Child Marriage

Child marriage is a marriage or similar union, formal or informal, between a child under a certain age – typically 18 years – and an adult or another child.
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* The vast majority of child marriages are between a female child and a male adult, and are rooted in gender inequality.

Although the age of majority (legal adulthood) and marriageable age are usually designated at age 18, both vary across countries, and therefore the marriageable age may be older or younger in a given country. Even where the age is set at 18 years, cultural traditions may override legislation and many jurisdictions permit earlier marriage with parental consent or in special circumstances, such as teenage pregnancy.

Child marriage violates the rights of children and has long-term consequences for both child brides and child grooms. For child brides, in addition to mental health issues and lack of access to education and career opportunities, these include adverse health effects as a result of early pregnancy and childbirth. Effects on child grooms include being ill-prepared for certain responsibilities such as providing for the family, early fatherhood, and a lack of access to education and career opportunities. Child marriage is part of the practice of child betrothal, which often includes civil cohabitation and a court-approval of the engagement Causes of child marriages include poverty, bride price, dowries, cultural traditions, religious and social pressures, regional customs, fear of the child remaining unmarried into adulthood, illiteracy, and perceived inability of women to work for money. Research indicates that comprehensive sex education can help to prevent child marriage.

Child marriages have been common throughout history and continue to be widespread, particularly in developing countries such as parts of Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, West Asia, Latin America, and Oceania. However, even in developed countries, legal exceptions still allow child marriage, including exceptions in 44 US states.

The incidence of child marriage has been falling in most parts of the world. 2018 data from UNICEF showed that about 21 percent of young women worldwide (aged 20 to 24) were married as children, a 25 percent decrease from 10 years ago. The countries with the highest observed rates of child marriages (below the age of 18) were Niger, Mali, Bangladesh, Guinea, the Central African Republic, Mozambique, and Nepal, all of which had rates above 50%. Niger, Chad, Bangladesh, Mali, and Ethiopia were the countries with child marriage rates greater than 20% below the age of 15, according to multiple 2003–2009 surveys. Each year, an estimated 12 million girls globally become married under the age of 18.

History

Before the industrial revolution, in many parts of the world, including India, China, and Eastern Europe, women tended to marry immediately after reaching puberty. These practices carried well into the 19th century in societies with largely rural populations. Men tended to marry later in societies where a married couple was expected to establish a household of their own. That usually meant that men remained unmarried until they accumulated sufficient wealth to support a new home, and were married in their mature age to adolescent girls.

In ancient and medieval societies, it was common for girls to be betrothed at or even before the age of puberty.Angeliki Laiou (1993), ''Coercion to sex and marriage in ancient and medieval societies'', Washington, DC, pages 85–190 According to Mordechai A. Friedman, "arranging and contracting the marriage of a young girl were the undisputed prerogatives of her father in ancient Israel." Most girls were married before the age of 15, often at the start of their puberty.M. A. Friedman (1980), ''Jewish Marriage in Palestine, Vol. 1'', The Jewish Theological Seminary of America In the Middle Ages, the age at marriage seems to have been around puberty throughout the Jewish world.

Ruth Lamdan writes: "The numerous references to child marriage in the 16th-century Responsa literature and other sources, shows that child marriage was so common, it was virtually the norm. In this context, it is important to remember that in halakha, the term "minor" refers to a girl under twelve years and a day. A girl aged twelve and a half was already considered an adult in all respects."

In Ancient Greece, early marriage and teenage motherhood for girls existed. Boys were expected to marry in their teens, as well. In the Roman Empire, girls were married from age of 12 and boys from age 14. In the Middle Ages, under English civil laws derived from Roman laws, marriages before the age of 16 existed. In Imperial China, child marriage was the norm.

In contrast to other pre-modern societies – and for reasons that are subject to debate – Northwest Europe was characterized by relatively late marriages for both men and women, with both sexes commonly delaying marriage until their mid-20s or even 30s. The data available for England suggest this was the case by the 14th century. The pattern was reflected in English common law, which was the first in Western Europe to establish statutory rape laws and ages of consent for marriage. In 1275, sexual relations with girls under either 12 or 14 (depending on interpretation of the sources) were criminalized; a second law was made with more severe punishments for under the age of 10 in 1576. In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the British colonial administration introduced marriage age restrictions for Hindu and Muslim girls on the Indian subcontinent.

A Scottish physician living in the 18th century Syria reported that locals tried to contract marriages for their children at a young age, but the marriage was not consummated until the girl "had come of age". Evidence from 19th century Palestine suggests that husbands sometimes initiated sexual relations before their wives reached puberty, but that it was a rare occurrence, condemned socially and censured by sharia courts. Writing in the 1830s, Edward William Lane observed that few Egyptian girls remained single by the age of 16, but socio-economic transformation, educational reforms and modernity brought significant changes, and by 1920 fewer than 10% of Egyptian women married before the age of 20. In 1923, Egypt's parliament set the minimum age of marriage at 16 for women and 18 for men.

