A discussion on the morality of polygamy

[gogoGoddess]

Here is what I am afraid of: going to bed with the same woman day after day for years. Eventually, perhaps not after long, she gets fat. She gets whiny. She gets old. All you guys who are married know what I am talking about.

That is enough to persuade me to remain single for the rest of my life. But then I am missing out on children. Children need at least two parents. If I never get married, I'll never have a Xerox copy of myself to successfully raise and make up for all my personal shortcomings.

Polygamy solves both problems. After my first wife gets fat/old/whiny/whatever, I can stop hitting her and start hitting a sweet young one instead. Maybe my wives would even keep themselves desirable to compete for my attention.

I could do this only when I am rich. If I ever get rich, that is what I plan to do.

So sad for you! When you care enough about the person you're with and especially yourself, you wouldn't allow yourself to go to pot, actually bettering yourself comes to mind--just ask my Ex!
I've seen more men fall into that fat-flabby lazy excuse for a bread winner, be better excuses for lazy-boy ads than husbands, muchless lovers---I've worked harder and made better money than most men I know, and I could careless about competing for some foolish mans attention----thats your insecurity.
Money doesn't make the man (or woman) charactor does.
Perhaps when you decide to reproduce, may there be fresh chlorine added that day or atomic fallout will make you sterile.
May God be with you!

 

[gogoGoddess]

That is a funny post it really did make me smile...However you are growing one day older every day just as she is.
You probably will build a shed over your tools your hair may become thin and gray..... what you have left.
You probably become grouchy more than she ever could.
Do you want to hear more..lol

I applaud your charge at his accusations, although funny, he lonesome and sounds shallow

 

[stray bullet]

That, or he is just having fun....

 

[jingwei]

Can you show us where he says that he no longer tolerates this behavior? I missed those passages.

Sorry, I was wrong. But the NT does state a new covenent. As for passages questioning polygamy,

Gen. 2:18-24 ,Gen. 2:21-24,Gen. 4:19,Eph. 5:31, Malachi 2:14 - Covenant of marriage is with one woman, Eph. 5:23,Eph. 4:4. Lamech, a descendant of Cain (4:17-18), originated polygamy.

C. The Customary Practice Of Handmaids Became The Norm, And Was Attended By Grief, Pain And Strife.
Sarah & Hagar - Gen. 16:1-6.
( Sarah's solution to her barrenness in view of God's promise -- but it was not God's solution.
This polygamous relationship produced conflict, grief & pain for all involved.)
Isaac, the some of promise - only one wife (Rebekah) - Gen. 24:67.
Esau deliberately entered polygamy, which marriages brought grief to Isaac and Rebekah - Gen. 26:34-35.
Jacob stumbled into polygamy through the deceit of Laban - Gen. 29:18, 27-28.
Envy of Rachel & Leah led to his taking Bilhah & Zilpah as wives - Gen. 30:1-13.
Jealousy, competition, conflict, hatred and deception resulted from these polygamous marriages! I do remind you Jacob's uncle was a pagan who worshipped false gods. Thus polygamy may be from pagan traditions.

Check Hebrews 11 to see how the faith of those polygamous men is comended and held up to all as our example.

David - Family life filled with turmoil (Amnon & Tamar; Absalom murdered Amnon and tried to usurp the throne, took his father's wives in public). God called him a bloody man and prophecied curses against him.
Solomon - 700 wives and 300 concubines (secondary wives) - They turned his heart away from God unto idols. His kingship threatened by god to be destroyed.
Kings of Israel were told to not practice polygamy - - Deut. 17:17


Monogamy Is The Rule For Marriage Which God Intended "From The Beginning" - Matt. 19:4-6; 1 Cor. 7:2 (Eph. 5:22-32).
Yeshua emphasizes "not two but one"twice Matt. 19:4-6

Yes it does, but the word used to describe that oneness is Echad (Heb.) which is not one as in "singular" or numerically, it is one in regard to unity. It is the same "one" that is used in the text " Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD". So the word lends itself to plurality.

Read above. Matt. 19:4-6

This is why there were never any charges brought against the OT saints...they were doing nothing wrong!!!!

God tolerated polygamy, but I haven't found a single polygamy marriage in the bible which didn't lead to trouble. If you find any, please let me know.
About doing nothing wrong, please read above about god's curse on David.
[/QUOTEAnd when God told David "I would have given you more", who are we to say that He would not say the same now? He has given us no indication as such.[/QUOTE]
He would have given David more WEALTH and POWER, not women, as you're misquoting. He would have given him more if he did not use polygamy as an excuse for adultery.

