Page:Folklore1919.djvu/82

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70
Customary Restraints on Celibacy.

imposed on unjustifiable celibacy. Sir James Frazer also brings out the general attitude of primitive society towards men or women who fail to fulfil this duty.[1]

The Jews, who have always encouraged early marriage, have now abandoned all attempts at compulsory marriages, but a Jewish court often used to put pressure on a man over 20 to compel him to take a wife.[2]


  1. Folk-Lore in the Old Testament, ii. ch. vi., especially pp. 336-7.
  2. Ebhen hā-'ezer, i. 2, cited in J. Hastings, Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics, viii. 461.