Ethics of Married Life

Love in marriage is not unfettered emotion; it survives and thrives through the discipline of married life. The path of marriage holds special challenges to a couple committed to a lifetime together. It serves as a crucible for refining character and a school for perfecting love.

Scriptures spell out some of the traditional ethical rules that have informed marriages through the ages. They spell out different but complementary roles in the household. Husbands should honor their wives and wives should obey their husbands. Both spouses should be faithful, sharing everything together and never contemplating divorce.

While occasionally these traditional roles have been made to justify a double standard, when rightly understood they describe reciprocal and mutual responsibilities. (See Chapter 20: Women’s Rights for a discussion of equality between the sexes in the larger society.)

Father Moon teaches that the ideal of marriage is when the spouses live for the sake of each other, the husband respecting his wife as God’s daughter and the wife respecting her husband as God’s son. Love is the ultimate basis of the equality of husband and wife.