The first instance of polygamy / bigamy in the Bible was Lamech in Genesis 4:19, “Lamech married two women…” Several prominent men in the Old Testament were polygamists. Abraham, Jacob, David, Solomon, and others all had multiple wives. Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines (essentially wives of a lower status) according to 1 Kings 11:3. What are we to do with these instances of polygamy in the Old Testament? There are three questions that need to be answered. (1) Why did God allow polygamy in the Old Testament? (2) How does God view polygamy today? (3) Why did it change?
(1) Why did God allow polygamy in the Old Testament? The Bible does not specifically say why God allowed polygamy. The best anyone can do is “informed” speculation. There are a few key items to consider. First, there has always been more women in the world than men. Current statistics show that approximately 50.5% of the world population are women, with men being 49.5%. Assuming the same percentages in ancient times, and multiplied by millions of people, there would be tens of thousands more women than men. Second, warfare in ancient times was especially brutal, with an incredibly high rate of fatality. This would have resulted in an even greater percentage of women to men. Third, due to the patriarchal societies, it was nearly impossible for a woman to provide for herself. Women were often uneducated and untrained. Women relied on their fathers, brothers, and husbands for provision and protection. Unmarried women were often subjected to prostitution and slavery. Fourth, the significant difference between the number of women and men would have left many, many women in an undesirable situation (to say the least).
So, it seems that God allowed polygamy to protect and provide for the women who could not find a husband otherwise. A man would take multiple wives, and serve as the provider and protector of all of them. While definitely not ideal, living in a polygamist household was far better than the alternatives: prostitution, slavery, starvation, etc. In addition to the protection / provision factor, polygamy enabled a much faster expansion of humanity, fulfilling God’s command to “be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth” (Genesis 9:7). Men are capable of impregnating multiple women in the same time period…causing humanity to grow much faster than if each man was only able to produce one child each year. Again, these are only “informed” speculations.
(2) How does God view polygamy today? The Bible says that God’s original intention was for one man to be married to only one woman, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife (not wives); and they shall become one flesh (not multiple fleshes)” (Genesis 2:24). We see in Deuteronomy 17:14-20, that the kings were not supposed to multiply wives. This most definitely puts Solomon in direct disobedience against the Lord.
In the New Testament, 1 Timothy 3:2, 12 and Titus 1:6 give “the husband of one wife” in a list of qualifications for spiritual leadership. While these qualifications are only specifically for positions of spiritual leadership, they apply equally to all Christians. Should not all Christians be “above reproach … temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money” (1 Timothy 3:2-4)? If we are called to be holy (1 Peter 1:16), and if these standards are holy for elders and deacons, then they are holy for all. Ephesians 5:22-33, speaking of the relationship between husbands and wives, when referring to a husband (singular) always also refers to a wife (singular). “…for the husband is the head of the wife (singular) … He who loves his wife (singular) loves himself. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife (singular), and the two will become one flesh … each one of you also must love his wife (singular) as he loves himself, and the wife (singular) must respect her husband.” There is absolutely no allowance for polygamy for followers of Jesus Christ.
(3) Why did it change? It is not as much God disallowing something He previously allowed as it is God restoring marriage to His original intent. According to Genesis 2:24, polygamy was not God’s original intent. God seems to have allowed polygamy to solve a problem…but it was God’s desire for the problem never to have occurred. In most modern societies, there is absolutely no need for polygamy. In most cultures today, women are able to provide for and protect themselves – removing the only “positive” aspect of polygamy. Are there some instances in which the allowance for polygamy would still apply today? Perhaps…but it is unfathomable that there would be no other possible solution. It is our firm belief that polygamy does not honor the intent and sanctity of marriage – and most importantly – does not honor God.
SoLo Lives! Ministry 
June 4, 2008 at 6:15 pm
Greetings,
There is so much to say that I can’t even begin. However, I will share a couple thoughts based upon your outline.
Your Introduction:
God allowance for polygyny has never changed.
Part (1):
A. He allowed polygyny for the same reasons He allows any Godly family.
B. The fact that the population is about 50/50 male and female ration does not prove that God is anti-polygyny. Scholars suggest that the very height of Israeli Hisotry less than 10% ever practiced it. It would never throw off the balance. In fact, it could be the answer to the single mother problem in most countries.
C. Women still need protection in our society.
D. We are still encouraged to be fruitful and multiply.
Part (2):
A. Yes, it does say joined to his wife. However, it does not say man cannot have more than one wife that he is joined to. A man can be joined to his wife number two as well as his wife number one. This is simply reading into the text a theological presupposition. In other words, a man can be joined to a thousand women (in theory), one woman at a time. How do we know this is true? Because Apostle Paul made it clear that when a man has sex with a harlot, he is one flesh with that harlot, whether that man is married or not.
B. Deuteronomy 17:14-20 is taken out of context. It did not say that a king could not have more than one wife. It said that he was not supposed to “hoard” a bunch of wives.
C. “mia” (one) can be translated as “first” or an indefinate article in these verses (1 Tim 3:2, 12; Titus1:6). “one” is not the only option.
D. You said, “While these qualifications are only specifically for positions of spiritual leadership, they apply equally to all Christians.” Interesting! This would imply that it is sin to be living as a single man, then.
