Sudanese Culture Hard on Women

Marriage, Culture and the Biblical Way

Our position on the treatment of women, marriage and family life must first and foremost be based on the teachings of Scripture. The Bible makes it clear that God views men and women as equals. Paul made this perfectly clear by his statement, “For you are all [men and women] sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:26-29 NKJV). Although we value culture; when cultural practices demean women we must graciously but firmly stand for the abandonment of those cultural practices. We also must give people a replacement for the thing we are asking them to turn from.

Husband and Wife---The Most Important Relationship

We believe that the husband/wife relationship is the primary family unit and that it must be put before parent/child and other extended family connections. Moses dealt with this in Genesis 2:24 when he said, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” Once a young man and woman are married their marriage must have priority over the husband’s relationship with his parents and the wife’s relationship with her parents. In cultures where extended families live in close proximity the relationship of the newly married should be respected as primary. Even though they may live in the same compound with parents and older brothers and sisters, they must leave their family in the sense that they put their relationship with their spouse above any other family relationship. Marriage is extremely important---It is the earliest social structure that God gave to humanity. The relationship of husband and wife takes precedence over that of parent and child. Once a woman or man marries the parents or brothers have no right to interfere in that new family unless at her request they are helping her to escape from an abusive situation. They definitely have no right to take the wife away because of lack of payment of dowry---instead they should forgive the dowry or reduce it to something that is manageable by the son-in-law.

When a man marries he should leave his parents home and create his own family so parents can’t interfere with his marriage. Parents should not have an expectation of their sons to marry a woman to be a servant to the parent’s family.

Polygamy Demeans Women

Wherever there is polygamy women are looked upon as property. Polygamy didn’t get started until six generations after the fall which is an indication that it is an evil that took some time to arise in society. “Then Lamech took for himself two wives: the name of one was Adah, and the name of the second was Zillah” (Gen 4:19). The foundation for polygamy is the belief in the superiority of men over women, the greed that believes that men have the right to fulfillment and pleasure that women do not; no matter the negative impact on the family. “For the wicked boasts of his heart's desire; He blesses the greedy and renounces the LORD” (Ps 10:3). The family can never be what it was meant to be in a polygamous system. “He who is greedy for gain troubles his own house” (Prov 15:27). Look at the huge problems in the polygamous household of King David.

Wherever men take multiple wives women are looked at as the property of the husband and as sexual objects for his pleasure with little regard to theirs. Christian women should refuse to be in a polygamous marriage. This generation of women must resist being treated as property.

Marriage of One Man to One Woman is Biblical

Paul wrote (1 Cor 7:2-3), “Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.” This scripture makes two clear points. God’s intention is for a man to have only one wife “His own wife” not his own “wives” which Paul would have said if he were condoning polygamy. This verse gives the exact same restrictions for women, God’s marriage requirements are the same for men and women---one spouse. Again in Ephesians 5:23 Paul exhorts husbands to “love his own wife”, singular. Even though the Old Testament allowed polygamy because of the hardness of men’s hearts, the prophets knew that it was wrong and that men were to be committed to the wife of their youth, not wives. The Prophet Malachi was telling them why God doesn’t regard their offering (Mal 2:14) “Yet you say, "For what reason?" Because the LORD has been witness Between you and the wife of your youth, With whom you have dealt treacherously; Yet she is your companion And your wife by covenant.” God’s plan has always been for one man to be married to one woman just as with Adam and Eve.

Jesus said that in marriage, two become one. “'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh' 6 So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate" (Matt 19:5-6). Polygamy separates the one flesh of a man and a woman. Every where in the New Testament where Jesus or one of the Apostles is teaching on marriage they always refer to a one man one woman relationship.

This brings up the question of what do you do when a polygamous man gets saved and comes into the church. In this situation there is no place in the New Testament that requires a man to put away any of his wives. Paul taught concerning the social issues of his time; being married to an unbeliever, being a slave, or about being circumcised or uncircumcised; “Brethren, let each one remain with God in that state in which he was called” (1 Cor 7:24). In other words did you become a Christian when one of these issues existed in your life? Don’t feel like you have to change those things. As a matter of fact biblical teaching on divorce and caring for ones family would demonstrate that the polygamous man who becomes a Christian has a serious responsibility to the family that he comes to the Lord with.