Religious norms and laws

Most of the religions known in history have established a minimum age for marriage in one way or another. Christian canon law forbade the marriage of a girl before the onset of puberty, and the Hindu holy book, the Vedas, proclaimed marriage after the age of puberty. In the Vedas, marriage is shown to be between two adult persons after the Brahmacharya stage. The Vedas, specifically the Rigveda and Atharvaveda, have verses that indicate that during the Vedic period, girls married well after attaining puberty and were of a mature age. The early Dharmaśāstra (Dharmasutras) also states that girls should be married after they have attained puberty while some texts extend the marriageable age to before puberty. In the Manusmriti, which was not implemented as law, a father is considered to have wronged his daughter if he fails to marry her before puberty and if the girl is not married in less than three years after reaching puberty, she can search for the husband herself.

Jewish scholars and rabbis strongly discouraged marriages before the onset of puberty, but at the same time, in exceptional cases, girls ages 3 through 12 (the legal age of consent according to halakha) might be given in marriage by their fathers. By Judaism, the minimum girl age, for marriage, was 12 years and one day, "na'arah", as mentioned in the ancient Talmud Mishnah books (compiled between 536 BCE – 70 CE, redacted in the 3rd century CE), Order Nashim Masechet Kiddushin 41 a & b.

According to halakha, girls should not marry until they are 12 years and six months old, "bogeret". Although Moses Maimonides mentions in the Talmud ''Mishneh Torah'' (compiled between 1170 and 1180 CE) that in exceptional cases girls ages 3 through 12 might be given in marriage by their fathers, he also clarifies in verse 3:19 of the same chapter that: "Although a father has the option of consecrating his daughter to anyone he desires while she is a minor or while she is a maiden, it is not proper for him to act in this manner."

According to the 1907 ''Catholic Encyclopedia'', apocryphal accounts that, at the time of her betrothal to Joseph, Mary, the mother of Jesus, was 12–14 years old.
However the site warn readers that it isn't reliable. To quote what the site said itself: "the apocryphal literature is full of details, the non-admittance of these works into the Canon of the Sacred Books casts a strong suspicion upon their contents" Apocryphal is spurious", "of questionable authenticity"

Historically within the Catholic Church, before the 1917 Code of Canon Law, the minimum age for a dissoluble betrothal (') was seven years in the s. The minimum age for a valid marriage was puberty, or nominally 14 for males and 12 for females. The 1917 Code of Canon Law raised the minimum age for a valid marriage at 16 for males and 14 for females. The 1983 Code of Canon Law maintained the minimum age for a valid marriage at 16 for males and 14 for females.

English Ecclesiastical Law forbade the marriage of a girl before the age of puberty.

There is no minimum marriage age defined in traditional Islamic law, and the legal discussion of this topic centered primarily on women's physical maturity. Classical Sunni jurisprudence allows a father to contract a marriage for his underaged daughter. The appropriate age for consummating the marriage, which could occur several years after signing the marriage contract, was to be determined by the bride, groom, and the bride's guardian since medieval jurists held that the age of fitness for intercourse was too variable for legislation. This was based in part on the precedent set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad, as described in the hadith collections considered to be authentic by Muslims. According to these sources, Muhammad married Aisha, his third wife, when she was about six, and consummated the marriage when she was about nine. Some modern Muslim authors and Islamic scholars, such as Ali Gomaa, who served as the Grand Mufti of Egypt, doubt the traditionally accepted narrative and believe based on other evidence that Aisha was in her late teens at the time of her marriage. As a general rule, intercourse was prohibited for girls "not able to undergo it," on the grounds of potential physical harm. Disputes regarding physical maturity between the involved parties were to be resolved by a judge, potentially after examination by a female expert witness. The 1917 Codification of Islamic Family Law in the Ottoman empire distinguished between the age of competence for marriage, which was set at 18 for boys and 17 for girls, and the minimum age for marriage, set at 12 for boys and nine for girls. Marriage below the age of competence was permissible only if proof of sexual maturity was accepted in court, while marriage under the minimum age was forbidden. During the 20th century, sharia-based legislation in most countries in the Middle East followed the Ottoman precedent in defining the age of competence, while raising the minimum age to 15 or 16 for boys and 13 to 16 for girls. In 2019, Saudi Arabia raised the age of marriage to 18.

Although by the beginning of the 21st century, the laws of most countries established the general minimum age for marriage at 18 years, in many countries some exceptions allow marriage before this age with the consent of the parents and/or by court decision. In some countries, a religious marriage is still recognized by the state authorities along with a secular marriage or even instead of it, in others, a registered civil marriage is mandatory.

Effects on each gender

Child marriage has lasting consequences on girls, from their health (mental and physical), education and social development perspectives. These consequences last well beyond adolescence. One of the most common causes of death for girls aged 15 to 19 in developing countries was pregnancy and childbirth. In Niger