Implications of Common Law Marriage

[Ed Edwards]

Common Law marriage would be the perfect situation for, say, a widow who might greatly appreciate and covet the companionship of a new husband, yet without having the government cruelly discontinue her benefits...plunging her into poverty in her old years.
...

My Mother draws Social Security (SS) &/or other US Government entitlements from TWO DEAD husbands. She did NOT draw SS on her first husband (my dad) while married to her second Husband. But when husband #2 died, she got government benefits because of both husbands.

 

[MorganT]

HUH??? that s kinda what I said.

Yes I know I was just adding to it.

 

[Me4Him]

I agree with you. Where also do we draw the line between the scriptural term "fornication" and marraige?

"fornication" is between an unmarried couple.

"Adultery" is between a married person and somone other than their spouse.

1Co 7:3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband.

4 The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.

5 Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.

6 But I speak this by permission, and not of commandment.

7 For I would that all men were even as I myself. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that.

8 I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I.

9 But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.

10 And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband:

 

[Jerome]

What would you state marriage dogmatists deal with this?

Dale's History of English Congregationalism, pp. 623-624
"Under Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act, passed in 1753, all marriages were declared to be invalid that had not been performed in a parish church by a clergyman, ... the remedy bore hardly on all persons that were not members of the Established Church. Before the passing of this Act, Protestant Dissenters could be married in their own places of worship by their own ministers. The marriage was irregular; but the consent of the man and the woman to become husband and wife made it valid; and the children were therefore legitimate. But after 1754 the pretended celebration of a marriage in a Dissenting meetinghouse became a legal offence, and the marriage had no validity."

 

[Thinkingstuff]

The fact that it said "married her" means that something culturally acceptable happened. We know that the law was in place and that betrothal was the accepted norm in marriage. Deuteronomy 22 gives us a view of what goes on with marriage - that it was an organized issue and not one of just deciding to take someone and that's it. There were parents involved, a commitment of some sort (a betrothal) and historically, we know there was a marriage covenant that was entered into by both parties. It was a culturally accepted norm.

What is the culturally accepted norm for today of marriage? "I'm married" tells a story - that there was a wedding of some sort. Ask anyone on the street "Are you married?" and they can tell you of their ceremony whether it's a big NY shindig that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars or a small ceremony with a justice of the peace. But it's something other than just deciding "Let's tell everyone we're husband and wife".

Interestingly enough, marriage is used as a symbol of the relationship between the church and Jesus - and it is not just a verbal thing telling people that we've entered into a relationship but that there's a legal bond there. Legal.

We also see in Romans 7 that the law is involved in marriage. If this is speaking of the Jewish law that was given to Moses, then it is still their civil law. If it is the law of the government, it is the law that is binding.

Marriage was not just a taking of a woman and sleeping with her. Ever. God gave Eve to Adam formally. That was the first wedding.

Have you ever noticed in the bible how when the writer of the document refers to a concubine he says concubine (distinguishing remark) but when God refers to the same person he says wife. For instance the prophesy to David that because of his sin a household member would sleep with his wives. Yet Abslom slept with Davids Concubines on top of the palace.

 

[annsni]

Have you ever noticed in the bible how when the writer of the document refers to a concubine he says concubine (distinguishing remark) but when God refers to the same person he says wife. For instance the prophesy to David that because of his sin a household member would sleep with his wives. Yet Abslom slept with Davids Concubines on top of the palace.

So you're saying that God didn't inspire 2 Samuel and that it was wrong?


Concubines WERE wives - but slave wives. In Genesis 25:1, Keturah is called Abraham's wife but in 1 Chronicles 1:32, she is called his concubine. Judges 19 speaks of a certain Levite's concubine....the says that her "husband" went after her. Concubines WERE wives.

 

[Thinkingstuff]

So you're saying that God didn't inspire 2 Samuel and that it was wrong?


Concubines WERE wives - but slave wives. In Genesis 25:1, Keturah is called Abraham's wife but in 1 Chronicles 1:32, she is called his concubine. Judges 19 speaks of a certain Levite's concubine....the says that her "husband" went after her. Concubines WERE wives.

