MARRIAGE IN THE BIBLE

I was annoyed that the opponents of marriage equality often claim "marriage has always been between one man and one woman". Of course this isn't true. Marriage has evolved over time, has differed across cultures, and conversely, many cultures have tolerated or formalized same-sex unions to various degrees. It isn't even true in the context of the Bible. The Christian Bible depicts several types of marriage arrangements, and none of them resemble modern marriage. This information was taken from religioustolerance.org, which thoroughly delves into social issues from all angles, and is an indispensable resource for those interested in any issue relating to religion.

EDIT: This is getting more attention right now, and now I'm getting some truly dumb hate mail reprimanding me (I am an adult, people, not a child), because, they claim, marriage customs had changed by the time the New Testament was written, and the New Testament is what's important.

Now, forget for a second that that's only one interpretation. Yes, plenty of Christians have not just tossed out the whole Old Testament like it doesn't matter, and there are rather serious theological problems that arise when you attempt to do that: namely, Jesus becomes pointless since he was supposed to fulfill Old Testament prophecies and redeem humans for our "original sin", and you just tossed those things out as well, so now he's just a guy saying stuff; and your god Yawheh, rather than an eternal being, looks like a petty deity who changes his mind about everything once in a while on some PRETTY important moral issues. Slavery? Child marriage? Animal sacrifice? Stoning gays to death? Oh, those things are totally fine... up to a certain point in history! Then I shall decree that it is no longer so! Even though I already let a bunch of people and animals get hurt by those things for centuries. Um... what??).

Not to mention when we are talking about the Biblical world we are really only talking about a very specific handful of people and cultures the Bible is focused on; and the rest of the world had thousands of other cultures, and they had their own marriage customs, and there are thousands of religions on this planet other than Christianity; and in America we live in a diverse, *secular* nation that guarantees religious freedom...

Forget all that. Never mind how utterly tiny these people's worldview is. They are mad at me because, they say, marriage changed... ***CHANGED***.

Changed. It changed.

Way. To. Miss. The. Point.