WHY BRIDE PRICE?
By OLUMOFIN Kehinde Benjamin
WHY BRIDE PRICE?
Genesis 34:12(KJV) says: Ask me never so much dowry and gift, and I will give according as ye shall say unto me: but give me the damsel to wife.
1 Samuel 18:25(KJV) says: And Saul said, Thus shall ye say to David, The king desireth not any dowry, but an hundred foreskins of the Philistines, to be avenged of the king’s enemies. But Saul thought to make David fall by the hand of the Philistines.
First and foremost, dowry (also broadly known as Bride Price) is scriptural, and the above scriptures among many other are examples where they are negotiated and paid.
Bride Price is the “purchasing price” paid to the bride father or family in exchange for their daughter in marriage. Though symbolic, yet very important. It is not her head price, since she’s priceless but rather, a token of love paid in exchange for her so she won’t be taken free without a price by her new head (husband) in exchange for her parents (father in particular) authority as head over her prior to her wedding day.
Scriptural marriage takes place at the point where the bride price is paid..
After Bride Price has been paid, with or without Church wedding, or Registry, you are married in the eye of God. Church wedding is an outside witness to what has been done secretly between two families. (Bride price is STRICTLY a family affair, the church has no right over it. Registry too on the other hand, is to satisfied the law of the land as a witness to the fact that the families have agreed and the bride price has been paid and received.
Prior to this, they were unmarried….and once the bride price is paid, the two are NOW married. This is the reason, no church will join two people in holy wedlock unless the bride price has been paid….and same for registry….if the registrar follow the intent of the law as it should be.
Ephesians 5:25(KJV) says: Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;
5:28(KJV) says: So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.
5:31(KJV) says: For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.
5:32 (KJV) says: This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
In these scriptures, the great Apostle made a similarity between Jesus and His wife (the church) and the marriage between a husband and his wife.
Christ paid a Price for His wife, according to the term God (The Father) demanded of Him to satisfied the conditions of His marriage to the Church….(1 Cor. 6:20; 7:23) and it is also expected, if our marriages must indeed be a type of marriage between Jesus and the Church, for the man to pay a token for his wife as well, according to the term specified by his bride father, or family.
Bride price is STRICTLY men thing…it should be paid by a man or his representative who should be a man, or men and must be collected by a man, preferably the bride father or his representative, who should be a man or men as well. This is very significant.
When this exchange of paying and receiving bride price has not taken place, marriage has not taken place, even if all other things or details has been observed.
WHY DOWRY SHOULD NOT BE RETURNED.
A returned dowry has negate the purpose of the exchange in the first place.
IT SHOULD NEVER BE RETURNED AND IF RETURNED, AS A MAN, PLEASE DON’T COLLECT BACK.
That was the mistake many married couples made and many have not even realized that they are in error and only cohabitating with the woman that is bearing children for them.
If payment of bride price means marriage has taken place, then it means non-payment or where it is returned, whatever has taken place has been unintentionally reversed.
Bride price is not HEAD PRICE, it is a token paid in exchange for her father’s authority (headship) over her that’s now shifted to her husband (as her new head). Just as God gave the headship over the Church to Christ, when He paid her price on Calvary.
If the bride price is returned, the spiritual effect is like the father or bride family is saying, “we gave you our daughter, but we have denied you your spiritual right over her as her new head and lord.
And where this is the case, the bride is still spiritually answerable to her dad as her head and not to her husband.
You now see why it is very difficult for many women to obey and submit to their husbands, no matter how hard they tried, simply because the spiritual authority over them still lies with their fathers and not with their husbands….and the authority a man did not have, he can’t exert it, neither can a woman submit or obey him as her head, even if she loves to, she just can’t give you what you haven’t had.
A man who has no spiritual authority of headship willingly submitted to him by the wife’s father, as symbolized by paying and receiving a price in exchange for that authority is merely cohabitating with her.
Before God, they are not married. He has no right over her because the day he paid for that right, he was technically rejected (which returning of bride price means, even when done in the best of intention and in the name of not selling their daughter).
Bride price, once again is not a head price…it is a purchasing price, buying the right and spiritual authority of a father over her daughter.
You can read Numbers 30:1-7 for more understanding on the significant of this right and authority of a father over his daughter or husband over the wife. The ONLY time this power changes hand between the two men (father and husband) is at the point of paying and receiving the bride price. Where this is not or where it is returned, even if on the same spot and on the day it was paid, or days or years later….it is the same effect….the marriage has been INVALIDATED.
IMPORTANCE OF BRIDE PRICE
- By it, the husband bought the bride’s father authority in exchange for his own.
- No bride price, no marriage.
- If returned, the union becomes INVALID.
As a counselor, I have made it a duty to ask intending couples to discuss bride price matter with their families before the wedding date.
And I specifically tell the ladies to ask their parents NEVER to return their bride price…the father can give his daughter; the bride, as a gift from him but not to the groom or to his family (parents).
Questions:
- 0803…5900: Wow wow wow🤔but sir , why is that in church these days, they still claim that one is not officially married if not court or church wedding, even after the bride price has been paid?
My Response: It’s church policy…..you can obey them if you are a member but that doesn’t make it scriptural. No church wedding in the Bible….
Mind you I did church wedding, so that does not mean church wedding is bad but it is NOT COMPULSORY.
The MUST in a wedding is the BRIDE PRICE. It is what makes the union binding before God and man.
- 0805…1913: An hypothetical situation sir, as the groom’s Father, I already made it clear to the bride’s Father days before the ceremony that i will return it.
My Response: A well taught groom who desires full spiritual authority, especially in the place of prayers over his wife and family SHOULD NOT go ahead with such an arrangement. It’s an attempt to rob him of his spiritual right even before the marriage takes place.
So I advice he should wait and keep praying until the bride family have a change of heart and aligned with the Scripture.
A marriage in which a man has no spiritual authority over his wife is NO MARRIAGE at all.
If I may add this…bride price should not necessarily be money….it can be in kind, but the tag on it should read BRIDE PRICE.
I heard of a family, who only asked the groom before all the witnesses to shout some certain number of HALLELUJAH as his Bride Price…
And if under any circumstance he doesn’t want their daughter again, he will have to bring all the witnesses, except none and they in return will do the same number of HALLELUJAH to dissolve the marriage.
What a smart family😀😀