Critical Response
I
Critical Response to Stefani Engelstein’s “Allure
of Wholeness” Traditional Marriage and the
Beauty of Holiness
Cynthia L. Hallen
Stefani Engelstein’s essay “The Allure of Wholeness: The EighteenthCentury Organism and the Same-Sex Marriage Debate” (Critical Inquiry
39 [Summer 2013]: 754–76) pieces together material from philosophy, science, politics, religion, and law in order to examine certain aspects of the
current debate on marriage. Although Engelstein grounds most of her
evidence in the European Enlightenment, she focuses her findings on
twenty-first-century American developments in the populist political debate between “liberal” proponents of progressive same-sex marriage and
“conservative” defenders of traditional heterosexual matrimony (p. 755).
One of the stated purposes of the essay is to document problematic
common origins that constrain the two main competing marriage arguments: (1) “sexual complementarity” as an argument for a conservative
family-oriented stance and (2) “civic autonomy” as an argument for a
liberal individual-oriented stance (p. 755). Understanding these origins,
Engelstein believes, will frame an egalitarian approach for discussing the
issue of marriage (see p. 755). Ultimately, she hopes to ameliorate the role
of undervalued caretakers, urging all to come to terms with “the labor
involved in caring for our needs as organisms and as persons” by moving
away from “myths” of autonomy and complementarity (p. 776).
Engelstein’s approach is eclectic, so the essay raises interesting quesCritical Inquiry 41 (Winter 2015)
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tions and produces thought-provoking juxtapositions. For example, the
inquiry begins with a brief but cogent correlation between the abortion
crisis and the same-sex marriage crisis in the United States, noting that
“divergent views on same-sex marriage have joined those on abortion
rights as indicators of a deep fault line in American culture” (p. 754).
Although she does not approach that fault line to explore parallels between
abortion opposition and same-sex marriage opposition, her statement
could prompt further research on the relationship between the sanctity of
life and the sanctity of marriage. Since out-of-wedlock pregnancy is the
most common motivation for nontherapeutic elective abortions, marriage
is still the most effective way to preserve and protect the lives of unborn
children.
Engelstein’s point of view is heteroglossic, at least in diction, but the
analysis is not dialectically balanced. She attempts to critique both sides of
the marriage debate, but the evaluation is not even-handed because she
deconstructs the defense of traditional marriage while implicitly endorsing
same-sex marriage. For example, the first three essay sections target conservative complementarity, and only in the concluding section does she
return to the propositio of critiquing both complementarity and autonomy. Nevertheless, the essay opens a door for other points of view in
deliberations about marriage. In this response, I would like to enter that
door. It is not my intent to engage in a polite but pugilistic demolition of
Engelstein’s inquiry. Stakes are high, and the topic of marriage is multidimensional, so any of us might slide into loose diction or logical leaping.
But, using Engelstein’s ideas as a springboard, I hope to make a case for the
traditional marriage point of view, restoring some balance for a debate that
is typically very one-sided in favor of same-sex marriage, especially in the
academy. To make a case for heterosexual matrimony, I will use a philological approach, analyzing selected features of Engelstein’s essay in terms
of lexis, scriptural exegesis, and anthropological linguistics. The book
What Is Marriage? will serve as a theoretical anchor during my philological
explorations and critical evaluations.1
1. See Sherif Girgis, Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George, What Is Marriage? Man and
Woman: A Defense (New York, 2012).
C Y N T H I A L . H A L L E N is associate professor of linguistics and English
language at Brigham Young University. Her publications include the Emily
Dickinson Lexicon, a comprehensive dictionary of words in Dickinson’s poems
(edl.byu.edu/) recently included in the Emily Dickinson Archives of Houghton
Library at Harvard University (www.edickinson.org/).