E. You said, “Ephesians 5:22-33, speaking of the relationship between husbands and wives, when referring to a husband (singular) always also refers to a wife (singular). “…for the husband is the head of the wife (singular) … He who loves his wife (singular) loves himself. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife (singular), and the two will become one flesh … each one of you also must love his wife (singular) as he loves himself, and the wife (singular) must respect her husband.” You are assuming that singular discounts plural in these passages. If I say that the boss is the head of his business, this does not require that he isn’t the head of more than one business, nor does it imply that he cannot have more than one business. If I say that a husband is to love his child, this not not necessarily mean that he cannot love more children. From my perspective, you are trying to force this passage into what you want it to say.
Part (3):
A. Genesis 2:24 does not say that this was God’s intent anymore than Genesis 2:5-9 suggest God’s only intent for man was to be a farmer. This is a fallacy of logic! Moreover, there is no command, nor suggestion anywhere in the text that this was is only idea concerning marriage!
B. You said, “God seems to have allowed polygamy to solve a problem…but it was God’s desire for the problem never to have occurred.” If polygyny is sin, you are suggesting that God allowed sin? If polygyny isn’t sin, then where are the clear prohibitions?
God did not change His Moral Law which included plural covenantal marriages. Man has drifted away from His truth.
June 16, 2008 at 2:30 pm
I think the fact of the matter is, God looks at the heart. In today’s society does anyone SERIOUSLY believe that a man takes multiple wives for THEIR benefit!?
NO. He does it because of his corrupt sin nature, his sex drive, his inability to stay with one woman; and so he justfies it by taking multiple wives.
If you REALLY love a woman you will be with her, and her alone. It is very selfish to expect her to “share” you, especially these days when people live MUCH shorter lives and have less time for the people they love.
There is no need to complicate it by adding extra women. There is no necessity, and these days a woman is not in any particular danger simply because she is single. So why would a man, in these social circumstances, wish to marry more than one woman? It is no favour to her. It may have been thousands of years ago, a fair exchange of sorts. But today the only reason a man does this is through selfishness, which is the OPPOSITE of love, and in complete contradiction to God’s Law.
Just because God tolerates sin for a time does not justify it. He has tolerated all of us in all our sin on many occassions. That does not justify sin, and in these last days we are to be focussed completely on Him, not justifying our sin through argument and reasoning but serving Him and living holy and separate lives.
Multiple partners is the way of the World, not God’s way. It is not condoned in the Word, and it causes dissention. That in itself is enough reason to remove it from among us and in ANY of its forms: whether it is called marriage, free love, experimentation… a sin by any other name smells just as foul.
You will know a tree by it’s fruit, and quite frankly, something smells rotten when it comes to polygamy.
July 9, 2008 at 3:57 pm
“If you REALLY love a woman you will be with her, and her alone.”
This is a tremendous assumption, essentially that you cannot love more than one person. Does that mean the the men of the Old Testament did not love their wives after the first? And if another woman loves the married man, is it not to her benefit to be able to live with him?
God does NOT tolerate sin. Ever. He would certainly not offer David more wives if it were wrong, nor remain quiet about his chosen leaders to have multiple wives. God does not change. If polygamy was not sinful then, it is not now.
Marriage to more than one person, committed, sacrificial, loving, is NOT the way of the world. The way of the world is divorce, abandonment, and serial monogamy.
July 23, 2008 at 10:30 am
PLEASE I NEED MORE NOTES ON THIS TOPIC
April 18, 2012 at 5:22 am
Ok so history has been written by men. We can rationalise till the cows come home. But if Adam can have more ‘eve’s, does that mean Eve can have more Adams? We can afford it now that we can look after Adam No.1 and No.2 By extension, what about Eve the original and now Eve the Clone? Hey, they are one and the same replica? I think we’d better stick to the original plan?
August 9, 2012 at 5:11 am
Polygamy caused strife in the lives of those men in the Bible. The first recorded polygamist was the murderer Lamech (Genesis 4:23–24). Then Esau, who despised his birthright, also caused much grief to his parents by marrying two pagan wives (Genesis 26:34-35). God also forbade the kings of Israel to have “many wives” (Deuteronomy 17:17). Look at the trouble when Israel’s kings disobeyed, including deadly sibling rivalry between David’s sons from his different wives (2 Samuel 13, 1 Kings 2); and Solomon’s hundreds of wives helped lead Solomon to idolatry (1 Kings 11:1–3). Abraham and Sarah would have been monogamous apart from a low point in their faith when Hagar became a second wife—note how much strife this caused later with Ishmael and Isaac and their descendants to this day (Genesis 16, 21). Jacob wanted only Rachel, but was tricked into marrying her older sister Leah, and later he took their slave girls at the sisters’ urging, due to the rivalry between the sisters. Jacob was hardly at a spiritual high point at those times and cause the House of Israel to fall in to a curse, and neither was David when he added Abigail and Ahinoam (1 Samuel 25:42–43). Also, Hannah, Samuel’s mother, was humiliated by her husband Elkanah’s other wife Peninnah because of Hannah’s previous barrenness (1 Samuel 1). Then why did God allow it? God’s permitting of polygamy seems more like the case of divorce, which God tolerated for a while under certain conditions because of the hardness of their hearts. But it was not the way it was intended from the beginning (Matthew 19:8). Whenever the Mosaic law had provisions for polygamy, it was always the conditional: “If he takes another wife to himself … ” (Exodus 21:10), never an encouragement. God put a number of obligations on the husband towards the additional wives, which would discourage polygamy
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April 12, 2014 at 11:42 am
Myhusband is a preacher and he married another woman from his county. And he still is married to me. My hard is broken. Because i love him. I told him out was sin. He said let God punish him than and he would take the punishment. I cried he when ahead and posted the pictures on facebook. He lays hands on people to pray for them. He day he is a man of God. This is happening here in america. I wonder will God deal with him
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