An Analysis of Joe O’s “Marriage” Part II

The second part of Joe O’s “Marriage” at Thinking in a Marrow Bone seems simple and easy to summarize. It is about the charity cultivated within marriage (and the role of that charity — even [or especially] within disagreements — to socialize children to expect such charity from different individuals). But again, it doesn’t necessarily exclude gay marriage in any direct way.

Part III continues the message by forming a ritual from difference. It provides a novel interpretation for the Biblical idea of knowledge by suggesting that married people must have an understanding of each other, physiologically, emotionally, and spiritually.

Joe’s relies on and emphasizes the differences between men and women first. He does not claim to know where the extent of these differences are (so in this way, he isn’t necessarily making sexually repressive and oppressive commentary), and in addition, he stresses the complementary nature of the genders to highlight their shared importance.

His emphasis on the physiological difference could possibly create a case for heterosexual marriage, but Joe’s main point, I think, is about the further differences. As he writes:

When we come together to know one another, we engage in a ritual of difference. I and my spouse are naked. By naked, I do mean literally; but I also mean figuratively – as in, we are emotionally and spiritually (soul-fully) exposed, vulnerable before one another. And in our nakedness our differences are revealed. That is, in knowing one another, we are confronted with the alterity of the other who is our spouse. This confrontation begins physically, and the physical then represents the other differences that are part of our relationship and of our knowing one another.

As we engage repeatedly in this ritual, it should become clear to us (if we are humble enough to see the truth) how deep our relationship is. We can learn reverence before our spouse – because only our spouse could reveal the depth through revealing his or her difference. In other words, in this our ritual of difference, we confront eternity – the eternity that is our spouse; the eternity that is our marriage.

The thing I get from this excerpt, once again, is that there doesn’t seem to be any reason why gay couples can not have this kind of soul-full exposing and emotional nakedness. Joe (and in fact, many of the other TMB writers) refer to Emmanuel Levinas’ concepts frequently, such as alterity here, and I admit I haven’t read up on Levinas, but as far as I can tell, I wouldn’t suppose that he would say the Other can only be the opposite gender. I wouldn’t suppose that he would say we can only cultivate I-Thou (err, I guess in Levinas, that should be “infinity,” rather than “totality”?) relationships with the opposite gender.

While I’m relatively sure that Joe’s reference to ‘eternity’ is a reference to Levinas’ infinity, what also occurs to me is that in describing marriage as eternity, he connects things to the unique LDS context. Since I don’t see anything that precludes this argument from also working for gay marriages (at this time, someone could attempt to raise a procreation argument, I guess…but that may not work anymore in LDS discourse, as Alan addresses in an article he’s been working on), this opens up a possibility for…*gasp*…eternal gay marriage. (Note the counterarguments…they generally object because of the impossibility or implausibility of procreation.)

Joe describes other rituals of difference, such as the conflict from part II (which is completely possible, once again, in a gay relationship.)

In fact, I think the major “thinking” point here is what these kinds of rituals inculcate within us.

…through our faithfulness to the one, the truly humble will learn from marriage that infinity characterizes us all, that reverence is due to us all, and feel compelled to treat all others with the same reverence.

So, clearly, this isn’t just about men to women or women to men. It is about something that we must develop for everyone. I think, then, that marriage becomes a practical door to becoming aware of this ethical obligation. But in this, once again, there is nothing that suggests that we cannot learn to revere all from, say, gay marriage.

In fact, it seems to me that with such a framework of marriage, mechanisms like physical and sexual attraction cease to be anywhere near central in importance. These mechanisms can be understood in such an “infinity-understanding” framework as being tools to encourage people to “open up” and “expose themselves.” Certainly, some people just want to get physically naked, but love allows people — for the first time — to ever consider getting emotionally naked. (Similarly, to play off of Joe’s interpretation of “knowledge,” some people want to “know” others in purely a carnal way…as the Sodom and Gomorrah story suggests [but Joe will address that in Part IV, hehe]…but perhaps their error [and sin?] is NOT to whom they are directing their knowledge-seeking, but the shallowness of their knowledge-seeking and their failure to seek the infinite.)

But supposing that falling in love allows one to consider emotional nakedness and pursuit of infinite knowledge rather than simply physical nakedness and physical knowledge and union, then shouldn’t we support this desire when it arises, because it — wherever it is found — can set someone on the path to understanding the infinity of every person?