That is an interesting subject. I’ll have to see what Rabbi Daniel Lapin says about this (American Alliance of Jews and Christians).
It may have allowed polygamy as an act of mercy, but it also mentioned many wrongs of Israel. The fact that it mentioned wrongs is not evidence of approval.
The prophets often mentioned that, because Israel chose to worship Baal, many curses was pronounced on the state of Israel. Polygamy may have been one of those curses because we know today that polygamy often makes a society more violent because it leaves many males without hope for a mate.
Rabbi Lapin says
“Years of slavery in Egypt damaged Jewish family life. For its very first ritual as a nation, God gathered the Israelites, not into political, tribal, gender, or labor groupings but into individual families. By asserting the bond between husband, wife and children, God was reestablishing the importance of the family as society’s fundamental element. Hence, rule number one.”
Anyone who interprets their reading of The Bible “allowing” polygamy has a reading for comprehension problem. Polygamy stories ALWAYS go South and many of our wourld’s problems today can be traced straight as an arrow back to these disasters thousands of years ago.
Hardness of heart is also behind the example of the rabbi who married hundreds of women and provided them with food. There was a famine, the author says ... but obviously there was enough food, or the rabbi wouldn't have it for his wives. The problem was hardness of heart when it came to distribution ... and apparently nobody was willing to help a starving woman unless he got to use her for sex.
Fortunately it was late '80s and I wasn't sent up for a Courts Martial....
Polygamy is evil. Justifications are BS. 300 wives to solve a famine problem? Really? The Rabbi had what? Massive grain silos? Sounds like Soviet-style socialism to me. He obviously didn’t work for those grain silos.
I realize that a lot of things happened in history that shouldn’t be judged by today’s standards. At the same time we shouldn’t bend over backwards to apologize for the bad behavior of ancient wrong-doers. If you have 300 wives you are a slave-holder. Ok so slavery was part of the ancient world, yes. But please don’t call it Good.
Won’t discuss. It is incoherent babbling by an aged Rabbi.
If polygamy isn’t Biblical marriage then how did Solomon get away with it?
Polygamy, when mentioned in the Old Testament, didn’t seem to turn out so good- Solomon’s kingdom failed after his death, there was strife between Ishmael and Isaac, Joseph getting sold into slavery, etc. The moral of the story seems to be, one wife would be the ideal. Societies today that permit polygamy- well, is Yemen the height of civilization? Or anywhere in the Middle East?
I would submit that the highest point of Western Civilization was that of the US in 1962, and that that civilization did not permit polygamy (or same-sex marriage). I would submit this proposition- the Republican party was right to label polygamy along with slavery as ‘twin relics of barbarism’ in its 1856 platform. I would also say that a reversion to such barbarism as we are seeing now is a sign of a crumbling civilization that will not deserve to survive.
I do not like to get into the religious aspects of polygamy any more than I do of using tobacco..
But will just say although I don`t think it would be for me I see no where that it is forbidden.
Abraham who was called the friend of God had two wives and Jacob the father of the tribes of Israel had four.
Regardless of what our feelings are on any particular subject we should not try to make the bible say what it does not say nor should we take away from it.
People will go to any extremes to try to prove their point including going to writings which was not considered worthy enough to be included in the bible to begin with.
And the sad part is most of this comes from people who believe in idealism or control more than they believe in the word of god.
But there is a bright side, it is tearing the whore of Babylon and her daughters apart which is what the word of God predicts.
I’m so sick of hearing the word “Biblical” it makes me want to throw up.
God is the final authority. A living breathing God. But I digress.
Marriage is not just a good idea. Marriage is a commandment of God.
1 Cor:
11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.
This was not just a suggestion. God set it up this way so that two halves will make a whole. We learn and grow from this union.
Polygamy was given to man by God, to be practiced under certain circumstances. But only when he commands it. The reason is easy to see; there are more women than men. So He provided away that everyone could be married.
This is why it’s human nature for woman to crave social interaction with other women. Men don’t require interaction at all from other men.
When the government forced the LDS Church to stop it’s practice, it was the women that marched and protested against this ban. Yup, the women wanted it. If you read the personal journals of the men at that time, the men described polygamy as one big headache. I thought that was ironic and humorous.
In the millennium, after Christ’s return, God will reinstate polygamy -for a time.
Isaiah 4:
1 And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach.
Their “reproach” is that they are not married. Marriage is so important that women will basically beg a righteous man to take on his name after it’s importance is revealed in the millennium.
With polygamy, all widows can be part of a family and need not be alone.
This is why homosexuality is such an abomination. Homosexuality takes you to the opposite place of God’s intent. It so thoroughly destroys God’s plan of happiness for each person. Homosexuality is nothing but evil.
1 Cor 11
11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.
Polygamy can be righteously practiced if God commands it. Polygamy was acceptable on a restricted basis under the law of Moses.
Anyways...
Adam and Eve represent what God had in mind: Jesus Christ and his bride, the church.
The Sinaitic system of Torah wasn’t what God had in mind from the beginning, what it does is condemn man to spiritual death as a sinner, the old covenant being a covenant of death, the solution to the problem of sin found only in Christ’s blood, our atonement. The Torah being but a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.
Likewise the polygamy practiced by Judaism in the old tesament. God had in mind monogamous marriage as seen in Adam and Eve. Polygamy is not what God predestined from the beginning, he predestined one man one woman in natural marriage, religiously one bridegroom (Christ) one bride (the church).
God made promise to Abraham of a singular “seed” through whom all nations of the earth would be blessed, Gen. 22:17, that seed was Christ. The Torah which came later was but parenthetical, “till the seed should come to whom the promise was made:”
“Wherefore then serveth the law (the Torah, or the old covenant)? It was added (a parenthetical addition) because of transgressions, till the seed should come (Christ) to whom the promise was made,” Gal. 3:19.
It is to be expected that this Rabbi would be an advocate of polygamy, the Torah and polygamy being peas of the same pod. Christians who believe the New Testament, which teaches monogamy, believe one man one woman is God’s ideal.
There's nothing to discuss. This is all governed by the Torah which G-d gave Israel at Sinai.
As rare as polygyny has been among Jews for millenia, it is still technically permitted by the Torah and any attempt to deny this or to claim that G-d has since changed this rule is to engage in "adding to or subtracting from" the Torah--forbidden activities.
Jewish interest ping!
Because it is a great improvement over burning the widow on the husband's pyre and selling your excess females into prostitution.
conjugal rights for 300 women??? I’m so sure.