Marriage 2 - 1 Corinthians 7:5-11

Paul gives some pretty good marriage advice, but he also accepts that there will be times when spouses must be apart from each other sometimes, and gives an example of when that might be appropriate in verse 5. But it’s important to read the JST for context, which says, “Depart ye not one from the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer.” It seems like this is referring to missionary service, or for callings within the church that require greater time apart, like bishops, even though they don’t necessarily leave their homes overnight, there is a lot of time away from the family required.

Paul kind of puts himself out there a little bit when talking about being away from your wife in missionary service, saying, “for I would that all men were even as I myself.” I talked to a friend about this statement a while ago and he said that he believes Paul was stating that he is celibate because his wife was not with him at this point. I think it’s important to note that I don’t think he’s saying that he’s not tempted because I feel that part of the human experience is being sexually tempted until the day you die. 

He might be tempted but he’s saying that he doesn’t give in, and it’s kind of a “look, if I can do it, you can do it. I’m not asking you to do anything that I’m not doing myself.” But he does recognize that his ability to withstand strongly might be one of his strengths and that “every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that.”

As for those who have never been married and widows, Paul says “it is good for them if they abide even as I.” It might seem like Paul is saying “it is best if they remain celibate,” which I think it true but the caveat here seems to be “as long as they are not married.” The implication here might be that it is better to remain celibate than to get married, but I don’t necessarily think that’s what Paul is saying. I think he’s saying that as long as you are not married or if you are away from your spouse for missionary service, remain celibate “even as I myself.” 

The next verse seems to feed into that sentiment a little bit saying, “but if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.” With a blind reading of that verse, it could seem like Paul is saying, “but if you are too weak to withstand sexual temptation, then get married.” This seems to give a clear message that living singly and celibately is much preferred by God than marriage and that marriage is the weak person’s version of keeping the commandments.

However, there is a JST that gives much added insight, saying, “but if they cannot abide, let them marry; for it is better to marry than that any should commit sin.”  I googled “JST 1 Corinthians 7:9” because I wanted to see if there was more that I could read about this because it just didn’t sit right. I came across a website gospeldoctrine.com that has some excellent information and reading it gave me some different ideas.

The article points out that there are several lenses through which we need to view Paul’s teachings in chapter 7. First, chapter 7 “has been the sources of more confusion regarding the doctrine of marriage than any other chapter in the Bible.” It’s like if we take the whole works of ancient scripture and try to formulate our opinions solely based on this one chapter, it would be like basing our whole perspective of killing based on Nephi’s incident with Laban. We can’t take a single, solitary snipet of talk or history and base our entire world view on it. Church leaders have said before and currently that gospel doctrine is preached loud and proud from the pulpit repeated. There isn’t going to be some gem of doctrine hidden in an obscure talk 40 years ago and then never mentioned again. God teaches his doctrine early and often. 

Second, “Joseph Smith made more corrections to this chapter than to any other chapter written by Paul save one (Romans 7).” If we pretend for a second that we only have the Bible to teach us the word of God, which has been true historically for millions of people, then reading chapter 7 the way that we have it translated today makes the doctrine very confusing. Knowing that this section of Paul’s work has been excessively mistranslated might help us when we come to a part that seems contrary to what we know to be true. If we think, “I don’t think that’s right,” and then remember that much of what we have as record is incorrect, then we can say, “ok, let’s try to corroborate this with other teachings to test the validity.”

Third, “Paul specifically addresses questions put to him by the Corinthian saints in a previous letter; so some of his advice is specific to them and cannot be universally applied to all saints of all times.” This is true for all teachings ever. So much of the Bible and all scripture, even the Doctrine and Covenants, are hard to understand because we just don’t know why these topics were being addressed and what the cultural significance for it was at the time. Teaching doctrine about marriage would be done vastly different to new converts in a pagan community than to life long members in a predominantly Christian society.

Fourth, “Paul expressly states that his advice is his own opinion and not the world of the Lord. Paul is only speaking the world of the Lord in the following seven verses: 1-5, 10, and 11; the rest is give as advice from ‘one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord.’” It would be so nice if church leaders would say “this is my personal opinion” when speaking so that we could take it in that point of view. But they don’t always and this is a good reminder that we are responsible for our own learning and testimonies. If something seems “off” about something a church leader says, or anyone for that matter, we are responsible for taking the matter to the Lord and learning for ourselves.

Fifth, when Paul is speaking here, he is doing so “as a single apostle and missionary of the Lord… Therefore, when he says ‘I would that all men were even as I’ (meaning unmarried), he says that in the context of performing missionary work with its rigors of travel and perpetual persecution.” This is a fantastic way of viewing Paul’s statement, and totally different than what I thought he was talking about, and it’s possible for it to apply to both. It seems like the article is suggesting that Paul was wishing that all missionaries were unmarried so that families wouldn’t have to be left behind, homesickness for missionaries would be lessened, and there would be no threats to their families back home.

The article quotes Robert J. Matthews as noting, “the popular myth that Paul was opposed to marriage is corrected by the Joseph Smith Translation so that his dictum that there is an advantage to remaining unmarried is limited to those on temporary mission assignments. This practice was advocated by Paul for efficiency in the temporary ministry, and is similar to the practice of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today in calling young men and women, unmarried to serve missions, and refrain from marriage while in the mission field. Paul’s teachings against marriage were not for all Church members, any more than the policy for young missionaries to remain unmarried today is a permanent rejection of marriage. The Joseph Smith Translation restores the proper context.” 

This was a great statement for me to understand the context of what Paul was saying. He was on a mission, so it would make sense that he was advocating for missionaries to remain unmarried. Coming from a Pharisaic background, Paul would have understood the divine nature of marriage and families and their role in the plan of salvation. And even though it seems that he is unmarried now, surely it wasn’t always that way. Many people might read in to Paul’s statements here as proof that he was not ever married, but he was a Pharisee before he became a Christian and a man could only hold these high offices if he was married, so there was no way that he was never married.

It’s also important to remember that when Paul is speaking of missionary work in his time, it was much different than the missionary work we do now. We have called individuals in a transitional time in their lives set to serve for a specific amount of time. Back then men were called in all stages of their lives, often for unspecified periods of time, traveling to often hostile locations to preach the gospel. So it would make sense for there to be different guidelines in these situations.

Viewing chapter 7 from a missionary point of view also helps verse 10 and 11 be clearer. If speaking to missionaries, verses 10 and 11 could be seen as guides for married missionaries. These are two of the seven verses that the Lord is commanding, and he tells the wife to not depart “from her husband,” but if she doesn’t, she shouldn’t get remarried, and men should not abandon their wives while out on missions. A little bit difficult to make sense of, but the missionary perspective surely helps.