Appreciate your entry Jim. But that is not in the vows that I’ve seen or heard. And a comparison of how much I should love my spouse is very hard to estimate. Remember, marriage vows didn’t come around until the mid 1500’s and the contract of marriage didn’t exist prior to the first recorded evidence of marriage contracts and ceremonies which dates to 4,000 years ago, in Mesopotamia, roughly 2000 before the birth of Christ.
Marriage is only as holy as the people that are implementing it. And for many years, agreements were based on a handshake and not a written contract. And although marriage ceremonies have romantic, and often religious, aspects, a marriage itself is a state-sanctioned agreement that carries legal rights and responsibilities for the spouses. And that handshake in today’s society is no longer as good as its word...unfortunately.
Case in point, the still used term “common law” used between God and the couple, maybe. Their verbal contract in some states that allow it is just their saying they are married. And that was used prior to and after the written contracts were invented. Legality, not morality.
wy69
It’s from the often criticized Ephesians 5:23-25.
The first half is slammed as “outdated”: “Wives, be subject to your husbands in all things”. This is often mocked as the “make me a sandwich” passage. I don’t know how old you are, but that’s probably why you’ve never heard it.
But the second half explains and justifies the first: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loves the Church”, i.e., Submit to torture for her, be scourged for her, BE NAILED TO A CROSS for her, die for her”. It’s not about superficialities.