Overall, The Law of the convenent in the OT discouraged polygamy (Limited to the wealthy - Exo. 21:10; Deut. 21:15-16. The cost of polygamous marriages would necessarily limit and lessen the practice.), and you would realize that aside from Abraham, Jacob, the kings and some others, all the rest of the people in the bible had one wife, including the old testament. In the new testament I couldn't find any polygamous Christians. If you found any, I'm sorry ,I want to know and be corrected of any mistakes.

 

[jingwei]

Commanding something is not merely "allowing" it.

What are you talking about? When did YHWH command polygamy?

I don't really see your argument here, though.

I'm trying to say that God no longer tolerates it because no CHristians recoirded in the NT were polygamists..

I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.

When you're obsessing over this that you absolutely HAVE to justify polygamy then you have a faith problem. If you can't understand it then I have nothing to say.

We're not talking about "insisting on multiple wives". When a friend of mine and I were involved with the same woman, she wasn't "insisting on multiple husbands". She wasn't thinking "if one of these people leaves, I have to start looking around for a replacement". But... She loved two people, and didn't see any reason to choose between them.

By Christian morality this isn't polygamy, this is adultery and premarital sex. Sorry to offend you, but I can't hide the truth to please another person.

Well, it may say that, but it also refers to David's multiple wives as "wives". In a way, each such relationship is a distinct marriage, joining two people... But more pragmatically, that's the default and most common case. The Bible doesn't always bother to explain the special cases, exceptions, and rare circumstances; we are assumed to be thinking creatures.

The bible did explain it. Please give me an example of a happy polygamous marriage in the bible. You won't find any.

If you are right, and the bible favours polygamy, then at least half of the hebrew people SHOULD be polygamous. but that was and is not the case.

 

[Seeking...]

Any reason for being bisexual? Do you think intimacy has to exist by all members to work?

I had described this as my ideal marriage and as I am bisexual - I just imagined it would be easier if all the marriage partners were of similar orientations. In general, I don't think physical intimacy between all partners would be neccesary for it to work. I do however believe that all partners must be emotionally intimate - otherwise you end up with some partners who have no relation to each other except through a mutual spouse. I would think that would be quite trying. How would those two manage when the "buffer" spouse was say out of town on business? I think all partners would need to have strong relationships with each other separate and independent of the group dynamic.

 

[Eph. 3:20]

Wow...
I will attempt to answer each argument in a seprate massage due to the amount of passages you have quoted. Please let me finish before you start to refute any of these. Thanks for the dialogue.

Sorry, I was wrong. But the NT does state a new covenent. As for passages questioning polygamy,

Gen. 2:18-24 ,Gen. 2:21-24,Gen. 4:19,Eph. 5:31, Malachi 2:14 - Covenant of marriage is with one woman, Eph. 5:23,Eph. 4:4. Lamech, a descendant of Cain (4:17-18), originated polygamy.

You seem to be throwing verses at me. Each Scripture verse has it's own context and subject matter. Just because the word marriage used in each does not mean they have the same definition for each passage. I would suggest a class in Biblical huermenutics (I say this lovingly, not with spite).

Genesis 2:24 "The creation account"

We all come to accept this term "the creation account" as true and valid, for it is. The woman in marriage completes her husband, for she was created from him. He is incomplete without her. It is from this passage that our "monogamy only" is believed to originate. The story itself is "the creation account." All we can say for certain about Gen 2:24 is that originated human life on this earth by creating one of each sex. The Bible does not say He did so "because it was His will that one man is to be married to one woman for life, excluding all others." If that was God's intention He did not say so. If a case is to be made for that it will have to be made from some other Scripture. However, once married, it is a lifetime comittment (Matt. 19), that is what's meant from Jesus' statement "from the beginning." Once brought together, they are not to seperate.

When men began to practice polygamy there was never a single word to correct this practice. Yet as zealous as Jehovah is for righteousness, holiness and truth, He never corrected those that would serve forever as His prime examples of faith and obedience. They all heard His voice voice; they all love His Law; they all were obedient to His commands. If God was displeased with their many wives and concubines, why did He not say so and correct it at the outset of human history so that it would not flourish and become common practice? And if we declare that God was displeased with polygamy, on basis do we do so? God doesn't indicate displeasure in any way. And He most certainly makes no statement to the effect that monogamy is His will forever for all men. Such ideas are not derived from Scripture, they are placed upon Scripture in spite of actual contrary evidence.