Paul also makes it unmistakably clear that a polygamist can not hold a leadership position in the church. “A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife” (1 Tim 3:2). “...appoint elders in every city as I commanded you---if a man is blameless, the husband of one wife” (Titus 1:5-6), “Let deacons be the husbands of one wife” (1 Tim 3:12). This is a strong statement that it was time for this woman demeaning practice of polygamy to stop and that the church was to send no mixed signals by having leaders who gave the wrong example.

Cohabitation Without Marriage is Unacceptable

There is a problem in Southern Sudan---no one is having weddings. This appears to be because of two reasons:

The first reason is that the bride’s parents are demanding such high dowries that most young people can’t get married because it is impossible for the young man to raise a large dowry and parents are so greedy that they will happily “sell” their daughter to an older man who can pay a high dowry. This shows that they have little regard for or love of their daughters. It is time for church leaders, community elders and godly parents to stand up and put a stop to these practices. If these groups are not willing to bring about changes in the dowry system then the government needs to step into the situation and pass laws to protect young women. In order to avoid the problem of large dowries young people are just beginning to cohabit instead of having Godly Christian marriages. The Scripture is clear that fornication is not the way Christian couples should begin a relationship. “Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness” (Gal 5:19). ”But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints” (Eph 5:2-3)

The problem of young people living together and having indiscriminate sexual relationships will not end until we deal with the more longstanding issue of how marriages take place. As long as we put the young people in this impossible situation the weaker ones will tend to fall into the snare of the enemy. However this snare is one that has been built by the culture and the practices of the parents and the weakness of the church. Our own practices have brought these conditions about and only after we make dramatic changes will our young people be free.

The second reason is that the church has been too weak to standup against ungodly cultural practices.[1] This happens because culture is exalted above God’s Word. When the old ways go against Christian principles then the churches need to stand up against those old ways. We need pastors who have the courage to stand up and demand that parents allow young people who profess love for one another the freedom to marry each other. Pastors who have turned a blind eye to this problem need to immediately make a fresh commitment to stand up for the truth by, 1. Teaching on the subject. 2. Getting involved enough with their young adults to know who wants to marry who and helping them approach their families. To begin to publicly demand an end of secret cohabitation and require public marriages in the church.

Dowries Contribute to Abuse of Females

The problem with dowry based marriage: Girls as young as 10 years old are forced into marriage. The Center for Disease Control reports, “Child marriage is a human rights violation that prevents girls from obtaining an education, enjoying optimal health, bonding with others their own age, maturing, and ultimately choosing their own life partners. Child marriage is driven by poverty and has many effects on girls' health: increased risk for sexually transmitted diseases, cervical cancer, malaria, death during childbirth, and obstetric fistulas. Girls' offspring are at increased risk for premature birth and death as neonates, infants, or children.”[2]

Men who pay a substantial dowry for a bride tend to see them as property. When a man sees his bride as property, he is more likely to perpetrate domestic violence. When the bride’s parents have an expectation of a large dowry, they also see the bride as their property and are emboldened to interfere in the marriage when the groom fails to make good on the demanded dowry. This is why families are known to steal wives away. They are also likely to turn a blind eye to abuse when their son-in-law has paid a large dowry that could be demanded back if the bride stands up for her human rights. When the man’s family helps pay a large dowry they also see the bride as their property. Young wives can often be more accurately described as family slaves than cherished and loved brides. Common chores that young brides are expected to perform for her husband’s family: cooking, cleaning, gathering firewood, washing, fetching water from the distant borehole, gardening and babysitting the family’s young children. Young people are forced to marry out of duty to family, financial considerations and family greed instead of love, attraction and calling.

When Christian people condone or participate in practices such as extravagant bride dowries they fit the description that Jesus gave of the Pharisees. “But the Lord said to him, "Now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean, but your inward part is full of greed and wickedness”” (Luke 11:38-39). Christian parents should only expect a token dowry for their daughters. Any thing more is making your daughter property and is greed. The dowry system needs to be limited to a token thing that honors the culture but does not keep people who want to marry each from doing so because of the greed of the bride’s parents.

