Worldviews of Marriage and Divorce

Worldviews of Marriage and Divorce

Part One:Worldviews

The way we were brought up by our parents, the authoritative texts of our religions, and our experiences in our lives all shape the way we view marriage and divorce, what is right and what is acceptable. These three things are interconnected as there may be a foundation of our beliefs on marriage that comes from our upbringing, but experiences can change our beliefs; just as our beliefs can reinterpret how we view our life experiences. Likewise, our beliefs based on our upbringing and teachings from our parents come from an attempt by our parents to pass down their own beliefs shaped by these things in their own life. Each major worldview has it's own view on what is acceptable in terms of marriage and divorce. Sometimes a religion's worldview on this draws people to the religion and sometimes it pushes people away. Sometimes people even create new belief systems to justify their own convictions or lack thereof. Following this introduction is a few explanations on marriage and divorce as seen through the different worldview lenses.

Islam

Islam has many conflicting views on marriage and divorce. In several works written by more passive western Muslim writers, they would have you to believe that true Islam promotes equality of women. An Islamic marriage is supposed to be a civil contract between two people where the woman does not lose her individuality (Mohd). Any property that she owns at the time of the marriage, or anything that is given to her during the marriage is still hers in the event of a divorce, whereas the husband's property will be divided at the time of a divorce (Mitchell).

In order for a marriage to be legal in Islam, the marriage must have included a proposal and an acceptance, a marriage contract is agreed upon, and they will have a ceremony where the wedding is official if they have two male witnesses or a male witness and two female witnesses (Mitchell). So, on the surface it seems as...