The Wedding in Cana:
and on Tuesday
there was a wedding
in the city Cana
of the country of Galileeand the mother of Yeshua was there
and both Yeshua and his followers were called too
and when the wine ran out
the mother of Yeshua said unto himthey have no wine
Orson Hyde, one of the original members of the re-organized quorum of the 12 apostles in the latter-day dispensation of Joseph Smith, and the president of that quorum from 1847 to 1875, created some controversy when he declared:
It will be borne in mind that once on a time, there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and on a careful reading of that transaction, it will be discovered that no less a person than Jesus Christ was married on that occasion.
If he was never married, his intimacy with Mary and Martha, and the other Mary also whom Jesus loved, must have been highly unbecoming and improper to say the best of it.
I will venture to say that if Jesus Christ were now to pass through the most pious countries in Christendom with a train of women, such as used to follow him, fondling about him, combing his hair, anointing him with precious ointment, washing his feet with tears, and wiping them with the hair of their heads and unmarried, or even married, he would be mobbed, tarred, and feathered, and rode, not on an ass, but on a rail.
and later,
I discover that some of the Eastern papers represent me as a great blasphemer, because I said, in my lecture on Marriage, at our last Conference, that Jesus Christ was married at Cana of Galilee, that Mary, Martha, and others were his wives, and that he begat children. All that I have to say in reply to that charge is this — they worship a Savior that is too pure and holy to fulfill the commands of his Father.
I worship one that is just pure and holy enough “to fulfill all righteousness;” not only the righteous law of baptism, but the still more righteous and important law “to multiply and replenish the earth.”
Startle not at this! for even the Father himself honored that law by coming down to Mary, without a natural body, and begetting a son; and if Jesus begat children, he only “did that which he had seen his Father do.”
So — was Jesus Married?
Obviously, for LDS doctrine to assert that marriage is just as essential for “fulfilling all righteousness” as baptism is — is itself sufficient to declare that Jesus was married [just as assuredly as we could say that he was baptized, whether we had an account of it in the gospels or not].
But I think the key is to look at why it’s ever even an issue to question his marital status in the first place. I mean — even if it was historically-validated that he never did marry [because he was an apocalyptic, end-times prophet who thought there’d be no point in marriage, kinda like Paul thought] — it still wouldn’t change my views towards my family life and its preeminence in my life one iota.
You’ll notice that His marriage usually comes up, though, because of the grove-smashing Deuteronomists and the sexually-deprived monks, etc. — who seek their “purity” throughthe premature and unhealthy deprivation/repression of sexuality [whether it’s through circumcision, vegetarian diets, oppression of women, celibacy, monastic living, monogamy, etc.]
So I think the Jesus-marriage question is a more interesting thing to discuss — not because of what the answer might be [historically-speaking] — but because of what I learn about people based on what they think about the very question itself.
For people who are scared of the “natural” because it doesn’t seem as “self-sacrificing” as the “spiritual way of life” [like Catholic priests who feel a life of celibacy and restriction is “more holy” than a family-life — or monogamists who would tell a polygamist that they need to “deny their natural man” and get with one-on-one monogamy instead of a natural state of multihusband-multiwife tribes], Jesus just can’t have been married — because we can handle a God who suffers, but not a God who’s sexual.
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LDS Anarchy 
Here’s a paper of found that summarizes some of the early LDS doctrine on the marital status of Jesus:
Did Jesus Christ Marry and Father Children?
I can go either way on this issue.
I can see Him being married to the church (a spiritual marriage only) and His seed being the saints and prophets alone (spiritual seed), without any physical counterpart, but I can also see Him taking a literal wife or wives and siring literal children, as well as taking a spiritual bride and children.
I see a potential problem with the first view in that Jesus didn’t come to spiritually fulfill the commandments and law, but to literally fulfill them, requiring physical acts on His part.
And I see a potential problem with the second view, in that the literal children of a divine, translated Being, whose life could not be taken from Him, and of a mortal woman would inherit…what specific traits? The immortality of the Father, or the mortality of the mother? The unlimited powers of the Father, or the limitations of the mother?
I have read that marriage was required of Rabbis, so I think it is reasonable to say that Jesus was likely married. Concerning the prophecy of seeing His seed, when I read Abinadi’s words in Mosiah 15:
my understanding has always been that this is referring to the vast ensemble of souls in paradise, who He saw and ministered to after He made the sacrifice on the cross.
A few more entries from the Bible that make it clear the Savior was married, are discussed in this article here:
http://www.mormonchronicle.com/our-married-savior-jesus-christ/
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this!
Personally — it makes more sense to me that he would have been married, and I prefer to think that he was.
If the purpose of the Messiah was for God to reveal Himself as a human-being living a complete human life on Earth, to walk through all of our experiences and show us the way through them all — then I wouldn’t think he did a very good job of that if he missed out on pretty much the largest chunk of human activity: match-making, pair-bonding, reproduction, rearing children, seeking emotional and sexual fulfillment with a spouse, etc.
Surely what Paul wrote of the qualifications for bishops of the church:
applies all the same to the Bishop of the Church.
In the movie Superman II, after Superman marries Lois Lane, they spend one single night together, and then he realizes he made a mistake. In Superman Returns, Superman returns from wherever he was for the last five years and discovers that Lois now has a five year old son. That one night was all it took; after all, even his sperm must be super.
In the case of Jesus, although the scriptures say he was in the form of a man, he wasn’t literally human, which is why Amulek teaches that the atonement would not be a human sacrifice. It seems to me that were the, essentially, immortal Christ to be married to a mortal woman, and engage in sexual relations, you’d end up with another Superman scenario. Just as it was impossible for anyone to take Christ’s life, surely the same would apply to His sperm. Human sperm has a life-span of, I think, about six or seven days. Surely that wouldn’t apply to the Lord’s sperm, though. Surely it would be as everlasting as the rest of His body.
Like Superman, one shot is all it would take for the Lord to get any woman pregnant, regardless of the day of her cycle. Any sexual relations between the Lord and a woman would be a guaranteed pregnancy, for her body would not reject the superior genetic make-up of His seed.
But again, would not such children be patterned after their Father, perfect in every way? What happens when you mix perfection with imperfection? Does the perfection upgrade the imperfection so that perfect children is the result, making Jesus not as unique as we thought, or does the imperfection downgrade the result, causing the Lord to be less than a perfect creator?
