Divorce is hardly easy. Even if the break-up is
amicable, there are still second guesses. Friends can be too quick
to offer advice and too slow to, well, just be friends.
Often, the sluggishness in comforting extends to
religious bodies. Spiritual communities are too quick to offer
condemnation instead of solace and support.
Some, like Buddhism, focus on maintaining
relationships with a minimum of rules. Others, like Islam, don't
trust the parties involved to work through life changes on their
own and watch people drown in the rules and regulations.
Others like New Age, take a middle approach and
allow the couple to work their through the kaleidoscope of feelings
with a minimum of mandates.
How do the five largest religions deal with divorce?
What do they teach about divorce? The answer could take a month of
Sunday's to read all of the books, so here's just a brief
synopsis.
Christianity
Christians view God as the Creator of humanity and
marriage. Most feel that God's plan for marriage means for it to be
a lifelong union.
Christians believe that through the prophets, God
emphasized three things about matrimony:
1. Marriage is sacred
2. God hates divorce, and
3. Marriage is intended to produce children of upright
character
A relatively standard belief in Christian circles is
that there are only two legitimate reasons for divorce:
A. A spouse is unfaithful, or
B. A spouse abandons their partner
Many situations don't fit those criteria, and people
are stuck since many conservative Christians see divorce as being
an option.
Christian views on divorce are based on biblical
sources from the days of Moses in Deuteronomy 24:14. New Testament
developments in the Christian world emphasized the permanence of
marriage.
Jesus is quoted in Matthew as saying, "Because of
your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but
from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever
divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries
another, commits adultery."
Many conservative evangelical churches strongly
oppose divorce, viewing it as a sin and point to Malachi
2:16.
The divorce rate in the religious arena is
comparable to that of society as a whole and most Christians even
conservatives, are increasingly seeing nothing wrong with divorce —
at least in their particular situation. W. Bradford Wilcox, a
leading sociologist at the University of Virginia and director of
the National Marriage Project, finds from his own analysis that
"active conservative Protestants" who regularly attend church are
35 percent less likely to divorce compared to those who have no
affiliation. Nominally attending conservative Protestants are 20
percent more likely to divorce, compared to secular
Americans
Hindu
The Hindu civil code permits divorce on certain
grounds, but the concept of divorce is alien to
Hinduism.
In Hindu beliefs, marriage is sacred, a divine
covenant and a sacrament.
In ancient days, women in Hindu society had very
little freedom. They were bought and sold, abducted, forcibly
married and forced into slavery or postpetition. There wasn't the
modern concept of a divorce or legal separation. When a woman left
her parent's home, she was completely at the mercy of her husband
or her husband's parents.
Part of the reason was that Manu, the lawmaker,
viewed women with suspicion and would not trust them with
freedom.
Many see the attitude of Hindus towards women as
being ambiguous.
The Hindu law books proclaim women to be
untrustworthy and declare a woman to be a possession. At the same
time, the books advise men to treat women honorably and keep them
happy.
Legal Position
The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 applies not just to
Hindus, but any person who is a Buddhist, Jaina or Sikh, domiciled
in India and who is not a Muslim, Christian, Parsi or
Jew.
According to the Marriage Act, divorce can be sought
on certain grounds including adultery, cruelty, religious
conversation, venereal disease, leprosy and a lack of communication
for more than seven years.
While the Marriage Act is somewhat long and
involved, its thoughts on divorce can be summed up as:
"Both parties to a marriage may seek lawful
separation by joint consent."
Hindu marriage has undergone some changes in modern
times. The position of women has changed, and she is not as
dependent as her ancestors were. Still, divorce is the desperate
last resort with the stigma associated with divorce being the
biggest challenge.
The Hindu law has now given way to the principles of
democracy and a belief in gender equality. Compared to marriages in
the western world though, Hindu marriage have greater stability and
a majority take the responsibility seriously.
