It may seem surprising that the book included a chapter called “Marriage.” After all, what does marriage have to do with healing sickness through prayer? Eddy explained her answer to that question in her book.

During the early 1870s when Eddy was writing her book, she had not yet begun using the term “Christian Science,” but had been calling her healing system “Moral Science.”  To Eddy, marriage was the basis of “civilization and progress” and the “school of virtue.”  Most importantly, she saw marriage as a necessary discipline for the healing system she was teaching.

Eddy had strong feelings on the topic of marriage. So did many other Americans in the 1870s, and they didn’t necessarily agree with each other. In the early 1870s it was not at all certain that the institution of marriage would continue to exist in America. Victoria Woodhull was an outspoken leader of the women’s rights movement at that time. Woodhull and many others wanted to abolish marriage completely, because they saw marriage as the worst form of slavery. These views were much in the news while Eddy was writing her book.  

The forthcoming book Crossing Swords: Mary Baker Eddy vs. Victoria Claflin Woodhull and the Battle for the Soul of Marriage by Cindy Safronoff tells the story behind Eddy’s chapter “Marriage” in the 1875 first edition of Science and Health.

Pre-order your copy now on Kickstarter.com!

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