Young people with the advice of godly parents and church leaders should be allowed to choose their own husband or wife based on love, attraction, calling and compatibility. “This is what the LORD commands concerning the daughters of Zelophehad, saying, 'Let them marry whom they think best, but they may marry only within the family of their father's tribe.'” (Num 36:6). Even though young people should be allowed to choose their own marriage partner, the person they choose must be a born again believer. “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness?” (2 Cor 6:14). The primary reason that parents control who their daughters marry is because of the dowry system. Young people who have the opportunity to marry whom they wish should listen carefully to the advice of Godly parents.

It is not our desire to eliminate the cultural practice of bride dowries it is our contention however that dowries should be turned in to a token or symbolic practice that celebrates the old ways but does not put a burden on young men and women who want to marry one another. The current practice of materialistic greed based dowries make the bride property, not a human being with equal rights and therefore must be ended.

We also understand that the extended family is very important in most African cultures. This is something that the western world has lost and that we can learn about from our African friends. The extended family must be operated according to Bible principles including the priority of the marriage relationship between a man and a woman.

Sudanese Culture Has Long Held Girls Back

The problem of the maltreatment of girls is highlighted in the “lost boys” situation. BBC East Africa correspondent Isabel Matheson in a June 7 2002 article talks about the “Lost Girls of Sudan” and said the reason the girls were treated so differently from the boys, who were given the great opportunity of going abroad for education is; “They [the girls] can be sold off for a good bride-price. When international attention focused on the lost boys, the Sudanese community kept the girls away from the limelight. Sudanese leader, Gideon Kenyi, says, "The issue of dowries had become a priority to the people who are owning the girls. They see the girls as a way of generating wealth, by marrying them or by giving them to someone rich." This dramatically demonstrates the disparity between young men and women in Sudan.

Hillary Mayell writing for National Geographic News February 12, 2002 stated, “There is nothing in the Koran, the book of basic Islamic teachings, that permits or sanctions honor killings. However, the view of women as property with no rights of their own is deeply rooted in Islamic culture, Tahira Shahid Khan, a professor specializing in women's issues at the Aga Khan University in Pakistan, wrote in Chained to Custom, a review of honor killings published in 1999. "Women are considered the property of the males in their family irrespective of their class, ethnic, or religious group. The owner of the property has the right to decide its fate. The concept of ownership has turned women into a commodity which can be exchanged, bought and sold.""

The fact that so many fewer girls have attended school in Sudan than boys is another indicator that women are held back. The good news is this is beginning to change but this situation is like a farmer finding a small rock sticking up in the middle of his garden, right where he wants to plow. As he begins to dig at it he realizes that it is actually a huge bolder with one tiny corner sticking up. If he is a lazy farmer he just might decide that it is too much work to dig up the rock and becomes content to plow around it. The industrious farmer, however, keeps digging and prodding and pushing, he calls his neighbor for help and they finally get the bolder out. To their surprise the bolder had capped off a spring that has enough water to water the gardens of all the farms around. This describes what is happening now in Southern Sudan. Will we free the women and drink from their spring or will we keep plowing around the issue and leave another generation of girls to suffer.

Other Contributors To Female Abuse

Cultural traditions in Southern Sudan have long held women in subjugation to men. These traditions are keeping the people of Southern Sudan trapped in a culture that not only demeans women but keeps the family from being the societal backbone that it was meant to be. In many communities it is widely acceptable for women to be beaten and abused by their husbands, without the man feeling personal shame or the ire of the community. This is because women are not considered worthy of the rights that assure human dignity. The Bible teaches something quite different. “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion…” (Gen 1:27-28 NKJV). “Husbands, likewise, dwell with them [your wife] with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered" (1 Peter 3:7 NKJV). The problem becomes an unending cycle, the son grows up seeing his father treat his mother like property and when he grows up and takes a wife he treats her the way his father modeled a husband deals with a wife. In turn his son is learning from him how to treat a woman.

When women are looked on as property rather than the joint heirs with their husbands that God declares them to be the following abuses are bound to happen: The practice of Female circumcision which mutilates female genitalia to keep the wife from sexual pleasure and it is thought to keep her from straying from her husband’s bed. The practice of a man’s brothers or near relative inheriting their wife upon their premature death---although originally this practice may have been a means of social security for the women and her children but in reality especially in modern times this makes the woman property with no right to exercise her own will. Using daughters as a means of wealth building through premature marriage for large dowries holds girls back from development. The practice of communities, government, family or churches that accept and or tolerate domestic violence in the form of sexual, physical, and mental abuse as well as treating the bride as a slave must come to an end. Church and governmental institutions must not enable gender discrimination within the judicial, social and religious systems.