Critical Inquiry / Winter 2015
Engelstein uses the broad term wholeness once in the title and once
more in her concluding paragraph to challenge the discourse of liberals
who argue for unisex civil rights and the discourse of conservatives who
invoke “the reproductive pair as a single organism” (p. 755). However, she
abandons the term in the introduction and the body of the essay, shifting
immediately to the term complementarity without a clear transition. After
identifying complementarity as the main argument for defending heterosexual marriage, she defines the term as “the idea that men and women
have distinct but reciprocally attuned bodies, attributes, and dispositions,
so that they together, as a heterosexual couple, create a single, functional
unit,” claiming that the notion of “complementarity” first arose during the
eighteenth century in Kantian philosophy (p. 754). Engelstein’s insistence
on German romantic philosophy is anachronistic because the word complementarity is a physics term that is not instantiated in the English language until 1911, referring to complementary relations in the field of
physics, specifically the explanatory capacity of wave and particle theories
of light.2 Recent applications of the term complementarity in the marriage
debate cannot be tied back to the Enlightenment without creating logical
distortions and chronological contradictions.
Furthermore, since the words wholeness and complementarity can be
synonymous, this creates a muddy diction and inadvertently a biased argument. The shift is unfortunate because wholeness is one of the richest
lexical items in the history of the English language, cognate with concepts
of physical healing and spiritual holiness. The reconstructed IndoEuropean root for the word wholeness is kailo-, meaning “whole, uninjured, of good omen,” with derivatives that include wholesome, health,
heal, holy, and hallow.3 The cognates, concepts, and connotations of kailoare congruent with principles of comprehensive union cited by Girgis and
his coauthors in their definition of man-woman marriage: “Marriage is a
comprehensive union of persons. . . . First, it unites two people in their
most basic dimensions, in their minds and bodies; second, it unites them
with respect to procreation, family life, and its broad domestic sharing;
and third, it unites them permanently and exclusively.”4 Engelstein downplays wholeness and the lexis of complementary relations in her portrayal
of traditional marriage.
Complementarity does appear as a foundational principle for defining
2. Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “complementarity.”
3. Calvert Watkins, American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots (Boston, 2000),
s.v. “kailo-.”
4. Girgis, Anderson, and George, What Is Marriage? p. 23.
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male-female matrimony in What Is Marriage?5 Nevertheless, Engelstein’s
claim that the concept of male-female marital complementarity “first
arose during the Enlightenment in tandem with the modern conception of
two biological sexes” seems ethnocentric (p. 754). From the biblical teachings of the Talmud, to the Germanic history of Tacitus, to the yin-yang of
Taoism, there is extensive historical evidence of heterosexual complementarity as the basis for matrimony. Engelstein’s essay may be challenging the
exclusivity of that historical basis, but in feigning a balanced critique of
both sides of the present marriage debate, Engelstein cannot escape the
appearance of elitism.
Engelstein depicts support for heterosexual marriage as a “vigorous and
durable” opposition to same-sex marriage (p. 754). The international tenacity and national intensity that characterizes the defense of traditional
marriage, not only in the United States but also in places like France and
Uganda, is not surprising when we consider the complementary sacramental nature of the bride and the groom in nuptial rituals across creeds
and cultures. In biblical Hebrew, the word for “bride” (kalla៮ h) stems from
the same root as the Hebrew word kll, meaning “whole, to complete, to
perfect.”6
The concept of comprehensive wholeness is evident in biblical references to marriage and family, with connotations of physical union, environmental harmony, and ritual holiness. In the Old Testament tradition,
the Lord creates a woman as a mate or counterpart (Hebrew neghedh) for
the first man: “And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should
be alone; I will make him an help meet for him” (Gen. 2:18). Without Eve,
Adam alone is merely a part (Hebrew badh), not yet a whole. Without a
woman, a man is merely a branch of a tree, but together they become
free-standing trees with roots and branches of their own: “that they might
be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD” (Isa. 61:3; see also
Ps. 1:3; Jer. 17:8). Early environmental implications of complementary
male-female marriage are exemplified in this Old Testament passage from
the prophet Isaiah: “For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the
garden causeth the things that are sown in it to spring forth; so the Lord
GOD will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations” (Isa. 61:11).