These and many other questions present some confusing scenarios, making the theology a whole lot messier. Jesus being celibate is a lot easier to process theologically. Perhaps His saying about eunuchs (Matt. 19:11-12) was referring to His own celibacy. Paul’s statement, “Husbands love your wives even as Christ loved the church. Husbands should love their wives as their own bodies,” is kind of strange. If Jesus were married, ought not Paul to have written, “Husbands love your wives even as Christ loved His wife”? We are baptized even as Christ was baptized (except that His was not for the remission of sins), so why is Paul making an indirect comparison? Why not make a direct comparison? Etc.
Could it be that Jesus was married, but just like His baptism, it was a done only as an example to us, to fulfill God’s commandment, and not as a rite of salvation? In other words, that the whole “spiritual wife doctrine” had its origin with Christ. (Imagine that, OWIW! ;)) A marriage for eternity, but not for time. A marriage to be consummated later; after all, all is as one day with the Lord, so consummation need not be performed on the marriage day, according to man’s time, to be valid in His sight. Little children need no baptism, for they are as alive in Christ as Christ is alive. Neither did Christ need baptism, nor any other ordinance of salvation, for He was saved already, the gospel being for fallen people, not for exalted beings like Himself.
So, applying the gospel to Jesus and saying He needs His own gospel in order to be saved and exalted strikes me as a strange concept. I think this topic might require additional revelation to clear up all the questions I could think up, for either scenario. The words of the LDS apostles and other LDS authorities who have claimed that Jesus was married seem to be as speculative as those who claim he wasn’t married. Wherever the truth lies on this issue, though, I’m ready to accept it, whether it’s a married Christ or a celibate Christ, it makes no difference to me. I’ll still worship at His altar.
Don’t know if it’s relevant or not — but this line of questioning reminded me of how Galileo figured out that all dropped objects accelerate at the same rate [regardless of their respective weights]. He reasoned in a thought-experiment that you have two objects [a light one and a heavier one], and you connect them by a string, and drop this system of objects from a tower.
If you assume heavier objects fall faster than lighter ones, then the lighter object would slow down how fast the heavier object falls. But the whole system [heavy object+light object+string] is heavier than the heavy object alone, and should therefore fall faster [not be slowed down]. This contradiction means you should reject your initial assumption that dropped objects fall at different rates based on their mass.
I don’t think Galileo’s answer in his thought-experiment can provide any insight your line of reasoning about mixing translated, perfected bodies with fallen, imperfect bodies — it’s just that the questioning struck me as the same.
Perhaps Jesus’ children would’ve been like Adam and Eve — born with perfected, translated flesh and not subject to sin. Then, as they reached the age of 8 and Satan was permitted to tempt them, the capacity to always stand firm against temptation was not as strong with them as it was with their father — so they “fell” to the corrupted, mortal flesh like their mother. And all it would take is for that to happen in the first generation — and there wouldn’t be the “worry” over Super-Jesus-Descendents roaming our Earth.
Also — when you’ve said the Holy Spirit could be the Mother of our spirits — that the resurrected, embodied Father would have spirit-children with a wife if she were incorporeal, spirit personage [meaning Her make-up doesn’t match His make-up — and the children gestate to match the make-up of their Mother]. So, by the same token, would then a perfected, divine Man have fallen-children with a wife if she were corrupted, fallen human?
I certainly feel the same as well. As I wrote in the OP — the answer being definitively shown one way or the other wouldn’t affect how I feel about marriage and family-life, and it also wouldn’t change my devotion to Jesus either. I’ve always been more interested in thinking about why the question of whether He was married or not is ever such a controversy in the first place.
If you took two objects of the same shape, mass and size and dropped them simultaneously, but one of the objects was spun rapidly before being dropped while the other one was not spun, they would hit the ground at different times, even in a vacuum. The spinning object would fall faster. If you repeat the experiment with objects of the same shape, but different masses and sizes, you can still get the spinning object falling faster than the non-spinning one, even if its a lighter object. If the spinning object is more massive, denser or larger in size, or of a shape coming close to a hypersphere (such as an inertialess drive rotor), or if it spins faster, it will fall even faster.
Also, if you took two dense spheres, one massively gigantic and one very small with little mass, and dropped them at an identical height from their mid-points in a vacuum, the mid-point of the massive object would reach the ground first, based on my non-conventional understanding of gravitation. The gravity field above the mid-point of each object is identical, but displacement is not, so there would be a greater push on the top of the larger, more massive object than on the top of the smaller object. This is why one object feels heavier in your hand than the other one. The initial velocity, due to the differences in stationary “push,” would be different for each object, but once in free fall motion, they would each accelerate equally for the distance involved. In other words, free falling objects fall at the same acceleration, but initially, two stationary, similarly sized and shaped objects of different masses would get moving at different velocities. This is because in the first instant of moving, the more massive object gets push more than the less massive object and then both objects “settle in” to constant acceleration. This instantaneous jump start with more massive objects probably would be negligible and would be hard to measure unless we had one object huge and the other one very small. But I fully expect it to be present in all objects, so, with all due respect to Galileo, I don’t think his findings contain all the facts.
A simplified reason why spinning objects fall faster is that they essentially make themselves kinda sorta “much more massive” by displacing or compressing the gravitational field through torsion fields instead of through normal mass displacement. But instead of these energies traveling towards or into the object, making the object heavier, they travel around it, making the object lighter and creating a kind of space river, facilitating its movement through space. Also the gravitational field both above and below the mid-point has a hard time getting a hold of the spinning object and pushing. What you end up with is a greater amount of “push” above the mid-point, pushing down or in the direction it is traveling, and a lessened amount of “push” below the mid-point, pushing up or against the direction it is traveling, and as each instant passes, these energies increase above and decrease below. In the case of the hypersphere spinning really fast, you can end up with no push energies whatsoever up or down upon the object, only a very fast moving “space river,” so that the object can free fall in whatever direction you throw it.
Not sure how that adds to the discussion, but I thought I’d mention it nonetheless…
Well, let’s back up even more. Even before children are conceived, the very sex act between a divine personage and a fallen human raises interesting questions. In human sexual relations, the sperm count of a healthy man can have 20 million sperm per milliliter. A divine Being engaging in sex would really only need one, not 20 million, to impregnate a woman. So, what, then, becomes of the others? As all God does has a purpose, we can readily see the purpose of such a high sperm count in fallen man, but in a divine being, would it serve the same purpose? Would not every sperm in the divine count be as equally excellent? If this excess semen were absorbed by the woman, what would be the result? Would this life-giving fluid sustain her, so she would need nothing else to survive? (Sorry if this sounds sacrilegious to anyone, but this is the topic of the post.)
