Women and Marriage

July 1992

Q: What is the meaning of the vow in Carya  Carya that states   that  women will take care of  the mundane needs  of their husbands?

     "In the wedding ceremony the husband vows to protect his wife and to look to her well being, physically, mentally, and spiritually. Now wife makes a similar commitment but it is said in a somewhat different way.  The linguistic patterning of the original language gets translated into the second language with some distortion and with some characteristic of the form of expression prevalent in the original dialect. Therefore this discrepancy has arisen.

    In careful translation it can be seen that the implied meaning of both the vows of the husband and of the wife are somewhat different in that the husbands vow requires a certain guidance or care for his wife's development. The wife also has this responsibility but without the protective implication. Yet she must look to his betterment. However this does not mean she is his servant. She should see he does not suffer on mundane plane but she need not of necessity act as his servant, to do all tasks for him.  She need only see that he does not suffer in this realm if it is in her power to prevent as he must likewise see that she does not suffer.  It does not mean she must do all tasks for him or spend her time in household duties. This will vary from family to family as to how arrangement for mundane needs of both husband and wife are secured.  So this vow should not be taken to imply that wife must physically serve all of husbands mundane needs, but that she should see he does not suffer if it is in her power to prevent.  He should do likewise.