You're jumping to conclusions. That's not what I'm saying at all. My indication is the fact that the requirement for marriage in God's eyes is not necissarily human convention (topic of this thread) but whether or not someone is having intimate relations with someone.

 

[annsni]

You're jumping to conclusions. That's not what I'm saying at all. My indication is the fact that the requirement for marriage in God's eyes is not necissarily human convention (topic of this thread) but whether or not someone is having intimate relations with someone.

If having intimate relations with someone means they're married, what is fornication? What of the woman caught in adultery? Jesus clearly said that the man she has right now is not her husband.

Throughout history, there has been a method to marriage. The Israelites had a way to marry, we see in Jesus' time that there was a wedding feast, meaning that there was something more "official" than just sleeping together.

No where in Scripture are we told to "sleep together" to marry.

 

[Thinkingstuff]

If having intimate relations with someone means they're married, what is fornication? What of the woman caught in adultery? Jesus clearly said that the man she has right now is not her husband.

Throughout history, there has been a method to marriage. The Israelites had a way to marry, we see in Jesus' time that there was a wedding feast, meaning that there was something more "official" than just sleeping together.

No where in Scripture are we told to "sleep together" to marry.

We're not told anywhere in scripture how anyone becomes married. That convention is human based dependent on culture and a culture may indicate marriage by "sleeping with" someone. consider the rape of Tamar. What did Tamar tell her 1/2 brother after he raped her? but interestingly enough concubines are considered wives though they aren't married by convention but by slavery.

 

[annsni]

We're not told anywhere in scripture how anyone becomes married. That convention is human based dependent on culture and a culture may indicate marriage by "sleeping with" someone. consider the rape of Tamar. What did Tamar tell her 1/2 brother after he raped her? but interestingly enough concubines are considered wives though they aren't married by convention but by slavery.

How do you know that concubines weren't married by convention?

As for Tamar, can you show me the passage about what she said after she was raped? I can see she said not to send her away because that would be a greater evil than the rape. This doesn't mean that they were now married because if it were, she would have had to have been divorced which didn't happen. She was a virgin, she was raped. Absalom could have asked the king for her and he would have given her to him but he didn't. He didn't marry her but raped her. However, we know the law - that if a man were to rape a woman, then he is to marry her. (Exodus 22:28) That is what she was telling him - that by the law, he is to marry her.

 

[Thinkingstuff]

How do you know that concubines weren't married by convention?

As for Tamar, can you show me the passage about what she said after she was raped? I can see she said not to send her away because that would be a greater evil than the rape. This doesn't mean that they were now married because if it were, she would have had to have been divorced which didn't happen. She was a virgin, she was raped. Absalom could have asked the king for her and he would have given her to him but he didn't. He didn't marry her but raped her. However, we know the law - that if a man were to rape a woman, then he is to marry her. (Exodus 22:28) That is what she was telling him - that by the law, he is to marry her.

Absalom was bad but he didn't rape his sister. It was his brother and the ultimate cause of Israel's civil war. But that being beside the point. At that point marriage was culturally done in some respect but what was the responsibility of the perpetrator? Marriage because of his act. So marriage ceremony is dependent on the culture that recognizes it. and in responce to concubines how do you know they did? So if its acceptable for a society to say that sleeping with someone makes them your spouce along with the responsibility it implies then it seems it is so. Now with regard to American law. Since, by common law a person living with someone must do so over so many years which means that if they are living with someone before the time occures for the common law to take effect then the person is living outside cultural requirements for marriage and thus not acceptable to God. And the people are fornicating. Simple. But the bible doesn't spell out how marriages are to occur it just recognizes once it does.

 

[Marcia]

We're not told anywhere in scripture how anyone becomes married. That convention is human based dependent on culture and a culture may indicate marriage by "sleeping with" someone.

Just because people did it does not make it okay - polygamy is a good analogy. Men like David and Solomon had many wives but this is not an endorsement from God.

So now the hypothetical couple thinks it's okay to just declare themselves married and sleep together because this was done, they believe, in the culture of the OT days?

Jewish marriage in Jesus' day required a contract for the betrothal. I posted this info previously. So the hypothetical couple maybe should consider a Jewish wedding since they searched the scriptures so diligently. Or maybe polygamy. I mean, what's to keep them from thinking that is scriptural as well?