Yes, one object feels “heavier” because gravity “pulls” harder on more massive objects than it does on less massive objects [the force being the product of the masses as the inverse of the distance between them].
So Galileo’s findings contain the fact that because of inertia — it becomes equally “harder” for any force to “pull” a more massive object [as compared to a smaller object]. So the strength of gravity’s “pull” will be equally-balanced by the “resistance to pulling” of inertia. That’s true. Now — if you want to affect the principles of gravity and inertia that he intuitively thought out by saying, “Yeah, so let’s now spin one object and see what spinning will do to the gravitational field [ignoring the fact that Galileo thought this through before we understood quantum field theory],” then that’s something different than saying he doesn’t account for the facts.
Nor do I with me bringing that up in the first-place. But it’s fun nonetheless.
I don’t think that we need to “back-up” in order to answer:
cause if the answer is “yes” to that, then the work is done. Jesus could’ve been married and had children who grew up to be like every other human on earth [because their mother was a normal human like everyone else]. But if the answer is “no”, then it makes more sense that He didn’t get married and have children like “normal” humans do.
Personally, I prefer to think that He did get married and had children who were not super-hero demigods but were like everybody else. But that’s just based off my own opinions and desires — in that I’d like to imagine that Jesus knew what it was like for me to have the struggles of marriage and a family life. I’d feel more empathetically-connected to Him in that way if that were the case.
It’s funny reading about the “pull” of gravity. I always describe it as a push and teach everyone that there is no such thing as a “pull,” every pull in the Universe being in reality a push. But I guess in the textbooks, it’s still described as a pull and as attraction.
A gravity field is kind of like an ocean of water. The deeper you go, the more atmospheric pressure you experience, because of the weight of the water pushing above you. It works the same in water, the weight of water pushing downward, or towards the center of the planetary shell, and in an airy atmosphere, the weight of air pushing downward, and in the vacuum of space surrounding an object, the “weight” of the gravity field pushing downward. Inertia is what the gravity field does when it doesn’t have time to “move out of the way.” Rapid movements, or rapid accelerations create a lot of inertia, which potentially could flatten you like a pancake if you tried accelerating too rapidly. But gradual acceleration allows the g-field the time to adjust to the new spatial configuration.
There is no doubt that Galileo did a bang up job with the information he had to work with, but it would be presumptuous to say that he was in possession of all the facts. Even our current level of scientific understanding is, at best, partially correct, and the “scientific facts” we are in possession of, only partially true. One of the reasons why the age of science must, of necessity, be put to rest at a certain point in time, is its inadequacy for the world-wide changes that will occur at the beginning of the great Millennium. In other words, current science, based on observations of a Telestial world, cannot explain the paradisaical state, or the Terrestrial world. The new heaven and new earth which is coming, will require a new “scientific” understanding, not based upon the old, erroneous conclusions, but revealed anew. So, the new revelation, or revelation of all things from the beginning, that is slated to happen at the start of the Millennium, will show the real truth and manifest why current understandings are fundamentally flawed in just about every respect. What we will receive then will be sufficient to comprehend both the Terrestrial and the Telestial, whereas what we have now is a perceived understanding of how things work, good enough to get some work done, but really not wholly accurate in any real sense. Again, it’s all only partially correct, what percentage is anyone’s guess, but likely quite low, hence the Lord calling our ideas “folly.”
The process of debunking many of the scientific “truths” and “laws” we hold dear and teach to understand our world, will begin prior to the Millennium, when the Lord sends servants to embarrass the Gentiles, according to this prophecy:
I suppose most would interpret this prophecy as dealing with only religious knowledge and sin, but my understanding is that God intends to level everything that didn’t and doesn’t directly come from Him, meaning that unless He, Himself, revealed it to man, we are going to be shown that both our observations were mostly blind and the conclusions we derived from them were mostly erroneous and are quite useless for Millennium living. So the scientific underpinnings we take for granted as the bedrock of society are going to be more or less completely destroyed, and a new understanding given to us, one that doesn’t build on the faulty past work of men like Galileo. When that day comes, there won’t be “inspiration,” as we are wont to call research that seems to cover a lot of ground, but direct revelation, and the prophecy of Habakkuk will be fulfilled, which says, “the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” and also the prophecy of the Lord, given to Joseph Smith, which says, “all shall know me, who remain, even from the least unto the greatest, and shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, and shall see eye to eye.” Jeremiah’s prophecy will also be fulfilled:
Again, I suppose many would read that prophecy and say that it only applies to religious knowledge, but my understanding is that the only thing we’ll be teaching people (if that) is how to read the Lord’s records, and from those records will come an understanding of all things, so that no one will be a teacher and no one will learn from man anymore, nor be taught by man, but all will learn directly from God, through the fulness of His revealed word. In other words, the pattern typified by Christ will apply to all mankind in that day:
Now, I don’t mean to diss Galileo or his findings. They are, indeed, useful in our current setting, but as I used to say to a friend of mine, who contended that at the very least mathematics is correct, “No, not even mathematics is correct and will have to be revealed anew, along with everything else.” Sounds crazy, I know, but that’s my understanding.
Isn’t that already covered by His atonement, though? To wit:
Didn’t he experience every possible privation, discomfort, pain, sorrow, horror and all the rest as He worked it out? And doesn’t the unspeakable joy of the Spirit cover all the joys of life as well as heavenly bliss? Since He received a fulness of the Spirit, then, wouldn’t that mean that He also understood, according to the flesh, all of life’s joys, and through the atonement, all of life’s sorrows and frustrations?
But how did He “experience” them? If he didn’t have a wife and children, then I wouldn’t feel as “swayed” by the assertion that “it was experienced through the Spirit” as I would if the fact were that He actually had a wife and children to experience that — mainly because so much of my life has been consumed with building and enjoying a family, and I don’t feel like there’s a better way to understand that than to have actually lived it out.
The publicized translation of the recently discovered “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife” fragment reads:
In any event — the fragment is the first I’ve seen that shows Jesus using the phrase “my wife” to refer to another woman [presumably Mary], whereas previously I’d only seen her described as a woman He “loved” or “kissed”.
