Sister-in-law

“ Which dear became wife, and which sister-in-law.
II. But now, I will own, I feel rather inclined
To suspect I've some reason to alter my mind;
And the doubt in my breast daily grows a more strong one,
That they're not QUITE alike, and I've taken the wrong one.
Jane is always so gentle, obliging, and cool;
Never calls me a monster—not even a fool;
All our little contentions, 'tis she makes them up,
And she knows how much sugar to put in my cup:—
Yes, I sometimes HAVE wished—Heav'n forgive me the flaw!—
That my very dear wife was my sister-in-law. ”

“ If your aunt-in-law is your aunt, your sister-in-law must be your sister.
No man may ally himself with any "that is near of kin to him."
A sister is a near kinswoman v. 12, 13.
Near kinswomen of the wife are expressly prohibited v. 17.
The reason against marrying a wife's daughter or granddaughter is, that they are her "near kinswomen." So is her sister. Marriage with a brother's wife or an uncle's wife is pronounced "an unclean thing."
How then can marriage with a sister's husband be clean? How can you prove any difference between the relationships? ”

“ A kind sister-in-law perhaps will come and live with us, and we can give her such accommodation as she wants. He has not room in his house for any female but a wife: none but an aunt can be expected to take charge of the children without pay, and the law says peremptorily and arbitrarily that the aunt must not be the wife. ”

“ The truth seems to be that there are cases in which the presence of a young and attractive sister-in-law in a widower's house would, under any system of law, produce scandal. There are others where, in all countries, a sister-in-law's care and presence would seem natural. ”

“ As to the difference sought to be made between a brother-in-law and sister-in-law, there is none in reason that I can convince—none at least to call for a difference and there is no law, written or unwritten, for it. I say "no law," for the prohibition wherever observed, is one of purely ecclesiastical rule. ”

“ Were the public mind deeply impressed with the truth we have labored to establish, it would tend much to preserve the purity of domestic life; render the intercourse of a wife's sister in her family, at all times and in all circumstances, easy and pleasant, free from suspicion and embarrassment; and preserve her and her brother-in-law from the temptations to which human nature, in its present fallen condition, is too liable. It would make a sister's house like that of an own brother. ”

“ It is an assumed thing, almost universally, that it is a positive good for the Sister-in-law to have the charge of the children, to be domesticated with them, to be all to them that any mother's substitute can be. Now, in our rank of life, I believe that good is more likely to be obtained by having the law as it is. Many a woman of marriageable age would feel more free to go and live with the widower, if the thought of a future union was an excluded thing from both minds. ”

“ They can enter fully into the subject — they know what DECENCY requires, and under its influence, will yield to all that has been suggested against commiting incest with a sister in law.
Marriage is justly styled "a delicate institution," essentially connected with order and decency. Sweet spring of purest comforts, exuberant source of domestic happiness, it pours its precious blessings wherever it is honoured, and amply pays for protection and defence. But, exposed to insults and susceptible of injuries, it withholds its invaluable benefits from those who suffer it to be abused and polluted. ”

“ This is a comedy, and I must not preach lessons of life here: but I am obliged to remark that the husband must be proof, the sister-in-law perfect, where arrangements exist that keep them under one roof. She may be so like his wife! ”

“ We have before observed, that nothing can abolish a pre-existing fact—and therefore such cohabitation would still be incest. Though "freed from the law of her husband," as Mr. Punshon emphasises it; it does not follow that a widow is free from all law as to his kindred, as he argues, or we might have such mixtures as would rival the incests of ancient Persia. Because, forsooth, I may not marry my sister-in-law, must I cry out with the logic of a petulant will. You insist that she who was once my wife is still my wife in the spirit world! ”

“ Is it possible, and would it be safe, that a husband should treat a wife's sisters as his own if he were allowed to marry them? And would not children suffer as well as husbands and wives? What is the real meaning of the argument that wives' sisters would prove the best stepmothers the children could have? It means that the wife's sister is the children's aunt, and is likely to bear them a closer affection than a stranger. Nothing can be more true under a law which does not invite her to become their stepmother. ”

“ When the fact is once known, that it is impossible to contract a marriage with a certain person, say a wife's sister, why should there be any more difficulty in a man's shaping his inclinations, affections, wishes and thoughts in such a line, as to shut out from his contemplation all idea of marriage with that person, anymore than with his own sister by blood? ”

“ He proposes that, regarding Marriage as a civil contract, Marriage contracted by a man with his deceased Wife's Sister, before the Registrar, shall be legal. [2]
As a citizen, I give him my support, and wish him success.
People in general, do not consider such Marriages improper. They cannot be proved to be improper by Scripture. The question is, therefore one of expediency, and my experience as a Parochial minister induces me to think the measure expedient.
In the upper classes of Society, a Sister in Law may live with a widower and no scandal arise. ”

“ I know that it will probably be of advantage to you to own it, and you know that I am in straitened circumstances; that is no reason why we should be unreasonable in our demands upon each other; but in justice to myself I must tell you this, that I would not for a million francs consent to distress madame your sister-in-law, because I love and honor her especially. That being understood, you can think it over and let me know your decision; for you owe me a call now, my dear neighbor, and I shall not release you from the debt, whether we come to terms or not. ”

