Ep 139: Polygamy!

00:00Thus, you should say to them, "My little finger is thicker than my father's loins."

00:06I'm going to assume that means what I think it means.

00:09It does.

00:10He's holding up his pinky and going, "This is bigger than my dad's Johnson."

00:19Hey, everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

00:24And I'm Dan Beacher.

00:25And you're listening to the Data Over Dogma podcast where we increase public access to

00:30the academic study of the Bible and religion, and we combat that pernicious spread of misinformation

00:36about the same.

00:37How are things today, Dan?

00:39Things are good.

00:40Things are good.

00:41Yeah, we've got a fascinating one.

00:46I'm looking forward to this because the comments are about to get unhinged up in her.

00:54If you don't watch our show on YouTube, which is totally great, most of the people who partake

01:01of our wares don't, you might want to head over there and just see what the people are

01:06saying.

01:07Because people might get riled up because we're going to talk polygamy and Dan's a Mormon,

01:14so ipso facto problems or something, historically speaking.

01:24So yeah, we're going to talk about that in the first half of the show.

01:27And then in the second half of the show, we're going to get to one of the great practitioners

01:34Probably one of the most famous.

01:34of polygamy.

01:36Yeah.

01:37We're going to do some Solomon stuff.

01:42We're not going to talk about his polygamy in the second half.

01:45We might talk about it in the first half, probably.

01:48Probably will.

01:49Yeah.

01:50We're going to talk about the end of his reign and the beginning of his son and all kinds

01:57of other historical stuff surrounding that or ahistorical or whatever.

02:02So that'll be, it'll actually be a lot of fun and it's very interesting.

02:07But first, let's dive in with taking issue.

02:14And the issue we're taking as we said is polygamy.

02:16But more specifically, I think, polygyny because polygamy is, as the Google has told me, is

02:26the practice of marriage with either multiple men, multiple husbands or multiple wives.

02:34And I don't think that that first thing is what the Bible has anything to say on.

02:39No, not so much new.

02:40So yeah, we're talking about polygyny or plural marriages and other more English term.

02:48I don't know.

02:50But is also unclear, but generally is referring to a man taking multiple wives.

02:56And this is in the news right now because, well, as of recording, right anyway.

03:04Who knows what the, the new statement, we may have been scooped by a couple of weeks on

03:08this.

03:09Yeah.

03:10That's okay.

03:11There is a, there's a pastor in like Missouri, a rich Tidwell who posted back in June on

03:19his blog about basically coming out as, as polygamists.

03:25He has two wives and eight children between the two of them.

03:28Some of them have been adopted.

03:31But this, for whatever reason, people have only become aware of it recently in the beginning

03:37of November and it is really went, Oh, wait a minute.

03:42Wait, what?

03:43And so it has caused a bit of a firestorm on social media as evangelicals are swooping

03:50in to condemn this, this pastor who posted a biblical defense of polygamy on his blog.

04:00And I want to talk about the argument that he makes and then talk about whether or not

04:06I think it's supported by the data, but yeah, and, and certainly, you know, hijinks will

04:12ensue.

04:13There's plenty of opportunity for, for all kinds of comedy and, and other things.

04:19I'm just going to put a marker down now, be me being the ignorant guy on the podcast.

04:24I am definitely putting a marker down for the Bible supports polygamy quite a bit, quite

04:33a bit.

04:34It may not, it may not be across the board.

04:36It may not be a, you know, a total like support every which where, but there's a lot of polygamy

04:44in the Bible and sanctioned polygamy at that.

04:47Exactly.

04:48Yeah.

04:49And that is where, and that's one of the things that, that he starts off with.

04:53There are, there are three passages that he points to from the Hebrew Bible that he suggests

04:58indicates God's sanctioning of polygamy, God's approval of polygamy.

05:03Sure.

05:04And, and I think there, I think, I think a couple of them at least make good sense.

05:12One of them, I'm not so convinced by the, and the, the, and that would be the earliest

05:17one chronologically, canonically, Genesis 30 verse 18.

05:23And this is where we have Jacob and Jacob gets tricked into marrying the wrong woman

05:30and has to work for another seven years and we've had an episode where we talk about this.

05:35Oh, right.

05:36That was a fun trick.

05:37Yeah.

05:38What a great, what a great trick that was.

05:39Sorry.

05:40You said this was Genesis.

05:41What?

05:42Chapter 30 verse 18.

05:43Okay.

05:44And so the woman he was tricked into marrying Leah said God has gotten, obviously this is

05:51NRSVUE, but I'm going to talk a little bit about the translation.

05:54God has given me my hire because I gave my maid to my husband.

06:00So she named him Isekhar and, and, and hire here is a word that means like recompense wages

06:10payment.

06:11Right.

06:12So God has given me my wages because I gave my maid to my husband and made there.

06:17I'm pretty sure is the word for, yeah, maid servant or, or a female enslaved person.

06:26Okay.

06:27So Leah is like, here, hubby, have this other wife and, and then God rewarded her for that.

06:35That is what Leah is saying that God has rewarded her for, for Megan, that sacrifice of given

06:43her husband, another wife.

06:45So Jacob is just racking up wives and the 12 sons of, of Israel slash Jacob come from

06:52a variety of different women.

06:55So, so that's a suggestion that at least according to Leah, God is okay.

07:01Was happy with this rewarded her, her for that, right?

07:06Another one that I think is a, a little better argument has a little better case to make is

07:15in second Samuel and this is second Samuel chapter 12 and verse seven are seven and eight

07:21are the important ones.

07:22And this is where Nathan is chewing, Nathan, excuse me, is chewing David out.

07:27So you remember the, the, you are the man speech and, and here he says, you are the man.

07:33Oh, hey, there it is, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel.

07:37I anointed you king over Israel and I rescued you from the hand of Saul.