Okay, but let’s put that on the female foot. Christ, being a male, then, could not be able to experience having a husband or anything else that goes with being female. Or the crippled foot. Christ, being unblemished, could not be able to experience being crippled for life, or any of the other debilitating life experiences that one can go through. Etc. If we take such a stance, then He would have to live the lives of every one of us, exactly, in order to fully comprehend what we are going through, yet He had only one life on earth and He obviously did not do all things that everyone has or ever will do. So, there is another mechanism by which He experiences all things, good and bad, according to the flesh, not requiring Him to literally do the same things in His own body. That mechanism, is, of course, the nature of the body, to correspond according to what the spirit feels, (which I think I mentioned on this blog already, but speaking of the mind-body connection and not spirit-body connection).
At no point in Jesus’ life was He infirm, except during the atonement. The previous verse says,
Pains, sicknesses, afflictions, temptations. When did He undergo these experiences, except during the atonement? The verse following says,
The Son of God didn’t just suffer the penalty of sin, He took sin upon Him, meaning that He experienced sin. Same with every pain, sickness, temptation, affliction and even death. He took all these things upon Him, meaning that He experienced them, that He might know, according to the flesh, these things. When did He experience all these things? During the atonement, while clothed in flesh, and because He was clothed in flesh, and experienced these things according to the power of the Spirit, the flesh corresponded, so that He felt what it physically feels like to have all these experiences. Thus, it is was not necessary for Jesus to contract marriage to know what it physically feels like to live a married life, all that was necessary was for Him to be clothed in flesh. The whole thing is done vicariously (“experienced or realized through imaginative or sympathetic participation in the experience of another”), through the subjective power of God (being in all things, through all things, etc.), as our Proxy, and not literally.
By the same mechanism, Jesus can, and did, experience all the joys of life, by merely being clothed in flesh and receiving a fulness of the Spirit. Marriage, then, is completely unnecessary for the Savior, as a requirement before He “understands our condition.” He understands it without marriage, merely by being clothed in flesh. Heck, even without flesh He understood our condition, for as the scripture says, “the Spirit knoweth all things,” therefore, the Spirit of Christ, before coming to earth, had a perfect understanding of all things that pertain to flesh.
In like manner, Jesus had no need for baptism or any other ordinance needed by fallen man, but we read that he was baptized to fulfill the commandment of His father, so, if Jesus was married, it was likely for the same reason: to fulfill a commandment of the Father, for He did nothing of His own will, it eternally being swallowed up in the will of the Father. The idea that Jesus was married because He needed to have the earthly ordinance for His salvation is preposterous. Marriage was not started as an earthly ordinance, but as a heavenly ordinance, for Adam and Eve were in the presence of God when they were married, prior to the Fall. The ordinance was established as a rite for translated (essentially immortal) beings, in God’s presence, before either of these two were cut off or separated from Him. So, marriage is, in its very essence, a heavenly ordinance transferred to earth, or adapted to an earthly (fallen) condition, because of the Fall. D&C 132 and the priesthood restored the rite to its proper perspective, or original purpose, by restoring the eternal, heavenly or celestial nature to it.
In the scriptures Jesus (or Jehovah) is always spoken of as a married man, or at least a betrothed man, whose bride is Israel and the church, and also a father of children, the children being the saints and prophets (His seed.) He is spoken of in these terms both before, during and after His earthly ministry. The gospel is not just symbolic, but literal or concrete, so all those saints and prophets who become saved, become the literal sons of God, meaning the sons (which includes daughters) of the Only Begotten Son of God, and joint heirs. Not symbolically, but literally, He spiritually begetting us and also physically begetting us through the resurrection or regeneration of our bodies. And the bride that He symbolically marries, will also become literal, for, if in the heavens all marry all, then Jesus must, of necessity, marry all those who are saved. As the sons and daughters of God become “one flesh” through marriage, becoming the whole man, the marriage of the daughters of God to Jesus would link the other husbands to Jesus, too, making it entirely appropriate for God to speak of His bride as Israel and the church (which has both males and females in it.)
So, we might say that Jesus was already married (or betrothed) to all the women who converted to the gospel, even without any earthly ordinance taking place. The bride price was the price of the atonement and has already been paid. But the actual wedding is still future, so perhaps that is why there is no record of irrefutable, concrete evidence of Him marrying with a ceremony, because His wedding day was prophesied to take place at another time.
Yeah, I remember that about the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife. Wasn’t that a fairly recent discovery? Like this year or last year?
Empirical data vs D&C 91
Concerning the question of what the essence of Christ’s children be we could perhaps look at the Nephilim. The Nephilim were giants who were the offspring of the watchers and mortal women. Some refer to the watchers as angels however some places refer to the watchers in terms that can be linked to translated beings. So you have immortal beings rebelling against God and mating with mortal women. The result was the Nephilim(giants). Now I’m not sure what connections we could make with Christ mating. However it would not be the first instance of an immortal being mating with a mortal one.
From Harvard’s website about the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife:
You know, I pointed out on Wheat & Tares [where this article is also posted] that I’m kinda surprised Joseph Smith didn’t go out on a limb and proclaim that Jesus was married, using the spirit of prophecy and revelation to do so — given the heavy emphasis his restoration doctrine put on marriage as an ordinance of exaltation.
We’re talking about a prophet who was willing to come right out there and declare that God the Father was once a man and sits enthroned in yonder heavens as a resurrection human that would look to be in the same bodily form as one of us [were we to behold Him]. You’d think it wouldn’t have been such a stretch for him to say that Jesus was married during His life [when compared with saying that God the Father used to be a mortal human].
Only fallen angels really get the gospel. Fallen angels are earth angels. In the 1950’s classic, Earth Angel, the lyrics tell a touching tale of love:
”I fell for you, and I knew the vision of your love, loveliness. I hope and I pray that someday I’ll be the vision of your hap, happiness.”
“Happy” and “Happen” have the same root. Happiness comes from knowing how we can make good things happen. Down here on the ground is the most happening place there is.