God gives us no instruction that monogamy is the only way a marriage is allowed to function. If it is infered, then it is our human inference, for there is no Divine Statement. The story is a physiological story and not a sociological story. The two come together "and be fruitful and mulitply."

The context of the passage is a narration of the creation of the sexes and the biological function at how life is to reproduce. The account reveals itself with no children, but gives us the capacity to "be fruitful and mulitply." Just as there are no children in the account, there are no other wives, but God gives us the capacity for more. There is direct command to "go get more wives," because again, it is the creation account...it's physiological, not sociological.

We cannot condemn, with one breath, polygamy because it falls outside of the Divine Plan, and then, at the same time, uphold celibacy and singleness, for they too fall outside of this Divine exemplar but are later upheld (Matt. 19:12, 1 Cor. 7:1) just as many wives are counted on as a blessing (2 Sam.12:7,8) It is clear in God's observance of human history over thousands of years that both singleness, monogamy and polygamy are acceptable practices within the human experience. He has not said a word to discourage any and there is no Divine Statement, Law or Principle that any of these violate.

Eph. 3:20

 

[Eph. 3:20]

Malachi 2:14 - Covenant of marriage is with one woman, Eph. 5:23,Eph. 4:4.

Okay the Malachi passage..
The subject matter is divorce. OT saints had fallen into the practice of disgarding their wives for other wives. This is expressly condemned in Scripture. That's what Genesis talks about. Once the two have become one, they are not to sperate. Moses allowed for divorce in the Law but men had corrupted the intention of that allowance and used it to walk away from their responsibility to thier wife. The passage does not speak to the well established practice of polygamy.

The Eph. passages talk about the marriage of Christ and the Church. What is the Church...many members. Each one of us that have accepted His covenant will be married to Him. Yikes..I'll be married to a man! (that's a different subject though)

Sarah & Hagar - Gen. 16:1-6.
( Sarah's solution to her barrenness in view of God's promise -- but it was not God's solution.This polygamous relationship produced conflict, grief & pain for all involved.) Isaac, the some of promise - only one wife (Rebekah) - Gen. 24:67.Esau deliberately entered polygamy, which marriages brought grief to Isaac and Rebekah - Gen. 26:34-35.
Jacob stumbled into polygamy through the deceit of Laban - Gen. 29:18, 27-28.Envy of Rachel & Leah led to his taking Bilhah & Zilpah as wives - Gen. 30:1-13.
Jealousy, competition, conflict, hatred and deception resulted from these polygamous marriages! I do remind you Jacob's uncle was a pagan who worshipped false gods. Thus polygamy may be from pagan traditions.

We talked earlier in this post about conflict. Basic premise..the more people you get involved, the more conflict you have. This is human nature. It's just as true about marriage as it is for a church, but we don't set limits on church growth. The quality of a marriage or church is only as good as the people involved within it.


Eph. 3:20

 

[Eph. 3:20]

David - Family life filled with turmoil (Amnon & Tamar; Absalom murdered Amnon and tried to usurp the throne, took his father's wives in public). God called him a bloody man and prophecied curses against him.
Solomon - 700 wives and 300 concubines (secondary wives) - They turned his heart away from God unto idols. His kingship threatened by god to be destroyed. Kings of Israel were told to not practice polygamy - - Deut. 17:17

Yes David's life was filled with turmoil. And the penalty he endured was directly related to his stealing another man's wife (adultery), that's why his son was allowed to take his concubines from him and have sex with them in broad daylight. He was a bloody man because he commisioned the murder of Uriah, the husband of the wife that he stole.

The Duet. passage speaks more about greed than it does anything else. Rulers were allowed to acquire riches, wives and horses etc... but this was not to be their primary goal.

Monogamy Is The Rule For Marriage Which God Intended "From The Beginning" - Matt. 19:4-6; 1 Cor. 7:2 (Eph. 5:22-32).
Yeshua emphasizes "not two but one"twice Matt. 19:4-6

The subject of the Matt. passage is divorce, not mulitple wives. Jesus is saying the same thing the Malachi passage says..you cannot divorce your wife for any trivial reason. He says nothing about the well established practice of polygamy.

