The Sacrament of Marriage - a Brief Historical Overview – Part II
Formation of the matrimonial liturgy: 4th – 11th centuries
The beginning of the church liturgy of marriage is to be found in the customs that prevailed in Christian families: the bishop or the priest went to wish the family in which the marriage was being concluded. On occasion, following the example of the brides of Cana in Galilee, the bishop was invited to the ceremony of marriage. As something natural, the new spouses asked the bishop to bless their union. In the fourth century, this custom grew to become a complete church ceremony. The first testimonies about the liturgy of the wedding blessing also come from this epoch. We have a detailed description of such a ceremony from the beginning of the fifth century. The ceremony took place in the church. The father led all those invited to the altar. There, the bishop blessed the union by saying an improvised prayer and covering the young couple with a veil. In the same century, this liturgy is included in the Holy Mass. From Pope Nicholas I (858–867), the new spouses presented their gifts at this Mass and received Holy Communion. After year One thousand, the Holy Mass took place after the marriage contract was concluded in front of the church or in its portico.
Despite this, all this liturgy was not compulsory for the faithful. Moreover, this liturgy was denied to all those who did not live an exemplary life of faith or who, being a widow or widower, entered into a second marriage. Well, there is no obligation in this age to marry according to the church ritual. The variety of forms of marriage, and moreover, the various stages of the ceremony (marriage vow - engagement; contract, according to local norms or customs; wedding blessing; bringing the wife to her husband's house; consummation of the marriage), however, created a whole range of theoretical and practical problems. When was the actual marriage concluded? The first interventions in this sense appear as a response to these problems. For Pope Nicholas I (858–867), the element that makes up marriage is consent, and only consent.
Despite the variety of rites and opinions, the Church has always felt responsible for marriage, and therefore some regulations concerning marriage appear in this epoch. For example, there are obstacles to marriage (kidnapping, kinship).
We can observe the unification and romanization of various laws and customs concerning marriage at the turn of the eighth and ninth centuries. This began in the eighth century during the reign of Pepin the Short. Both civil law and church norms punished violations of canon law, which forbade certain relationships. In the same way, both laws defended certain formalities imposed by local or general law. It all had one and only purpose: to protect the marriage from various abuses and irregularities. For the same reason, the Church in this era began to insist heavily on the preservation of the legal and public form of marriage, although it did not matter at first whether it was a civil or a church form. Over time, the canonical form begins to dominate.
In the strict sense, the canonical form of getting married was introduced by the apocryphal writings of Pseudo-Isidore. This compilation of the Decrees (circa 845) had both ecclesiastical and political goals, it sought the moral and religious renewal of the Franconian Church, which defended the indissolubility of marriage, insisted on the obstacles of kinship, and fought against the scourge of kidnappings. For the same reasons, Decrees emphasized civil formalities. The authors of this compilation, to make their work more credible, falsely attributed individual documents to earlier popes or to civil legislation. These apocryphal writings, considered authentic until the fifteenth century, were incorporated into the Decree of Gratian, which was the Canon Law of the Middle Ages. Consequently, a canonically compulsory wedding blessing was made and civil forms of marriage were included as part of the Church Law. However, all this was not compulsory for the validity of the union, although in some regions local synods tried to impose the obligation of priestly blessing under threat of nullity of the marriage.
Thus, the 11th / 12th century ends the long journey of formation in the matrimonial liturgy and the obligation for everyone to follow it. This was not the result of some advertising of jurisdiction by the Church, but a reality that was slowly emerging over the centuries.
To sum up, the church celebration of marriage in the 11th / 12th century was as follows: before entering the church, the priest asked for mutual consent of the engaged couples. Then the parents gave their daughter to her husband. The dowry was then offered by blessing the wedding rings and putting them on the fingers. Finally, the priest blessed the union. After all this celebration, everyone entered the church in procession to attend the Holy Mass, during which the imposition of a veil and special blessing took place. At the end of Holy Mass, people sometimes went out to bless the bedroom of the new spouses.
In this way, the church's liturgy integrated a whole series of secular customs. Things, symbols, civil laws, wedding rings, dowry, veil, etc., items and customs from Germanic, Celtic, Frankish, Lombard and other tribes made up the Church's liturgy. It was also partly influenced by Greek and Roman or oriental laws and customs, mainly due to the Spanish Visigoths.
Until Tomorrow
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