As fallen angels, we are given the all-important task of waking up the gods and keeping them awake to reality. In D&C 132, verses 16 and 17, it speaks of the marriage of heaven and earth and describes this glory in terms of a “far more…eternal weight” Through us they are enlarged and exalted. In a detached state, floating singly around in the heavens as a mere idea, they can become just as lonely as one here in the lone and dreary world. The gods have two choices before them. They can tell Luciferian lies to their selves and remain there afraid of falling from great heights. Or they can take the leap of faith and allow themselves to dive deep into a much fuller love and joy. The first option is motivated by fear. It is a lie and they know it.
https://ldsanarchy.wordpress.com/2013/08/08/wearetheweather/
This quote by Orson Hyde is flawed logic and wrests the scripture. Nephi didn’t just teach that Jesus needed to be baptized in order to fulfill all righteousness, which may imply that baptism was but a part of the works that Jesus needed to do, but that Jesus actually did fulfill all righteousness by being baptized. If something is fulfilled, then no more is required. Look at Nephi’s words:
All righteousness, then, was fulfilled, by Jesus’ baptism. Nothing else but the witness that He would be obedient to the Father in keeping His commandments was required of Him to fulfill all righteousness, (that designated witness being water baptism), for Jesus was already eternally obedience personified and now embodied.
To fulfill means “to accomplish; to perform; to complete; to answer in execution or event what has been,” so if Jesus “did fulfill all righteousness” by being baptized, then all righteousness was accomplished, performed, completed. Nothing is left lacking after completion.
So the assertion that marriage was just as essential as baptism in order for Jesus to “fulfill all righteousness” is erroneous.
Because Jesus was baptized at age 30 (and not at age 8, like the rest of us brought up in the church), and began His ministry afterward, if He were married as part of the requirement of fulfilling all righteousness, it would have been prior to His baptism and receiving the Holy Ghost. (Which order is strange considering we teach baptism and confirmation at 8 and marriage afterward.)
The Wikipedia entry for Marriage at Cana says this about the possibility of that wedding being Jesus’:
The wedding at Cana was after Jesus’ baptism, so it can’t be included as part of the fulfillment of all righteousness (which was accomplished at His baptism), even if is was Jesus’ own wedding.
Another thing to consider are the similarities between Jesus and the Essenes, who practiced celibacy. The Essenes predated Jesus, so it would not have been entirely radical for Him not to take a wife, as He might have been seen as another Essene on the scene, (a more prominent one.)
I have not read the following long article yet, having only just skimmed through it, so I don’t know if it is any good, but it appears to analyze Jesus and the Essenes in detail, and I’m linking to it for future reference, to be read later.
Jesus Christ and the Essenes: Similarities and Differences
The New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman mentions the connection with the Essenes when he makes his case for why he thinks Jesus wasn’t married:
Hebrew tradition; Jesus was called Rabbi. In order to be a Rabbi he had to have been married. Jesus was around children and held them, in order to do so he had to have His own children. In the Roman conquest of conquering the world, the Romans felt that Christianity was a threat to their Kingdom so they slaughtered Christians. The main thrusts of their conquest was seeking the lives of the lineage of Jesus Christ and killing them, they fled to England and the Romans pursued them to England and met the most fierce opposition in doing so. England is the only country that was not conquered by the Romans, the best they could achieve was a treaty with them! The protection of the lineage of Christ was the difference in comparison to every other country they stomped! A testimony to Gods hand in the affairs of the world. Just sayin. Peace.
I have found at least 3 Nordic names that I believe belong to his(Jesus) children, as well as the Nordic names for one of his wives and the Nordic name for his mother. As just about every scholar knows the name Mary did not exist at the time of Jesus, nor did the name Jesus exist for that matter, Jesus is a Greek alteration of the Hebrew name for that which we in English use “Joshua.”
Now I may have some things wrong but here it goes…
Jesus’ oldest son is named Yngvi-Freyr, shortened to sound like “Ing,” Yng became one of the first Patriarch/Kings of the Swedish people, and Yng is where we get Eng for the English People. The Queen of England claims to be a decedent of Yng. Joseph Smith, Jr. is also a decedent of Yng. Yng was raised by his uncle “Njord,” Jesus’ brother-in-law and king in the “North,” in an Israelite settlement on the north shore of the Black Sea, with the Israelite people who called themselves the Wayne People.
According to the Icelandic Sagas, when Jesus brought most of the Church in Jerusalem up to the north shore of the Black Sea where the Don River connects, Njord and Freyr were living with the people there, he took Njord and Freyr, changed Freyr’s name to Yng and put them into the 12 apostles of the Church.
Yng’s father is Jesus Christ, his foster father is Njord. Yng’s grandmother is Frigg, in Jerusalem Frigg’s name was the Hebrew for Miriam and Yng’s mother, and a wife of Jesus Christ is Freya, Both of these women were named the same in Jerusalem, the Nordics made some distinction, but it is from the name of Jesus Christ’s mother that we get the English word Free.
The “Holy Grail” are the decedents of Jesus Christ through Yng, who are the Patriarchal bloodline and kings of Sweden.
Fundamentally the question is not “What proof do we have that Jesus was married ?” But rather, “where is there any proof that celibacy was a doctrinal law of God?”
From a theological standpoint, Jesus was required to marry in this life to “fulfill all righteousness.” Marriage is an essential ordinance and must be entered into in this life. But in order to “fulfill all righteousness” the Savior had to do more than just keep all the commandments and ordinances of the Gospel. He also had to keep all the covenants He made.
We must not forget that, as the God of Israel in the Old Testament, Jesus Christ, as Jehovah, made many covenants with His people. One of the covenants He made was with David. He promised David that there would always be an heir to his throne. (2 Samuel 7:16) In order to fulfill this covenant, the Lord had to continue the royal seed and could only do so by siring legitimate heirs Himself. Not to marry and not to have progeny would have violated His covenant with David. This the Lord would never do.
So what became of Jesus’ children after His crucifixion and what became of His posterity? History, the prophets, and scripture provide partial answers to these questions. His descendants, along with the posterity of His siblings were, hunted, persecuted and killed from the earliest times. Even their genealogical records were destroyed in order to deny their very existence. Indeed, even before the crucifixion, according to the ecclesiastical historian, Eusebius of Caesarea, Herod burned the royal genealogies in order to promote his own specious nobility. (Eusebius, The History of the Church “From Christ to Constantine, I:7:13)http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4…_of_the_Church
One more time;According to the Icelandic Eddas, Not many years after the death and return of Jesus Christ, Peter the rest of the Apostles and most of the Church left the Holy Land and went unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
The Apostles and the Church, being lead by Christ, went through Turkland. Then they came to the north shore of the Black Sea. There on the Don River were people who were related to the people of Israel (The Wayne People). From these people the King chose certain men (Nord and Freyer) to replace his two brothers that they left in Israel. With the full Twelve and this additional people they continued their traveling.
