Because of Fornication Let Each Man Have His Own Wife (on 1 Cor 7:2)

“But because of sexual immorality let each man have his own wife.” 1. Today too I wish to lead you by the hand to the springs of honey, a honey that never brings satiety. For such is the nature of Paul's words, and all who fill their hearts from these springs speak through the Holy Spirit; or rather, the delight of the divine oracles hides all the excellence even of honey. The prophet showed this when he said: “How sweet are your oracles to my throat, beyond honey to my mouth!” And the delight of the divine oracles is not only sweeter than honey, but more precious than gold and every stone, and purer than any silver. “For the oracles of the Lord,” he says, “are pure oracles, silver tried by fire, tested in the earth, purified seven times.” Therefore someone also said in exhortation: “[To eat much honey] is not good, but one must honour glorious words.” For from the one, disease that was not there is often produced, while by the others we can put away even the illness that is there; and honey is spoiled in digestion, whereas the divine oracles, when they are digested, become sweeter and more useful, both to those who have them and to many others. One who has enjoyed a material table abundantly and then belches from it becomes [offensive] to his companion; but one who belches from spiritual teaching imparts much fragrance to his neighbour. David, at any rate, constantly enjoying such a feast, said: “My heart has belched forth a good word.” For it is possible to belch out an evil word too. And just as at a material table the quality of the belch follows the nature of the foods, so too with the power of words: as they feed, so many people belch. For instance, if you go up to the theatre and hear immoral songs, you will certainly belch such words at your neighbour; but if you come into the church and partake of spiritual things, such too will be your belches. That is why the prophet said, “My heart has belched forth a good word,” showing us the food of the table of which he always partook. Paul too, obeying this, exhorts: “Let no rotten word come out of your mouth, but whatever is good.” And what is the rotten word, he says? If you learn the good, then you will know the rotten too; for he set this one in contrast to that. What the good one is, you will not need to learn from me; for he himself interpreted its nature for us. Having said “whatever is good,” he added, “for the building up of the church,” showing that the good word is the one that builds up the neighbour. As, then, the one who builds up is good, so the one who pulls down is rotten and … So you too, beloved, if you have something to say that can make the hearer better, do not withhold a word in the time of salvation; but if you have nothing of the kind, only wicked and corrupt words, be silent; do not accuse your neighbour. For that word is rotten, not building up the hearer but even overturning him. If he cares for virtue, he is often lifted up to arrogance; if he is careless, he becomes more slothful. If you are about to utter a shameful word full of laughter, be silent. For this word too is rotten, making both speaker and hearer more licentious and kindling the evil desires in each. As wood becomes food and fuel to fire, so words become to wicked intentions. Therefore we must not by any means utter everything we have in our mind, but must take pains to banish from the mind itself evil desires and every shameful thought. And if we ever unawares admit filthy thoughts, let us never bring them out through the tongue, but choke them by silence. For wild beasts and reptiles that fall into a pit, if they find some way out above, climb up and become fiercer; but if they stay shut in below continually, they easily perish on every side and vanish. So too evil thoughts: if they find some way out through our mouth and words, they kindle the flame within; but if you shut them in by silence, they grow weaker, and, wasting away in silence as if by hunger, they quickly die in the mind. So even if you desire some shameful desire, but do not utter a shameful word, you have quenched the desire too. You do not have a pure mind? At least have a pure mouth, and do not empty the filth outside, so as not to harm both another and yourself. For great defilement comes not only to those who speak shameful things but also to those who hear others speak them. Therefore I exhort and … our nature, and I advise you to refrain not only from saying such things, but also from hearing others say them, and to be fixed continually on the divine law. For such a man the prophet calls blessed, saying: “Blessed is the man who has not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners, nor sat in the seat of the pestilent; but his will is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he will meditate …”

