Chapter 21 Section 21: Civil Marriage

Next, in order to convince those who may still be skeptical about the "true love" of Chinese husbands, that in China husbands can deeply love their wives, I can draw from Chinese history and literature Give sufficient evidence.Here, I would very much like to quote and translate an elegy written by Yuan Zhen, a poet of the Tang Dynasty, in memory of his deceased wife.Unfortunately, this poem is too long to be quoted in what is already too procrastinating.However, if one begins to know the Chinese and hopefully understands that emotion—real love, not what is often misunderstood as sexual love today,—how deeply a husband loves his wife in China, then You should read this elegy.It can be found in any collection of Tang poetry.The title of this elegy is "Sorrow and Sorrow".As this long poem cannot be quoted here, I intend to substitute it for another short poem by a modern poet.The poet, who was once an aide to the late governor Zhang Zhidong, arrived in Wuchang with his wife and children as the governor's entourage. After staying there for many years, his wife died.Due to excessive grief, he had to leave Wuchang immediately.On departure, he wrote the elegy.The original text of the poem is as follows: (z-51)

Everyone hates this, How many hundred years can there be? The pain of the Yangtze River, Same crossing but different destination. Express it in English, probably like this: The feeling here is common to everyone, One hundred year show many can attend? Buttiso water soft the Yangtze, Together we came, ----- but together were return not. It is at least as deep, if not deeper, in feeling than Tennyson's following poems.And it uses fewer words, and the language is more concise and clear.Tennyson's poem reads: Hit, hit, hit, Hitting on your cold gray rock, O sea! ... Your caressing hand suddenly disappears,

Your voice is still in my ears! But what about a wife's love for her husband in China today?I think it needs no proof.In China, according to the rules, the bride and groom cannot see each other before marriage, but even so, the love between the bride and groom still exists.This can be seen from a quatrain in the Tang Dynasty: The bridal chamber stopped red candles last night, Waiting for Xiaotang to pay respects to uncle and aunt. After putting on makeup, I asked my husband-in-law in a low voice, Is there any shade of thrush? (33) In order to illustrate this, I must say something about certain customs of Chinese marriages.In China, "six ceremonies" must be performed for a legal marriage. First, it is "asking the name", that is, a formal marriage proposal; second, it is "nacai" (accepting silk gifts), that is, engagement; third, it is "regular". , to set the wedding date; the fourth is "welcome", that is, to marry the bride; the fifth is "dian geese", which means to sprinkle wine on the geese, that is, a vow of eternal love to guarantee the marriage contract. The reason for this is that Yanbei believes that all spouses The most loyal among them; the sixth is "Temple See".Among the six rites, the last two rites are very important. For this reason, I intend to describe them in detail. (z-32)

At present, the fourth rite to marry a bride is generally exempted, except in my hometown of Fujian Province, which still maintains an ancient custom.Because it caused too much trouble and waste to the Lang family.Nowadays, the bride is no longer married, but sent to the groom’s house. When the bride enters the groom’s house, the groom stands at the door to greet her, and he himself opens the sedan chair on which the bride is riding, and welcomes her to the main room. In the main room, the bride and groom worship heaven and earth, that is, they both face the gate of the hall and kneel before the sky.Put a table in the hall, put two red candles on the table, and then the husband sprinkles wine on the ground - in front of it is the goose carried by the bride. This etiquette is the so-called "drinking goose". Between a man and a woman, there is an oath—he swears to be loyal to her, and she swears to be loyal to him, just like the two geese they saw before their eyes, unswerving.From then on, it can be said that they became the intimate husband and sweet wife of course.But this kind of combination has only passed the moral law and the gentleman's law-they give each other the word loyalty, and has not yet been recognized by the citizenship law.Therefore, this ceremony may be called a moral or religious marriage. (z-34)

The next ritual is the so-called worship between the bride and groom.The bride standing on the right side of the hall first kneels in front of the groom, who also kneels facing each other, and then they exchange positions. The groom stands where the bride stood, and kneels toward her—she also kneels back in the same way.Here, I want to point out that there is no doubt that this kind of worship is completely equal between men and women, and between husband and wife. As mentioned earlier, that ceremony of vows may be called a moral or religious marriage.To distinguish it from the ceremonies that followed three days later and could be called civil marriages.In a moral or religious marriage, a man and a woman are married before the moral law, before God.This is only limited to the men and women.In China, the family has almost replaced the state in all social and civic life—the state only exists as an open and external court—the family has no significant effect on marriage or the marriage of men and women in what I call moral or religious marriage. There is no legal jurisdiction.In fact, from the first day of the marriage to the "civil marriage" held on the third day, the bride is not only not introduced, but also not allowed to show up or be peeped by the groom's family members.