Continuing the Sagas they went …
“… westward to Gardarike (the Viking name for “Russia”) and then south to Saxland (the Viking name for “Germany”).
Because the King was “All-wise” and had foreknowledge he chose not to build his, headquarters, for administering Germany and Europe on the Continent of Europe. Instead he built it on an Island just off the coast of peninsular Denmark. Because it was his headquarters the name of that Island is the name for “perfect joy”: “Fun (Fyn).”
Then, from Denmark, the King went over to Sweden. To the west of Stockholm there is a great Lake that is called, Maelare Lake, that, with other large Lakes, almost divides north Sweden from south Sweden. The King formed that Lake by the miracle of raising up a Mountain, that had been there, and putting it over into the Sea. That Mountain, then, in the Sea, was, thereafter, called, “Sea-land.” Today that is the Danish Island of Sjaelland (which means, “Sea-land,” in Danish), on which the Danish City of Copenhagen is located and which Island is the “Old ‘Zealand’” (in English) for which, “New Zealand” was named. He named the new Lake that formed there, “LAKE LAW” and built a small Temple on its shore. The place where he built that temple he called, “Sigtuna.” “Sig” is Swedish for “victory.” “Tuna” is Swedish for “town.” 400 years later, (as told in the Icelandic book, “The Prose Edda”), when Attila the Hun wanted to marry the Burgundian Princess, in the story at the heart of the “Nibelungen Lied,” Attila had to take his oath by that Temple at Sigtuna. Hey Google the infors…………..
Among the British Israel movement, English tradition and Vatican historians – some hold the view that the Jews drove several of the Lord’s family/inner circle away in 36 AD – they tried to kill some by casting them adrift on the Mediterranean without or or sail… through divine providence they drifted to and landed at Marseillies, France – where they traveled north up the Rhone river to Switzerland, hen contied down the Rhine until they crossed the North Sea/English Channel, and created/joined a group of Israelites at Glastonbury…
Those mentioned as part of these outcasts are:
Joseph of Arimethea (whom the locals in England seemed to know as being a tin merchant)
Mary, mother of Jesus (died there in 48 AD- all the apostles are said to have met there for her funeral, and Christ then appeared there)
Mary’s cousin Anna (Joseph of A.’s daughter. – she is said to have married the royal Briton line, whom which comes the house of Tudor).
Lazarus, and his sisters Mary & Martha (possibly wives of Jesus)
Mary Magdalene (possibly a wife of Jesus)
Marcella – a maid to Lazarus’ sisters (a daughter of theirs & Jesus?)
Maximin – a disciple (a son?)
I do not believe this list is complete…. it is highly likely that if Joseph step-father of Jesus died before Jesus was a full adult, then Joseph of A. took his grand-nephew Jesus with him on his trips to England and elsewhere where those descendants Abraham (who left Moses during the Exodus, Troy during the Judges, Israel during David/Solomon’s times, 10 Tribes after Assyria, etc.) where those people would have quite possibly have been receptive to the Messiah….
it is quite possible that after the Resurrection, the Lord moved his family to a safe zone – far away from Jerusalem, Glastonbury, Cornwall, & Wales then untouched by the Romans.
Christ is also said to have appeared at Glastonbury in 37 AD – and did much the same as He did for the Nephites, the Hawaiians/Polynesians, and the Scandinavians…
Glastonbury is also supposed to be the mystical isle of Avalon of King Arthur fame (a hill surrounded by a marsh in 450-500 AD).
Mary the mother of Jesus and at that time and place women were between 12 and 14 when they got married, but that 14 was on the older side. Men were a little older. Keep in mind that Jesus had the intellect to govern Israel when he was 11 or 12. I’m sure he was mature enough to be married by the age of 16, which wouldn’t have been unusual for that time. Let’s say that he was married at 16 and had his first child at the age of 17 and that it was a girl. By the time he was 30 he would have had a 13-year-old girl who was ripe for marriage. This math could even lead us to ask the question, who exactly was married at Cana? Let’s say she was married at age 13 and had her first child one year later, when she was 14. Jesus would have had a grandchild by the age of 31, which wouldn’t have been out of the ordinary for the time and place. At the age of about 33, he would have been on the cross, and he would have seen his seed, like Isaiah said, and his seed could have included children and even grandchildren (as well as his spiritual seed, whom he would have seen in vision). Nothing for sure, just math.
Dan Mullen,
The law of chastity:
So, “having no sexual relations” [or celibacy] is the default position. The law assumes celibacy and then says that if and only if you’re married, then you may have sexual relations [cease being celibate] with the spouse you married.
To keep the law of chastity — Jesus would’ve had to have been celibate. So, unless someone can show that He was married, then I’d have to assume He was celibate.
LDS authorities affirmed the plural marriage of the Son. The five include Orson Hyde, Orson Pratt, Jedediah M. Grant, Joseph F. Smith and Joseph Fielding Smith. Four of the five were apostles at the time of their remarks and two of the five ascended to the presidency of the Church. Jedediah M. Grant was not an apostle at the time of his remarks but was ordained as an apostle and appointed to the First Presidency soon afterward.
Dan:
How does their priesthood office lend anything to the truth of whether the historical Yeshua of Nazareth was married or not
?
All I can say is..find time to seriously ask God for forgiveness for this words u av written ‘cos u will be held accountable for it!
Celibacy had no recognition within the scriptures. Ancient Jewish law and early Christian law sanctioned and required their disciples to obey the marriage covenant. If the apostles fulfilled the law of marriage, it is only reasonable to assume that they were obeying that law by sanction and direction of the Lawgiver Himself.
And though Jesus gave and instructed his disciples in all of the laws of the gospel, including marriage, it is most unreasonable that He would neglect or refuse to obey that law Himself.
Jesus Christ never omitted the fulfillment of a single law that God had made known for the salvation of the children of men. It would not have done for him to have come and obeyed one law and neglected or rejected another. He could not do that and then say to mankind, “Follow me!” (Joseph F. Smith, Mill. Star 62:97)
The first principle, ordinance, and commandment given to man was the marriage law. It would indeed seem very peculiar that the Lord of all mankind would be a perfect example in all things except marriage. Historical records, scriptural evidence, and reason all prove that He was the Good Shepherd in obeying every law of the Gospel.