07:43And then verse eight says, I gave you your master's house and your master's wives into

07:49your bosom and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah.

07:53And if that had been too little, I would have added as much more.

07:57So here we have God ostensibly through the prophet Nathan declaring that God gave David

08:04many, many, many, many wives basically said, Saul's wives, they're now your wives.

08:09Right.

08:10And another, you know, various cash and prizes.

08:12Yes.

08:13Yes.

08:14There are other prizes as well.

08:16And, and the argument that I've seen made is that when it says gave them into your bosom,

08:21the idea here is, I transitioned them to your protection.

08:27In other words, they were living in Saul's household and now they're, you're responsible

08:33for them, which, which is nonsense because one, it's like, I gave you all this cool stuff.

08:40Oh, and also this burden, this responsibility, yes, which is very clearly not what God is

08:47saying here.

08:48What is saying, I gave you all these women to have sex with.

08:51You're welcome.

08:52Yeah.

08:53And, and so very clearly that represents God prophetically as not only endorsing, but

09:00facilitating plural marriage, including women who had been with another man, which is little

09:10peculiar.

09:11Um, and then there's another one that I think is, uh, might even be a little stronger.

09:18Second chronicles, 24 and we're looking at versus, and we can start at verse one, but

09:25we're going to go to verse three.

09:28Verse one says Joash was seven years old when he began to reign.

09:32He reigned 40 years in Jerusalem.

09:35His mother's name was Zebia of Beersheba, Joash did what was right in the sight of the

09:42Lord, all the days of the priest, Jehoedah.

09:46Yeah.

09:47And then verse three says, Jehoedah got two wives for him.

09:52And he became the father of sons and daughters, okay, pretty clearly the author is suggesting

10:00that if Jehoedah got two wives for Joash and Joash did everything that was right in the

10:09sight of the Lord, all the days of the priest, Jehoedah, that is the priest is the priest

10:14is the priest's representative or whatever, that that is sanctioned endorsed by God.

10:21Right.

10:22And that, and that's some new Testament stuff because I think, I, I, I think when we talk

10:26about this, that's going to, it, it tapers off towards the, like the, the support for

10:33polygamy's, I thought tapers off.

10:36It does, it does tapers off, but, but, so I'm actually surprised to hear a, to hear that.

10:42Yeah.

10:43That sounds like it's not there.

10:46There's certainly no full-throated condemnation happening of, of, of, of, no, no, not, not

10:54by any stretch of the imagination.

10:56Although there is a passage that some people will point to as an indicator that polygamy

11:03was not what God wanted.

11:07And this is a weird one.

11:08Again, it's an interpretation that is forced and is nonsensical.

11:13Um, but Leviticus 1818, uh, from the NRSVUE and you shall not take a woman as a rival

11:22to her sister, uncovering her nakedness while her sister is still alive.

11:29So the idea here is obviously, Hey, if you've already got a wife, don't marry her sister

11:33also.

11:34Okay.

11:35That's, you know, that's, uh, that's a problem.

11:39Again, that, that, that casts a weird light on the Jacob story.

11:44Yeah.

11:46Um, but, and, and some folks think Leviticus 18 and 20, we're actually, these laws are

11:55actually following the narrative of Genesis.

12:00And so the idea is that they're making laws basically to address all of the circumstances

12:05and situations that are, that are happening in, in Genesis.

12:09And so this could be precisely saying, Hey, what happened with Jacob and Leah and Rachel?

12:16Yeah.

12:17Maybe don't do that.

12:18That's not, that's not for you.

12:19That was for him.

12:20Not you.

12:21But the argument is that, uh, this does not mean this is not only limited to a biological

12:28sister, but just don't take any woman as a, uh, who could become a rival to a first wife,

12:35meaning polygamy, no good, uh, and, and that reading isn't supported by anything.

12:42That's right.

12:44That's silly.

12:45Yeah.

12:46But probably the most common objection.

12:48And I, you know what?

12:49I don't even know if, if, uh, Tidwell, uh, actually brings this objection up in his blog

12:57post, seems like he should, but I don't think he does.

13:02I don't think he, I don't think he engages the argument.

13:04Genesis two, 24, which we've talked about, uh, many times in the past, thus a man shall

13:11leave his father and his mother's house and cleave under his woman and the two of them

13:16shall be one flesh.

13:17Right.

13:18And this is taken as a prescription of how what God's pattern plan ideal for marriage

13:25is.

13:26In other words, it's supposed to be one man, one woman, one vote, um, but as we've discussed

13:35before, it's clearly not a prescription of proper, uh, marriage.

13:40It's just a descriptive etiology of pair bonding and independent kinship units.

13:46It's not saying it must be one man and only one woman because obviously the rest of Genesis

13:52is chock full of Israel's heroes and even precursors, marrying multiple women.

13:58Uh, and so the, the authors are very clearly okay with, uh, polygyny.

14:04And so are, are obviously not condemning that.

14:08So there are a bunch of passages in the Hebrew Bible that just outright endorse, uh, if not

14:17just condone polygamy, yeah.

14:21Things start to change when we get to Greco-Roman period Judaism and not because of the Bible,

14:27but in spite of the Bible, it's because of Greek philosophy and Greco-Roman social conventions

14:33and mores because while the, the Greeks and the Romans were pretty socially loose, maybe,

14:41um, you know, you wanted to, uh, fidelity within marriage might not have been at the

14:47top of their list of priorities, but they did find polygyny to be a practice of weirdos.

14:54Um, they didn't really like it.

14:56Right.

14:57And then there were, um, Greek philosophical treatises that kind of talk about the structure

15:04of society and things like that in the household and how it's all supposed to work.

15:09And, uh, and that endorsed monogamy as well, although, you know, slaves were, were entirely

15:17permitted and everything like that.

15:18Totally fair game.

15:19Yeah.

15:20And, you know, and a side piece here and there is obviously fine.