 

[canadyjd]

Just because people did it does not make it okay -

The same could be said for state sponsored marriage, couldn't it?

Or maybe polygamy. I mean, what's to keep them from thinking that is scriptural as well?

Because polygamy is condemned by scripture.

peace to youraying:

 

[Jerome]

Here is a fascinating account of prominent colonial Baptist, Hannah Ludwell Lee Corbin, great aunt of Robert E. Lee. Apologies in advance to those of you who will probably be just scandalized by her flouting of Virginia's marriage rules. Oddly enough, she does not seem to have been targeted by the Church Ladies League of her Baptist church.:laugh:

Paul C. Nagel, The Lees of Virginia, p. 56:

"Mrs. Corbin and Dr. Hall continued living together at Peckatone without benefit of the Anglican Church's sacrament of marriage. And when a son was born in 1763, the mother formally recorded herself as Hannah Corbin, widow.
....
The larger community also seemed to accept the bond between Widow Corbin and Dr. Hall. It appears unlikely that the public and the Lee family considered themselves to be condoning a sinning couple. Instead, Hannah and Richard's defiance was more likely that of living together by the sanctification of a dissenting religious sect. While there is no record to prove it, Hannah Corbin and Richard Hall most likely had a Baptist wedding.
As members of the Baptist sect, it would not trouble them that such a marriage had no legal validity in Virginia. Widow Corbin was exceedingly pious and equally stubborn, as was Dr. Hall, who had borne the abuse inflicted on the first Baptists in Virginia. Furthermore, in the case of Hannah and Richard, a Baptist-confirmed union actually brought an advantage.
It worked greatly to Hannah's benefit that hers was technically an illicit liaison. She remained the Widow Corbin and in compliance with the terms of her late husband's stringent will. In the eyes of the law, she was unmarried. Thus, having embraced both the person of Richard Hall and the Baptist faith, the Widow Corbin dextrously served God without mortifying her flesh."

 

[Marcia]

The same could be said for state sponsored marriage, couldn't it?
Because polygamy is condemned by scripture.

peace to youraying:

People on the BB have argued that polygamy is not condemned in scripture!

That issue aside, in our culture, marriage is licensed in order to be recognized, with the exception of the 11 states that recognize common law marriage (which personally I do not think is right, either). Since this does not go against the Bible, this is how people should do it; otherwise, it looks like shacking up, and imo, is shacking up.

I have not seen any biblical evidence that getting a marriage license is going against the Bible.

 

[annsni]

I have not seen any biblical evidence that getting a marriage license is going against the Bible.

This is just what I've been asking. HOW can a state marriage be an affront to God?

 

[menageriekeeper]

Men like David and Solomon had many wives but this is not an endorsement from God.

There is no condemnation from God against their polygamy either. The condemnation came from marrying outside the Jewish religion.

It is not until the NT that leaders in the church were required to only have one wife.

Ann, you made a remark that under Alabama law there must be consummation/sex before a comman law marriage is complete. Let me tell you that this is a requirement for a state lisenced marriage as well. One of my many cousins had her marriage annulled (NOT a divorce) because the fella she completed the ceremony with refused to consumate the marriage. They weren't completely married until that happened and the judge wiped out all record of the attempt.

 

[annsni]

Ann, you made a remark that under Alabama law there must be consummation/sex before a comman law marriage is complete. Let me tell you that this is a requirement for a state lisenced marriage as well. One of my many cousins had her marriage annulled (NOT a divorce) because the fella she completed the ceremony with refused to consumate the marriage. They weren't completely married until that happened and the judge wiped out all record of the attempt.

If ANY marriage does not consummate the relationship, then is it even really a marriage? The two become one flesh is an important part of marriage. Of course there are those very few relationships where the marriage cannot be consummated, but that is an exception rather than the norm. An example is a friend of mine who married a quadraplegic - no consummation there although they ARE intimate together to consummate it as they can.