In the gatherings outside, even if something good is ever said, still among much that is worthless the many will hardly utter anything sound; but with the divine Scriptures it is entirely the opposite: you will never hear any evil word, but all are full of salvation and much wisdom, like what was read to us today. And what is this? “Now concerning the things about which you wrote to me,” he says, “it is good for a man not to touch a woman; but because of sexual immorality let each man have his own wife, and each woman her own husband.” Paul legislates about marriage and is not ashamed, nor does he blush; and quite reasonably. For if his Master honoured marriage and was not ashamed, but adorned the thing with his presence and his gift (for he brought to the marriage a gift greater than all, changing the nature of water into wine), how would the servant have blushed in legislating about marriage? Marriage is not an evil thing: what is evil is adultery, evil is sexual immorality; and marriage is a remedy that does away with sexual immorality. Let us not, then, dishonour it with diabolical processions; but what those in Cana of Galilee did, let those who take wives now do too: let them have Christ in the midst. And how can this be done, he says? Through the priests themselves: “For he who receives you,” he says, “receives me.” If, then, you drive away the devil, if you drive out the immoral songs and the effeminate melodies and the disorderly dances and the shameful words and the diabolical procession and the uproar and the dissolute laughter and the rest of the indecency, and bring in the holy servants of Christ, then Christ will surely be present through them, with his mother and his brothers: “For whoever does the will of my Father,” he says, “is my brother and sister and mother.” And I know that I seem burdensome and tiresome to some, giving this advice and cutting out an old custom. But I care nothing for that; for I need not your favour but your benefit, not applause and praise but gain and wisdom. Let no one tell me that it is the custom: where sin is dared, do not mention custom; if what is done is evil, abolish it even if it is an old custom; if it is not evil, introduce and plant it even if it is not the custom. And that it was not an old custom to behave so indecently, but that what is done is an innovation, remember how Isaac took Rebekah, how Jacob took Rachel. For the Scripture records their marriages and tells how these brides were brought into the bridegrooms' houses, and records nothing of the kind: they made a banquet and supper more splendid than usual and invited their relatives to the wedding; but flutes, pipes, cymbals, drunken leaping and all the rest of the present indecency were absent. But people in our time even sing hymns to Aphrodite as they dance, and on that day they sing of many adulteries, corruptions of marriages, unlawful loves, lawless unions and many other songs full of impiety and shame, and after drunkenness and so much indecency they parade the bride publicly with shameful words. How, then, tell me, do you demand chastity of her, when from the first day you train her to such shamelessness and arrange that things are done and said before her eyes that respectable slaves ought not even to hear? For so long a time the father, with the mother, laboured to guard the virgin, so that she would neither say nor hear another say any such words: chambers, women's quarters, guards, doors and bolts, going out only in the evening, being seen by no one, not even by her intimates, and many other things besides; and you, coming in one day, have poured all that away, making her shameless by that disgraceful procession and bringing corrupt words into the bride's soul? Do not the evils that follow come from this? Do not adulteries and jealousies come from this? … For when you call the demons by the songs, when you fulfil their desire by shameful words, when you bring mimes and effeminate men and the whole theatre into the house, when you fill the house with prostitutes and prepare the whole chorus of demons to revel there, what sound thing do you expect afterwards, tell me? And why do you bring in priests too, when you are going to perform such things the next day? Do you wish to show a generosity that brings gain? Invite choirs of the poor. But you are ashamed, no doubt, and blush? And what is worse than this unreason: when you drag the devil into the house you think you do nothing shameful, but when you are about to bring in Christ you blush? For as Christ is present when the poor come in, so when effeminate men and mimes dance there, the devil revels in the midst. From that expense there is no gain, but even much harm; but from these outlays you will soon receive a great reward. “But no one in the city has done this.” Then be eager to begin it and become the founder of this good custom, so that those after you may refer it to you. And if someone emulates and imitates this custom, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren will be able to say to those who inquire, “So-and-so first introduced this good law.” For if in the contests outside, at banquets, those who produce these useless public services more lavishly are celebrated by many, much more in the spiritual service will all praise and acknowledge their gratitude to the first who introduced this wonderful beginning, and the same thing will be both honour and gain. For when it is accomplished by others, it will bring you, who first planted it, the reward of those fruits. This will soon make you a father too, this will protect your children, and the bridegroom with the bride … For just as God continually threatens sinners, saying, “Your sons will be orphans and your wives widows,” so to those who obey him in all things he promises a rich old age and all good things with it.