1 Cor. 7:2 talks about being married as opposed to being single and being led into some kind of fornication brought about by the "present distress" (vs. 26).
The subject matter for this is not monogamy vs. polygamy.

God tolerated polygamy, but I haven't found a single polygamy marriage in the bible which didn't lead to trouble. If you find any, please let me know.

They all had strife and conflict..even the monogamous ones.

About doing nothing wrong, please read above about god's curse on David.....And when God told David "I would have given you more", who are we to say that He would not say the same now? He has given us no indication as such.
He would have given David more WEALTH and POWER, not women, as you're misquoting. He would have given him more if he did not use polygamy as an excuse for adultery.

No, I'm sorry you're wrong. The rebuke that David was given by Nathan was in direct response to the stealing of another man's wife. David didn't steal wealth and power, he stole another man's wife and thus God says...If all of this had been to little, I would have given you more." (2 Sam. 12:8) He is being rebuked about stealing another man's wife...see the parable that Nathan gives him in 2 Sam. 12 1-4, which is a direct analogy of his transgressions.

Overall, The Law of the convenent in the OT discouraged polygamy (Limited to the wealthy - Exo. 21:10; Deut. 21:15-16. The cost of polygamous marriages would necessarily limit and lessen the practice.), and you would realize that aside from Abraham, Jacob, the kings and some others, all the rest of the people in the bible had one wife, including the old testament.

These passages have more to do with upholding polygamy that discouraging them. The premise is that you cannot diminish the rights of the first wife to have a relationship with a secon, third or fourth wife. You cannot divorce her to marry another without just cause (adultery). The culture of early Israel revolved around tribal lineage. A woman who slept with somebody outside of her husband was thought of as damaged. How was the husband than to know if the baby she was carrying was in fact his? Lineage and inheritance was vital to the cultural progression.

In the new testament I couldn't find any polygamous Christians. If you found any, I'm sorry ,I want to know and be corrected of any mistakes.

1 Tim. 3:2 talks about the "husband of one wife" for Pastors, elders and deacons. One must ask the question, Why would Paul say this if polygamy wasn't already known to be in the church at Ephesus? And then moreover, if polygamy is the moral scourge that many say it is...why wouldn't Paul, in this very instance where he's discussing the subject already, condemn it, or advise against it, for the rest of the general church population? We can go even more in depth with this passage as the word one "Mia" (Gk) does not represent a numerical word always but in the Epistles represents "first" or "one" of many.

Again, thanks for the discussion.

Eph. 3:20

 

[seebs]

What are you talking about? When did YHWH command polygamy?

Levirate marriage, among others. If your older brother dies childless, you must marry his wife, even if you are already married. Failure to do so is a grave offense.

I'm trying to say that God no longer tolerates it because no CHristians recoirded in the NT were polygamists..

The NT doesn't even tell us whether the people described are married at all; it doesn't matter. The closest we see is the advice that a bishop be "a man of one wife". If that's a special requirement on bishops, what does that say about everyone else?

When you're obsessing over this that you absolutely HAVE to justify polygamy then you have a faith problem. If you can't understand it then I have nothing to say.

I don't "have to" justify anything. I'm merely observing that there is no condemnation.

By Christian morality this isn't polygamy, this is adultery and premarital sex. Sorry to offend you, but I can't hide the truth to please another person.

Are you implying that people who disagree aren't really Christians?

By some peoples' morality, remarriage after a divorce isn't remarriage, it's adultery. Other people disagree. Apparently, Christians are not unified in their belief about what the exact rules of marriage are.

The bible did explain it. Please give me an example of a happy polygamous marriage in the bible. You won't find any.

I dunno, Abraham seemed happy.

If you are right, and the bible favours polygamy, then at least half of the hebrew people SHOULD be polygamous. but that was and is not the case.

This is a total non-sequitur and a straw man, I'm impressed.

I'm not saying the Bible "favors" polygamy. I'm saying it "never forbids" polygamy. And I would expect that most people would never be polygamous, because there are practical reasons for us to avoid it.

You might as well say that, if the Bible really "favors" a priesthood, at least half of all Hebrews should have been priests. Not everyone is called to every possible life.

 

[Buzz Dixon]

Polygamy leads to violence.

You don't believe me, check any history book about any society where the rulers were allowed to have more than one wife. Invariably conspiracies, assassinations, and civil war is the out come.

