Sex, examined solely and indiscriminately as a committed act, is always literally the unification, or joining, of two separate which is to say two individual’s fleshly genitalia, if not simply one fleshly genitalia entering the fleshly orifice of another, or the fleshly genitalia of one being penetrated by the fleshly member of another: hence, we are given the Biblical term, “one flesh”, as opposed to another term recognizing any other sort of special unity beyond the flesh, when it comes to the marriage bond, like that of the soul or, more particularly, the spirit—this latter dimension of which, (that of the spirit), Paul quite clearly contrasts the unification of “one flesh” with when speaking of a man engaging in coitus with, and therefore being “joined to”, even a “harlot” (1 Corinthians 6:16-17; Matthew 22:28-30 Mark 12:23-25). Now, in the act of proper, which is to say Biblically-sanctioned sex—that which employs each member’s genitalia in the manner evidently intended by Nature’s design to be used (Romans 1:26-27; 1 Corinthians 11:14)—we find that this “joining’ of the “flesh” continues, in accordance with Nature, even on a microscopic or molecular level:—the man’s individual D.N.A, conveyed in semen, mixing with the individual D.N.A, contained in an egg, of the woman to whom he has physically “joined” himself; with this consequential, more-lasting unification, than the mere sexual act itself, going on to produce the offspring, jointly comprised of his father’s and mother’s D.N.A, who, furthermore, outlasts the nine month incubation, (in the woman to whom his father therefore is, quite plainly, still biologically connected or “joined” with), by that of his own natural lifespan, which is sensibly expected, barring all catastrophe, to surpass the natural lifespans of his two biological contributors, namely his father and his mother, rendering such offspring the enduring embodiment or testification, (so long as each parent still exists themselves in the flesh), of their mutual lifelong unification, and blood relation, as the “one flesh” intended by Nature to rear and train and counsel him throughout the majority of his life (Malachi 2:14-16; Romans 7:1-3). Thus, sex, or the act of becoming “one flesh”, which naturally gives rise, through no interfering, to family, is the ostensibly reductive term by which marriage is Biblically recognized at the outset of humanity in the garden of Eden, which is where Jesus directs our considerations when discussing the ideal purpose and condition of earthly marriage (Matthew 19:18-19); for the Holy-Spirit-inspired Word does not record that Adam and Eve were “married”—no, the term “married” or “marriage” is nowhere used with respect to their lawful union, which nevertheless made of Eve Adam’s “wife”; it is, however, all contained or implied, if only we will perceive it, by the words “one flesh”.
Thus, marriages, even today, are still said to be “consummated”, which is to say completed or rendered truly official, by the subsequent act of sex—all ceremonial and legislative proceedings predominantly being a societal recognition of what is about to then permissibly or rightfully take place in the flesh between two people, for the necessary sake of accountability on everyone’s part then and thereafter, both the spectator and participant alike, due to man’s sinful nature, which ever inclines him to trespass against what is proper and therefore against what would be known to be the basic and exclusive rights of others, whether these trespasses come from outside a marriage, or from within one, or both (Genesis 12:12-13; 1 Corinthians 7:2, 8-9; Matthew 19:10-12). With this in mind, before the declaration of two people being henceforth publicly recognized as “man and wife”, it has long been customary for the marriage official to put forth to the assembled witnesses, “Should anyone present know of any reason that this couple should not be joined in holy matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace!” This is clearly declared out of awareness of the fact that even an outward nuptial display, observably following all the legislative rules, may still be unlawful, answering in the end only to the individual consciences or awareness of those who may more fully know either of the members involved—insomuch as it remains a possibility that one of the two getting formally wed may yet secretly be in a legal marriage or be carrying on an adulterous affair with someone outside the union about to take place, in either case making of that impending union a complete mockery and rendering everything up to that point, and in some cases potentially beyond, utterly fraudulent and illegitimate (i.e. Numbers 5:12-13; 2 Samuel 3:14-16; Mark 6:18; 1 Corinthians 5:1). Furthermore, if a man only formally took a wife—meaning he only legally married her, but did not have sex with her, meaning he did not consummate the affair; the two therefore only living together as roommates—this fact alone, if reliably proven or believed, would be a significant comfort to the man seeking to wed the widow or divorcee—yet again testifying of the soul’s innate and deeper recognition of what marriage itself, despite all outward display or profession, truly or essentially is. A somewhat comparable situation is found in 1 Kings 1:1-4; 2:13-21, not that Abishag had been legally wed to David, as I suspect had she officially been wed, Bathsheba would not have thought the petition on Adonijah’s part for her hand remotely acceptable, due to what an official marriage would have necessarily implied; although Solomon nevertheless had the wisdom to perceive the regal implications of that particular situation regardless.
