MARRIAGE
It is an understatement to say that marriage is of
utmost importance in African religion. In effect,
marriage is widely acknowledged throughout the
African continent as one of the most critical
moments in a person’s life, along with birth,
puberty, and death. Marriage is a sacred rite of
passage. This is the case because marriage is inti-
mately linked with procreation. In fact, the main,
if not only, purpose of marriage is procreation. In
most African societies, marriage is not deemed
complete until a child has been born. Likewise, a
man is not a full man or a woman a full woman
until they have given birth to a child. Marriage is
an important institution in Africa because the
survival and thriving of the whole community
depends on it. It is sacred, cosmic drama in which
all normal members of the community are
expected to participate. This entry looks at the
link between marriage and procreation, examines
the role of the family, and follows the course of
the institution from preparation and negotiation
through ceremonies and separation.
Link to ChildbearingThus, to thoroughly grasp the significance of mar-
riage in African religion and life, one must fully
understand the meaning of childbearing for
African people. Many scholars have noted that the
preservation and transmission of life may well be
the highest African cultural value. Within the con-
text of the African worldview, the birth of many
children is consequently seen as an imperative and
a blessing because those children will ensure the
continuation and strengthening of the family lin-
eage and the community at large. Also, the
children will be responsible for ensuring that their
parents receive proper burial rites and for per-
forming commemorative rituals that, in turn, will
maintain the deceased in a state of immortality
through their continued connection with the
world of the living.
Marriage creates the context within which
children are conceived and born, hence its critical
significance. Getting married and having children is
a social, moral, and, ultimately, spiritual obligation
and privilege. Likewise, one’s refusal or failure to
get married and have children is largely incompre-
hensible, and certainly quite reprehensible, as far as
African religion is concerned. It signifies that one is
rejecting God, whose original creative and continu-
ous power manifests itself, among other things,
through the uninterrupted birth of human beings; it
is as well a rejection of humanity because the latter
depends on human fertility for its perpetuation.The Family’s Role
Marriage, from the standpoint of African religion,
is never simply an affair between a man and a
woman, but an event that involves at least two
families. African families are normally quite large
because they include several subunits. In a matri-
lineal context, for example, a family will include
at the minimum a woman, her husband, their
daughters, their daughters’ husbands, and their
children. In addition, there may be other relatives
sent to live with them, servants and their children,
who become an intricate part of the household.
Furthermore, families also include not only the
living, but also the ancestors of the lineage, as well
as the children yet to be born. Some scholars have
rightly pointed out that marriage provides a
unique and dramatic opportunity for all the
members of a particular community to meet: the
deceased, the living, and the unborn. All have a
stake in marriage. In the case of an exogamous
marriage system, that is, when the wife must come
from another lineage or clan, marriage involves
not only two families, but also two clans as well.
Also, in patrilineal societies, men may marry
more than one woman, provided that they have
the financial means to support them and their
children, and marriage then becomes a multiple
marriage, involving an even larger number of indi-
viduals, families, and clans.Preparation and Negotiation
Marriage being a most serious affair, young men
and women are thoroughly prepared for married
life. Indeed, in most African societies, one can get
married only after having been initiated. When
no initiation rites are followed, young people
nonetheless receive instruction regarding marriage,Marriage 409