146 RITUAL OF THE EASTERN CHURCHES

license to marry within the prohibited degrees varies with
the nearness of the relationship. In computing the de-
gree of relationship the Eastern church .counts all persons
up to the common ancestors. For example, first cousins
are said to be related in the fourth degree; an uncle and
his niece In the third degree; children of first cousins in
the sixth degree. The Greek Church prohibits marriage
(without especial license) in the sixth degree. In no case
may first cousins marry. According to the acts of the Coun-
cil of the Lebanon the Maronites are forbidden to marry
within the eighth degree., Eastern computation, fourth de-
gree, Latin computation. Licenses, however, cover the mar-
riage of first cousins.1

In Syria and Palestine the usual time /or solemnizing
weddings is Sunday. At the village of Mahardy, in north-
ern Syria, where the population is Greek Orthodox, there
is but one wedding day in the year, usually a Sunday in
October. The priest goes from house to house, reading
the marriage service over each couple in an abbreviated
form. The festivities, however, are celebrated in common
during four or five days when the whole village thinks of
nothing else.

In the ritual of the Greek Church the offices of betrothal
and coronation (the marriage proper) constitute two sep-
arate services. For a second marriage the two are com-
bined in the abbreviated office called simply a marriage
service. In former years in Syria the betrothal service was
used at the time of the actual engagement to marry, which
might precede the wedding by an indefinite period. The
sanctity of the service, however, was threatened by the
scandal of broken engagements, hence some twenty years
ago, so I am told, the formal betrothal service was post-
poned to the time of the wedding, and a shorter service was
authorized for the time of contract, it being stipulated that
the party breaking the engagement should pay a certain sum.

1 Divorce is permitted by the Greek Church but not by the Uniatc
Bodies. A Greek lawyer informed me that a man may divorce his
wife for adultery and for conspiring to kill him. A woman may di-
vorce her husband on the latter but not on the former ground.