The Bible verse quoted here from the Book of Ecclesiastes (chapter 4, verses 11-12) is traditionally quoted at weddings in churches. The third strand of the cord is allegedly God. The thought is not necessarily wrong, of course, but it is not to be found in Ecclesiastes 4. Contextually speaking, we are not talking about God, but about a couple (the Hebrew word for 'lying together' used here (shakab שׁכב) appears several times in connection with sexual intercourse). Exegetically speaking, it would be more correct to see in the triple cord a couple composed of three people. 
For readers who consider themselves Christians: Did King David, that pious man of God, the author of Psalms 23, 119 and many others that are still regularly the subject of sermons today, really only sleep with one of his wives at a time? 
The church wedding is problematic in several respects. On the one hand, the idea of fidelity in the Bible was different. I understand that importance can be attached to the blessing of God that couples hope to receive in this way. On the other hand, however, the promise made before God can become problematic for sensitive and sincere souls at the latest when they have to admit to themselves that their marriage is not working. Breaking the marriage contract that I had made not only with my wife, but above all with God, was a huge problem for me. How relieved I was the day I found out that church marriage was a Roman invention. Nowhere in the Bible did the wedding celebrations have a religious reference. ‘Till death do us part’ – nowhere in the Bible did God demand this promise, on which every church wedding ceremony is based. Nowhere, for example, had Moses introduced any offerings, and nowhere would Jesus have pronounced a divine blessing over any wedding celebrated. It was the Romans and Greeks who made offerings to their deities in the hope of obtaining the blessing of the invisible world – a principle that was later Christianised by the Church. From a biblical perspective, marriage has never been anything other than a human contract between people, in which God was not contractually involved. 
Read the Bible through the glasses of one's own context
​In Genesis 24 verse 16 it is said of Jacob's fiancée that she was a ‘virgin, and a man had not known her’ (a Hebraism for saying that no man had slept with her). The superfluous word ‘man’ in this verse led the rabbis to the assumption that Rebecca must have had a torn hymen, i.e. she must have already had sex, but not with a man.  Would that mean that Rebecca had already had sexual relations with a woman before her marriage and was still considered a virgin despite this? This discussion is found in the Midrash. What it implies is, that in a polygamous context (that of the rabbis) it is not surprising for two women to make love together. 
​In our culture, marriage is about relationship, whereas in a polygamous context it was about community. In a team, relationships diversify and the dynamic changes: 
In the evangelical circles in which I grew up, this rabbinical assumption would probably have made a perfect candidat to illustrate how ‘fleshly’ and ‘ungodly’ Jews think. Because Jesus, so church people reason, could not have been anything other than an advocate of monogamy. ​​

Monogamy in the First Century

At the time of the New Testament, there was effectively a pro-monogamous movement in Judaism named the Essenes:
By Chris Zürcher. Page updated on 24 March 2025