marriage

Marriages are made in heaven. Some married couples repeat this axiom with resentment and bitterness, and others, who are still further away from heaven, repeat it hypocritically. The natural consequence is that one has taken to shrugging one's shoulders, to smiling, and even to sneering at the words.

In reviewing all the marriages that a man comes across in his circle of acquaintances in the course of time, this is quite comprehensible. Those who sneer are right, only it would be more correct not to sneer at the axiom but at the marriages. They, indeed for the most part, deserve not only ridicule and scorn, but contempt.

Marriage as it is today, and has been for centuries, has put the saying to shame and so discredited it, that no one can believe in its truth. Present-day marriages, with but few exceptions, are distinctly immoral. The sooner the modern conditions and usages come to an end the better, in order to keep thousands from running blindly into this disgraceful plight, thinking that it must be right, as it is what time-honored custom dictates. Added to this, at the present time, everything is shamelessly concentrated on trying to dull, if not suffocate every purer ideal. No one thinks of making a human being what he ought to be, can be and must be, by showing the necessary respect and consideration to his physical vehicle.

The body, like the soul, is precious, and should, therefore, be something unapproachable and may not be exposed either as an enticement or as an object of admiration. It is something sacred. Regarded in this light, it cannot be separated from the soul on earth. Both must command respect and be held holy if they are to have any value at all. Otherwise they are rubbish, something unclean, to be thrown into a corner or sold cheap to a passing hawker. Should an army of such hawkers come swarming over the earth today, they would find an untold quantity of this rubbish awaiting them. At every step they could add to their collections. And truly such hawkers are going about in great numbers. They are the ambassadors and emissaries of the Powers of Darkness. They greedily seize upon their easy prey and triumphantly drag it down farther and farther into their dark realm, till it is swallowed up and can never find its way back to the Light. No wonder then that all should laugh if anyone seriously affirms that marriages are made in heaven.

Civil marriage is but a business contract. The couples that thus bind themselves, do not intend seriously to begin life together mutually helping one another, to raise the standard of their inward and outward value, to attain together still higher ideals and thus to be a blessing to themselves, to all humanity and finally to Creation itself. It is a bargain, entered into to ensure each other's material welfare, so that they should have no reason to reproach themselves that they surrendered themselves to each other for nothing. Where then remains the sanctity of the body that should be brought into marriage on both sides and held there in all honour? Of the sanctity of the body no notice is taken!

In this bargain, woman plays such a deplorably unworthy part that one must fain turn away in disgust. In eighty out of a hundred cases she sells herself to her husband to serve him, for he does not seek an equal — a companion — but in case he does not wish to show her off, he wants her as a cheap and willing housekeeper to make his home comfortable, with whom he can also satisfy his animal instincts under the cover of respectability.

Young girls leave their parents to marry, often for the most trivial reasons. Some are tired of being at home and long for an independent sphere of action. Others think it would be more attractive to be a married woman and hope to lead a fuller life, or they may contemplate bettering their material circumstances. There are also cases where a young girl marries to defy or cross another, and cases where the motive is simply erotic, these feelings having been awakened and artificially nourished by reading bad books, or by suggestive games and sports.

It is seldom that real love urges them to take this most important step of their earth-lives. Countenanced by their parents, who consider them too worldly-wise to allow themselves to be guided by higher motives and their purer intuition, they rush into this perilous venture and they must often partly pay for their recklessness in their married life. But only partly, the bitter experience of the consequent reaction of such marriages comes much later, for the principal fault made was the neglect of the opportunity to advance spiritually. Many an incarnation has been utterly fruitless for the individual, as it has not been able to contribute anything to his advancement. Retrogression may even have begun and the lost ground must then painfully be made good again.

How different when a marriage has been built on the right foundation and is harmonious. The husband serves his wife and the wife her husband, each the other joyfully, of their own free wills. They grow older side by side, ennobling one another, and smiling at all mundane trials. Such a marriage is a gain for life. In such happiness lies the guarantee for the upward flight, not only of the individuals, but for all humanity.

Woe to those parents who drive their children into false marriages by persuasion, by stratagem, by constraint or for conventional reasons. The burden of responsibility, which extends further than for the child's welfare only, falls back so weightily on them, sooner or later, that they will wish never to have entertained such “brilliant plans”.

The marriage ceremony in church is looked upon by many as only part of a purely mundane celebration. The churches themselves or their representative ministers say: “Whom God has united, let not man put asunder.” Their belief is that God has united the couple. The more “advanced” thinkers take the ceremony to mean that the couple is united in the sight of God. The latter interpretation is more justified than the former, but the words really mean something else.

