Couples are willing to spend hundreds of thousands of shillings in purchasing rings they will exchange on their wedding day. However, does the ring protect them in any way? PAUL KARIUKI finds out
He was fast moving in life. He had purchased a plot, put up a permanent brick house and, as a sign of his serious intent to settle down in life, he had a beautiful woman to complement him. But within a few days, he was dead.
There was nothing for the woman to show she was legally married to the deceased other than a ring on her finger. They hadn’t solemnised their marriage and the ring he had given her couldn’t guarantee her any claim to his wealth nor the money left in his bank account.
To compound it all, the in-laws were hostile to her from day one and unceremoniously sent her packing, labelling her a gold digger who had cast an evil spell on their son to benefit from a ‘windfall’, though he had died of natural causes.
Although this happened several years ago in my home area, it brings to fore a probing question of whether a wedding ring has any value in marriage when there’s increasing unfaithfulness to the marriage contract.
In his book, Jewellery and the Wedding Band, author Wilbur D Kropf shows that a wedding ring is not a necessity in a Christian union, as most church marriages deem it to be.
“It is a jewellery of no sentimental value and in the same class as fashionable or jewel-studded eye glass frames inconsistent with aiding one’s vision. The validating evidence to a marriage is a marriage certificate that is far more reliable and legal than a piece of metal on one’s finger,” says Kropf.
Origins
Thus, having a wedding ring on the finger shouldn’t be construed to mean your marriage is secure and protected. And neither should lack of it, especially on the part of a married woman, attest her of a loose moral character. It’s not evidence of faithfulness or an asset to faithfulness.
Wedding rings, according to the author, came into existence in around the eleventh century or, be exact, during the Dark Ages. They (the rings) had been instituted by a secular and sensual culture and had become fashionable to wear.
Rings are worn today because of social and cultural pressure, but social practices and pressures never in themselves determine the right or wrong of an issue.
This has seen the debate concerning the appropriateness of the wedding ring rage among religious denominations.
According to Seventh Day Adventists, a wedding ring is not exchanged during the church ritual, and members who feel they ought to wear rings exchange them at the reception ceremony.
Those against its use argue that the band falls in the category of the inappropriate ornaments of gold and pearls mentioned by Paul in 1 Timohty 2:10 and and Peter in 1 Peter 3:3. The Adventists thus strongly feelthat a golden ring is an ornament forbidden by the apostolic admonitions against wearing “gold or pearls or costly attire”.
This implies your marriage, if legally recognised, is complete without a ‘validating’ wedding ring. Take into account that weddings are public proclamations of the couple’s fidelity to each other as they exchange vows and solemn promises that will be in effect for the entire of the newlywed’s life.
The ring is only a ‘trapping’ common with the showy display, extravagance spending and luxurious furnishings that characterise today’s marriage ceremonies.
If a ring protects the married, what protects the unmarried? Is a man of loose morals protected by it in the institution of marriage?