Without a female companion, the male is merely a string, a strand, a
5. See ibid., p. 12.
6. All biblical quotations, citations, and glosses in this article are adapted from the edition
of the King James Bible and James Strong, Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
(Abingdon, Tenn., 1890) in the Latter-Day Saints scriptures database of the Neal A. Maxwell
Institute at Brigham Young University.
Critical Inquiry / Winter 2015
separate fiber in the fabric of life, but when he enters a covenant with a
female spouse, they are endowed with an investiture: “my soul shall be
joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he
hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh
himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels”
(Isa. 61:10). As a couple, they then constitute whole cloth, a linen garment
woven into a new entity that has the potential to clothe new bodies with
new life. This clothing metaphor is not exclusive to biblical or other Semitic marriage rituals; textiles also play an essential symbolic role in many
Native American marriage ceremonies. For example, in the Hopi way, the
bride wears a maiden shawl (atu-öh) during wedding rituals and for ceremonies thereafter.7 The groom’s male relatives gather wool and weave
many articles of sacred white clothing for the bride to wear in this life and
in preparation for entering the afterlife worthily.8
The wholeness, completeness, and perfection evoked by the marriage
event are not limited to the individual, the couple, the society, or to human
beings generally. In many cultures, traditional marriage fosters responsible
fertility in family life that blesses the land, enabling humans to live in
harmony with the earth and the universe. The land is blessed by the fidelity
of the bride and the groom, but the land is desecrated when the bonds of
marriage and family life are broken: “Then will I cause to cease . . . the voice
of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the
voice of the bride: for the land shall be desolate” (Jer. 7:34). As in the
biblical way, the Hopi Powamuya ceremony emphasizes the relationship
between matrimonial events and purification rituals performed for “all
things animate and inanimate, not only in the immediate Hopi environment but throughout the entire world.”9 Such wholeness is not exclusive
and is generously egalitarian.
A bias is evident immediately in Engelstein’s noun phrase “the allure of
wholeness.” This use of “allure” seems misguided. The essence of heterosexual marriage is not a matter of the “allure of wholeness” but rather the
“affinity of holiness.” The Oxford English Dictionary’s etymology of allure
includes “hawking” and “deception” as glosses, and such connotations
contrast with the notion of complementary affinity.10 The OED’s etymology of affinity lists glosses relating to family values and social cohesion:
neighborhoods; relatives by marriage; similarity in character and tastes;
7. See Anna Silas, Journey to Hopi Land (Tucson, Ariz., 2006), pp. 35–38.
8. See Mary Russell-Ferrell Colton, “Hopi Courtship and Marriage: Second Mesa,”
Museum Notes 5 (Mar. 1933): 1–13.
9. Silas, Journey to Hopi Land, p. 70.
10. Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “allure.”
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family and kin; friendly relationships; spiritual connections; and structural
resemblances between different elements of creation.11
Engelstein claims that contract theory and complementarity in marriage developed “at precisely the same period” in eighteenth-century
political discourse and sociolegal structure (p. 762), but a lexical analysis shows that marriage contracts and affinities have ancient precedents across cultures. “To contract affinity” is one of the English glosses
for marriage in the Hebrew word chthn in the Old Testament (1 Kings
3:1; 2 Chron. 18:1). Affinitive marriage denotes diplomatic alliances for
families and states, not just people making love, but also nations making peace through alliances that can have positive consequences for
individuals and civilizations.