And one may hear Paul too saying that a multitude of sins has often caused untimely deaths: “That is why,” he says, “many among you are weak and sick, and a number have fallen asleep.” And that the poor, when they are fed, let nothing of the kind befall, but even if something unexpected happens, quickly bring about its correction, learn from the girl in Joppa. When she lay dead, the poor whom she had fed stood around her, wept, raised her up, and brought her back to life. So much more useful is the prayer of widows and the poor than all laughter and dancing. Here the delight lasts one day; there the gain is perpetual. Consider how great it is for the bride to enter the bridegroom's house having received so many blessings on her head. How much more solemn these are than crowns! How much more useful than wealth! Whereas what is done now is the height of madness and folly. Even if no punishment or penalty were laid down for those who behave so indecently, consider how great a penalty it is to endure being drenched with so much abuse publicly, in everyone's hearing, by people who are drunk and corrupted in mind. For the poor, when they receive, bless, and pray for countless good things; but those people, after drunkenness, after gluttony, pour all the filth of jests upon the married couple …; and as if those coming together were enemies, their relatives vie with one another in speaking reproaches about the married pair, sayable and unsayable, imitating those drawn up in battle; and their rivalry with one another, with every excess, [falls upon] the bridegroom with the bride … Shall we seek, then, another proof, tell me, that it is by the demons moving their souls that these things are done and said by them? Who, then, will dispute any longer that it is by demons moving their souls that all these things are said and done by them? No one; for such are the devil's returns: abuse, drunkenness and madness of soul. But if someone should take it as an ill omen that the poor are brought in instead of these, and should say that these are signs of misfortune, let him learn this too: that not the feeding of the poor and widows, but [the presence of] effeminate men and prostitutes is a sign of all unpleasantness and countless evils. For often, from that very day, the prostitute has gone off taking the bridegroom captive from among his friends, quenched his love for the bride, undermined his goodwill, destroyed his affection before it was kindled, and sown the seeds of adultery. Fathers ought to fear these things, if nothing else, and to prevent the presence of mimes and dancers at weddings. For marriage was introduced not that we might be licentious, nor that we might commit sexual immorality, but that we might be chaste. Hear Paul, at any rate, saying: “But because of sexual immorality let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.” For there are these two reasons for which marriage was introduced: that we may be chaste, and that we may become fathers; and of the two the leading reason is chastity. For when desire came in, marriage came in too, cutting off excess and persuading a man to use one wife. For it is not marriage at all that produces the begetting of children, but that word of God which says, “Increase and multiply and fill the earth”; and all who have used marriage but did not become fathers bear witness to this. So this is the leading cause, that of chastity, and especially now, when the whole world is filled with our race. In the beginning children were desired so that each might leave a memorial and remnant of his life. For since there were not yet hopes of resurrection, but death prevailed and those who died thought they perished after this life, God gave the consolation of children, so that living images of the departed might remain, our race might be preserved, and their offspring might be the greatest comfort both to those about to die and to their relatives. And that you may learn that children were desired chiefly for this reason, hear what Job's wife laments to him after the many blows: “Behold,” she says, “your memorial has perished from the earth, your sons and your daughters.” And again Saul says to David: “Swear to me that you will not destroy my seed and my name after me.” But now that the resurrection is at the doors and there is no talk of death, but we are journeying to another life better than the present, zeal for these things is superfluous. For if you desire children, you can acquire far better and more useful ones now, when spiritual birth pangs have been introduced, and a better birth, and more useful caretakers of old age. So there is one reason for marriage, not to commit sexual immorality, and for this reason this remedy was introduced. But if you are going to engage in acts of sexual immorality even after marriage, you have come to marriage superfluously, idly and in vain; or rather, not only idly and in vain, but even to your harm. For it is not the same thing to commit sexual immorality when one does not have a wife, and to do this same thing after marriage. For such a thing is then no longer sexual immorality, but adultery. Even if what has been said is paradoxical, it is true.