Pastors It’s Time To Make A Stand

The pastors must also make a stand against the ungodly extravagant weddings like those that have risen up in neighboring Uganda. This kind of greed and pride on the part of the bride will also create bondage. Psalm 119:36 says, “Incline my heart to Your testimonies, And not to covetousness.” In these weddings people go in debt, beg and borrow just so they can have a more elaborate and ostentatious wedding than their friends. They pay more for the rental of their wedding day limousine than for the monthly rental of their house. The motivation for these extravagant weddings is greed, pride jealousy and the competitive desire to out do friends and enemies. People have forgotten that weddings/marriage is a spiritual event binding men and women together in a lifetime bond of love and partnership. Weddings should focus on worship, gospel preaching and the spiritual union not on how many dresses the bride can wear on her wedding day, or how elaborate a reception they have. This has also arisen because of the weakness of pastors who are afraid to stand up for what is right. If these practices cross the border into Southern Sudan it will again create the condition of couples living together without marriage---this time it will be because they can’t afford the wedding.

Pastors need to immediately begin teaching and making public stands on the following:

1. Dowries should be tokens that young people can afford.
2. Parents need to set aside and repent from greed that demands a large dowry.
3. Cohabitation living together and having sex together before a public church wedding has taken place is unacceptable.
4. Parents should be forbidden to “sell” their daughters to older men with large dowries just to satisfy their own greed for material things.
5. Women and girls should not be forced to marry but should be allowed to marry whom they want as long as it is to a believer.
6. No believer should marry an unbeliever.
7. It is important that the concepts of “leaving and cleaving” and that wives are not to be obtained to be servants for the husband’s family are followed. 8. Women are not property to be bought but equals who should be treated as partners in marriage who are to be loved cherished and honored by the husband.
9. Parents should not interfere in the marriages of their children but should respect, encourage, and love their child’s spouse as if they were their own child.
10. Pastors must teach on courtship, marriage, children, and various other family issues.
11. Pastors must have the courage to make strong stands on these issues but they must start by teaching and preaching on these subjects and living a good example.

The Bible Calls Men to Honor Their Wife

Once a man and woman are married the man should not think that he owns his wife, he should realize that he is called to love her, cherish her, honor her, protect her, make her sexually happy and provide for her material needs. Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself” (Eph 5:33a). Men need to understand that God has given women the same need for and right to emotional and sexual fulfillment as the husband. “Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband” (1 Cor. 7:3). It is crucial for men to understand that if they do not treat their wives right by respecting them and trying to make them happy that they will reap the result of a tumultuous home and the withholding of Gods blessings. “Blessed is every one who fears the LORD, Who walks in His ways. 2 When you eat the labor of your hands, You shall be happy, and it shall be well with you. 3 Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine In the very heart of your house, Your children like olive plants All around your table” (Ps 128:1-3). “Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered” (1 Peter 3:7). This says love your wife the way you love yourself---would you want your wife to have 2, or 3, or 4 men with whom she has sex? It is impossible to love your wife as yourself and have multiple wives and to treat her as a slave and let her do all the hard work. Married women have the same right as men for emotional and sexual satisfaction from their mate. Men, blessing in your home depends on your walk with God. Your prayers will be hindered if you treat your wife poorly.

No wonder so many men struggle with spiritual dullness and a lack of energy for the things of God. Many times it starts right in the home because the home is a primary place that determines if God can pour out the spiritual blessing He desires to give each Christian man. Men we are the ones who must stand up for women and girls, protecting them and making a way, removing the barriers that society has put on them and giving them the opportunity to be the women God has called them to be.

© 2006 Gary L. Short

[1] The same problem exists in arenas like, making sacrifices to demons yet being a church member. Praying to the god of the land and yet being a member of the church. Pastors are afraid of the community elders and because of this the people are living mixed lives that nullify their Christianity.[2] CDC---Health Consequences of Child Marriage in Africa Volume 12, Number 11–November 2006