Thus, the most ideal Law—that being the Jewish, God-given Law, after which modern-day law takes significant but not complete pattern—ever striving throughout its legal parameters to produce accountability on the part of all who answer to it (1 Timothy 1:9); the Law is found to quite naturally entail what the “rights” of those in a marriage are (i.e. Exodus 21:7-11), as Paul himself is found reiterating those “rights” in letters to the Gentile believers both under Timothy and of Corinth (1 Timothy 5:8; 1 Corinthians 7:3-4),—these “marriage rights”, or “authority”, as Paul calls it, pertaining strictly to the “body”, which is to say to the particular “flesh” involved:—a married man, being an earthly entity, therefore, after the format of the God he represents, (Who of course does so both physically and spiritually), must make provision for his wife’s flesh, nourishing it with physical food, protecting it beneath the cover of physical clothing, which will reasonably include shelter, and cultivating it with physical affection, which will reasonably include sex. While the former two fleshly obligations—that of food and clothing—must quite practically be awarded to any and all blood relatives falling by either debilitating age or necessity under our care, the final unique obligation of sex is therefore what alone distinguishes a marital relation from all other relations and family relations on earth in the eyes of God, being symbolic of the spiritual union with Him, as He alternately substitutes the fleshly act of sex in the Bible with the transcendently ambiguous word “know” (Genesis 4:1; Galatians 4:9; 1 Timothy 6:6-8). A deliberate nullification, then, of these three essential familial and marital rights, therefore quite sensibly nullifies or terminates the contract or covenant which an initiation of these behaviors gave birth to and began; just as is the case with any contract to be lawfully voided. Therefore, we see in the Law a servant woman able to go free from the man whom, upon taking another wife, thereafter ceases to provide these three necessary things to the dependent woman he has so clearly replaced and forsaken. Likewise, we find the Law terminating equal-footed marriages, via the death penalty, which have had the terms of the marital covenant or contract brazenly breeched via adultery, which is to say again, via a trespass of the sexual union which made it a lifelong bond or binding covenant in the first place (Leviticus 20:10; Deuteronomy 22:22-24).
We now find occasion to examine the difference, which is largely but a technical one, that exists between the words “fornication” and “adultery”. To properly appreciate this technical, which is really to say circumstantial difference, we must look and consider how the Law differentiates and defines them by its penal treatment of them.
To begin with, as the Law was given through angels, and therefore indirectly so, as a requirement to the nation of Israel alone, who were collectively God’s workmanship strictly in the flesh, demonstrating the Mosaic Law, in all its perfection, to nevertheless merely pertain and preside over the realm of Man’s flesh, as it could only ever hope to convert the flesh by the enforcement of fearful fleshly consequences, while never being able, thereby, to convert the inward spirit and heart, as only the Law of Christ, Who is the Spirit, is sufficiently able to accomplish (Romans 8:3-4; Galatians 3;21-25); we find, therefore, among the lesser, fleshly, legal dominion of the Law the frequent use of the word “fornication” in addition to the word “adultery”, which latter word, if we examine, by contrast, God’s directly-given spiritual commandments, such as those given in the Ten Commandments, written by the “Finger of God” (Exodus 31:18; John 8:5-8), as well as those spoken of by Christ Himself, Who is “the Righteous Right Hand of God” (Isaiah 41:10; 51:5; 63:5)—we find that this latter word, “adultery”, is the word which God, in speaking to His people for Himself, is apt to use in overwhelming preference to “fornication”, as a means however of most certainly including the technical sin of fornication in His only more spiritual, and therefore more comprehensive, use of the term “adultery” (Matthew 5:27-28). For, as is the case under the fleshly Law, while fornication and adultery both regard the act of sex, fornication simply implies that neither member of the unlawful sexual union meanwhile belonged to the covenant of marriage; whereas adultery simply acknowledges that one or more persons engaged in the illicit scandal did in fact belong to a marriage covenant. Thus, under the fleshly Law, among the people of God, (intended to inform church judgment today), the penalty for fornication, (which is specified as not including the rape of an unmarried person [Deuteronomy 22:25]), was that the two