Misconceptions About White Wedding
By Inalegwu Harry-Ameh
You may have been told the white wedding gown symbolizes virginity, holiness, and purity, by Christian marriage rites. With all due respect, those claims are bogus and untrue.
Also, the claim that the church isn’t supposed to wed a couple who may have had sex or already have children together because it would be unscriptural or against Christian religious practice is, to put respectfully, baseless, and scripturally untenable. Scripturally and otherwise, everything about marriage is essentially the business of the intending couple and their families, by their tradition. A couple got married under African traditional custom but were told by their church not to start living together or have sex until they are wedded in the church; that is completely unacceptable and spiritually incongruent. Originally, the church was never an institution, neither was it saddled with the ecclesiastical responsibility of conducting marriages (even our Lord the Christ was merely a guest at the marriage at Canaan, he did not even sit with the hosts___ John 2). The command from Christ was not for his disciples to go about and plant church denominations and preside over them, but that they go, preach the gospel of God’s kingdom and turn the hearts of men to God (Mark 16:15, Matthew 10:7, Acts 10: 42).
“A white wedding is a traditional formal or semi-formal wedding originating in Great Britain [as their tradition and not necessarily a Christian practice, having nothing to do with Africa and the rest of the world]. The term originates from the white colour of the wedding dress, which first became popular with Victorian era elites after Queen Victoria wore a white lace dress at her wedding (Wekepedia).”
The white wedding gown had nothing to do with either the woman’s chastity or some scriptural stipulation, there was nothing connotative about it. It is also on record that Princess Philipa of England, daughter of King Henry IV, who married Eric of Pomerania in 1406, was the first to wear white at her wedding. It was all a matter of choice peculiar to them as individuals (wearing a white wedding dress), the royalties before them would often go for other colors (red in particular). White even used to be the preferred colour to be worn when mourning.
Do you know the origin of the wedding veil? Again, another bogus tale coined from myths but now baselessly and unnecessarily spiritualized by many churches. The veil was believed, superstitiously, to frighten away evil spirits or disguise the bride from them. Since it was also believed to be bad luck for the groom to see the face of his bride before the wedding, the veil was worn to guard against that. More disturbing is the fact that the veil also used to be worn by a bride in arranged marriages where she was particularly meant to be seen by her husband-to-be for the very first time. Again, the veil has no root in Christianity, neither does it have anything to do with the sexual chastity of the woman.
In biblical times, everything about marriage was between the couples and their families, it had nothing to do with the priests and the synagogue (Genesis 24, 1 Samuel 17: 25, 1 Samuel 18: 17, John 2). Sexual chastity is good and it was considered very honorable and a requirement for a woman to be a virgin before she is married in biblical times (even in African traditional customs), but it wasn’t a compulsory requirement and the choice largely was the men. It is inconsequential whether a woman is a virgin or not, any man can decide to marry her and that has got nothing to do with white wedding gowns and veils. A man was compelled to marry a woman if it was he who deflowered her. So it wasn’t that men married women so they could necessarily be the first to sleep with them (but it is very commendable to be the first person your spouse has slept with, though it factually isn’t the ultimate and does not guarantee a long-lasting and joy-filled marriage).
It is fallacious to say Christianity has its type of marriage. Jesus did not lay down marriage rites for his believers to follow. There’s no place in the new testament where it is stated that a Christian male and female must perform certain “church rituals” before they are wedded as husband and wife. Christ did not preside over any marriage ceremony, neither did his disciples. Please note that one is not saying such rites or church marriage rituals are wrong, the point is that they now come with obnoxious demands and it would be very blasphemous to say God Himself is the one who originated them (Matthew 21: 13, Isaiah 56: 7). Marriages were never conducted in the synagogue or temple of God, not in the old or new testament. I know a pastor who never conducts marriages or allows it to be conducted in the church he presides. People only went to the temple to worship and make sacrifices unto Yahweh in biblical times, not to conduct marriages. The early Christians or followers of Christ preferred celibacy to getting married as they felt having a spouse and children would affect one’s ability to freely go about preaching the Kingdom of God and possibly dying a martyr (1 Corinthians 7:7, Matthew 19:10).
The practice of white wedding has indeed come to stay and it has its pleasures, the problem is that it is not well understood by a people to whom it is not autochthonous and it is gradually becoming an unnecessary practice gladdened with superfluity.