New Age
When Gwyneth Paltrow recently made news for her
"conscious uncoupling" with her husband, it was a new term for
many. What is conscious uncoupling and in what way does it diverge
than a typical divorce.
Actually, a conscious uncoupling isn't remotely
similar to divorce. It's more of a "pre-divorce" where two people
decide how they are going to live their lives before they start the
divorce process.
A conscious uncoupling then is all about the
"wholeness in separation," or the capacity to comprehend that every
annoyance and quarrel was a sign to look inside and identify a
negative internal object that needs healing.
From this perspective, there aren't any bad guys.
Just two people each being teacher and student
simultaneously.
Some observers ask why can't two people just move
past resentments and stay together.
According to the teaching of conscious uncoupling,
humans aren't meant to stay married for years. Pointing to the
increased lifespan of the last century, many New Age believers
believe there are three lifetimes now as compared to early humans.
Adherents claim that social research suggests that because
lifespans are so long, most people will have two or three
significant long-term relationships.
"Our biology and mind aren't set up to be with one
person for four, five or six decades," says Dr. Habib Sadeghi,
Paltrow's guru
"You'll see that though it looks like everything is
coming apart; it's all coming together," he added.
Buddhism
The question of divorce is not explicitly discussed
within Buddha's teachings; neither is it prohibited.
Instead of teaching against divorce, as in the
Christian or Islam religion, most of the Buddhist teachings are
pro-marriage and relationships.
Both sexes are given the freedom to separate if they
cannot agree with each other and Buddhism teaches that separation
is preferable over a lifetime of misery.
Buddhism teaches that marriage plays an important
part in life's web of relationships by giving support and
protection. A good marriage, according to Buddha, should grow and
develop gradually from understanding and not from
impulse.
In a Buddhist marriage, each partner is encouraged
to develop a complementary role where each manifests a supportive
and appreciative recognition of the other's skills.
Instead of teaching male or female supremacy, there
is to be no thought of either the man or woman being superior and
the complementary aspect is reinforced, calling for a "partnership
of equality, gentleness, generosity, calm and
dedication."
Islam
Just as Buddhism is substantially relaxed about
marriage mandates and divorce, Islam goes to the other extreme and
overloads adherents with complex rules and numerous regulations.
The Muslim laws surrounding the divorce are spelled out in detail
and vary widely depending on which Islamic School of Thought —
Hanafi, Hanbali, Maliki or Shafi — they follow. Complicating this
further is the question of whether the couple is Sunni or Shiite.
Cultural traditions and a host of other factors within Islam
combine to make the rules thicker than a 1960s New York
phonebook.
Divorce is allowable in Islam, but it is not
encouraged. The Prophet Muhammad called divorce the most
displeasing thing to Allah. Muslims view divorce as a last result
and often seek counseling to avoid it. Muslims believe that Allah
allows divorce as an option because sometimes it is truly in the
best interests of all involved.
Determining the proper procedure for divorce is
complicated and depends on the timing of the divorce, the reasons
for the divorce and which Islamic School of thought
govern.
Women's property is not divided during a divorce.
What a woman earns or is given before and during the marriage
remains her property. However, a man's property is divided if a
divorce occurs.
Typically in the laws of Islam, there are three
kinds of divorce — and each type have their separate rules — and
each different law has its own conditions.
1. Talaq — When a man has initiated a divorce, the
procedure is called talaq.
2. Lian — When a man accuses his wife of adultery
without witnesses and the wife denies any adultery.
3. Khula — When a woman has initiated divorce
proceedings.
The Talaq divorce is the one most westerners are
probably most familiar with where the husband speaks the phrase "I
divorce you" to his wife, three times. In keeping with the hefty
book of rules and regulations, Shia and Sunni Muslims add their own
rules as based on their own schools of jurisprudence.
The Quran goes into great detail about divorce with
over 100 passages pertaining specifically to divorce and the
procedure of obtaining a divorce.