What does the Bible say about marriage?

This is God's institution: He said it was not good that man should be alone, and He provided a suitable help for Adam in the person of Eve. Adam said, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman (isha), because she was taken out of Man (ish). Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh." Gen. 2:23-24. This declaration of union was confirmed by the Lord, who, in quoting the above, added, "Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." Matt. 19:5-6; Mark 10:7-9. It is confirmed also by being taken as a type of the sacred union of the Lord with the church: "We are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church." Eph. 5:30-32.

All this shows that God's institution of marriage was the union of one man and one woman, the two and only two, becoming one. What is more than this is not of God, but is of human lust. This order was first broken through by Lamech, the sixth from Adam, who had two wives. Long after this instances are recorded of wives, on account of their great desire for children, giving their maid servants to their husbands: an act that would now be judged as most unnatural in a wife. Sarai gave her Egyptian handmaid to Abram 'to be his wife' (the same word for 'wife' being used for both Sarai and Hagar), and God said He would make of Ishmael a great nation. Jacob's two wives gave their handmaids to their husband, and thus he had four wives. God reckoned the twelve sons of these four women equally as sons of Jacob, and they became the heads of the twelve tribes. It might have been thought that God would not have blessed the issue of these unions, but He did: there is no record of any law having been given on this subject.

Verse 24 puts on record the thought of God as to marriage from the outset, and to this the Lord Jesus appealed when answering the Pharisees, as recorded in Matthew 19:3-9. Deviation from this Divine thought and order, or worse still the denial of it, has probably been the cause of more sin and misery in the world than any other single fount of iniquity. When maturity is reached, a man is to leave father and mother and to found a new family, adhering to one woman as his wife. Thus they become one flesh. As we have just seen, Adam and Eve were one flesh to start with, since she was taken out of him.

As well as God's seeking to impress on us the reality of the relationship of Christ and the church, however, He is showing how close is the unity of husband and wife in God's sacred ordinance of marriage. Today this has been terribly violated by the selfish independence of both men and women, but God's word is plain, “For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (v. 24). Thus God established marriage as the first of human relationships, and He makes if clear for all succeeding generations that a man should leave his father and mother and cling to his wife. It is just as evident that the woman should leave her parents to become fully devoted to her husband. The word “cling” is beautiful here. It involves the reality of love, of devotedness and of faithfulness.

From the beginning God's thought of marriage was one wife for one man. The man was to cleave to his wife, not to his wives. It is true that many Old Testament believers had more than one wife, but this was contrary to God's word, though He bore with it because of the hardness of men's hearts. Only in the New Testament was this corrected by the Lord Jesus, together with the question of divorce (Matt. 19:9). Of course in the world today bigamy, polygamy, adultery and divorce are widespread. Only among Christians can we expect the true character of marriage to be maintained, and this should surely be the case since believers have known the living reality of the grace of God revealed in the person and work of their Lord and Savior, though too many believers also have succumbed to the attacks of the enemy in this matter, sadly failing in their Christian testimony.

He had made them male and female, each adapted for the other, each completed by the other; and had said as to what the union implied, "they two shall be one flesh." Two, and only two, are spoken of, as with Adam and his wife at first, where neither polygamy nor divorce could be thought of; and "one flesh" would make either polygamy or divorce abomination. Man's own voice, before sin had beclouded the mind, thus had given utterance to what the Lord speaks of as a divine utterance: for God and man were then at one. He who with true insight had before named the beasts and found among them all no helpmeet, spoke now in the joyful discernment of that helpmeet found.

But the Lord makes it transparently clear that the basic, original order in creation is not to be changed, but affirmed by the truth of the kingdom of heaven. God, in creating both male and female, made a marked distinction between them, but in marriage indicated a unity of vital character. Because of God's manifest order in creation it was right that a man should leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. This verse settles many questions. First, when marriage takes place, the man (or woman) is no longer in the place of subjection to parents. Secondly, he cleaves to his wife:--only one wife, so that bigamy and polygamy are absolutely unscriptural. Cleaving to his wife involves genuine love for her, and faithfulness and devotedness.

The two are then recognized before God as being "one flesh." It is God Himself who has joined the two together. Therefore man has no authority to divorce them. Governments today of course ignore God's decree in this matter, but the word of God will not change to accommodate men's preferences. Marriage was from the beginning intended to be a binding agreement so long as both individuals remain alive.

Up to the time of a man's marriage the chief relationship in which he stands is that of a son, and his responsibility is towards his parents, but when he marries he leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife. Henceforward she becomes his chief care, for he and she are no more twain but one flesh.

Every right-minded man will look upon his wife as the only woman in the world for him, he will desire no other; and that not because he has chosen her for his wife, but because God has joined them together. He will look upon her as the very woman that God made for him; he will treat her as God's gift to him, and more, he will treat her as himself, for they twain have become one flesh; and that by no mere ordinance of man, but by God's own act and decree, hence "what God has joined together let not man put asunder."

Another feature of pious marriage life made prominent in this passage is that matrimonial union involves the establishment of a new household. The apostle says, “Because of this a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be united to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh” (ver. 31). By entrance into the marriage relationship, two parental homes are vacated, and a new Christian home set up by the married pair.

Marriage is central, therefore, in the web of human life, the basis of all relationships as God has instituted them. And as marriage (not mere sexual union) it has at most its mere shadow in the temporary attachments of the creatures below man. Personal obligation, voluntarily assumed, and expressed in constant fidelity, distinguishes it by the height of a whole heaven from these partial reflections of it.

Thus God had formed and consecrated with His own blessing the sacred tie of marriage, as the first relationship among men upon the earth, He, Who created man in His own image, had made them, male and female, and said "For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they twain shall be one flesh."

It is true that, having been united in wedded bonds, Adam and Eve jointly disobeyed the commandment of the Lord, and fell into and under sin. Nevertheless, the holy and divinely-sanctioned character of marriage which it received in the state of sinlessness remained after the entrance of sin. God had made the single pair, and He made them the one for the other exclusively. As our Lord said, God had joined them together by bonds that are indissoluble by man. This character of permanence attaches to marriage still, as it ever has done. In every union under divine superintendence, God binds together the two hearts and lives by a tie that none can sever.