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Does a single woman always need her father’s approval to marry?

A

Aaron_D

New Member
Real Person
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I know that in the old testament daughters were given in marriage by their fathers and could have their vows cancelled by their father. So I would assume that it would still apply today and that God would want me to have a woman’s fathers permission in order to marry her. When I meet someone that I am interested in I plan to be upfront about believing in polygyny and patriarchal gender roles. It seems to me like it would be easier to convince a woman that I am dating to accept polygyny than to convince her father and her family to approve of it. So I am wondering if there are any circumstances where a single woman’s father would not have authority over her.

If women do not live in their father’s house, does he still have authority over her? If the father believes in gender equality and encourages his daughter to leave home and be independent, would he be abdicating his authority? Does anyone on here who is in a plural marriage have a good relationship with their in laws?

I understand that legally women can marry whoever they want, but I want to make sure that I honor God and give the proper respect to a woman’s family even if they do not agree with biblical gender roles.
 
Aaron_D said:
I know that in the old testament daughters were given in marriage by their fathers and could have their vows cancelled by their father. So I would assume that it would still apply today and that God would want me to have a woman’s fathers permission in order to marry her. When I meet someone that I am interested in I plan to be upfront about believing in polygyny and patriarchal gender roles. It seems to me like it would be easier to convince a woman that I am dating to accept polygyny than to convince her father and her family to approve of it. So I am wondering if there are any circumstances where a single woman’s father would not have authority over her.

If women do not live in their father’s house, does he still have authority over her? If the father believes in gender equality and encourages his daughter to leave home and be independent, would he be abdicating his authority? Does anyone on here who is in a plural marriage have a good relationship with their in laws?

I understand that legally women can marry whoever they want, but I want to make sure that I honor God and give the proper respect to a woman’s family even if they do not agree with biblical gender roles.
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Just concentrate on good relationship with father-in-law. It will provide neccesary blessing.

And regarding that wow thing. It last only 24 hours, after that right to cancel has expired.
 
@Aaron_D, I would not be raising polygamy with a potential father-in-law. It's just creating trouble for yourself. Statistically speaking, it's probably not going to happen anyway - most men only have one wife. Just focus on finding one wife and being a good husband to her. You may well decide that one is hard enough work anyway and you wouldn't want any more! :) And even if polygamy does happen for you, it will likely only occur after many years of monogamous marriage.

Do you intend to discuss every different possible future you might have with your potential father-in-law? "I might decide to move to Poland one day, would it still be ok to marry your daughter if there's a 5% chance I might take her to eastern europe?". "As I study scripture I might change my views in the future and decide to leave the Baptist church and become Catholic, or Orthodox, or Lutheran, I really don't know what I'll be thinking in a decade - is it still ok for me to marry your daughter?".

Of course, if you want to never marry, go for it!
Aaron_D said:
If women do not live in their father’s house, does he still have authority over her? If the father believes in gender equality and encourages his daughter to leave home and be independent, would he be abdicating his authority?
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If a father has told his daughter "it's your decision who you marry, not mine", then he has given his permission for her to marry any man whom she believes is right. You could call it "abdicating his authority", or "delegating responsibility", or whatever you like depending on whether you want to spin it positively or negatively. But this is the case for probably most women these days, as most fathers (wrongly) no longer see this as their role. Yet even if they shouldn't have done it, the result is that their daughter has full Biblical freedom to marry whoever she likes.
 
Aaron_D said:
I know that in the old testament daughters were given in marriage by their fathers and could have their vows cancelled by their father. So I would assume that it would still apply today and that God would want me to have a woman’s fathers permission in order to marry her. When I meet someone that I am interested in I plan to be upfront about believing in polygyny and patriarchal gender roles. It seems to me like it would be easier to convince a woman that I am dating to accept polygyny than to convince her father and her family to approve of it. So I am wondering if there are any circumstances where a single woman’s father would not have authority over her.

If women do not live in their father’s house, does he still have authority over her? If the father believes in gender equality and encourages his daughter to leave home and be independent, would he be abdicating his authority? Does anyone on here who is in a plural marriage have a good relationship with their in laws?

I understand that legally women can marry whoever they want, but I want to make sure that I honor God and give the proper respect to a woman’s family even if they do not agree with biblical gender roles.
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A father’s authority over his daughter’s marriage is a little bit of a nebulous thing. It’s not explicitly laid out in scripture. It is heavily implied that the father should have a role and that it is best practices to honor that role.

It is not at all clear that he has an absolute veto or that a union that doesn’t receive a father’s blessing can not be valid. It’s a wonderful thing to have though and I would question the wisdom of not getting it in most circumstances. I got my father in law’s permission.
 
The Revolting Man said:
It is not at all clear that he has an absolute veto
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If a father has an absolute veto over any vow that his daughter who is in his house makes, I do not see your point as valid.
Today, however, fathers pretty much don’t care about their responsibilities.
 
