How important is a social rule called “exogamy,” a rule which requires an individual to marry outside of a social unit called “family”?  I can hardly think of a rule in life that more determines and shapes who we are as individuals than the rule of exogamy. 

 

The universal rule not only determines what comprises a "family," as anthropologist Lévi-Strauss correctly points out, "exogamy provides the only means for maintaining the group as a group." 

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For the materialist, no concept nor form has an inherent meaning. Instead, SOCIAL EXISTENCE alone determines what constitutes a "family."  

 

 According to Marx, Mao, Sartre, Harris and others, SOCIAL EXISTENCE within a particular eco-system alone determines how one thinks about one's duties, obligations, and rights vis-a-vis lineal and collateral kin.  Whatever type of "family" emerges from the shaping and moulding powers of the "material elements  of the world" (Col 2:8), it will be protected by the unlearned Rule of Exogamy.  But it will not "accord with Christ." 

 

For example, missionaries assigned to the Vaupés area of Colombia and Brazil would be, unknown to them, assigned to and area which would classify Joseph and Mary as “brother” and “sister” because they spoke the same language. 

 

For example, the rule of exogamy for the Wanano tribe of Brazil and Colombia prohibited the marriage of a Wanano to a Wanano because they both spoke the same language. Those who spoke the same language were classified as being “brothers” and “sisters.”

 

To avoid committing incest, one had to "marry out," that is, marry someone who spoke a different language.  For the Wanano, the real "family" was made up of "those who spoke the same language."

 

At some point in history, the Wanano, along with approximately sixteen other diverse tribes, collectively decided that the best way to stop inter-tribal warfare over fishing rights was to replace the inherent or Divine meaning attached to the form called "family" with a divergent meaning: "those who speak the same language." 

 

For the materialist, it is SOCIAL EXISTENCE within a particular eco-system, in this case the Vaupés rainforest of Colombia-Brazil which determined what meaning should be attached to the universal form call "family."  For both the materialist and contextualizing missiologist, the social unit called "family" has no inherent meaning which is fixed and constant.

 

Thus came into existence the rule of linguistic-tribal exogamy.  Included in the Wanano concept of "family" were four other tribes that belonged to the same language family called  Eastern Tukano.   Since these four tribes, the Pira-tapuya, Arapaco, Siriano, and Tuyuka, all belonged to the same language "family," linguistic exogamy meant all members of Eastern Tukano had to marry some who spoke a non-Eastern Tukano language.

 

Now for  those who believe there exists no inherent or Divine meaning attached to the concept of family, it means all meanings are determined by environmental pressures, and, according to missiologist Charles Kraft, "belong to the people." 

 

But if missiologist Charles Kraft is correct when the states: “A cultural form does not have inherent meaning, only perceived meaning. And this meaning is context-specific," then there exists for every missionary an existential problem that simply cannot be ignored. 

 

The problem is this: The preaching of the Gospel to the Wanano and the other tribes of the Northern Amazon depends on the universal concept of family having attached to it an inherent meaning, a meaning which has not been shaped by the regularities of nature which the apostle Paul calls "the material elements of the world" (Col. 2:8).  

 

Now the moment the Wanano and these other tribes hear that Joseph and Mary spoke the same language, from their collective perspective, Joseph and Mary committed incest.  They were guilty of marrying someone who spoke the same language. The Wanano and the other tribes of the area would immediately think: Why would this kind and compassionate missionary be proclaiming that Jesus, a subhuman bastard, could save them? 

 

Convictions

1. The political questions being asked in the Western World today are: What is marriage?  And, Are gay marriages valid?     

2. Regrettably, because "exogamy [aka marrying out] provides the only means of maintaining the group as a group,"  what they are not asking is: What does it mean to MARRY OUT? It is a question the promoters of “missiological correctness” have refused to answer because for them a cultural form or word, in the words of missiologist Charles Kraft, “does not have inherent meaning, only perceived meaning. And this meaning is context-specific”.  Meanings derived from “context” alone define who I am.

3. Words have the power to create a false reality. For example, to prevent intertribal warfare over land and fishing rights, tribes of the Vaupés compelled their young people to “marry out,” which meant marrying someone who spoke a different language. In time the practice became rule, the rule became a law, and the law produced a new type of family. In so doing, contextual existence define reality.

4. When these sixteen tribes of the Vaupés replaced the inherent meaning of family with "those who spoke the same language," a spiritual DIVERGENCE away from a universal positive constant took place. Spiritual blindness, loss of meaning, wife stealing, and chaos entered the Vaupés area of Colombia and Brazil.

5. Because the rule of exogamy, when misapplied, distorts reality and suppresses human freedom rather than promoting it, it is incumbent upon the missionary to attempt to understand, to some degree, how his or her target group has applied this life changing rule. It will inform them regarding what the society thinks the “family” is, as well as what their anxieties are. This will take some work. It will also reveal that contextualizing the Gospel is very un-Biblical thing to do because it involves the acceptance of cultural forms that are in fundamental opposition to universal forms that have meanings which are fixed and constant.   

6. There exist inferior and superior cultures.

7. If these tribes are to escape chaos and disorder, it means a spiritual return to the Universal.

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Gilbert Prost

June 2020