On the Necessity of Marriage

By:  Dr. Maqsood Jafri

Should we marry or should we have free sex culture? this is the burning question of our age. The Semitic religions namely Judaism, Christianity and Islam have strictly prohibited adultery, fornication and same sex and have ordained marriage. Marriage is a social and religious pact between a man and a woman. Even the atheist societies stress on the need of marriage as a social contract. Marriage is disciplines the societies. Even non-Semitic cults like Hinduism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism and Bahaism believe in marriage. One husband and one wife is a generally and universally accepted practice. Free sex is an animal practice. It mars human psyche, personality and society. It promotes and breeds venereal diseases. With out a better half we can not have a better life. No wife , no life. We should not ignore the advice of elders and the betters who in the light of an age experiences concluded to gave a pure and noble family system. I still remember the pathetic condition of a Londoner who begged for a few pounds from me to brothel. On my askance, he retorted that he has no wife and satisfies his sexual urge by indulging in free sex. With out moral values and sexual discipline every house can turn in to a brothel which is undesirable.

I am convinced that the experiment of free sex in Europe and America has totally failed and rejected by every sane and sage. I must condemn the extreme trend of some dogmatic families who put un-necessary impediments of the youth for the marriage of choice. The marriages of compulsion are irrational inhuman and un natural. Forced marriages are a social crime. Free choice of marriage is the religious, social and human right of every man and woman. Islam permits four wives at a time but it is conditional. It appreciates one wife and says that you can have more than one wife if you can do justice with them. But in the same verse says that you can not do justice with them. Before Islam there was no binding on the number of wives. The monarchs and the rich people had numberless wives and concubines. Islam restricted this unwanted custom and limited their number. Generally, it is the impression that Islam encourages polygamy. Great British philosopher Bertrand Russell writes that man by nature is polygamous and woman by nature is monogamous. Besides this psychological verity, it must be clear that it was only Islam that limited the number of wives with the condition of justice. No other religion has put any restriction on the number of wives. There is an other serious question to be answered. once I came across a young lady who was married to an old retired officer. She happened to be his second wife and marriage was based on mercenary and economic interests. It was not a marriage of conviction but the marriage of convenience. The marriage of financial interest on the part of that young lady. Such marriages based on material interest cause social ills. The old husband and the young wife are unnatural couple. The government must pass a law in the parliament about the age difference between the husband and wife. According to physiognomy, the difference should not be more than five years. The husband can be older to wife but not more than five years as the lady gets old and barren earlier than the man.

I have noticed an other flaw in marriages of incompatible couples. Mental harmony is very essential for a happy marriage. Bad marriages are the result of mental incompatibility. Under the family pressure some very educated guys are married to family uneducated girls. The gap of understanding makes their lives miserable. It is very pertinent to be see that the couple has mental harmony. In the earlier period the girls were not educated and the only standard of their getting proper husband was their physical beauty. Now with physical beauty , the mental maturity is also required. In the urban areas where the guys and girls are still illiterate, we still find their standard of choice is different from the educated rural class. In villages we have still the olden ways of traditional folk love. No mental harmony issue but simple liking on physical attraction of family blood relations. It is not the marriage of minds but the marriage of bodies. Whether it is marriage of minds or the marriage of bodies, the most important factors are mutual love and respect. Even the illiterate girl wants to be loves, cared, caressed and respected as she is not a sheep but a human being.

Most of the people marry to satiate their sexual impulse as sexual drive is a natural drive like hunger. In youth period sexual urge impels them to marry any girl available by chance, liking or by family relations. Mostly in traditional culture the marriages are arranged marriages. It is done at random. One is not much choosy. Emotional involvement or the love at first sight decide their fate and future. In primitive days, the free mixing of young boys and girls was strictly prohibited to avoid sexual cohabitation with out marriage.