Comment by Justin
“How does their priesthood office lend anything to the truth of whether the historical Yeshua of Nazareth was married or not
no influence
can be maintained
by virtue of the priesthood
D&C 121:41
Marriage was firmly implanted in the minds of all Jewish men; however, it was most rigidly observed by those who complied to the laws and offices of Rabbi and Priest. Jewish law required a High Priest to be married on the “Day of Atonement;” and so important was this law that in the case of some unforeseen circumstance, an extra woman was held in readiness for the marriage. This marriage on the Day of Atonement was a prerequisite for entering the Sanctuary. Paul wrote that Jesus was the “Great High Priest” who would make atonement for all men. Since one of the laws of “great high priest office was marriage, then every priest including Jesus had to comply with that ordinance to fulfill the obligation of that office.
Another thing to remember is that the Bible we have was filtered through the early Catholic church, and thanks to Augustus celibacy was considered superior over the congress of man and woman and matrimony. Any text that would explicitly describe Jesus’ matrimonial relationship with a woman or women would be excluded from the canonized texts we now have as a matter of course. Such texts do exist. Moreover, ancient Jewish/Israelite culture did not look upon celibacy favorably – quite the opposite. Men and women were expected to marry and have children. Marriage was ordained of God and is godly.
That’s not to say that the scriptures we do have don’t have very tantalizing evidence of Jesus’ matrimonial status to two women. The first is here:
Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word. But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me. Luke 10:38-40.
We have to put aside modern social customs and look at these verses in terms of ancient Jewish culture. What happens in these verses is that two sisters had a disagreement which was brought before a male for arbitration. The one who resolves an issue between women in a private home would be the father… or husband. That is key. It would not have been proper for anyone else to intervene in an intra-familial squabble. These verses are a very strong indicator of Jesus’ relationship with Mary and Martha. They came to him because he was the man in charge – he was their husband.
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. John 11:5
What’s interesting about this verse is the Greek word used for love. The Greeks had 4 words for love, each referring to a different type of love. There is eros, which is erotic/passionate love. Storge, which is a love to describe parents feeling for their children. Philia, which applies more to friendship and general close associations. And then there is Agape (ἀγάπη), which is a much deeper love, and is often used in ancient texts to describes the feelings between man and wife. This verse uses Agape. This is not in and of itself complete proof since there are variance in how these words are used, but is a fairly decent indicator of His relationship with Mary and Martha.
Lastly, we have a scene after the resurrection:
Jesus saith unto [Mary], Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father, but go to my brethren and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father; and to my God, and your God. John 20: 15-17
Firstly, it was common in that day for a woman to greet her husband with the term ‘master’. Secondly, she made some kind of move to embrace him. For a married woman to touch a man who was not her husband in public (or anywhere else for that matter) was scandalous. That she attempted to touch him immediately after she realized who He was indicates a very instinctive reaction, as a joyful wife might react to being reunited with her beloved husband after a time of separation.
One last point to make that should be obvious to all endowed members is that a man’s priesthood is not complete without a proper union with a woman. Godhood is man and woman. It’s interesting to note that Jesus’ ministry starts with a miracle performed at a wedding. Jesus said he did all things that the Father had done, and the Father is not alone (or childless).
In the mid 16th century, due to the encroachment of immoral French influence in Flemish oil painting, the Royal Bloodline of Jesus was forced to flee Sweden all except for the boy prince, Jans Hanselplans. But the French fashions were relentless and eventually it was necessary to evacuate Jans, the last of Jesus’ literal descendents from the Royal Palace which was at that time located in Stockholm’s Swedish Fish Quarters (The Sweedish Fish being an ancient symbol for Christianity among true followers since the days of Sweetooth Swedenborg, a Norse Revivalist and spiritual leader who later inspired Wyclef during the Reformation).
The young prince was secretly swapped with his whipping boy, who also happened to be his bastard twin brother, and was quietly smuggled out of the country as a stowaway stashed in a shipment of pork products bound for the Isle of Man. In route the ship was intercepted by a canoe crew of Native American pirates. Once these pirates reached their native shores of Nova Scotia, and began to make an official record of their newly acquired goods, they were astonished to discover the young child in a barrel of lard. When Jans emerged he was immediately recognized by the humble natives as divinity. He was covered in lard, which no doubt gave him an added air of luster due to the exceeding whiteness of the lard on his skin.
He dwelt and reigned among the First Nations of the Eastern Canadian Provinces for a number of years and is known among them as Chief Snow White Birch via their oral traditions which have been passed down over the centuries (The John Birch Society with its notable members like Ezra T. Benson actually derives from carefully preserved, esoteric knowledge of the Jans, or in English, John/Chief Birch connection). At the age of 33 Prince Jans promptly departed for the British colonies to the south, but not before announcing in a well documented prophecy, that he would one day return, and that the sixth day of every April should be observed as a springtime ritual in his memory, when nice children would be issued gifts and naughty boys and girls should have their faces darkened by charcoal from the communal fire pit.
Jans traveled across the 13 colonies from north to south, and in each colony he took one wife to whom was born one divine son (any female offspring preceding the birth of a male heir were drowned or otherwise disposed of). Each of these divine descendents was named George (code for Jesus) and assigned a numerical value. From these Georges would come all subsequent British Royalty as well as the noble line of U.S. Presidents from George Washington to George Bush. Of course there were temporary spiritual set backs once Lincoln took it upon himself to free the slaves without express permission from God the Father via his appointed oracle in Salt Lake, Brigham Young (Young was related to Swedish Royalty by connection to the fabled Yng who was the chosen keeper of the Holy Grail and made Forever Young after drinking of its alchemical elixir), but for the most part the Elite Bloodline of the Council of 13 Georges has been preserved in purity throughout the illustrious history of the United States of America until now.
Besides Lincoln’s falling out of favor like unto King David for the unpardonable sin of freeing Hamites, and with the notable exception of JFK who was struck down by the Hand of God for his womanizing and winebibbing after the manner of wicked King Noah (Many are unaware of Kennedy’s problems with wine consumption, but it will be obvious to anyone who truly understands that Catholicism is all about alcoholism) God’s work rolled forward practically uninhibited across the span of American history and across the American frontier. This went on for many, many years, right on schedule and culminated in the divine figure of Jimmy Carter in the late 70s (Jimmy Carter, or “J.C.” as he was called by family and by the fraternity of those in the know, was actually named Jesus Christ on his birth certificate which was kept hidden from public knowledge until such a time as the general populace would be prepared for the truth). J.C. was the literal reincarnation of Jesus Christ who appeared among us for a short time, smiling as he secretly checked up on us in the U.S.A. to see if we were ready for a full-scale Second Coming.