15:23Right.

15:24So this, this rubbed off on Greco-Roman period Judaism.

15:27And so they didn't come out and say, we no longer accept polygamy, but it was less and

15:34less common so that you didn't really, you didn't really see it happening because it

15:39wouldn't have been acceptable within this Greco-Roman context.

15:43And so by the time of the New Testament, you polygamy is not really polygyny.

15:48Excuse me.

15:49We agreed before filming that we were going to use polygyny and not polygamy.

15:53I mean, we could say polygamy.

15:54It's because most times when someone uses the word polygamy, they're talking about the practice

16:00of marrying multiple wives because that's, that's been the only one, you know, the only

16:05thing that's been practiced in, in for most of what we, what is commonly known in human

16:12history.

16:13Or maybe some, some polyandrous societies, but I've never heard of them.

16:21Yes, I think they mostly exist in comic books, but, but I can't think of any off the top

16:31of my head.

16:32But if you do know of some, by all means, let us know.

16:37Yeah.

16:39And, and so you, polygyny is not really that big a deal, but you do have some places where

16:44it seems to be poo-pooed or, or if not condemned.

16:49So in the Dead Sea Scrolls, it seems to, to not approve of polygyny.

16:57New Testament has no outright condemnation of polygyny at all.

17:01It just seems to have been the norm that, that you only marry one wife at a time.

17:06The one exception would be 1 Timothy 3, 2.

17:11Now 1 Timothy, pastoral epistle, not Paul.

17:16Okay.

17:17This is, uh, this is a pseudo Pauline.

17:20This is after Paul's death.

17:21This is somebody trying to appropriate Paul's authority by pretending to be Paul.

17:26But we have, uh, in this passage, the author is explaining what is required to be an overseer

17:32or a bishop and says that he must be a man of one woman, which is probably intended to

17:40address fidelity within marriage and then not remarrying after either divorce or the

17:46death of a spouse, because there, there was actually, and you know, you see this in Matthew,

17:51that if a man divorces his wife or anything other than, than sexual infidelity, that, uh,

17:58he commits adultery by marrying another woman and causes her to commit adultery if she marries

18:04another man.

18:05So, um, you know, you weren't supposed to get remarried.

18:08You have one wife and, and that's your wife.

18:10And that's it.

18:11You used yours.

18:12You used your one.

18:13You're, you're, you're, you're done out.

18:15Yeah.

18:16Um, but it does seem to suggest that they're not, they would not approve of a polygamous,

18:23uh, polygynous, uh, marriage for a, a leader and, and a lot of people try to insist that

18:30when it says, uh, overseer or bishop, that means pastor, but it doesn't, uh, pastor is

18:37only mentioned once in all of the New Testament and that is in Ephesians four.

18:42What's the difference?

18:43Well, they're different offices within the church and they're entirely different words

18:48in Greek, but, but there are folks who try to make the case that there's a, there's a

18:52passage in Acts that talks about elders and overseers kind of being the same and talking

18:58about how they are to pastor or pastor the flock.

19:02So it uses verbs associated with past or ring to refer to them.

19:08And so people will see, see, that means a pastor is just the same thing, but the gospel

19:15of John uses the verb pastoring to refer to an apostle as well as Jesus as well as Jesus

19:22as followers.

19:23So like that, the use of that verb by itself doesn't mean this is a reference to the ecclesiastical

19:29office of a pastor, which again is only ever only known from Ephesians.

19:35Ephesians also probably not Paul.

19:38That's not one of the outright spurious epistles, but one of the disputed, uh, epistles.

19:45So probably a later thing, like, you know, it, it sounds to me like that's, that's when

19:50the organization, the organization chart has started to appear.

19:54Yes.

19:55Yes.

19:56The org chart is showing up in emails and irritating everybody.

20:00But yeah, that's, that's a more developed hierarchy and more developed institution where

20:04they've got these offices and that's, and Paul would not have been operating with those,

20:10with those institutions anyway.

20:16But anyway, 1 Timothy three, two, even though it probably is not directly addressing polygyny,

20:23it would preclude polygynous marriages, even though it is also just about the standards

20:29for someone who wants to hold that position.

20:33It's not necessarily saying any follower of Jesus cannot do this, but it probably would

20:38have been a standard that became pretty widespread.

20:41So we do have one passage that does seem to, uh, seem to prohibit polygyny in the New Testament

20:48and rich Tidwell is not ignorant of that passage.

20:53So he makes an argument for why 1 Timothy three, two does not prohibit polygyny.

21:01He says, in 1 Timothy three, two, Paul utilizes the Greek word Mia, which we translated as

21:09one in English, and he talks a little bit about this in, uh, in another passage, although

21:14Mia may translate as an indefinite one or a as in the indefinite article in the context

21:21of marriage in 1 Timothy three, two Mia means ordinal first.

21:26If Paul intended to communicate a man must have numeral one wife to be in ministry, he

21:31would have employed the word peace as he did in 1 Timothy five, nine, the same epistle

21:37because he's explicitly means numeral one.

21:41Mia must be used in 1 Timothy three, two as a grammatical rule.

21:45Uh, read my response, titled the Mia and he saga, therefore 1 Timothy three, two ought

21:49to be translated the husband of his first wife.

21:54As Paul, like Jesus is preventing hyper gammy and divorce.

22:01In other words, he still has to be married to his first wife.

22:06Should I make a guess as to your response to this?

22:11Let's see.

22:12Cause I don't know anything about the grammar or, uh, or words of Greek, but I'm going to

22:17guess that you're going to object to his, uh, his explanation of how these words are used.

22:23Yes.

22:24It's, it's nonsensical.

22:25Um, he says, a man who divorces his first wife to marry another as Jesus prohibits in

22:30Matthew 19 19 also see also Malachi two 15 through 16 is not fit for eldership in the church.

22:37Paul is not addressing polygamy, nor disqualifying the patriarchs from ministry.

22:42He is prohibiting hyper gammy and serial monogamy among the elders of the church and then he

22:50goes on to say something interesting.

22:52Moreover, do we truly believe that if Abraham Jacob or David resurrected a possibility, according

22:58to Matthew 27 52 to 53, they would not be permitted to hold office or preach in the church.

23:06These polygamous men wrote or are featured in many of our Holy scriptures, but we wouldn't

23:11give them a microphone today.

23:13What utter nonsense.

23:15I believe the answer to these questions lies in Romans 11 23.

23:19These polygamous men of the Bible were called by God and retained their offices despite

23:24their having several wives, and I, and I saw somebody who responded to that particular

23:31argument by barking that yes, absolutely they would be prohibited from being pastors and

23:39they went on to say even God prohibited David from building the temple because he was a man

23:45of war.

23:46And so God can withhold certain offices and responsibilities from, from people.

23:53He didn't address Jacob or Abraham, but, but I, but I think that's an interesting argument.

23:59And yeah, the first Timothy three to the notion that, that Mia and he's really carry these,

24:07these significant differences that must be maintained context independent doesn't really

24:13work.

24:15It can be used that way, but it doesn't mean we have to use it.

24:19Well, if it can be used that way, then there's some legitimacy maybe to his argument.

24:24Well, there's, there's the, yeah, it's basically that you can't prove it's false.

24:29Right.

24:30Right.

24:31It's a, it's possible.

24:32We're, we're ginning up that tiny little sliver of, of not impossible.

24:37Right.

24:38But yeah, there's, there are no scholars who read it that way.

24:44But it does seem like he has a, a, a motivation, a specific motivation, a little bit, a little

24:49bit of a motivation.

24:50I feel like it's, I feel like the most interesting part of this whole thing is that the, you

24:58know, if you want to use the Bible to justify polygamy, polygyny, whatever, that seems easy.

25:06That's it.

25:07Like he's not wrong.

25:08Yeah.

25:09Not as easy as defending slavery, but certainly easier than, than defending same sex intercourse

25:16or something like that, like there's, there is ample ample evidence that, that it was considered

25:27okay by God.

25:28And this is another thing that he talks about.

25:30According to the Bible, God does not change.

25:32Right.

25:33So God is okay with polygamy and the Hebrew Bible.

25:35God is okay with polygamy and the New Testament.

25:37And this is something that, that is a bit of a problem for the folks who, who want to

25:45understand the Bible to be condemning polygamy.

25:48Why would God allow it in, in one part of the Bible and then prohibit it in another?

25:53If God does allow it in the most important figures in the Bible.

25:58Yeah.

25:59Condone and even endorse it.

26:00Yeah.

26:01Yeah.

26:02And, and so it does raise the question of, um, you know, we have other, well, not we as

26:06in me, but a lot of these folks assert certain dogmas about God's unchanging nature and about

26:12the universality of the moral principles on which the gospel is found.

26:18Yeah.

26:19How do you get around that?

26:21And that is why I think you have a lot of folks who try to argue that, that God actually

26:25prohibited or didn't like polygyny, just tolerated it.

26:30Like, I'm not sure about this, um, but I, I'll, you know, I'll see where this is going.

26:35And, and so people will bring up the argument that throughout the Hebrew Bible, uh, polygynous

26:40marriages are characterized by conflict and problems as like every relationship in the

26:48Hebrew Bible is characterized by tension and conflict, uh, every relationship in humanity

26:55is characterized by like, I don't know if you've had a spouse or a, or, or a relationship,

27:01but you're going to have conflict that is, uh, that, that's a guarantee.

27:06And they're like bad things always happen.

27:07It's like Adam and Eve are a monogamous marriage.

27:10The worst thing happened.

27:12Right.

27:13Yeah.

27:14And you know, you've got all kinds of, all kinds of circumstances, like everybody who has

27:19a brother in the Hebrew Bible runs into all kinds of problems.

27:23Right.

27:24It's like, does that mean that having a brother is, is, uh, frowned upon?

27:28God's like, I don't know about this one.

27:30Um, let's get him.

27:31Yeah.

27:32I think it's so interesting that the Bible is so obviously explicit about this.

27:38And so overwhelmingly, uh, so, so loaded with it as, you know, I, I example after example,

27:47and you know, I suppose we should bring up Solomon, who like is the, he's putting up

27:53wilt Chamberlain numbers.

27:55And, and, and that works on two different levels.

27:59No, well, we might get to the rest of that, but, uh, but yeah, I mean, he, he, what did

28:04he have?

28:05700 wives and 300 concubines or something like, according to the thing.

28:10So like, and you know, there's no part of that that's condemned.

28:15There are things that like the Bible's like, Oh, Solomon wasn't good about this or whatever.

28:19But it's not that.

28:20Well, that's, that's except that they're foreign wives.

28:23Yes.

28:24They're foreign wives and they influence him towards, uh, and, and so, and, you know, people

28:27will bring that up as well.

28:28Well, look what happened to Solomon with all them foreign wives.

28:30It's like, well, he still had more than one local wife and that didn't cause any problems.

28:36God wasn't like, I'm not too hot on that other thing either.

28:40And his dad was like, his dad was loaded up too.

28:43Yeah.

28:44David, David had multiple wives as well.

28:47Yep.

28:48So I don't know.

28:49It's just, the thing that's weird to me is that you can look at this book.

28:53You can read all of those stories of all of these men who have all of those wives.

28:59And then because your culture obviously is not okay with that, you know, I, my, my parents

29:07were both LDS historians.

29:09They were both historians of Mormonism and, uh, they, so I'm, I'm fairly familiar with,

29:17uh, Mormon history.

29:18And of course, famously, infamously, infamously, infamously.

29:23And then Mormons, the early Mormons, and then later fundamentalist break off offshoots

29:29of Mormonism practiced polygamy.

29:32Yes.

29:33And, uh, the way that the world, I live in a city where one of them ran for mayor.

29:38Yeah.

29:39Yeah.

29:40Yeah.

29:41It's all around.

29:42I can see the house.

29:43They're compounds, uh, from my front yard.

29:46Yeah.

29:47Okay.

29:48Well, there you go.

29:49So it's, it's still around.

29:50But the way historically that the, uh, that America, American culture came crashing down

29:57on these people for this thing.

30:00And I, you know, to, on one hand, I get it in the sense that I, I think that the, the

30:06polygyny of Mormonism, uh, creates a, a wild power imbalance.

30:13It is something that is entered into, uh, often unwillingly by the women and, and it

30:20is often forced upon women and it is like the way it is practiced is not consensual.

30:25And therefore not, there's no way to excuse it, but how did these, did this country come

30:34down so incredibly hard, like literally people were saying the dual barbarism.

30:40I don't remember the exact quote, but they were equating slavery and polygamy as being

30:46the, the two barbaric practices of the United States of America.

30:50Yeah.

30:51Reynolds versus the United States from 1879.

30:54Oh, okay.

30:55There we go.

30:56Yeah.

30:57And, um, a lot of people have been like this, they didn't really have a, that could have

31:02an argument, um, because it, because it was mainly just like, you know, this is characteristic

31:08of barbaric people and, um, uh, and, and I think, uh, also said it always leads to abuse

31:16or, or something like that.

31:18Right.

31:19Um, which, uh, I think it's plain to see.

31:21I, if you watch any reality TV, you know that it doesn't necessarily lead to abuse.

31:26Yeah.

31:27Wasn't it?

31:28I never actually watched a single episode of sister wives, but it's, it seems like he

31:33probably wasn't abusive.

31:34I don't know.

31:35Would they, he wouldn't get to keep his, his reality show if he was abusive.

31:38I, I didn't watch any of it either.

31:40I don't, I don't knew, but yeah, you, I couldn't get past his hairstyle to be perfectly honest.

31:45I'm not one to talk.

31:46I know that.

31:47Uh, I just think it wasn't going to say anything.

31:51I just think that it's really weird that, uh, that Bible believing people, people purporting

31:57to be Bible believers are so vehement against this, like I get why you're vehement against

32:07slavery.

32:08That makes sense to me.

32:09And I get why you'd be vehement against the, a practice that was entered into against a

32:16woman's will that I, and I understand as well, yeah, but presuming that adults enter into

32:23a, an arrangement of their own free will and with their, with their consent, full consent

32:30and, uh, and approval, I don't know how biblically minded people condemn that.

32:36I don't, I don't get it.

32:38Well, we've, we've already seen that, that folks who would identify as biblically minded

32:43people have, have a way of massaging what the Bible is, is minding them, um, about so,

32:50um, but it's interesting within Judaism, because I, I've mentioned before, one of the reasons

32:57that Christianity and Judaism, um, deviated so, so significantly from each other is because

33:03Christianity really leaned into, uh, Greek philosophy and, and the Greco-Roman world,

33:10whereas Judaism tried to distinguish itself from it and rejected, uh, Greek philosophy

33:17and to some degree, it was still quite influential, but you know, they, they were like Septuagint

33:23not for us.

33:24We're going back to the Hebrew, we're going back to halochic legislation, all this stuff.

33:29And so for centuries after the split from Christianity, while Christianity is, is rejecting

33:36polygamy, Judaism was kind of like, we're a little bit comfortable with this.

33:41Uh, we, we, we can't really find a reason to object in the Hebrew Bible, but we just

33:48don't like it.

33:49So, um, like you have, uh, Joseph is referring to it as an ancestral custom in, in one of

33:55his texts, but it, and it's like a, a round a thousand CE when Greek philosophy and, and

34:02just philosophy in general becomes a lot more influential within Judaism that you finally

34:07have some, some, uh, Jewish philosophers who are like, yeah, no polygamy.

34:11We're, we're just, we're just outlawing it is just not so, um, so they, they had a longer

34:19time, um, coming down, uh, as firmly as they ultimately did, uh, against polygamy.

34:26But, but yeah, it, it does seem like something that's, uh, you know, people appeal to all

34:32the time, people appeal to the Hebrew Bible and God's designed for marriage as, as what

34:37should be governing how marriage works, um, and, uh, except when it comes to that part

34:44when they're like, and then they'll, they'll go to Genesis 2, 24.

34:48Um, and, and I just want to be clear, uh, because people are going to accuse me of being

34:55a dirty, dirty Mormon who is just trying to defend polygamy.

34:59Right.

35:00You could not be more mistaken about my position on marriage.

35:05Uh, so, so as, as frequently as I have to remind people that I'm doing my darndest to

35:14just represent the data and the scholarly consensus, that's what I'm doing here.

35:19Yeah.

35:20And this should in no way, shape or form whatsoever be misconstrued as me defending polygamy because

35:26I like it.

35:27I have already been accused of that countless times just because I posted a video a few

35:32days ago about this.

35:33So of the two of us, I'm the one who's more likely to come to the defense of, yes, of,

35:38uh, of a non-traditional, uh, marriage slash, uh, love practices, uh, I suppose I don't,

35:48I don't support polygyny religiously mandated polygyny.

35:53I certainly don't support that.

35:54Certainly not.

35:55Yeah.

35:56And, and, and I think that's one of the, the big issues is, is, is if it is something that

36:00is religiously sanctioned, then I think it does pressure folks, particularly young folks growing

36:07up in that kind of society that conditions them to think this is, this is my role.

36:11This is what I have to do.

36:12I mean, you already have women on Twitter saying, we need to repeal the 19th amendment only

36:19because the men around them in their lives in a, uh, you know, kind of in control in

36:25of their worldview are, are conditioning them and convincing them that they need to defend

36:31that, uh, that particular limit to their agency.

36:36And, and I think the last thing we need is, uh, you know, a bunch of folks raising up

36:42young girls to, to believe that, uh, they have their only goal in life ought to be becoming

36:48a polygamous wife of, of, uh, another, uh, did well or whomever.

36:54Well, yeah.

36:55And too often in those situations, as we see with fundamentalist, uh, Mormons currently

37:00and, uh, historical Mormons back in the 1800s and early 1900s, uh, when it, when it's, when

37:10it's culturally, especially when it's shrouded in cultural shame, uh, and, and becomes this

37:16insular thing, really bad practices crop up.

37:20So like, you know, 14 year old women being forcibly married off to 50 something year

37:27old men, that sort of thing, it's not because God said so yeah, it's Epstein level, not

37:32okay.

37:33So, uh, so yes, and where we, as of recording, there's a, there's been a bunch of emails

37:41that have dropped and, and you know, well, I'm sure that the dust will have settled to

37:46some degree unless more emails are dropping, uh, yeah, yeah, it's, it's rain and Epstein

37:51letters at this point.

37:53Brief. Okay. We're, let, let's, let's erase, uh, our brains from that for a little bit.

38:00And let's actually move on to our chapter and verse.

38:08And the chapter, I guess is, we're, I guess what we're going to do is we're going to

38:12get to first Kings chapter 11.

38:15Yeah.

38:16Uh, and this is, this is, this is the thing.

38:20It starts out with, uh, talking about, uh, the marriages of, of Solomon, uh, and, and

38:28the fact that he loved many women, many foreign women, uh, that was the problem. It wasn't

38:34the many women.

38:35It was the fact that they were Moabite and Ammonite and Edomite and Sidion and Hittite,

38:42uh, women.

38:43Yes.

38:44Uh, and not only were, was he in love with these women, but he was building shrines to

38:48their gods on the hills. Uh, so, so that's, that's sort of the, yeah, 700 princesses

38:57and 300 concubines princesses. Okay. I have seen wives in translations. What does it say?

39:04It says Nashim, which would mean women or wives in Hebrew. What, what is it? Oh, NRSVUE. Are

39:13you getting sassy? No, no, it says wives. And then it says, uh, Sahot, which would be,

39:18which would be the feminine plural of, uh, Sah, which would be, uh, a prince or a noble

39:25nobleman. So yeah, um, princesses and 300 concubines. So wait, it says among his wives

39:32were 700 princesses. Yeah. The non princesses probably there's a couple hundred more of

39:38those who knows. Again, it's, it's those Chamberlain numbers. Yeah. And, um, yeah. Who knows how

39:45many trombones and, uh, and the camels. Yes, June love the camels. Um, I see, I see how

39:53I was able to bring in not just the music man, but also a Latin man. You, you, you went

39:59all over the map with that. You, you encircled the globe twice, uh, on that one. But it says

40:05when Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods and his heart was

40:11not true to the Lord, his God, as was the heart of his father David. Yeah. Kinda. Yeah.

40:17Trying to have been David kind of got the, the raw end of the heart. David fudged the

40:21rules a little bit here and there, but sure. Yeah. So, and, and, but I mean, I think the

40:26main thing is, and this is something that we've talked about the main, one of the things

40:29that we need to remember here is that, uh, and one of the things that was never talked

40:35about in my religious upbringing was the fact that these other gods that Solomon was, uh,

40:41was kind of falling prey to were real gods by, they believed them to be. Yes. They believed

40:48them to be real gods. So this is a, this is like really treading on, uh, on Adonai's turf

40:55here. Yeah. Yeah. And you, you have, uh, first Kings 11 is interesting for so many reasons.

41:02Verse five refers to a Solomon following a starte, the goddess of the Sidonians and Milcom,

41:08the abomination of the Ammonites. Right. So Milcom was a patron deity of, of the Ammonites,

41:15but then you, excuse me, you go down to verse seven and it says, then Solomon built a high

41:19place for chemosh, the abomination of Moab. We've talked about chemosh before and for

41:25Molek, the abomination of the Ammonites. So we've just seen it was Milcom, who's the

41:30abomination of the Ammonites. Oh, yeah. That's right. Molek, the abomination of the Ammonites.

41:35This, this is a, a scribal corruption. Okay. There has been a, a change where Milcom and

41:42Molek, the only difference in written Hebrew, anciently, there's one letter, the M on the

41:47end of, of the, uh, the word, the name. And so obviously the, the meme has just fallen

41:55out, uh, from, excuse me, from the, uh, from the word Milcom. And so a lot of people use

42:03this as a, to argue that Molek was recognized as a deity. And Molek is, was not a deity.

42:10Molek was just a, a type of sacrifice. And then later Greek translators and, and later

42:14folks confused it for the name of a deity that we're saying, we're, we're saying that

42:19Milcom is the actual deity and Molek was, was, uh, an incorruption. Yeah. Okay. Textual,

42:26um, oopsie. I do think that Milcom is, would be a good name for a software company. Um,

42:33it, yeah. It just sounds right. I don't know. Uh, Milcom and Molek would be a good, would

42:39be an interesting name for a, uh, like a, a buddy comedy. Oh, a buddy comedy. I love it.

42:47The two, the two abominations of the Ammonite. Uh, I, I like it. Yeah. All right. So, so,

42:53okay. So let's, yeah, let's go on with, uh, with the song here. I'm going to get down

42:59to verse, uh, 23. Okay. Sounds good. We have some adversaries raised against Solomon,

43:04resins, son of Lioda, who had fled from his master king, Hadadazair of Zola. Um,

43:12they, whenever I wanted to say that, whenever on, uh, like the Simpsons,

43:18they always have Ned Flanders saying some kind of nonsensical name from, uh, from, uh, from the

43:24Bible. This is, this is one that I would have, if I didn't know this passage, I would have been

43:29like, they made that up. That's not my thing. Hadadazair of Zola. Hadadazair. Yeah. Okay.

43:36Yeah. Um, it's just Hadadazair. Uh, Hadad was the name of a deity as there, which just means help

43:42of. So, so help of Hadad, Hadad's, uh, helper and, um. Ooh, well, we're talking about names,

43:50name, because it's going to come up. What is the, what does the suffix Boam mean?

43:54Because we're going to get a Jeroboam and, uh, and, uh, uh, what's the son's name?

44:01Jeroboam and Rejo-boam. Right. Yes. Um, so the, uh, the arm on the end is not, is not clear. Uh,

44:14it could mean, uh, like it could mean people, um, means people. It could mean, uh, uncle, like

44:22there's, there's a, um, there's a form of this word that, that has reference to a male, uh, ancestor.

44:29It could mean an uncle God. Uh, it could be a deformation of Jeroboam. Oh, so Jeroboam, Jeroboam,

44:38the, they're spelled the same except for the, the ma'am on the end instead of a lamad. So, um,

44:44at least when it comes to, uh, Jeroboam, it's not clear what exactly is, uh, is going on with the,

44:55with the arm on the end of the name. Now when it comes to Rejoam, um, this is more likely to be,

45:04like the, the, um, Rahav means to be wide. Um, and this is a word that can mean street, uh,

45:12in Hebrew. So it might be this uncle God is, has made wide or maybe it's the people have become

45:23extensive. They've spread out. Okay. Um, so.

45:26Uncle God on the street is what I'm going with. Uncle God on the street. Yeah. So that.

45:32All right. Sorry. That was a, that was, I, I, I took us off down a rabbit trail.

45:38No worries. Um, but we have Jeroboam and, and this is a, this is an interesting story.

45:43Uh, oh, so, so anyway, a lot of people made trouble in Solomon's neighborhood.

45:48They were up to no good. Um, and then Jeroboam, uh, shows up and he's, he's like a, uh, a day

45:57laborer and he's coming down to Jerusalem and he's, he's helping up with helping out with stuff.

46:03And verse 28 says, when Solomon saw that the young man was industrious, he gave him charge

46:08over all the forced labor of the house of Joseph. And so forced labor, this would be Corvay labor.

46:14This is the, the king of Judah requiring that the people from the northern kingdom,

46:20who would have been subjugated to Judah, require they send folks, um, on a certain schedule to

46:27come do forced labor. So, uh, this is, this is not really slavery. It's something, uh, a bit different.

46:33And, um, and then Jeroboam's leaving Jerusalem work days over. He's going home and a prophet,

46:42a hydra, the Shilah Knight found him on the road and he had, he, and he had a new garment on and

46:50he gives it to, um, to, uh, Jeroboam, but tears it into 12 pieces, which is kind of like, cool.

47:00Thanks. What? Um, thanks for the shirt. I guess it's rags now. Yeah. Um, he says, take for yourself

47:0910 pieces for thus says the Lord, the God of Israel. See, I am about to tear the kingdom from the

47:15hand of Solomon and we'll give you 10 tribes. One tribe will remain his for the sake of my servant,

47:22David and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city that I've chosen out of all the tribes of Israel,

47:26this is because he has forsaken me, worshiped a start, they got us of the Sidonians and so on

47:31and so forth. Um, so it's a symbolic, you know, the prophets always doing weird symbolic stuff.

47:38Look at this jar. I'm going to break this jar. Look, I'm nude. Look, I'm tearing your, your code

47:43into 12 pieces. Um, so they're just put, can you put your clothes back on please? No? Oh, you're

47:50tearing it up. Great. Yeah. Okay. Um, so basically the, the 10 pieces are, represent the 10 tribes of

47:56Israel, which is the northern kingdom. So basically, so what, what he's saying is Jeroboam is going

48:02to get to be king, even though he's just this day laborer guy. Yeah, the prophet is like, hey,

48:06guess what? You're going to take over 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel and, um, and Jeroboam is,

48:12is represented as, as rather humble. Um, but Solomon finds out about this and Solomon's,

48:21you never want that. That's never any good. Solomon, not happy. But, uh, so he tries to kill

48:26Jeroboam, Jeroboam promptly flees to Egypt, uh, to King Shishak of Egypt and he remains in Egypt

48:33until Solomon dies. Yeah. Um, and then Solomon's dead, reigned in Jerusalem, 40 years, slept with

48:41his ancestors, was buried in the city of his father, David, and his son, Rehoboam succeeded

48:46him. Now Rehoboam, and, and here's the thing, there was never a single United Kingdom. Uh, scholars

48:53are pretty sure that Judah in the south and Israel in the north were originally separate

49:01kingdoms. And there, there was a, there would have been a time maybe where, uh, where Israel might

49:07have, uh, subjugated the southern kingdom or maybe the southern kingdom subjugated the northern

49:12kingdom, which is how it's represented in this text, which is, by the way, being written from

49:16the perspective of somebody who lived in the southern kingdom. Um, and so Rehoboam goes up to

49:21Shechem, which is the, the capital of the northern kingdom for all Israel had come to Shechem to

49:27make him king. And then Jeroboam heard about it and he comes back from Egypt. Um,

49:34and, uh, or no, he stays in Egypt and they, they call him and, uh, all the, uh, they sent and

49:43called him in Jeroboam and all the assembly of Israel came and said to Rehoboam, your father

49:48made our yoke heavy. So, you know, Jeroboam is a forced laborer. Um, now therefore light in the

49:53hard service of your father and his heavy yoke that he placed on us and we will serve you basically

49:57saying, look, the northern kingdom, your dad was mean to us. If you will be nicer to us, we will

50:04happily be part of your kingdom. Right. Chill out a little bit. Let's, uh, let's be kind,

50:10rewind and, uh, and maybe we can all get along. And King Rehoboam took counsel with the older men

50:17who had attended his father Solomon while he was still alive, saying how do you advise me to

50:21answer the people? So he's basically going to the elders who were his dad's advisors and they said,

50:27if you will be a servant to this people and serve them and speak good words to them when you answer

50:32them, then they will be your servants forever. Then he went to the cool kids, the younger crowd,

50:42and, uh, who grew up with him. So his even millers of the world,

50:48his friends and, uh, and he says, what do you advise? Uh, and they said,

50:53thus, you should say to this people who spoke to you, your father made your

50:58aryoke heavy, but you must lightness for us. Thus, you should say to them, my little finger is

51:03thicker than my father's loins, which is, I'm going to assume that means what I think it means.

51:11It does. He's, he's holding up his pinky and going, you know, this is, this is bigger than, uh,

51:18than, uh, my dad's Johnson. Meaning, meaning, I suppose that like, my dad was a wimp. Yeah. And, and, and,

51:28because having a big shlong is, uh, it makes you stronger as a human as a person or something makes

51:37you more powerful as a man. Yeah. You, the, the, the one with the bigger Schnitzen Grubin is, is

51:44the, the man or man. Um, so he says, my father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline

51:51you with scorpions. So he, like you, the sound of, uh, of that more than the elders, uh, recommendation

51:59that I want to make it worse for these people rather than better. Yeah. Cause I got to say scorpions, I,

52:05I'd probably take a scorpion over, over a whip. Whips seem like they do like way more damage.

52:13Um, because yeah, he wants to flex on him. Yeah. And you know, that's, that's the, the

52:20tendency of the girth of his little pinky. Yeah. See that ring. That's like a, that's like a 12.

52:26That's a 13. Um, so Jeroboam and all the people came to row, Rehoboam the third day, as the king

52:33had said, come to me again, the third day, the king answered the people harshly. He disregarded

52:37the advice that the older men had given him and spoke to them according to the advice of the young

52:42men. My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with

52:46whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions. And basically they tried to kill him.

52:52It does seem like when it, when he came face to face with the people, he skipped the, uh,

52:58the little finger bit. So, uh, you know, it sounds, it sounds like he improvised a little bit in the

53:05moment. Yeah. So the, we're out on that one. He was like, ah, I, I don't want to try that one out

53:12with this crowd. So, but he goes back to Jerusalem. He sends a Doram who was the taskmaster over the

53:18forced labor. And, uh, he sent him up to Israel to basically, um, say, all right, come on, let's go.

53:26And they stoned him to death. And so, yeah, Rehking Rehoboam then hurriedly mounted his chariot

53:33to flee to Jerusalem. So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.

53:40So it's, it's the explanation for how, uh, the two kingdoms that were always separate kingdoms

53:46came to be separate. So it's kind of an ASAP's fable for, um, for a people who kind of, um, came

53:56up with this, uh, this origin story that we were once a united kingdom and we got separated. And

54:04that is probably fiction. Um, and it's being told from a southern perspective because after

54:10the destruction of the northern kingdom, the southern kingdom kind of appropriated all their

54:14traditions and was like, we're Israel now. And, uh, and we're, and we've got the lineage of David.

54:20Yeah. And the idea is, oh, we were always Israel. The northern kingdom just rebelled against us.

54:24And that's why, um, that's why they, uh, got destroyed in 722 BCE.

54:31Do is there any, uh, archaeological evidence that Raya Boem and, and solemn were solemn with

54:39Solomon a real person? The scholars are a bit divided on that. I think there are, there are

54:45those who would argue that David was, uh, probably a real leader of a dynasty. We do have, uh, the

54:53tell Dan inscription. I remember you talking about that or the tell Dan Steely, uh, no relation to

55:00Steely Dan, but, um, that had, that talks about how, uh, the Hazael, the airaman killed the,

55:09somebody who would have been the part of the house of David. So that would have been a dynasty,

55:14not a kingdom, just the dynasty that, that, uh, occupied Jerusalem. And so it's, it's certainly

55:22plausible that there was a historical Solomon, uh, relationship to David unclear, uh, because they,

55:30you know, it tries to make David out to be Saul's, you know, right-hand man initially,

55:36and, uh, Saul then is trying to kill David and David is a, you know, a mercenary for the,

55:42for the Phoenicians, um, not Phoenicians. Oh my gosh. Did I say Phoenicians? I'm having the worst

55:48time with, with, uh, names. Oh my gosh. Um, who are the, the Sea Peoples?

55:58Oh my gosh. I can't help you. Sorry. Yeah. I mean, we've told that story. Go back,

56:03go back and look in our back catalog. You'll get that story. Yeah. You'll get that story. So, um,

56:07so anyway, the, a lot of these stories seem to be coming from centuries later,

56:13where people are just kind of dressing it up to serve their, their memory of this golden age. And,

56:19and so there's a lot of, uh, a lot of propaganda, a lot of fiction. So it's, it's certainly possible.

56:25Reboom, Jeroboom, more likely probably, I think than, than Solomon to be, to be historical.

56:32Yeah. Yeah. I think so, but it's really about a hundred years after that,

56:37that we get into a period where we can begin to archaeologically confirm, uh, these kings. So,

56:44the Amride dynasty is, uh, is where things really take off. And, uh, and some, and that was probably

56:52the most successful ruler ruling dynasty in Israel. Uh, and I'll, and some scholars think that it is

57:00the memory of the Amrides that has been shifted to David to make it seem like David was really

57:06the one who expanded Israel the most. Cause we want the glory down in the south, down in Jerusalem,

57:12rather than in Shechem in the north. Okay. Interesting. Well, there you go. Uh,

57:20Shechem, if you got them and, uh, we'll, we'll, uh, close it out there. If you would like to help us

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