For we are not unaware that many think it adultery only when someone corrupts a married woman; but I say that even if a man who has a wife consorts wickedly and licentiously with a public prostitute, or a maidservant, or any other woman who has no husband, such a thing is adultery. For the charge of adultery arises not only from the persons who are wronged but also from those who do the wrong. Do not quote to me now the laws outside, which drag wives who commit adultery to court and … demand an accounting, but do not demand an accounting of men who have wives and are corrupted with maidservants; but I will read you the law of God, which is indignant alike in the case of the wife and of the husband, and says that the thing is adultery. For having said, “and let each woman have her own husband,” he added: “Let the husband render to the wife the goodwill that is due.” What did he wish to show when he said this? That he should preserve the revenues of her property for her? That he should keep her dowry safe? That he should supply costly clothes? A more abundant table? Splendid outings? A large retinue of servants? What do you say? What kind of goodwill do you seek? For all these are [marks] of goodwill. I mean nothing of the kind, he says, but chastity and decency. The husband's body is no longer the husband's but the wife's. Let him keep her possession intact, then, and not diminish it or corrupt it; for among servants too that one is called well-disposed who, having received his master's goods, wastes none of them. Since, then, the husband's body is the wife's possession, let the husband be well-disposed toward the deposit. For that this is what he means, having said “Let him render the goodwill,” he added: “The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband; likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife.” When, therefore, … body, say to her: “The body is not mine; it is my wife's; I do not dare to misuse it, nor to give it to another woman.” Let the wife too do this. For here there is great equality of honour; yet in other matters Paul gives great precedence, saying: “Nevertheless, let each of you so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she fears her husband”; and “The head of the woman is the man”; and “The wife ought to be subject to the husband.” And again in the Old [Testament]: “Your turning shall be to your husband, and he shall rule over you.” How, then, did he introduce here an equal exchange of servitude and mastery? For to say, “The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband; likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body …” … And just as he is master of her body, so she too is mistress of his body. Why, then, did he introduce such equality of honour? Because there precedence is necessary; but where it is a matter of chastity and decency, the husband has no advantage over the wife, but is punished just as she is if he corrupts the laws of marriage; and quite rightly. For it was not for this that your wife came to you and left father and mother and the whole house, … that you might make countless wars; you took her as a partner and companion of life, free and of equal honour. For how is it not absurd, when you receive her dowry, to show all goodwill toward it and diminish nothing of it, while what is more precious than any dowry, chastity and decency, … and your own body, which is her possession, to corrupt and defile? If you diminish the dowry, you give account to your father-in-law; if you diminish chastity, you will render an account to God, who introduced marriage and entrusted the wife to you. And that this is true, hear what Paul says about adulterers: “For he who rejects [this] rejects not man but God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you.” Do you see by how much the argument has shown that it is adultery not only to corrupt a married woman but also [to consort with] any prostitute whatever when one has a wife? For just as we say that a wife commits adultery if she has a husband, whether she sins with a servant or with anyone at all, so we would say that a husband commits adultery if, having a wife himself, he behaves licentiously with a maidservant or with any public woman whatever. Let us not, then, neglect our own salvation, nor offer our soul to the devil through this sin. For from this come the countless overturnings of households, the countless wars; from this love ebbs away and goodwill is undermined. For just as it is impossible for a chaste man ever to disdain and despise his wife, so it is impossible for a licentious and unrestrained man to love his own wife, even if she is the most beautiful of all. For from chastity love is born, and from love countless good things. Consider other women, then, as stones, knowing that after marriage, if you look with licentious eyes at another woman, whether a public woman or a married one, you have become liable to the charges against adulterers. Chant these words to yourself every day; and if you see desire for another woman rising in you, and your wife then seeming unpleasant to you because of it, go in, take Paul as mediator, and chanting these words continually, quench the flame. And so your wife too will again be more desirable to you, no desire undermining your goodwill toward her; and not only will your wife be more desirable, but you too will seem much more dignified and free. For there is nothing, nothing more shameful than a man who commits sexual immorality after marriage. He blushes not only before his father-in-law and his friends and those he meets, but even before the servants themselves. And not only is this the terrible thing, but that he sees the house itself as … and continually imagines the prostitute.