The injunction is given on the understanding that marriages are really made in heaven.

When the false notions and interpretations of today are set aside, all cause for laughter, ridicule and sneering will cease immediately and the unimpeachable truth of the words will become evident in all its magnitude. The natural consequence will be that men will see and understand that marriage is intended to be something quite different to what it is now, that a marriage may only be celebrated under utterly different conditions to those accepted today and that the couples who unite should only do so from absolutely pure motives.

“Marriages are made in heaven.” These words show, in the first place, that every individual soul coming into the world has certain qualities that only another soul with corresponding suitable characteristics can help to develop harmoniously. The corresponding suitable qualities are not identical. They are their necessary complement and serve to make the individual in question of full value. The two souls should complete each other mutually to make a harmonious union. Their union is, as it were, a full chord, each note of which is of value and essential to the harmony of the whole.

That is the marriage that is made in heaven. From this, it must not be inferred that there is but one possible partner on earth with whom a person can enter into a harmonious union; there are generally a few who are furnished with the necessary complementary qualities.

It is, therefore, unnecessary to wander about the world in search of a really suitable consort. It is only a case of exercising due circumspection, and of keeping eyes, ears and heart open, and above all, of laying aside what, up till now, were considered justified pretentions, and which were made preliminary conditions. What is considered so necessary today is just what should not be. The conditions for a marriage on a sound basis are, that both parties work together and pursue high aims — conditions as necessary as air and exercise for physical health.

He, who counts on ease and freedom from the cares of life and tries to adjust his union so that it should assure him these conditions, will make his life unwholesome in every sense.

Seek then to contract marriages that are made in heaven, and happiness will be yours!

To have been made in heaven, means that the couple was intended for each other before or on entering the world. The being intended only refers to the qualities they are furnished with, to complete each other. Those who have the qualities are intended for one another. In other words, they suit each other and complement each other and thus their union is intended.

“What God has united, let not man put asunder.” The misunderstanding of these words of Christ has done much mischief. Many took the words what God united to mean marriage, but marriage has but little to do with the meaning. What God has united, is a union, in which the conditions required for full harmony, are fulfilled, and which has been contracted in heaven. Whether the union is ratified by the State or by the Church makes no essential difference.

But naturally it is necessary to obey also the laws of the State. If then a religious ceremony is celebrated in all reverence by those so united, it follows that, through their spiritual attitude, a still greater blessing descends on their union. Of such a marriage one can truly say, it has been made in heaven and before God.

Now follows the admonition: “let no man set asunder.” How has the sublime meaning of these words been degraded!

Their truth lies clear as noonday: wherever a union exists that has been made in heaven, i. e. when two people so complement each other that harmony results, a third shall not interfere, whether to make discord, to prevent the union taking place, or to cause it to be separated. Such wrongdoing will in the course of reaction cling as a heavy weight to the perpetrator, for he will have harmed two people and also turned away the blessing which their happiness would have spread around them in the material and ethereal worlds.

The simple truth that lies in these words is self-evident to all. The warning is intended to protect only such unions as have been made in heaven under the aforesaid conditions, and in confirmation of which they are born into the world with the necessary qualities to complement each other. Between such, no third person may interfere, not even parents.

The couple concerned will certainly never wish to part. The divine harmony, the result of the corresponding qualities of their souls, would not admit of such a thought. Their happiness and the permanence of their marriage is thus assured in advance. If one of the parties appeals for a divorce it is the best proof that the necessary harmony is wanting and that the marriage Has not been made in heaven. In such a case the marriage should be separated, to reinstate the couple, living such an unworthy life, in their self-respect. The greater part of the marriages of the present time, are of the wrong sort. This evil lies principally in the loose morals and in the dominating worship of the intellect.

“Putting asunder what God has united” does not only apply to marriage but also to those who wish to unite to develop harmonious qualities. If such a bond exists and a third party tries to interfere by slandering or by other well-known methods, then his intention alone is equal to adultery. The meaning of the words: “What God has united, let not man put asunder” is so simple and clear, that it is difficult to understand how they could have been so erroneously interpreted. The fault lies in having erected a barrier separating things spiritual from things temporal which is the reason man's power of conception came in time to be limited by his intellect, a condition which cannot bear good fruit.

The words came from the spiritual world and it is only spiritually that they can be interpreted
===deola (culled fro. grail message by abd-ru-shin)