In the case of the myth before us, we need hardly look to any particular statement on the matter. It is enough to say that marriage as we know it today has so short of a history that the notion of "traditional marriage" itself is rather an oxymoron. That some ascribe civil marriage a history dating back to Adam and his "wife" Eve, is absurdly laughable.
The modern blend of civil recognition coupled with ecclesiastical solemnization dates back to 1753 when Hardwicke's Marriage act was passed. Before then--under the English Common Law, from which we obviously derive much of our legal tradition--marriage was either solemnized or not--and often not for the peasantry. Such became a civil matter only when it became the subject of a legal dispute, which called for evidence establishing a history of "habit and repute" such as witnesses testimony. This recognition by a civil magistrate being the basis for marital law then is our tradition as an Anglophone nation, one should think.
The tradition of "marriage" ascribed to Christianity hardly seems relevant to a discussion of civil law (the separation between the ecclesiastical and civil laws being older than the United States--and affirmed in no uncertain terms by our Constitution), but it is an interesting study nonetheless. The lore and legends of the Hebrews, which form the Old Testament of the Christian Bible, contain none of the precise terms that we use today to describe a husband, wife, or marriage (as noun or verb). In four instances the Old Testament uses the word "ba'al" (Anglicization of letters approximate) to refer to a husband. Two of these are in reference to women taken as plunder of war, as that word means "master". In the many other instances of "husband" the word translated ("iysh") means literally "man," as it does when the same word is used to refer to men or mankind generally. The same is true of "wife" ("Nashiym") meaning precisely "a woman" or plural "women" except in instances referring to Babylonian "queens" ("Shegal")--that word deriving from a root meaning to "violate" or "ravage."
The only verbs referring to the act of getting "married are "chathan" (the father's action) meaning "give away" and "laqach" (the suitor's action) meaning "to take posession". And the Hebrew words that refer to the noun of "marriage" are "ownah" ("to dwell together) and "yashab" ("to dwell" or "abide"), an ironic similarity to the primitive state of civil marriage under the old common law. It would seem then that the "institution of marriage" as we know it, is a product of modernity, rather than ancient tradition of Occident or Orient.
The evolution that marriage has undergone--the franchising of cohabitation within the realm of the state, which now issues licenses, and arbitrates between spouses, and even on behalf of children--can be attributed largely to an economic movement; capitalism. That the laws of marriage had to adapt to include the sound protection of propertied interest among families, as part of a broader system of contract law, was inevitable given the broader distribution of property that free market economies brought. Similarly, it was inevitable that those who take part in the marketplace, but remain disenfranchised from its full benefits, would insist upon equal protection of their property and rights. It would seem that the institution of capitalist marriage could only be aided by this broadening of the franchise, and further, that resistance to it is the prattle of the Luddite.