Do you wish to learn exactly how terrible this is? Consider what kind of life those lead who suspect their own wives: how unpleasant their food, how unpleasant their drink. The table seems to them full of deadly poisons, and they flee the house as though it were destruction, full of countless evils. They have no sleep, no gentle night, no company of friends, not even the rays of the sun themselves; they think they are troubled even by the light itself, not only when they see their wife committing adultery, but even if they merely suspect it. Consider that your wife too suffers this when she hears from someone …, if she suspects that you have given yourself to a prostitute. Reasoning on this, flee not only adulteries but also suspicions; and if she suspects you unjustly, [comfort her] and persuade her. For she does this not from enmity or arrogance, but from care and from great fear for her own possession. For your body, as I said before, is her possession, and a possession more precious than all that exists. Do not, then, wrong her in the greatest matters, nor give her a mortal blow. Even if you despise her, at least fear God, the avenger of such things, who has threatened unbearable punishments for such sins. For of those who dare such things he says, “Their worm will not die, and the fire will not be quenched.” But if the future does not much sting you, at least let the present frighten you. Many, at any rate, of those who attach themselves to prostitutes have perished miserably even here, the wretches, having suffered sorceries from the women with whom they committed sexual immorality. For these women, striving to detach him from the wife who lives with him and was pledged to him and to bind him wholly to their own love, set magic in motion, prepared love potions and stitched together many charms; then, throwing him in this way into grievous illness, handing him over to decay and long wasting and surrounding him with countless evils, they carried him off from the present life. If you do not fear Gehenna, man, fear their sorceries. For when through this licentiousness you make yourself bereft of God's alliance and strip yourself of help from above, the prostitute takes hold of you freely, calls her demons, stitches together the leaves, works her plots, and with great ease overcomes your salvation, making you a reproach and a laughing-stock to all who live in the city, so that you are not even pitied when you suffer evils. “For who will pity a charmer bitten by a snake,” he says, “and all who approach wild beasts?” I pass over the loss of money, the daily suspicions, the conceit, the arrogance, the insolence that prostitutes inflict on the foolish, which are more bitter than countless deaths. Your wife, who often did not even say a harsh word, you could not bear; but the prostitute, even when she slaps you, you worship. And are you not ashamed, do you not blush, do you not pray that the earth may open for you? How will you be able to enter the church and stretch out your hands to heaven? With what mouth will you call on God, the mouth with which you kissed the prostitute? And are you not afraid, do you not shudder, tell me, lest a thunderbolt brought down from above burn up your shameless head? For even if you escape the notice of the wife who has been wronged, you will never escape the sleepless eye; for to that adulterer who said, “Darkness is around me, and walls; what do I fear?” that wise man answered: … so much brighter, looking upon the works of men. That is why Paul said all this: “Let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband; let the husband render to the wife the due … to the husband.” “Honey drips from the lips of a prostitute, which for a season pleases your throat,” … and “sharpened more than a two-edged sword.” The prostitute's kiss has poison, a poison hidden and concealed. Why, then, do you pursue a pleasure that brings condemnation, gives birth to destruction, inflicts an incurable wound, when it is possible to be glad and suffer nothing terrible? For with the free woman there are together pleasure, safety, ease, honour, adornment and a good conscience; but there, much bitterness, much harm, perpetual accusation. For even if no human being sees, your conscience will never cease accusing you; but wherever you go, this accuser will follow, accusing and crying out loudly. So if anyone pursues pleasure, let him above all flee intercourse with prostitutes. For nothing is more bitter than that intimacy, nothing more unpleasant than that intercourse, nothing fouler than their ways. “Let the hind of [your] love and the foal of your graces keep company with you; let the spring of your water be your own.” Having a pure spring of water, why do you run to a pit of filth? … what defence will you have? What pardon? For if those who give themselves to sexual immorality before marriage are punished and pay the penalty, like that man clothed in filthy garments, much more those after marriage. For here the charge becomes double and triple: because, though they enjoyed consolation, they bolted off into that licentiousness, and because the act is reckoned not only sexual immorality but also adultery, which is worse than every sin. Let us continue, then, chanting these things to ourselves and to our wives; and that is why I too will end with these words: “But because of sexual immorality let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband; let the husband render to the wife the goodwill that is due, and likewise also the wife to the husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband; likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife.” Keeping these words with exactness, in the marketplace and at home, by day and in the evening, at table and in bed, and everywhere, let us both practise them ourselves and teach our wives both to say them to us and to hear them from us, so that, having lived the present life chastely, we may also obtain the kingdom of heaven, by the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom be glory to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.