Sex, marriage, and family in John Calvin's Geneva

V. 1. Courtship, engagement, and marriage

Introduction

1. Making and breaking intimate bonds

An overview of the reformation of engagement, annulment, and marriage in Geneva

The tradition

The Reformation

2. The new alliance of church and sate

The Reformation work of the Genevan Council and Consistory

Council and consistory

Patterns of consistory cases

3. Looking for love in all the right places

Calvin on courtship and matchmaking

Theological reflections on courtship

Calvin's own courtship

Calvin the matchmaker

4. Love thyself as thy neighbor

Individual consent to engagement and marriage

Mutual consent and the impediment of compulsion

Frivolous, drunken, and mistaken promises

Conditional promises

5. Honor thy father (and thy mother)

Parental consent to engagement and marriage

The 1546 marriage ordinance and its interpretation

Theological and prudential reflections

Consistory cases

6. Capacity to contract marriage

The impediments of infancy and mental inability

The impediment of infancy or impuberty

The impediment of mental inability.

7. The two shall become one flesh

The impediment of polygamy or precontract

Theological writings on polygamy

Consistory cases or precontract

8. Fitness for marriage

The impediments of lack of virginity, contagion, sexual incapacity, and disparity in age

Lack or betrayal of presumed virginity

Contagion or incurable disease

Sexual dysfunction

Disparities of age

9. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of a relative

The incest impediments

Theological teachings

Consistory cases on incest

10. Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers

The theology and law of interreligious marriage

Theological teachings

Consistory cases

11. For richer or poorer

The economics of engagement and marriage

The tradition

The reformation

12. "The perilous interval"

Premarital delay, sex, and desertion

Delayed weddings, premarital sex, and cohabitation

Premarital desertion

13. I now take thee

Of banns and weddings

Wedding laws, liturgies, and feasts

Consistory cases

14. Concluding reflections

The emerging covenantal model of engagement and marriage.