Aaron_D said:
Does anyone on here who is in a plural marriage have a good relationship with their in laws?
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When I took my second wife her father had already passed away and I have a good relationship with her mother. I don't have a particularly good relationship with the parents of my first wife since I took a second.
Aaron_D said:
I understand that legally women can marry whoever they want, but I want to make sure that I honor God and give the proper respect to a woman’s family even if they do not agree with biblical gender roles.
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There are many different situations with women in the world. As far as I can discern, Jacob didn't get the permission of the fathers of Bilhah or Zilpah to take them as wives, nor did Boaz ask Ruth's father for her hand in marriage. There is nothing in the biblical record that indicates any of this was a problem. Be wise with what you do and seek to avoid creating difficulties for yourself or your bride(s). Shalom
 
frederick said:
As far as I can discern, Jacob didn't get the permission of the fathers of Bilhah or Zilpah to take them as wives, nor did Boaz ask Ruth's father for her hand in marriage.
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No, but Laban (acting as surrogate father) gave both Leah and then Rachel their respective handmaidens (perhaps his daughters, too, by another wife - but Scripture is silent on that too) when he gave THEM to Yakov.

And Ruth's father, if he yet even lived, is never mentioned. But by then she was a widow. He was, in fact - as the story tells us - near of kin.

Be very careful "reasoning from silence."
 
frederick said:
As far as I can discern, Jacob didn't get the permission of the fathers of Bilhah or Zilpah to take them as wives
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They were slaves. Their headship had presumably changed from their father to Laban back when he purchased them (we are not told anything about this part of their story, but had their father been in poverty and sold them to clear his debts for instance, that would be a transfer of headship - and any other conceivable situation would also constitute a transfer of headship). Then their headship was transferred from Laban to Jacob when he gave them as wedding gifts. Of course the morality of all of that can be debated for ever, let's not do that, I'm just saying it's the practical reality. Jacob was their head already and only needed his own permission.

Which, incidentally, is why he had a wedding when he married Leah and Rachel, but not when marrying Bilhah and Zilpah. Leah and Rachel were under their father's headship, and the wedding feast celebrated the formal transfer of ownership to Jacob. But the formal transfer of ownership of Bilhah and Zilpah also occurred then. So by the time he took them as wives, they already were his.
 
steve said:
If a father has an absolute veto over any vow that his daughter who is in his house makes, I do not see your point as valid.
Today, however, fathers pretty much don’t care about their responsibilities.
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One more time again, what does a vow have to do with one flesh?
 
The Revolting Man said:
One more time again, what does a vow have to do with one flesh?
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Entering into an agreement to spend the rest of your life with a certain man, tell me how that is not a vow, a promise before Yah.

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FollowingHim said:
@Aaron_D, I would not be raising polygamy with a potential father-in-law.
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I don’t plan to bring up polygamy with a potential father in law. I do plan to discuss my beliefs with any woman that I am seriously interested in. And I imagine that the woman would tell her family that I believe in polygyny and that they would have questions for me.
 
FollowingHim said:
They were slaves. Their headship had presumably changed from their father to Laban back when he purchased them (we are not told anything about this part of their story, but had their father been in poverty and sold them to clear his debts for instance, that would be a transfer of headship - and any other conceivable situation would also constitute a transfer of headship). Then their headship was transferred from Laban to Jacob when he gave them as wedding gifts. Of course the morality of all of that can be debated for ever, let's not do that, I'm just saying it's the practical reality. Jacob was their head already and only needed his own permission.

Which, incidentally, is why he had a wedding when he married Leah and Rachel, but not when marrying Bilhah and Zilpah. Leah and Rachel were under their father's headship, and the wedding feast celebrated the formal transfer of ownership to Jacob. But the formal transfer of ownership of Bilhah and Zilpah also occurred then. So by the time he took them as wives, they already were his.
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Exactly. There are many different situations women find themselves in.
 
The Revolting Man said:
One more time again, what does a vow have to do with one flesh?
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Nothing. You become one flesh completely independent of any agreement you may or may not make.

But "one flesh" is not the only matter pertaining to this thing we call marriage.
Aaron_D said:
It seems to me like Exodus 22 16-17 is an example of a father cancelling a one flesh union.
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No, you cannot "cancel" a one-flesh union. We are told that when a man and woman unite sexually, they become one flesh. Even when a man has sex with a prostitute, he becomes one flesh with the prostitute. It's a physical thing, not a spiritual thing (it's not "one spirit", but "one flesh"). You can't just "cancel" it, any more than you can just "cancel" a new haircut (sorry dear, I disapprove of your haircut, so I renounce it, which means that magically all your hair has grown back as if you never had a haircut...). Sex makes them one flesh, regardless of what anyone thinks about it.

But there are two things at play here - one flesh and physical possession / ownership of the woman.

Exodus 22:16-17 is an example of a father forbidding a man from having possession of the woman he has already become one flesh with. Despite the fact they have had sex, he cannot just take her to be "his woman" because the father said "no, she's mine and I'm not giving her to you".
 
FollowingHim said:
But "one flesh" is not the only matter pertaining to this thing we call marriage.
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It in all seriousness, this is the part that no one can show me in scripture. This is the disagreement. Everyone has made up this extra-biblical layer of “marriage” that can’t be found in scripture because they’re terrified to have to deal with the fact that the vast majority of us are in invalid, adulterous relationships.

I understand how scary that is but it is also extremely insulting to our Savior to imply that He can’t redeem those relationships if we will humbly repent. Especially if He has already blessed those unions with children, he has glaringly signaled His willingness to make these things right.
 
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