“ This will appear from the simple statement that the children of the one sister-in-law are heirs at law of the man; the children of the other are not in the line of succession at all." If there be any force in the last illustration, a sister is nearer to the eldest brother, who is the heir, than to the younger brothers, who are not heirs of the entailed inheritance!
↑ It has been objected to the marginal translation, that it would require the plural noun "women" to be inserted before the phrase "woman to her sister," translated, "one woman to another." ”

“ Even after marriage, if brother and sister have to communicate with each other on family matters, such communication must be made through the intermediary of a third person, nor can the sister enter the brother's hut even after his marriage, despite the presence of her sister-in-law therein. ”

“ Where is there an unperverted mind which does not feel that the moral relation of two sisters successively to one or the same man as husband, is strictly parallel to that of two brothers to one and the same woman as wife? And even if the Law, in spite of this moral identity, did not entirely recognize the practical equality of obligation in both cases, there is no reason why Christians should not do it. ”

“ Even in childhood the members of such families address each other as brother-in-law and sister-in-law. When the bridegroom and bride go home after the marriage ceremony, the bridegroom’s sister bars the door of the house and will not let them in until they have severally promised [360] to give her their daughter for her son. A girl must be married before arriving at adolescence on pain of permanent exclusion from the caste. If a suitable husband has not therefore been found when the period approaches, the parents marry the girl to her elder sister’s husband or any other married man. ”

“ Lord Lyndhurst's act was especially designed to put an end to marriage with a deceased wife's sister. [288] Such unions, clearly unlawful, appear to have become very common since the age of the Stuarts. [289] For where no property or other [97] interests were at stake a man's marriage with his sister-in-law was likely to go unchallenged until the death of husband or wife made it perfectly valid. ”

“ Adam Clarke, the celebrated Wesleyan, in his commentary says, "Thou shalt not marry two sisters at the same time, as Jacob did Rachel and Leah; but there is nothing in this law that rendered it illegal to marry a sister-in-law, when her sister was dead."
Rosenmüller.—"Uxorem ad sororem ejus (duas sorores) , ne ducas in matrimonium scil. בחייה‎ in vita ejus ut in fine versus additur, i.e., uxore tuâ vivente. Non igitur prohibet Moses matrimonium cum sorore uxorismortuæ." ”

“ When she dies the widower marries her sister, the brother in like manner being required to marry his widowed sister-in-law in the case of the death of the husband, even though he may happen to be already married. ”

“ Men are selfish enough in all conscience, but surely so large a proportion would not desire or encourage such a sacrifice; and few young women, supposing them willing, would be permitted by their parents to devote the best years of their life to such an object. Setting all considerations of morality apart, the only mode by which, in the majority of cases, a widower can permanently secure the maternal care of a marriageable sister-in-law for his children, is by marrying her. ”

“ They come as being equally the husband's sisters, and the drooping wife is not distressed at the thought that one of them is to take her place in his affections, and be her successor. Finally, the relaxation of the law would destroy those happy relations which now exist between families united by marriage, and which add so much to the purity and enjoyment of domestic life. ”

“ But in the case of Challis—if I am rightly informed—my fascinating sister-in-law is ready to accept the situation. Now, although, under the existing Law, one's own Deceased Wife's Sister is excluded from the questionable advantage of becoming one's Legitimate Wife, the most [511] stringent morality has never enrolled someone else's Live Wife's Sister among prohibited degrees of consanguinity.... ”

“ M’Caul’s view, and the view of the promoters of the alteration of our law of marriage correct, we should at least have the anomaly of a permissive precept foisted in, if I may so say, among the prohibitory sentences of this chapter, dealing in all else with prohibitions only. For, it is plain, to read the verse as meaning a man may marry two sisters, if it be not simultaneously, is a permission upon the previous restriction; whilst to say a man may not marry two sisters simultaneously, even when the law of the Levirate would seem to demand it, is a prohibition. ”

“ If the Puritan had read Dr. Livingston's dissertation on this subject, he would have been preserved from this unfounded assertion; for that venerable man has quoted the closing part of the famous letter written "by those celebrated divines, who, in the name of their Church, replied to the inquiry made by Henry VIII. whether it was lawful for a man to marry his sister-in-law." Let it be transcribed: "It is manifest and cannot be denied, that the law of Levit. 18, prohibits a marriage with a sister-in-law. ”

“ This, however, must necessarily be less likely to arise when the second Wife is sister of the former, than in any other almost conceivable instance. Who can look at the motherless children so tenderly as the sister of their departed mother? Who so likely to bear with their little waywardness; because she loves them as the sister of that one who is no more, and who saw those children when they were under that mother's care? ”

“ If we examine our terms of relationship, we find that those applied to individual persons and those used in a narrow and well-defined sense are just those in which the family is intimately concerned. The terms father, mother, husband and wife, brother and sister, are limited to members of the family of the speaker, and the terms father-, mother-, brother-, and sister-in-law to the members of the family of the wife or husband in the same narrowly restricted sense. ”

“ A man has virtually for wives all the wives of his brothers, and also their widows, on account of the levirate.
If a man has a brother-in-law who is at the same time the husband of a paternal aunt, the sister of that man is the grand-daughter of the brother-in-law.
A man becomes your brother-in-law if he is merely the husband of a paternal aunt, because he can marry your sister. ”

“ We can, however, easily imagine of many cases arising in which such a marriage would be distasteful to the brother, and hence the law does not actually compel him, but provides rather an easy mode by which he may free himself from the obligation by merely publicly declaring before the assembled elders that he was not disposed to marry his brother's widow. ”