 

[JustChristian]

Here is a fascinating account of prominent colonial Baptist, Hannah Ludwell Lee Corbin, great aunt of Robert E. Lee. Apologies in advance to those of you who will probably be just scandalized by her flouting of Virginia's marriage rules. Oddly enough, she does not seem to have been targeted by the Church Ladies League of her Baptist church.:laugh:

Paul C. Nagel, The Lees of Virginia, p. 56:

"Mrs. Corbin and Dr. Hall continued living together at Peckatone without benefit of the Anglican Church's sacrament of marriage. And when a son was born in 1763, the mother formally recorded herself as Hannah Corbin, widow.
....
The larger community also seemed to accept the bond between Widow Corbin and Dr. Hall. It appears unlikely that the public and the Lee family considered themselves to be condoning a sinning couple. Instead, Hannah and Richard's defiance was more likely that of living together by the sanctification of a dissenting religious sect. While there is no record to prove it, Hannah Corbin and Richard Hall most likely had a Baptist wedding.
As members of the Baptist sect, it would not trouble them that such a marriage had no legal validity in Virginia. Widow Corbin was exceedingly pious and equally stubborn, as was Dr. Hall, who had borne the abuse inflicted on the first Baptists in Virginia. Furthermore, in the case of Hannah and Richard, a Baptist-confirmed union actually brought an advantage.
It worked greatly to Hannah's benefit that hers was technically an illicit liaison. She remained the Widow Corbin and in compliance with the terms of her late husband's stringent will. In the eyes of the law, she was unmarried. Thus, having embraced both the person of Richard Hall and the Baptist faith, the Widow Corbin dextrously served God without mortifying her flesh."

It sounds to me as if this widow didn't just avoid a state marriage but also a church wedding. So she got around her late husband's wishes by not having a state sponsored marriage. She might has served her new husband but certainly dishonored the memory of her previous one. I'm sure the previous husband was the butt of many jokes.

Many senior citizens don't get married today to avoid paying the marriage tax penalty or to continue collecting social security. Essentially they are defrauding the state. Should Christians condone this?

 

[canadyjd]

People on the BB have argued that polygamy is not condemned in scripture!

I have not argued that, and I do believe polygamy is condemned by scripture.

That issue aside, in our culture, marriage is licensed in order to be recognized, with the exception of the 11 states that recognize common law marriage (which personally I do not think is right, either). Since this does not go against the Bible, this is how people should do it; otherwise, it looks like shacking up, and imo, is shacking up.

I've tried this before, but I'll try again. You basically have 2 arguments. The first is that common law marriage violates Roms. 13, that we are to obey the government.

But common law marriage does not result in disobedience to the government because there is no law (in the other 39 states that don't recognize common law marriage) that forbids a couple from taking vows before God, telling family and friends they are married, moving in together and raising a family.

If you know of a state that makes it illegal to do so, please point me that that statute.

The consequence, if you will, of not getting a state license, is that the state will not recognize the marriage as valid. That will have implications about how you file taxes and other such dealings with the state.

For someone who believes state sponsored marriage has become so corrupt that to participate in it would be an affront to God, such consequence has no meaning since their desire is to please God and not man.

Your second argument, as I see it, is that such actions goes against the norms/culture of our society, and to participate sets a bad example for Christianity.

I have pointed out, with scripture, how cultural traditions corrupted the origional institution of marriage as given by God. God said that for this reason a man should leave his father and mother, be joined with his wife and the two become one flesh. (btw, that is the best argument against polygamy, imo, you can't have "two become one flesh" if there are 3 or more)

Examples of culture corrupting God's intentions for marriage in scripture are polygamy, concubines, prostitution, divorce, homos*xuality, and even non-believers marrying believers just to mention some.

If the cultural corruption has filtered into the state sponsored "marriage" by acceptance of divorce, inter-marriage between believers and unbelievers, homose*ual unions (all of which are recognized, at least in some states), then some genuine Christians can sincerely believe that participation in the state sponsored institution of marriage is giving tacit support for sin.

I have not seen any biblical evidence that getting a marriage license is going against the Bible.

The question is, how do you respond to genuine Christians that see it differently than you do?

From what I have seen on this thread, the most likely response to their desire to please God and recapture the intent of the institution of marriage is to claim (without any support from scripture, btw):

1. their marriage is invalid without state approval

2. they are living in sin/are engaging in fornication

3. their children are bastards

peace to youraying: