Biblioblogs.com, a site dedicated to keeping track of Bible related blogs, has just updated its list of blogs. One of the new ones is a blog called Biblical Foundations, a blog that is not directly related to biblical studies but is more of a cultural critique.

One of the recent posts on Biblical Foundations is concerned with the idea of polygamy and argues against the practice of polygamy in the United States. Although I am not interested in engaging the cultural issue, since it seems to be arguing against something that very few are arguing for, I did want to address his use of the Bible in his argument.

Kostenberger’s argument is that monogamy is the norm in the Bible and polygamy is a result of the fall. He states,

Scripture is unequivocal that having multiple wives constituted a departure from God’s plan for marriage. This is conveyed not only in Scripture verses that seem univocally to prohibit polygamy (cf. Deut. 17:17; Lev. 18:18), but also from the sin and general disorder that polygamy produced in the lives of those who engaged in the practice.

There are two parts to his argument: (1) the Bible condemns polygamy, and (2) the practice of polygamy produces sin and disorder. I wanted to address both of these assertions.

First, it is hardly the cases that the Old Testament prohibits polygamy. Leviticus 18:18, which Kostenberger quotes as being against polygamy, actually assumes that polygamy is the norm. It forbids a man from taking two sisters as wives at the same time. But this assumes that polygamy is acceptible when the two wives are not sisters. If this verse had wanted to prohibit polygamy, it would have said that taking two women as wives at the same time was forbidden. But it doesn’t say that.

The other passage, Deuteronomy 17:17, forbids the king from having many wives. But that does not mean that it limits him to only one wife. And the reason it gives is not that polygamy is wrong but that having many wives would turn the kings heart away from God. In fact, when Nathan confronted David about having taken Bathsheba in 2 Samuel 11, he says that David is wrong for committing adultery, not because he is committing polygamy. And if Leviticus 18:18 had already prohibited polygamy as Kostenberger asserts, there would be no reason for a second law forbidding many wives for the king, since he would have been covered under Leviticus 18:18.

As for Kostenberger’s second argument, that polygamy leads to sin and general disorder, such could also be said for cases of monogamy. On the whole, polygamous families do not seem to have any more or less family strife in the Bible than monogomous ones. In addition, God used polygamy to fulfill his promise to Abraham. The promise of numerous offspring comes about when Jacob takes two wives (and two concubines!), who bear him the twelve ancestors of the tribes of Israel. Kostenberger’s statement that

Scripture everywhere insists that individuals who abandoned God’s design of monogamy and participated in polygamy did so contrary to the Creator’s plan and ultimately to their own detriment.

is simply not accurate. Scripture nowhere insists that Jacob was wrong when he engaged in polygamy. Monogamy may have been the norm in the Old Testament, but polygamy was certainly not prohibited.

Of course, none of this should be taken to mean that I endorse polygamy. I don’t. The only thing this post is meant to endorse is sound exegesis.

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