26/04/2024
Why is it that when a woman cheats on the marital bed it negatively affects the husband and not her? (MBUM Traditions)
By Taa Nformi EK (Educator/Expert in Mbum culture and traditions)
To answer this question you must be or momentarily pretend to be mbum, clean your brain of any foreign religious concepts to embrace only MTR( mbum traditional religion), clean your brains of colonial(western) education, and embrace mbum traditional marriage principles, even for a moment.
Seven(7) principles in consideration here:
1. The man is the head of the woman and not equal in role or the other way round. He is the head of the family by divine authority. He is also the leader by natural ability.
2. Man married the woman to himself and not the other way round. He went out to find a wife for himself. He brought her to his home. He owns the home, the bed and the woman in it.
3. Man fulfilled marital responsibilities in order to own his wife, not the other way round. Women are not for free. They are persuasively acquired. I don't want to use the term "buy" because mbum people don't buy wives in the western sense of the word.
4. The Marital bed is owned by the man and not the woman. He invites a woman to his bed.
5. The woman belongs to the man and not the man alone, but his entire family including the ancestors and God over it. She is the most treasured possession of the ancestral family because she is hired to enrich and grow the family.
6. The woman after marrying the man is primarily the person owned by the family and ancestors God over them. She is treasured by the entire family and ancestors with NYU 's guarantees.
7. After marriage a woman is therefore like a family property allowed to be under the man by his family. The husband becomes a caretaker and not the primary owner. If the husband dies, she is inherited because she doesn't belong to the husband alone. He must take care of her so that she can continue to be a family's asset even after the husband's death. He must therefore take care of her jealously.
Based on these principles, we can proceed to answer two questions in sequence:
1. Why is it that when a man cheats on his wife in their marital bed it doesn't affect him negatively or affect the wife negatively?
2. Why is it that when a woman cheats it affects the man and not the woman?
Answer to #1:
Because divine and family authority is given to the man(husband) to own the Marital bed. The woman doesn't own the Marital bed with or like the man. She is invited into the marital bed owned by the man. As owner,having divine authority over his bed, he can therefore use it as he wishes. If course in respect of other divinely inspired rules(norms). For example, he cannot have sexual relations with his biological sister or mother in his marital bed just because he owns it. It would be a taboo.
The man is not guilty of "stealing" another woman in his own bed. That is why he can bring a girlfriend to his marital bed because he owns it. That is the reason why he can marry more than one woman and they all sleep in that bed as he invites them there. On the other hand, the woman doesn't have divine and family authority over the marriage nor the marital bed. She would be a thief if she uses what doesn't belong to her unworthily. She is guilty if she sleeps with another man in a bed that doesn't belong to her but to her husband.
Answer to #2:
Because the ancestors and the family are viewing that the person(man) who is entrusted with their property (the woman) is doing a bad job of keeping their very important and expensive property with care and she is slipping off. So the ancestral spirits descend on the man as a business man would descend on a careless servant sometimes it comes with warning of light sickness on and off and if it persists, the man may end up dieing.such sickness is never automatic and doesn't kill without warning. On the other hand one would think that the consequences of such a sin should fall on the committer (the woman). Hell no! Because she is simply considered to be a property who doesn't have control over herself if the man doesn't. She is considered weak and vulnerable by ancestral spirits and even the living family. For example, you won't blame the chicks when they go astray for any reason. You blame the mother hen for being careless. So the ancestors put blame on the man because they are simply valuing their possession and holding the caretaker (the man) to account. The woman is innocent even when she goes astray because of the above reasons.
This conspt is deep and very controversial in Mbum traditional thought. If you don't first divorce yourself if foreign religious thoughts and modern knowledge of life and social relationships, you cannot comprehend this type of idea. The best approach to understanding this concept is the answer these questions in sequence as I have done here.
And again, you are free to criticize this traditional thought and practice, but there is no doubt that it was divinely inspired, having survived since mbum people became humans created by NYU.