A few years back I read an article that laid a lot of the Middle East's cutural problems on young men longing for a full-time father, not one who divided his attention among several mothers. This leads to the strange love/hate relationship Middle Eastern males often have with females (I would say "Madonna/harlot complex" but that's the wrong theology ).

Anyway, the bottom line of the article was that Middle Eastern culture was warped because a significant portion of the males throughout its history had always been searching for a loving father and never really got one. This manifests itself in many ways, not the least is the Islamic concept of Allah as being distant and remote and arbitray, not kind and loving and personal as Christians know God.

 

[seebs]

Er, dude.

Check out any society where humans have leaders. Invariably, conspiracies, assassinations, and civil war are among the many, many, outcomes.

When people come up with these theories about how every deviation from the way they grew up is the cause of all the ills of the world, I generally manage to keep the mockery to polite snickering, but it's really hard to take it seriously; it's never particularly well researched or supported, and mostly the concept of "control groups" is simply ignored.

 

[Buzz Dixon]

Societies with clear lines of succession among the leaders do not have rival princelings duking it out with one another.

In a lot of cultures, the first act of the new king was to either kill all his male siblings and half-siblings, or else have them castrated.

 

[seebs]

Societies with clear lines of succession among the leaders do not have rival princelings duking it out with one another.

In a lot of cultures, the first act of the new king was to either kill all his male siblings and half-siblings, or else have them castrated.

Well, er.

Let's just say that I'm not gonna take those people as a moral example, 'k?

 

[stray bullet]

Can you explain how exactly polygamy leads to violence?

Adolf Hitler had a mustache, doesn't mean anyone with one is a murderer.

 

[Buzz Dixon]

Stalin had a mustache too. And look at all those guys in those Errol Flynn movies...

 

[seek2find]

Maybe this is a different topic, but isn't the question more about polyamory, not polygamy? I know there is a lot of evidence in the Bible concerning marriages with only 2 people involved, but many of those same people had concubines.

As far as it causing conflict...well, it seems the main ingredient for conflict is people, irregardless of marriage views.

 

[goodoldboy]

Hmmmm; how much of that do you think is YOUR FAULT? Do you help with the cleaning? Vacuuming? Dishes? When is the last time you brought her FLOWERS for no reason? Or shaved, put on a SUIT, and took her to a nice restaurant?

When is the last time you told her she was BEAUTIFUL, and/or that you LOVED her?

Do you expect her to always be a MODEL, trim and styled for you? What reason do you give her to BE that for you?

Women need VALIDATION. Do you? If a husband thinks his wife is fat, does he invite her to play RAQUETBALL or TENNIS or go HIKING with him? Does he think that maybe, just maybe, her self-esteem might influence her weight, and HE MIGHT INFLUENCE HER SELF-ESTEEM???

If you want green grass, you gotta CARE for it; feed it, weed it, keep it trim. Stomp on it enough, and it ain't green no mo'.

I don't mean to come off harsh here; just wondering how many guys think "marriage" is reason to stop DATING? It isn't. Call the wife, and ask her out. Often. And do things for her --- she's not a "waitress" and "personal valet". Doing housework is the most loving act you can do for a woman.

Marriage is the union between two souls. If you don't want the solidarity, if you want SHALLOW and MEANINGLESS, and no foundation to nurture healthy child psyches, then by all means don't marry. But if you are MATURE and want MEANING, and know how to WORK at making life GOOD, there is nothing better than marriage. But nowadays we don't wanna work at things, do we?

I haven't done any of those things, Ben johnson. I wouldn't even if I was married. Why would I need to help with the cleaning and cooking if I work all day and pay the bills? I would never tell her that she is beautiful, because then she might think I am a nice guy. And you know what women think of nice guys. Or maybe you don't. Well, I'll tell you: nice guys get kicked to the curb because they don't appeal to a woman's mating instincts. Women love the jerks.

But I would invite her to exercise if that is what it takes to keep her from being a fatty. But chances are I would prefer a woman who can keep slim on her own.

That's me, shallow and meaningless. That's why I would prefer polygamy. I gotta keep my women competing for my attention or else they stop caring. Being nice really isn't going to make her care for you.

 

[gogoGoddess]

once again, Good Ole' Boy, has demonstrated his lack of tact and his selfish indulgence.
Luckily, I know your shallowness is only measured by your lack of comprehending the amount of time to really know another. And by far you are the only real jerk I have had the pleasure of not really knowing.

 

[seebs]

I think we can safely say that he's joking.