s a funny one. I made my mom buy them one evening and was surprised when they tasted like chloroquine. That kind of shock is the same for many young women. They discover marriage isn’t a fairy tale they have been promised after they are neck deep in it. They realise they can’t bend the institution of marriage to their will, and the companionship, love, romance, sex, and love they have been promised is a lie designed to make them serve their male counterparts.
As such, is important that women de-center marriage and religion altogether. Marriage in the context of religious practice, including its customs, does not respect or honour women. If women must seek companionship with men, it should exist outside the confines of marriage, with both parties being in a mutually respected partnership. Heterosexual relationships do not need a male-centred celebration to make them valid, nor do they need religious books that confer authority to men to guide them.
