Nonsensical quips like “it’s Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve” reveals the simplistic and mistaken application of Scripture to the understanding of marriage. Claiming that the biblical traditional marriage is only between one man and one woman signifies an unsophisticated comprehension of the Bible, its history, and the social context from which the text arose. What we understand to be a traditional marriage, as defined by Western culture, does not have scriptural roots and is incongruent with what is actually written in the Bible. In fact, one would be hard press to find any modern-day Christian, who in practice would actually abide by how the Bible constructs marriage.

The biblical understanding of marriage originally meant male ownership of women who existed for his sexual pleasure and their reproduction abilities. Once “married,” a woman’s property and her body became the possession of her new husband. Not surprisingly, sexual activities such as prostitution, adultery, and incest were topics regulated under the category of property law. Participating in such acts concerned the trespass of another man’s rights to his own property, not any violation of trust created within a mutually giving and vulnerable familial relationship. Intercourse with a woman who belonged to another man fell under thievery of the other man’s rights to his woman’s body and his right to legitimate offspring.

Patriarchy defined the commandment “Thou shalt not commit adultery” (Exodus 20:14) as an offense that can only be transgressed by women. The only time a man could be accused of adultery was if he trespassed on another man’s “property,” hence violating another man’s rights (Leviticus 20:10). Ever wonder why the woman who was brought to Jesus, “caught in the very act of adultery” (John 8:3–11) was alone? After all, if she was caught in the very act, one would expect there to be another person in the room. But she and she alone was brought to Jesus because only she had sinned. Her sexual partner’s marital status was irrelevant because patriarchy allowed him to engage in multiple sexual relationships.

Men could have as many sexual partners as they could afford. Polygamy and concubinage were the biblical norm with no explicit prohibition of these practices in the biblical text. Marriage was neither required in the biblical text nor universally accepted throughout Western Christendom as a prerequisite for sex. A man during biblical times could engage in sex with whomever he chose: concubines (1 Kings 11:3), war booty (Deuteronomy 21:10–14), sexual slaves (Genesis 16:2), and occasional prostitutes (Genesis 38:15). If our society repudiates concepts like polygamy, concubinage, and sexual slavery, then it must reject the Bible’s construct of marriage.