Jesus saw that America and the world was not quite ready for his Second Coming, so he sent one mighty and strong like unto Moses in the form of Ronald RayGun to clean up the scene and to be a type after the similitude of the Only Begotten. After Reagan there was peace and prosperity in the land for the space of many years and God’s Plan was right on track, suffering only minor setbacks under Clinton. But now the voice of the people has chosen wickedness and America has only recently become an Obamanation to the Lord, though not the “Real America” referenced by Sarah Palin (Sarah actually has a certain percentage of native blood from her mother’s side that can trace itself back to a young Indian maiden who was offered to the great Chief Snow White Birch as a virgin concubine). Thomas S. Monson, despite being the mouthpiece of the Lord, has remained deafly silent on the state of the union. But don’t let him fool you. His surname itself -MONSON- is an anagram which when turned upside down spells out -NO SNOW- . It is a distress signal and a warning to all that the Divine Bloodline of Jesus Christ’s offspring and rightful rulers through Chief Snow White Birch has been desecrated by racial impurity.
Femi:
Could you cite which words in particular you are referring to [and to whom you are referring] — cause if I’m going to be made to account for my words, I’d like to know just which ones you’re talking about.
Dan:
The law of chastity assumes celibacy — does it not? To quote:
Thus — having no sexual relations [i.e., celibacy] is the assumed state of any of the sons of Adam or daughters of Eve — and the exception to that state is in the case that the two people are married and are having sexual relations with each other.
It’s weird how you answered my question:
by appealing to what you suppose was “in the minds of all Jewish men … especially those who complied to the laws and offices of Rabbi and Priest“.
I mean — what does the thoughts in the minds of First Century Jews have anything to do with you appealing to the priesthood offices of Orson Hyde, Orson Pratt, Jedediah Grant, Joseph F. Smith, and Joseph Fielding Smith? I mean, you wrote:
and this is what I was asking you about.
I’m not even here to argue that Yeshua of Nazareth wasn’t married. You’ll notice that I’ve already said:
but that,
So, Dan, you don’t need to convince me of anything with your “Augustine of Hippo and the celibate Catholics” and the “being a good Jewish Rabbi” stuff — I think that’s irrelevant to the question. So to [in my estimation] are all the appeals to whatever Orson Pratt or Joseph Fielding Smith may have said.
One of God’s first laws and commandments to man was marriage. And from the Garden of Eden to the present time, God has continued to sanction and bless those who have honored this covenant. Marriage, solemnized by God in the beginning, was established with a Divine acceptance for the purpose of propagation of the species, for mutual help, and for comfort and companionship. It was a union so sacred and spiritual in its nature that the man and woman were to become “one flesh. (Gen. 2:24; Matt. 19:5) This inseparable union is spirituality illustrated in a similar comparison with Christ to His Church (Eph. 5:30); and God has throughout history given many laws and commandments concerning marriage–not restraining marriage, but rather restricting anything that would break the bonds of marriage, fornication, adultery, whoredom, etc. Among these perils to marriage was celibacy (state of being unmarried), which was never an acceptable practice in ancient Israel, nor in early Christianity, but rather a doctrine of the pagans until it became incorporated into an apostate Christianity. By its nature celibacy contributes little to the quality or character in man–much less in a woman–because fruitful propagation of the species is contributory; barrenness in anything tends to extinction.
Paul foresaw the apostasy of Christianity and warned the members of the Church concerning these events. Celibacy, among other things was a “doctrine of devils”.
If he would be baptized to “fulfill all righteousness” of course he would be married to comply with the COMMANDMENT to multiply and replenish
LDSA commented about the “fulfill all righteousness” business above:
yeah but he was already married before he was baptized, so that part of all righteousness was fulfilled already.
Then why didn’t Nephi mention it as a part of Him “fulfilling all righteousness”? Why did he make a big to-do over the baptism — if that was actually incomplete if it wasn’t for an earlier marriage? Why expound to us baptism as a requirement to be like unto the Son of God — but then leave out marriage? If we’re told by Nephi to be baptized even as Christ was baptized — then why has no prophet ever told us to be married even as He was married? It’d be easy to do, wouldn’t it?
It was said above by LDSA — but essentially, I’m asking:
Matt.22:29-30
Going completely off of scripture, LDS or otherwise, ancient or modern…can anyone show where the commandment to multiply and replenish the earth inasmuch as it corresponds to physical actions and aspects like physical love-making, and child-rearing…is linked to the man-made institution of marriage?
My thoughts?
You bringing up that exchange between Jesus and the Sadducees made me think about D&C 132:
So who is the “they” that is spoken of in both the above quote and in “For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.“? A man who marries him a wife in the world, and marries her not by God nor by His word and covenants with her so long as he is in the world and she with him.
And why are they angels, instead of gods? Because they are not bound by any law when they are out of the world.
So — obviously something is binding us together in this physical world, which if we’re not together in those bonds before the resurrection — then we cannot be enlarged but remain separately and singly without marriage in and after the resurrection.
And that bond is clearly matrimony, or the new and everlasting covenant of marriage:
So, you called marriage a “man-made institution” — and certainly humankind has invented their own forms, terms, and purposes for cohabitating relationships and have called these things “marriage” [which are the arrangements for which people can seek and obtain legal marriage licenses] — but “marriage” is not a “man-made institution”:
Now — the more common meaning of “ordinance” is:
which is how the word is used in legal contexts — i.e., “you can’t smoke in this building because that violates a city ordinance.”
So — if God “ordains” a thing, then it is by an “ordain-ance” [an authoritative decree or command]. And, in the gospel, we keep the divine ordinances through physical rituals [baptism for the remission of sins, confirmation into the church, receiving the Holy Ghost and the baptism of fire, re-enacting the Lord’s supper, initiatory washings and anointings, endowment with the signs, keywords, and tokens of the priesthood — and marriages].
So while I can’t say that the commandment to multiply and fill-up the earth and the physical actions and aspects of love-making and child-rearing has anything to do with getting a state-issued marriage license from the court house — it certainly has something to do with marriage.