Affinity implies trust and fidelity in the contractual dimensions of
marriage. The word betroth, derived from Old English, denotes a lawful
promise between a bachelor and a maiden based on cognate concepts of
trust and being true to each other.12 Likewise, the courtship term affiance, a Latin loanword derived from the reconstructed Indo-European
root bheidh-, denotes a formal promise of matrimony between a fiancée
and a fiancé based on cognate ideas of faithfulness and fidelity. Calvert
Watkins explains the deeper significance of these etymons: “The root
*bheidh-, ‘to trust’, whose English derivatives include faith, fidelity,
and confederate, is noteworthy in that its descendants in several of the
Indo-European daughter languages refer specifically to the mutual
trust on which covenants and social contracts must stand in order to be
binding.”13
Allure can imply sex appeal or superficial charm, but the ornaments
of the groom and the jewels of the bride are emblems of shining holistic
beauty (Hebrew p’r) that transcends time. The word allure can also
have positive connotations of “attraction,” implying both pleasure and
preference, but marriage invokes a reverence and a responsibility beyond the limitations of personal satisfaction and mutual convenience.
Attraction may be the impetus for heterosexual and/or homosexual
love, leading some individuals to choose extramarital sexual relations,
whether transient or lasting, committed or promiscuous. Affinity, on
the other hand, is the cornerstone of kinship in dimensions of creation
that include but also supersede pleasure and preference. Affinity points
11. See ibid., s.v. “affinity.”
12. See the reconstructed Indo-European root deru- in Watkins, American Heritage
Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.
13. Ibid., s.v. “bheidh-.”
Critical Inquiry / Winter 2015
to lawful marital relationships that are forged within social institutions
and the bounds of nature.
Engelstein’s use of organism as an example of the emergence of sexual complementarity for matrimony is metonymically inadequate, presupposing that the lexical instantiation and semantic development of
this word is evidence of a new universal human perception (see p. 755).
Western civilization has long-standing traditions and teachings about
the complementary roles of males and females, extending back far beyond Aristotle and Kant. Furthermore, what European philosophers
speculate about and what ordinary people know from experience may
not be the same and can often be at odds. In the Aymara Indian language of the pre-Incan ancient Kolla people (“holy ones”) in South
America, the most important grammatical marking is for distinguishing human and nonhuman entities. The Aymara verb for marriage
jaqichasiña “means literally ‘to cause oneself to become a human being,’ that is, to assume full human responsibility and relationships
within the community.”14 In the Aymara worldview, a man is not fully
a person until he marries a woman, and vice versa. Individuals are not
full members of the community until by marriage they enter into the
lineage of their kinship group (ayllu).15
The assertion that the perceived complementarity of male-female
relations originates in the philosophy and science of the Age of Reason
is informative. However, when Engelstein reduces the notion of complementarity to a “myth” (p. 776), she disregards the personal intuitions, cultural practices, and spiritual beliefs of some of the most
enduring and resilient civilizations in the world. This attitude approaches insult when Engelstein contrasts gender-neutral economic
systems in privileged geographic locations with supposedly far less flexible sex roles in “poorer, more rural, and less coastal populations” (p.
773). In a film commentary on Andean women, Martha J. Hardman
challenges us to see gender roles from cross-cultural perspectives:
The basic virtue of all Aymara is respect—respect for every human
being. . . . The Aymara woman is not without power or resources. She
is not, within her culture, a subject person. She and her man do different things, but they are essential to each other, and, to live well,
must form a cooperative and equal partnership, a fact known to both.
14. Martha James Hardman, “Gender through the Levels,” Women and Language 16 (Fall
1993): 42.
15. See the John Tafel Cole citation in “Family Structure, Kinship, Marriage,”
aymarainfo.wikispaces.com/Family⫹Structure,⫹Kinship,⫹Marriage
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In this decade when the new concern for women has been marked by
the designation of International Women’s Year, we would do well to
look to other societies, like the Aymara, to see how a more equitable
society could be run—rather than seeing them through our own culture’s distorted lenses. The harshness of the Aymara environment and
our ethnocentricity should not blind us to the uncommon respect for
humanness in the Aymara social structure.16
Respect for every human life, respect for humanness. Such phrases have a
familiar ring.
16. Hardman, “Andean Women,” Film Essay, Faces of Change (New Hampshire, 1976),
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