CHAPTER FOUR - The Question of Marriage

C: EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES

30. Choosing marriage?

The aim of this activity is to emphasise that marriage is a human social response to a given situation, and that there are different ways of responding to that given situation, so that there are different reasons for marriage: Judaism and Christianity, for example, view the ideal response in very different ways.

The activity further aims to examine participants’ responses to the question as to whether or not marriage is desirable.

• Either generally, or as a round robin, the group is asked whether or not they believe marriage is a good idea.

• They should explain their answers, giving the reasons for their answers.
• Whichever response they give, they should be challenged, in order to deepen their thinking.
• List the different reasons on large sheets of poster board, or white board, as the answers come in.

• The next question is whether participants know the Jewish response to the question.

• If they do know (namely, that the approach is positive), ask them what its basis is. Use the text of the creation of woman from Bereishit 2:18-24, and analyse it together for its implications on the subject in question.
• Continue, by explaining that Judaism built upon that quest, bringing texts 11b, 12 and 15 (from the text section) as examples of Judaism’s approach.
• You might also like to present and explain the prophetic frequent metaphorism of marriage in describing G-d’s relationship with the Jewish People (text 13), as indicative of Judaism’s approach.

• Divide the participants into pairs, or small groups. Give each group a sheet with the previous quotations, together with texts 14a and 14b from the Christian tradition. They have ten minutes or so to read over the sheets and point out the differences between the two approaches.

• Bring everyone back together and discuss the answers.

• Following this, each person has a few minutes to write down which approach speaks to them more deeply and explain why.

• The participants now return to their earlier pairs, or small groups, and share their responses.

• Review:
The whole group comes together to share their responses to the issue:

• Has anyone in the group has changed their opinion since the beginning of the activity (when they were asked to give their initial opinion on marriage)?
• Have any of them received fresh insights, even if their opinion has remained the same?