First, the charge must be true second, there must be no proof of the woman’s virginity. With this in mind, notice that there are two requirements that must be met before the woman was punished: “If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the young woman’s virginity can be found” (Deuteronomy 22:20, emphasis added). Keep in mind that the text (Deuteronomy 22:13–21) requires the man to make a legal charge that the woman was not a virgin. This sheet was then given to the father of the bride for safekeeping, just in case a charge was made. The practice at that time was that a white linen bedsheet was placed over the honeymoon bed, and the act of intercourse would usually cause bleeding when the hymen was broken. To your main question though, the wife’s virginity, as opposed to that of the new husband, was much more easily established. In such a case, the man was shamed publicly, punished (and later rabbinical writings suggest this punishment was in the form of lashes), fined 100 shekels of silver (a hefty fine at that time, considering that the price of a slave was set at 20 shekels at that time-see Genesis 37:28), and he was then not allowed to divorce his wife for any reason. So, are women expected to remain virgins until marriage, but men are not? To answer this question, we need to consider all the relevant Scriptures and also understand a bit more of the culture of the time.įirst, consider that God had also established laws (Deuteronomy 22:13–19) to deal with a man who lied about his wife’s virginity (because he “hates her”) after the wedding night. As a ministry that seeks to uphold biblical authority and the glory of God, we must be able to help answer such questions as they are ultimately attacks on both God and his Word. of this but saying what some people presume). Such questions are often used by those who presume to judge God and his Word as a means to really question whether God is fair or misogynistic (We're not accusing M.R. We will try to keep things as clinical as possible. Please be aware that due to the nature of the question, we will have to include mature concepts in our response. Hello M.R., thank you for writing to Answers in Genesis. Is the same expected to be applied to a divorced man? Is a divorced man allowed to remarry? Are only women expected to uphold virginity in society? In Matthew 5:31–32 it talks about how if anyone marries a divorced woman he has committed adultery. Were men not expected to be virgins before marriage? I know these are two separate understandings. In Deuteronomy 22:20–21 the woman who is discovered not to be a virgin is put to death, but there’s no mention of a man needing to be a virgin or the man she slept with before she married being put to death as well. I noticed how in Deuteronomy there is a lot of emphasis on the virginity of the woman, but there isn’t any mention of the virginity of men. I’ve been reading a few verses on marriage and divorce and it seems God treats men and women differently when it comes to marriage.
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