The marriage of Joseph and Mary

[JK8619]

These issues seem to get some people upset sometimes, so I just want to say that I am NOT making an argument or attacking Church doctrine. I just am curious and would like to hear people’s ideas on this issue.

A marriage must be consummated to be legitimate. Catholic doctrine states that Mary remained a virgin throughout her life. If this is true does this mean that her marriage to Joseph was not legitimate. If it was, how?

Once again, I’m not trying to offend anyone. I just hope I can get some good insight on this.

 

[RPRPsych]

Interesting question.

But you must remember that the circumstances, here, were exceptional - Joseph was being called to be nothing less than the foster-father of Christ himself. Under such exceptional circumstances, there’s nothing improbable about a divine dispensation (so as to speak) being granted, even if this was necessary.

But was it? I’ve thought about it, and came up with the following.

First, Joseph and Mary’s marriage was legitimate under Jewish law. There is nothing explicitly stated in the Pentateuch about consummation being necessary.

Second, what counted here was Joseph’s legal descent from the line of David. While Mary was also of the line of David, royal descent was patrilineal in Jewish tradition.

Third, it’s the capacity to consummate the marriage (and not the actual consummation itself) that forms an impediment to marriage, even in today’s Canon law. The Church has recognized rare cases in which a married couple maintain vows off chastity - such marriages are, in fact, referred to as Josephite marriages.

But that’s just off the top of my head Over to wiser folk!

 

[Jaypeeto4]

RPRPsych is correct. It is the capacity to consummate the marriage which makes the marriage legitimate and real, not the actual consummation. Once you are married, you are married.
OTHERWISE,
the priest at church would have to perform the whole mass,
ask the couple to exchange rings,
then instruct them to copulate (perhaps in front of the congregation),
and then and ONLY then, after they were done, declare,
“By the authority invested in me by God and the state of (Whichever”,
…I now pronounce you man and wife."

You are man and wife before the consummation and it is 100% legitimate.

 

[Corki]

Actually, even with our understanding of marriage as a Sacrament, consumation is not needed for validity or “legitimacy”. Consumation make the marriage indissolvuble. Mary and Joseph had a valid marriage.

 

[JK8619]

Interesting question.

But you must remember that the circumstances, here, were exceptional - Joseph was being called to be nothing less than the foster-father of Christ himself. Under such exceptional circumstances, there’s nothing improbable about a divine dispensation (so as to speak) being granted, even if this was necessary.

But was it? I’ve thought about it, and came up with the following.

First, Joseph and Mary’s marriage was legitimate under Jewish law. There is nothing explicitly stated in the Pentateuch about consummation being necessary.

Second, what counted here was Joseph’s legal descent from the line of David. While Mary was also of the line of David, royal descent was patrilineal in Jewish tradition.

Third, it’s the capacity to consummate the marriage (and not the actual consummation itself) that forms an impediment to marriage, even in today’s Canon law. The Church has recognized rare cases in which a married couple maintain vows off chastity - such marriages are, in fact, referred to as Josephite marriages.

But that’s just off the top of my head Over to wiser folk!

That is a reasonable answer.

Thanks,
JK

 

[RPRPsych]

A bit graphic, but that’s a pretty cool way of putting it! Wish I’d thought of it myself.

I remember reading that this matter was debated in the Middle Ages, and the consensus was that consent, not consummation, was the key step. Does anyone have a better reference than my all-too-hazy memories?

 

[JK8619]

The main reason I asked is because a Catholic couple in my city were given and annulment because they had never consummated the marriage, but the girl was mentally ill as well.

 

[Corki]

The main reason I asked is because a Catholic couple in my city were given and annulment because they had never consummated the marriage, but the girl was mentally ill as well.

Outsiders are usually not privy to the reasoning behind a tribunal decision. It is quite possible that the marriage was deemed null due to the incapacity to give consent (due to the mental illness) and that the lack of consumation was one of the pieces of evidence.

 

[ConstantineTG]

The main reason I asked is because a Catholic couple in my city were given and annulment because they had never consummated the marriage, but the girl was mentally ill as well.

Remember that St. Joseph could have sent Mary away which was allowable by Jewish Law. He was thinking about it in fact, when he got the vision from Gabriel and had been told not to be afraid to take Mary and the child.

 

[tabycat]

If I rember rightly, as soon as Mary and Joseph be come engaged (?), they were consider to be ‘married’ and if for some reason they did not come togather, they had to get a diverice.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

Can. 1057 §1. The consent of the parties, legitimately manifested between persons quali-fied by law, makes marriage; no human power is able to supply this consent.
§2. Matrimonial consent is an act of the will by which a man and a woman mutually give and accept each other through an irrevocable covenant in order to establish marriage.
…

Can. 1061 §1. A valid marriage between the baptized is called ratum tantum if it has not been consummated; it is called ratum et consummatum if the spouses have performed between themselves in a human fashion a conjugal act which is suitable in itself for the procreation of offspring, to which marriage is ordered by its nature and by which the spouses become one flesh.
…
Can. 1141 A marriage that is ratum et consummatum can be dissolved by no human power and by no cause, except death.
Can. 1142 For a just cause, the Roman Pontiff can dissolve a non-consummated marriage between baptized persons or between a baptized party and a non-baptized party at the request of both parties or of one of them, even if the other party is unwilling.

 

[JK8619]

Joe,

Thank you. Your post is helpful.

JK