sexually-consenting parties be compelled to be married, thereby bringing the one missing and honorable virtue of sexual commitment, of physical covenantal agreement, to a picture that was solely selfish, sexual exploitation (Deuteronomy 22:28-29); and to do this, moreover, that is to say, to contain sex within the proper framework of marriage, so as not to morally pollute the people of God (1 Corinthians 5:1-6; Hebrews 12:14-16; Jeremiah 3:1); the mere act of consensual sex, between two unwed individuals, thereby showing itself sufficient means to enforcedly acknowledge the two, then and thereafter, as legitimately wed, which is fundamentally to say sexually committed; thus a ceremony would be made to publicly establish it under an officiator by as little as two or more witnesses, just as we establish marriages today. However, under that same fleshly Law, the penalty of adultery was never the remarriage of those caught in the illicit affair, but rather their mutual execution, thereby releasing those betrayed by the treacherous act from suffering the inane penalty of sexual commitment to the one no longer sexually committed to them in return; serving, furthermore, as a means of prohibiting such treacherously inclined persons from seeking what might have seemed an easy way out of their present sexual involvement, which essential reasoning we still find to be the very spirit of the Law when it comes to this matter: (1 Corinthians 7:10-11). Thus, the reason God preferentially uses, almost to the point of doing so exclusively, the term “adultery”, when speaking Himself directly to His people, as opposed to the word “fornication”, which we see distinguished constantly by the fleshly Law that was left for officiating Man to enforce upon Man, is because God, Who is Spirit, is foremost informing those who will hear Him, by referential use of the more serious earthly offense, of the more serious punishment of death that attended that offense under the Law, which He means therefore to inflict, spiritually and eternally so, upon all sexually immoral transgressors, whether they be immorally prurient in secret thought alone, and thus unanswerable to the fleshly or earthly Law, or, outwardly, through the more public fornication which the fleshly Law deemed a less despicable offense than that of adultery. As God’s judgment is pure and complete, unfractured like our own (1 Corinthians 13:12), and operates on the ultimate level, the seemingly disproportionate consequence of death inflicted across the board for any and all sexually immoral acts, is legitimately founded upon the reality that fornication, regardless of its being outward or inward, is ever, on the culprit’s part, but a total inward or spiritual disrespect for sex, and therefore invariably for the person whom the act of sex ever objectifies, and thus, invariably, for the institution of earthly marriage to which sex inextricably belongs, being ever but the preemptive act of adultery; being ever but adultery prior to Mankind’s legal recognition; being ever that of a licentious individual displaying utter disregard for the anticipated likelihood of themselves as well as some other individual—with whose body they prematurely and irreverently entangle themselves, and therefore defile,—eventually marrying the spouse whom God, in His Omniscience, has all the while intended for them, and thereby purloining such future spouses of the sexual sanctity rightly due their marital relationships alone.
In summation, all the laws surrounding marriage are primarily there to manage and prevent fornication and adultery from becoming prevalent in a society, which two things are but an exploitative abuse of the very intimate gift of sex, which is ever to be handled responsibly via the marital covenant. The ideal structure, toward which, when we come to Christ, we ought then to continually strive, is that sex is to be exclusive, and is to only ever be with one person for the duration of their natural life. This does not mean that two unwed individuals flippantly can and ought to lyingly profess themselves married, all the while defiantly rejecting the laws that govern marriage, (which defiance truly betrays their genuine lack of commitment), as we are told to answer to the governing authorities and abstain from even the appearance of sin, but that sex between consenting people, particularly those among the congregation of God, is serious and has a binding element of itself (1 Corinthians 6:18), and therefore ought to be respected as having nearly all of the full weight and significance of the marriage covenant, if the union be at all reconcilable to such Lawfully given terms; for this is even why a virgin initially bleeds upon sexual penetration: Natural design establishing what is to ideally be one lifelong fleshly covenant by blood (Hebrews 9:18).
