Martinus: Livets Bog, vol. 4, sect. 1216

1216. The perfect, divine marriage between "man" and "woman" has thus degenerated among the people of the East or in the harem countries too. A "harem" is thus a direct result of this degeneration. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the absolutely "divine marriage", and its form is indicative of a more barbaric, robust or primitive culture than the marriages of the West. A "harem marriage" differs from the marriages of the West in that the marriage partners are not on an equal footing. While the man enjoys enormous liberty, the woman, as we have seen here, is completely enslaved by him. He insists on having her one hundred per cent for himself alone, while retaining his own unrestricted freedom to take up with all the women he can procure and incorporate in his "harem". This phenomenon reveals thereby for us that the "husband" in a "harem" is not a "husband" at all, but merely a "male animal" barbarically misusing his power over the weaker and unresisting female being, even though this misuse occurs while he gilds the victim of his misuse with expensive materials. In the West, however, a "marriage" is a "marriage" as long as the "honeymoon" lasts. It is, after all, a re-experiencing or a repetition of the "divine marriage", if only for a brief period. And here the beings are on an equal footing. Any form of infidelity, that is, sexual relations of one of the spouses with a partner outside the marriage, completely entitles the other spouse in the marriage to a divorce, to having his or her full freedom restored and to compensation for the broken marriage. This certainly gives rise to many divorces and subsequent short-lived marriages, but this does, however, express the freedom upheld by the beings. In a "harem" this freedom does not exist. Here infidelity has become legalised for the man and allows the woman no right to divorce. To the extent that his finances allow, he can incorporate every new woman that he falls in love with into his harem, indeed, sometimes even by force, which of course further indicates that a "harem marriage" is not a "marriage". That the woman in return is supported financially for the rest of her life, even though her "husband" has long since lost his marital interest in her in favour of other women, is certainly a kind of "pension", but this "pension" cannot in any way compensate for her loss of freedom or independence. She finds herself continuously surrounded by a guard of eunuchs, and still locked up.
Is it conceivable that there is any advanced, evidently marriage-minded being with a normal sexual desire who, after having been abandoned by his or her spouse, would voluntarily allow himself or herself to be imprisoned and thereby cut off from further normal life with healthy, normal sexual satisfaction, even though this prison was a golden cage, an orgy of marble, gold, diamonds, oriental carpets and purple robes? No, the source of life, the "highest fire", cannot be satisfied by these bloodless things. The hungry being cannot live without satiation. Life in the golden cage and the soft cushions is therefore merely an authorised matrimonial drama. Behind the golden bars sit thirsty souls whose lives are merely broken dreams, a fleeting Fata Morgana in the desert instead of marriage's natural source of life: cheek to cheek and lips to lips in living, warming, passionate love in flesh and blood.