Is remarriage committing adultery?

What do you guys think?

Welcome aboard.
Interesting question but why limit it to the guys, can't the dolls answer as well?

I'm more of a rag doll at present, but here's my opinion for what its worth.

Its only my personal belief and I respect other's opinions on this.

Re marriage is like adultery only more open and honest.

I think re marriage is not adultery when you're widowed.

No. It's incredibly stupid--like he didn't learn anything--but no, it's not adultery.

I believe that remarriage is okay in certain situations, such as for widows. My personal belief on this topic is that it is not committing adultery if one of the spouses have remarried already than it's okay for the other one to get remarried, if you are a widow or if the first marriage is completely dissolved.

How about having more than one wife at the same time?

Please define adultery and even perhaps marriage.

Marriage is when you make a promise to be sexually faithful to your partner and your spouse does likewise.

Adultery is when you break the promise.

... and when one partner dies, does that promise still hold?

Depends on the terms of the promise, obviously, but, generally, no.

Marriage is a social institution, and people who marry are understood to be making the promises which their society regards as constituting marriage. Thus in a society which accommodates polygamous (or polyandrous) marriages, the marriage promise of fidelity doesn't necessariy mean exclusivity.

Likewise in a society which accommodates divorce, sexual relations with somebody else after your marriage has been dissolved is not considered adultery. We generally do expect, though, that people will end their marriages before commencing a new relationship, and there is some social condemnation of those who do things in the other order.

"What society understands by marriage" can be a bit flexible, of course, and we need to distinguish between "society" and "the state" and "all the citizens of a particular state". If I'm, say, a Christian in an Islamic state whose laws accommodate polygamy, but I marry within the Christian community in a Christian ceremony, my society - the Christian community - understands that marriage to be exclusive, not potentially polygamous, and that is the promise I will be understood to make (and, therefore, the promise whcih I do in fact make).

Depends on how seriously you take this.
"But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery" (Matthew 5:32).

Back then the earth was flat.

Yes we know the world isn't flat, and now we've admired its beauty from outer space, unfortunately though its still home to the same kind of murderous, exploititive, slave driving, deceiving, jealous, and adulterous individuals as it was in biblical times, so what's your point?

Samuel wrote:

How about having more than one wife at the same time?

Isn't one enough trouble?

I feel that all ideas should be questioned, especially old ones. Some we have already found to be false, some we are still debating their relevance. But I don't think that anything, no matter who said it or in which book it is recorded, should be safe from review.

The word adultery to me has a negative connotation of wrongness. It also means unfaithfulness of some kind, not only physical. If one marriage/commitment has ended (by divorce, death, separation ...), then it is not possible to act an adulterous manner.

Remarriage simply means to marry again.

However, I would question the idea that one can only be faithful to one person or thing. In some cultures a man can have more than one wife (as others have pointed out) and not be adulterous. One can be faithful to whatever vows one made at the time, one does love more than one person without being adulterous.

To be adulterous is to be unfaithful to one's commitments.
So in the same context as the question, no, remarriage is not being adulterous, as long as the previous marriage has concluded.

Do adults in adultery do what infants do in infancy?

On a more serious note adultery has meanings which vary with culture and religion; in some any union that takes place whilst the other partner is living is considered to be adulterous if the original marriage was legitimate.

In answer to the original question Samuel's comment is on the mark, the moral code of the idividual would answer the question.

• For someone with the moral code of the bible then ethical remarriage is only based on 2 situations. Other than that it would be adultery.
• For someone with a "newer age" moral code (i.e. infant=infancy, adult=adultery) then there may be many ways to ethically remarry. They may not even have the concept of adultery at all.

Since the Bible is a book of morals i'm not too certain you could refer to it as "depends how serious you want to be".
That is, if my understanding of ethics vrs morals is correct, of course.

Is remarriage adultery? No, I don't think so. Why?

Because I believe that adultery is synonymous for "cheating" and that "cheating" strictly implies sexual intercourse or activity.

--If you were to fall in love with someone else and out of love with your spouse, I believe that you are not cheating on your spouse, because how can you cheat on someone you are no longer committed to?
--If you were to fall in love with someone else and stay sexually active with your spouse you are then cheating on the other person with your spouse.
--If you were to fall in love with another person in addition to your spouse, then you are not cheating, because you still love your spouse.

On that note, I personally believe that we can and do fall in love with more than one person at a time, and that we have many soul-mates, not just one.

I also believe that marriage is a social institution that often goes hand in hand with religious observances. As such, I firmly believe in America's separation of church and state, and believe that legal marriage should be inclusive of all religious and social aspects. Monogamy, Polygamy, Same-Sex Marriage, and the like should all be included under the protection and freedom of legal marriage, even if there are certain religious qualms about these issues. I have a simple enough answer:

If you don't believe, religiously, that marriage is a holy union, don't get married in a church, don't be married by a minister or priest.
If you don't believe, religiously, that marriage is one man with many wives, don't take many wives.
If you don't believe, religiously, that marriage is two men, or two women, then don't take another man as you husband, men, or another woman as your wife, women.

However, because America is not a theocracy, I find that I am particularly vehement in my opposition to the adopted legal standing of marriage as "one man and one woman."

This is right on the mark: you can define 'adultery' however you want, but the question, Is adultery wrong? is a different question to whether you are technically committing adultery or not.

I think that you either intend to be faithful to your specific partner or not, and your partner appreciates your faithfulness or not, and that this isn't necessarily true at all times (you might feel the desire to be faithful at one point, but not twenty years later). Should you be made to be faithful to someone to whom you have no desire to be faithful?

I believe that remarriage
is okay in certain situations, such as for widows. My personal belief on this topic is that it is not committing adultery if one of the spouses have remarried already than it's okay for the other one to get remarried, if you are a widow or if the first marriage is completely dissolved.I also believe that marriage is a social institution that often goes hand in hand with religious observances. As such, I firmly believe in America's separation of church and state, and believe that legal marriage should be inclusive of all religious and social aspects. Monogamy, Polygamy, Same-Sex Marriage, and the like should all be included under the protection and freedom of legal marriage, even if there are certain religious qualms about these issues. I have a simple enough answer: