The Bible is not all Greek to you
Psalms 119:18: "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law."
Here's a bright idea: trust your English-language Bible. The Bible wasn't written in English, of course. But if you use an English Bible that was translated by honest, diligent, scholarly translators, you can rest assured that even though their translation work surely isn't perfect, you possess the true word of God. It's even better if you can use and compare multiple translations!
Sometimes it can be tempting to think that without reading the Bible in its original languages, we can't ever really understand it. What wondrous insights there must be hiding in the original languages, we think: what extra meaning which the translators cannot possibly convey in their translation!
It's true that some meaning is sometimes lost in the process of translation. Psalm 119 is an acrostic poem, for example, something that a good translation cannot replicate. But we ought never to think that we are blind without a knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. It isn't Greek and Hebrew which open our eyes to the meaning of God's word, nor is it a committee of translators. It is God who opens our eyes, through means, and he can do so with a faithful English translation just as well as he can with Greek and Hebrew.
Few people are more dangerous than novice Greek students, and I'm not the first person to say so. But I am personally qualified to say so with conviction, because I myself once a new Greek student, possessed of a little knowledge and no wisdom. I forgot that it was God who illuminates his Word, and I thought that with my newfound knowledge of Greek, I could illuminate the New Testament for myself and discover its secret insights. By mercy, God may have revealed one or two genuine insights. But I was overeager, and I found some false insights: meaning in the New Testament Greek that wasn't actually there. As I added to my knowledge, I unintentionally multiplied my ignorance. I tangibly harmed my faith and morals. I was a danger to myself and others.
I wasn't alone. There are other unwise Greek and Hebrew students out there who, like very inheritors of the Gnostic playbook, would have us believe that we are all blind, unable to see the secret insights which they, by their knowledge (which is actually just ignorance), have attained.
Blunder 1: What is adultery?
Suppose that you looked up the Hebrew and Greek words for "adultery" in dictionaries of those languages, and you found them consistently defined as a man sleeping with another man's wife, i.e., a married woman sleeping with a man other than her husband. Conspicuously absent from such definitions is any notion that the genders may be reversed: strictly speaking, if an unmarried woman slept with another woman's husband, that would not meet the above definition of adultery.
That the above definitions are fundamentally correct with respect to the Hebrew and Greek words for "adultery", no one will deny. Suppose then, that you took the strict definition of these words and enumerated the following presupposition about the Bible: any instance of adultery in the Bible must be strictly interpreted as a man sleeping with another man's wife.
You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. It is an error, a rookie mistake that I have some unfortunate experience making, to fixate on some specific aspect of a word's dictionary definition, and then to stringently hold the Biblical authors to that aspect of the definition whenever they use the word. Speakers, authors, and conversationalists alike will occasionally stretch and mirror the technical definitions of words to expand and enrich their meaning in a specific context. Our Lord, for example, was wont to do this in the context of moral teaching.
Matthew 5:28: "But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart."
Even if men and dictionaries have a very narrow definition of "adultery", it is evident that our Lord and our God has a much more expansive definition. We could quibble over whether Jesus generally meant lusting after any woman, or specifically meant lusting after another man's wife, but that would be missing the point. The same Lord who wrote for Moses on one mount, "Thou shalt not commit adultery", now preaches from another mount that the human interpretation of adultery is too narrow, and doesn't meet our Holy Father's standard.
But even Jesus' teaching on the mount begs to be interpreted a bit more broadly. If Jesus reveals the sin that is in a man's heart when he looks at a woman to lust after her, does he not also reveal the sin that is in a woman's heart when she looks at a man to lust after him? May we not safely conclude that God will account this sin to anyone who commits it, without showing partiality to their gender? Enter Mark 10:11.
Mark 10:11: "And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her."
Had we done our due diligence when we looked up definitions of the Greek words for "adultery", we would have found that while dictionaries may provide definitions, lexicons go above and beyond by giving us information about a word's usage. Thayer's Greek Lexicon, for example, gives this definition for μοιχαω: "to have unlawful intercourse with another's wife, to commit adultery with", but goes on to list cases where the word is used somewhat differently, as in various metaphorical uses across the Septuagint Bible and other Greek literature. Mark 10:11's unique use, "committeth adultery against her", is given this acknowledgment: "ἐπ' αὐτήν, commits the sin of adultery against her (i.e., that has been put away), Mark 10:11".
In English, Jesus' meaning is quite clear. He says that a man who has divorced his wife commits the sin of adultery if he marries someone else. The man does not commit the sin of adultery against another man by violating that man's marriage. Rather, he commits the sin of adultery against his (first) wife, by violating his own (first) marriage. Once again, Jesus' moral teaching has revealed that the human interpretation of adultery is too narrow, and that God has a different, more exacting definition.
If we are smart enough to be humble, we can accept the wisdom of this lexicon, and the wisdom of faithful translators, and move on. But suppose that we were hellbent on upholding our amateur presupposition that any instance of adultery in the Bible must be strictly interpreted as a man sleeping with another man's wife. Could we do it?
Such an interpretation is possible—I have seen it done and here intend to refute it—but only if even more amateur mistakes are made in interpreting the Greek. To borrow Claudius Aelianus' metaphorical use of μοιχαω, one must commit adultery with Jesus' words in order to change the meaning so drastically.
Blunder 2: What is putting away?
Mark 10:11: "And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her."
In order to change Jesus' meaning to fit the flawed presupposition, the next step is to change what he means by "put away", or απολυω. Conveniently, there's a second rookie mistake that unwise Greek students can make which suits our purpose perfectly: the mistake of assuming that when Biblical authors use two unrelated words with similar meaning, they must be intentionally distinguishing between what those two words mean.
Mark 10:2-4: "And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife? tempting him. And he answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you? And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away."
The rookie mistake here is to fixate on the fact that the verb used for "put away" (απολυω) has an origin unrelated to the words of the phrase "bill of divorce" (βιβλιον αποστασιου), and indeed that απολυω does not inherently or definitionally mean "divorce". In this way, we can insist that when Jesus and the Pharisees say "put away" without mentioning a "bill of divorce", they are not referring to a proper divorce, but to a situation where a husband sent his wife away without actually divorcing her.
But don't be fooled into thinking that just because somebody threw a few Greek words at you that they know what they're talking about. If you just read the passage in English, it's quite easy to see that even if "put away" isn't defined as "divorce" in all other contexts, that is how it is being used here. We could call it a euphemism. Accordingly, many faithful, modern translators actually translate απολυω as "divorce" in this passage! And if for some reason you don't trust their translation (even though you should), a parallel passage in Matthew can clear things up even further.
Matthew 19:7-8: "They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away? He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so."
In Matthew, Jesus' answer reveals what was obvious the whole time: that when he and the Pharisees use the word "put away", they understand that the bill of divorce is a part of that action. After all, Moses didn't allow Israelite husbands to "put away" their wives without a bill of divorce! Accordingly, when Jesus describes what Moses permitted, he doesn't even mention the Mosaic bill of divorce. He doesn't have to, because all his listeners know that "put away" refers to complete, adequately notarized divorce according to the full Mosaic law.
Blunder 3: Who is another?
Mark 10:11: "And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her."
But let's ignore the truth and carry on with our misinterpretation. So far, we've adulterated the meaning of Mark 10:11 like this: "Whosoever shall put away his wife without properly divorcing her, and marry another, committeth adultery against her." Annoyingly, this still violates our blundering presupposition that any instance of adultery in the Bible must be strictly interpreted as a man sleeping with another man's wife.
Since that first blunder was to fixate on a specific aspect of the definition of "adultery" and ruthlessly enforce that aspect even in places where we were never supposed to, perhaps this misinterpretation can save itself by doubling down and doing the same thing with a different word. Enter αλλος.
Αλλος is the word which the King James Version translates "another". The Liddell-Scott-Jones lexicon gives this definition: "another, i.e. one besides what has been mentioned". This may be a very simple meaning, but that doesn't mean the word is simple; it has quite a large variety of ways in which it can be used.
Perhaps we could be diligent and try to find one of these usages that will change Jesus' words in just the right way. But would you be surprised to learn that that's not how this misinterpretation works? Very foolishly, this misinterpretation simply ignores lexicons, for all it needs is the HELPS Word-studies definition for αλλος: "another of the same kind; another of a similar type".
Fundamentally, αλλος indicates one degree of similarity between itself and the word it relates to. The HELPS definition indicates this when it says "another of the same kind". In Mark 10:11, where "another" is used as a pronoun, it means 'another noun of the same kind'. What kind of noun? A wife. There is only one explicit degree of similarity: both "wife" and "another" are wives. Any other commonalities are incidental. Of course, if we just read the passage in English (or if we read it in Greek without being foolish), this is exactly the conclusion we would come to.
But that doesn't work for the itching-eared misinterpretation we've been learning. So what if we interpret the HELPS definition to mean 'another wife of the same kind'? Now two degrees of similarity are required: first that both are wives, and additionally that both wives are of the same kind. We know what kind of wife the first wife was: she was the kind of wife who had been put away. Thus, if two degrees of similarity are required, we will conclude that "another" is also the kind of wife who had been put away by her husband.
So now the adulteration of Mark 10:11 reads like this: "Whosoever shall put away his wife without properly divorcing her, and marry another wife who was previously put away by her former husband (who did not properly divorce her), committeth adultery against her."
At last our foolish presupposition has been satisfied. We presupposed that in order for the word "adultery" to apply, the man in Mark 10:11 had to sleep with another man's wife, even though Jesus says nothing about that. But now we see how, with a few blundering twists of our Lord's words and a completely inadequate knowledge of Greek, we can force Jesus to mean that. Indeed we could probably make Jesus mean anything we wanted him to. How convenient!
Lest I be accused of misrepresenting this blasphemy, I should add that there are a few finishing touches to the misinterpretation, relating to the phrase "against her", which I have decided neither to retell nor refute. I think I have made my point.
Mark 10:11: "And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her."
This verse means exactly what it says in the English. By the providence of God, the translators did a good job, clearly translating the clear meaning of the Greek. You don't need to learn Greek for yourself to understand it, and if anyone starts telling you about how they found within the Greek a trove of previously overlooked knowledge which completely changes the meaning, don't listen to them. Tell them to repent. If they then start telling you about how um, actually, polygamy is totally not a sin and they can prove it, you should (depending on your age) tie a millstone around their neck and invite them to go swimming.
Finally, the part about polygamy
I.e. polygyny, when a man has multiple wives.
Polygamy is a sin. I expect no applause for saying so, because to most of us that's obvious. We know that God's design for marriage was one man and one woman. We know that church elders can't be polygamists. We know that the consensus of the church throughout history (there were a few exceptions) has been that polygamy is wrong (with some people wondering if there are exceptions).
None of that constitutes absolute proof, I admit. The closest we can get to proof is probably Mark 10:11, where we learn that a man who violates the exclusivity of his own marriage is an adulterer in God's eyes. This isn't foolproof; a fool could object that it's only adultery if you get divorced before you violate the exclusivity of your marriage. So instead of trying to formulate a foolproof proof that polygamy is wrong (which either isn't possible or I'm just not smart enough), let's consider some of the arguments that can be made in favor of polygamy and see if they can hold up to a little scrutiny.
Rachel & Leah
Genesis 30:4-6: "And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife: and Jacob went in unto her. And Bilhah conceived, and bare Jacob a son. And Rachel said, God hath judged me, and hath also heard my voice, and hath given me a son: therefore called she his name Dan."
Genesis 30:18: "And Leah said, God hath given me my hire, because I have given my maiden to my husband: and she called his name Issachar."
In their rivalry, sisters Rachel and Leah each caused their husband Jacob to sleep with their respective handmaids, Bilhah and Zilpah. Each sister (Leah most clearly) apparently thought that God viewed her action favorably and blessed her for it. Should we conclude that their analysis was right?
Genesis 29:32-33: "And Leah conceived, and bare a son, and she called his name Reuben: for she said, Surely the Lᴏʀᴅ hath looked upon my affliction; now therefore my husband will love me. And she conceived again, and bare a son; and said, Because the Lᴏʀᴅ hath heard that I was hated, he hath therefore given me this son also: and she called his name Simeon."
When Leah had given birth to previous sons, she correctly discerned that God was showing her mercy, but she incorrectly concluded that the purpose of his mercy was to make Jacob love her, something which he continued not to do even after the birth of Simeon. Her analysis was fallible, just as we should expect of a fallible woman. To conclude that polygamy is blessed on the basis of an unloved wife's wishful thinking is absurd.
Genesis 30:1: "And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die."
Rachel is an even clearer example that the sisters' conclusions about why God gave them children were flawed. Just before she gave Bilhah to Jacob, Rachel sinned by envying her sister and threatening her husband. So even if she somehow managed to conclude that Bilhah's child was an indication that God had judged in her favor, we certainly shouldn't agree with her!
David
1 Kings 15:5: "Because David did that which was right in the eyes of the Lᴏʀᴅ, and turned not aside from any thing that he commanded him all the days of his life, save only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite."
Should we conclude that King David's practice of polygamy was not sinful because of this verse? To an excessively zealous interpreter, it certainly might seem to imply that David's only sins (or perhaps his only major ones) were those which related to Uriah. But consider the occasion that David took a census of Israel.
2 Samuel 24:10: "And David's heart smote him after that he had numbered the people. And David said unto the Lᴏʀᴅ, I have sinned greatly in that I have done: and now, I beseech thee, O Lᴏʀᴅ, take away the iniquity of thy servant; for I have done very foolishly."
This was a major violation of the Law, and it brought judgment on the entire nation. Other clear examples of David's sin include rashly swearing to take vengeance on Nabal (1 Samuel 25) and arranging for the Ark of the Covenant to be improperly transported (2 Samuel 6). So why aren't these sins counted in 1 Kings 15:5? I don't know. I could offer my speculation, but that's not the point. The point is that there is no reasonable argument to be made that, except for ones related to Uriah, all of David's actions (such as taking a census and taking multiple wives) were sinless.
Note too that polygamy was like divorce: the Law did not actually prohibit it, even though (as Jesus indicated) it is evil in God's eyes. Thus while David did sin when he took multiple wives, he still, on this particular matter, "turned not aside from any thing that [the Lᴏʀᴅ] commanded", because the Lord never actually commanded him to be monogamous.
2 Samuel 12:7-8: "And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith the Lᴏʀᴅ God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul; And I gave thee thy master's house, and thy master's wives into thy bosom, and gave thee the house of Israel and of Judah; and if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto thee such and such things."
Not only did God never command David to be monogamous, but when Nathan the prophet rebuked David for committing adultery and murder in the matter of Uriah, God even claimed responsibility for giving over the late Saul's wives to be David's wives! We should probably assume that this is literal. But it would be ridiculous to suggest that Nathan recounted these events in order to imply that David had possessed Saul's household and kingdom in a blameless way. Quite the opposite is true!
Or someone could suggest this: if God gave Saul's wives into David's bosom, then it must not have been sinful for David to have them, because God would not give David a gift that was sinful. This suggestion sounds reasonable, but it is based in a misunderstanding of how Nathan was using the word "give". Consider this verse in Jeremiah where the same Hebrew verb is again translated "give".
Jeremiah 34:21: "And Zedekiah king of Judah and his princes will I give into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of them that seek their life, and into the hand of the king of Babylon's army, which are gone up from you."
God promised to give King Zedekiah and his sons into the hand of the king of Babylon. But right from the start the king of Babylon had murderous intent, and when he did finally receive Zedekiah's family, he wickedly forced Zedekiah to watch as his sons were murdered. God did not give Zedekiah's family to the king of Babylon as a blessing for him to possess blamelessly and without sin. Rather, knowing full well that the king of Babylon would act with sinful cruelty, he gave Zedekiah's house into his hand as an act of judgment against Zedekiah.
Likewise, God overthrew Saul's house and gave it into the bosom of David as an act of judgment against Saul. Nathan recounted this fact to David to rebuke him: what an irony that the righteous King David had received everything that once belonged to his wicked master Saul, but was now himself acting like a wicked tyrant! Of course, God giving over Saul's house and kingdom to David wasn't merely judgment; it was also a genuine expression of God's favor to David. God went so far as to say that if the spoils of Saul's judgment (his house and wives and kingdoms) weren't enough, God would have given over more of these things to David!
So was God giving David his endorsement to overthrow more men's households and take their wives, as many as he wanted? Of course not! God was rebuking David precisely because David had just committed such wickedness. In order to receive the spoil of Saul's house, David had needed to wait for God's judgment and favor to overthrow Saul. Now God was telling David that if this hadn't been enough for him (which it implicitly should have been), he should again have waited on God's favor and judgment to overthrow some other man's household. But David had instead forgotten God's favor and wickedly used his own power to despoil and overthrow the household of righteous Uriah.
2 Samuel 12:8 is used in the Talmud to show that a king is permitted to have exactly eighteen wives. The arithmetic is actually pretty good, but it's completely beside the point. With just a little bit of context, we can see clearly that these verses don't prove how many extra wives you can take, or how many extra households and kingdoms you can take, or indeed whether you're allowed to take those things at all. What these verses do is reveal the irony and the extreme depravity of David's sin.
Hosea
Hosea 1:2: "The beginning of the word of the Lᴏʀᴅ by Hosea. And the Lᴏʀᴅ said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lᴏʀᴅ."
Hosea 3:1-2: "Then said the Lᴏʀᴅ unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lᴏʀᴅ toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine. So I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of barley, and an half homer of barley:"
Great and furious—and too dogmatic for my taste—are the debates that rage over this question: was Gomer, the wife Hosea took in Hosea 1, the same woman that he had to love and to redeem in Hosea 3? Most egregiously, some will claim that unless their answer to that question is correct, the prophetic imagery is incorrect because it fails to meet whatever arbitrary degree of correspondence they deem to be necessary. For our part, we should try to avoid such arrogance.
Of course, polygamy only enters the picture if we conclude that the woman Hosea took in Hosea 3 was not Gomer. So even though I'm personally inclined to think that she was Gomer, let's bypass that first question and just consider the other possibility: assuming that God told Hosea to marry someone other than Gomer in Hosea 3, doesn't that mean that God commanded polygamy?
Hosea 3:3: "And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man: so will I also be for thee."
Once again, all it takes is a little context. Hosea told this wife that she couldn't have any man but him, and he told her that the reverse was also true: Hosea plainly told this wife that he wouldn't have any woman but her. Therefore he was not practicing polygamy.
Maybe Gomer was dead. Or, since Jesus told us that divorcing a wife because of her adultery isn't sin, maybe Hosea had done that. Maybe this woman actually was Gomer after all. I don't know, and I don't need to know.
The Law
Deuteronomy 25:5: "If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry without unto a stranger: her husband's brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husband's brother unto her."
Things are finally getting serious. Arguments for polygamy from examples of its practice are consistently very weak, as we've seen, but arguments from God's holy Law necessarily have greater moral weight. If levirate marriage, which God instituted for Israel in the verse above, would require an already-married man to marry the wife of his dead brother, then wouldn't we be forced to conclude that polygamy is permissible? The answer may surprise you. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Ruth 3:12: "And now it is true that I am thy near kinsman: howbeit there is a kinsman nearer than I."
We already know, based on the book of Ruth, that Israelites interpreted the command for levirate marriage somewhat flexibly, and were almost certainly correct to do so. The Israelites understood that the levirate duty passed first to literal brothers(-in-law), in accordance with the literal text of the commandment, but after that the duty passed to other male relatives in order of their proximity, even though this isn't something the commandment actually spells out. It is thus not unreasonable for us to conclude that the levirate duty was also intended to bypass certain exceptional relatives, such as eunuchs or men who were already married, even though the commandment doesn't literally spell this out.
Deuteronomy 25:7: "And if the man like not to take his brother's wife, then let his brother's wife go up to the gate unto the elders, and say, My husband's brother refuseth to raise up unto his brother a name in Israel, he will not perform the duty of my husband's brother."
It seems even more plausible that exceptions were intended when you consider that the levirate duty was not an absolute duty, but one that could be refused! Still, someone could very reasonably object that God's commandments, even when you can refuse them, don't have exceptions. Perhaps such an objector would be surprised to learn that levirate marriage, as commanded in Deuteronomy 25, already was an exception!
Leviticus 18:16: "Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother's wife: it is thy brother's nakedness."
Leviticus tells us that marrying your brother's wife was incest and sexual immorality, right alongside marrying your sister. (And it still is, though that's a whole other discussion.) Israelite men were not allowed to marry their brothers' wives. Deuteronomy 25:5, wherein God commands Israelite men to marry their brothers' wives, is therefore an exception. Let that sink in: God commanded Israelite men to do something which, in all other circumstances, was grossly immoral.
From this we may make two important observations. First, while Leviticus 18 (and also 20) does not enumerate any exceptions to its prohibition on marrying sisters-in-law, we must conclude that there was an exception because of what Scripture teaches elsewhere. And so, if we believe that Scripture teaches that polygamy is wrong, there is no inconsistency in believing that there was also an exception to the levirate duty for men who were already married. (There are also no examples which disprove this belief!)
Second, notice that Deuteronomy 25:5 cannot be used to draw conclusions about what kinds of marriage are generally permissible. If someone tried to argue from Deuteronomy 25 that it was permissible in general to marry your sister-in-law, then Leviticus 18 would prove them wrong! So even if we were to assume that already-married men were not exempt from the levirate duty, and that such men were supposed to engage in polygamy for the purpose of fulfilling said duty, it does not follow that polygamy is permissible in general.
Exodus 22:16-17: "And if a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife. If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins."
Deuteronomy 22:28-29: "If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found; Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days."
A lot of the same points which applied to levirate marriage also apply to these passages. We may reasonably conclude based on moral teaching elsewhere in Scripture that this commandment did not fully apply to men who were already married. As before, this exception is more plausible on account of the fact that the commanded marriage (but not the reparations) could be refused.
But even if we assume that there was no exception for already-married men, and that this commandment forced such men to practice polygamy, that doesn't prove that polygamy isn't wrong. All it would prove is that polygamy is less wrong than not taking responsibility for a maiden whom you've seduced. The situation is already sinful, no matter how you slice it, and thus what God commands to be done will mitigate the evil of the situation. But it won't erase it!
Remember, this is how Jesus interpreted the Law's commandments regarding divorce. In general, it is morally wrong for a man to give his wife a bill of divorce. In spite of this, God's holy Law commanded that a man who was divorcing his wife had to write her a bill of divorce, not because this was morally right but because it helped mitigate the evil of the actions that were already being taken.
Exodus 21:7-8: "And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do. If she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her."
Exodus 21:10-11: "If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free without money."
The analogy between divorce and polygamy certainly makes sense in these verses! When a man bought a slave to be his wife, the Law did not forbid him to divorce her or to marry another woman, but it did regulate such evil. Once the woman had become his wife, he couldn't send her back into slavery under someone else's roof (if he divorced her), or even under his own roof (if he took a second wife). He could either send her away as a free woman or keep her as his wife. Of course, none of these scenarios are implied to be morally right, and the passage even considers divorce to be an act of deceit! The point of this commandment is that irrespective of how bad divorce and polygamy are, it is worse (and accordingly is unlawful) to enslave a woman whom you have married.
God
Ezekiel 23:4: "And the names of them were Aholah the elder, and Aholibah her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sons and daughters. Thus were their names; Samaria is Aholah, and Jerusalem Aholibah."
A final, weighty argument in favor of polygamy is that God describes himself as a polygamist multiple times throughout Scripture. Sometimes he is portrayed as being married to one main wife, who includes or is accompanied by multiple others, as in Psalm 45, Song of Solomon, and Revelation 21. Sometimes God is portrayed as having been married to both Israel and Judah, as in Jeremiah 3, Jeremiah 31, and Ezekiel 23. And Jesus, in Matthew 25's Parable of the Ten Virgins, describes a wedding in which the bridegroom (i.e. the King of Heaven, i.e. Jesus himself) fulfills his betrothal to multiple women.
Some of these examples can be debated. Some cannot, and there may even be other Scriptural examples that I've missed. Regardless, we are faced with an interesting question: if God, the very antithesis of evil, portrays himself as a polygamist, doesn't that prove that polygamy is not evil?
Leviticus 18:18: "Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister, to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her life time."
As it turns out, this argument is extremely easy to refute. God portrayed himself as having been simultaneously married to two sisters, but this is something which the Law explicitly prohibited for the Israelites. Even though Ezekiel said that God married the sisters Oholah and Oholibah, no Jew would dare to conclude that he too was allowed to marry two sisters at once, because Leviticus 18:18 says otherwise.
So too we cannot conclude, from Ezekiel 23 or from any other passage where God is portrayed as a polygamist, that a man is allowed to marry multiple women. Just because God can do something (or prophetically describe himself doing something) doesn't mean we can! We don't imitate the Judge of the earth in taking vengeance, now, do we?
Revelation 21:2: "And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband."
Revelation 21:12-14: "And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb."
Bear with me in a little overkill. In New Jerusalem, will Judah and the ten tribes of Israel be two separate brides for the Lamb? Of course not! The twelve names of their tribes shall inscribe the gates of one bride together, in a time when God's redeemed people will undivided. The King looks like a polygamist now, but when all his betrothed princesses are gathered together, we shall see clearly that we actually comprise one, holy, glorious Queen.
Conclusion
Well now I've gotten all excited, talking about Jesus and Heaven and Psalm 45 and stuff. It is with reluctance that I circle back to polygamy. I admit that I am aware of one or two other arguments for polygamy, but as they aren't textual arguments, I think it is safe to ignore them. You shouldn't be convinced that polygamy is right based on the fact that lots of good men practiced it—nor should you be convinced that polygamy is wrong based on the fact that it never went well for them!
Ephesians 5:31: "For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh."
Whatever we are convinced of, we should be convinced of it by diligent study of the holy Scriptures, following in the wise (though fallible) footsteps of saints who preceded us. Not by vibe checks. Not by some random guy on the internet's collection of a few Bible verses. (!) And definitely not by listening to someone who tries to tell you that God's truth is hidden in Hebrew or Greek out of your reach!
…You may have realized by now that the question of polygamy isn't actually of primary concern to me. I never would have gotten angry enough to write this post just based on the few, weak arguments of polygamists. But when I see someone wielding Greek like a toddler with a handgun, adulterating the words of Jesus, I remember the follies of my own past. And I have to speak up. God help me.
In other news, this dusty little website is about to turn one decade old. Hooray. The Lord is merciful.
Thank you for bearing with me. As a special treat, I propose that we all go read Psalm 45, and hearken to the King who commands all of us, every one, to betroth ourselves to him!
Psalms 45:10-11: "Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father's house; So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty: for he is thy Lord; and worship thou him."
Sources
Aelianus, Claudius. Περὶ Ζῴων Ἰδιότητος.
Berean Patriot. "What Jesus Meant by Adultery in Matthew Chapters 5 & 19". Bereanpatriot.com, 2018.
Berean Patriot. "Is Polygamy (Polygyny) Biblical? Does God Allow it?" Bereanpatriot.com, 2021.
Hill, Gary, ed. The Discovery Bible. 2021.
Liddel, Henry, and Robert Scott. A Greek–English Lexicon. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940.
Sefaria. The William Davidson Talmud. Sefaria.com. https://www.sefaria.org/texts/Talmud
Thayer, Joseph. Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament. Harper & Brothers, 1889.
Aelianus, Claudius. Περὶ Ζῴων Ἰδιότητος.
Berean Patriot. "What Jesus Meant by Adultery in Matthew Chapters 5 & 19". Bereanpatriot.com, 2018.
Berean Patriot. "Is Polygamy (Polygyny) Biblical? Does God Allow it?" Bereanpatriot.com, 2021.
Hill, Gary, ed. The Discovery Bible. 2021.
Liddel, Henry, and Robert Scott. A Greek–English Lexicon. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940.
Sefaria. The William Davidson Talmud. Sefaria.com. https://www.sefaria.org/texts/Talmud
Thayer, Joseph. Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament. Harper & Brothers, 1889.