What God Has Joined Together: Historiesof Religion and Marriage

Abstract

There has been a great deal of interest recently, both in academia and across the broader public, in the history of marriage. The legal recognition of the marriages of LGBTI people across many nations sparked a flurry of histories of marriage equality movements. In the United States, the Supreme Court itself in 2015 turned to historians on the question of marriage for its Obergefell vs Hodges decision. The American Historical Association's amicus brief, which informed the decision, stated that, although religion influenced understandings of marriage, it was primarily a civil institution.3 Yet, of course, religion has been there.