What Does the Bible Say about Polygamy?

When a man takes multiple wives, or sometimes when a woman has multiple husbands, that person is a polygamist. There are many reasons someone may want to have more than one spouse including lust, a desire for more children, or the belief they have a divine mandate to do so. In the Old Testament, several important and influential men have multiple wives and concubines.

The first marriage God ordained was between Adam and Eve, one for another. Adam recites a poem in response to meeting Eve, “This shall be bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man” (Genesis 2:23). This poem is about love, about completion, and God’s divine will.

By contrast, the next husband to recite a poem is a descendent of Cain named Lamech - the first bigamist. He had two wives named Adah and Zillah. His poem is not sweet, but about murder and revenge: “Adah and Zillah, hear my voice; you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say: I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me. If Cain's revenge is sevenfold, then Lamech's is seventy-sevenfold” (Genesis 4:23-24). Lamech is a violent man whose forefather was violent, reacting on impulse. He is the first man to take more than one wife.

Moving forward, many men deemed righteous also take multiple wives. However, this decision has consequences which increase in magnitude over the centuries.

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Jacob: In Genesis, Jacob labored for seven years to marry the beautiful Rachel. She was the youngest, however, and tradition dictated he marry the older sister. So her father tricked Jacob into marrying his oldest - Leah. Angered, Jacob worked another seven years to marry Rachel. Moving forward, there is contention between the women, since Jacob loved Rachel more. They even gave their husband handmaids as concubines in attempts to undermine one another and maintain status. God allowed both women to bear sons, giving them protection and joy, but the relationship was never right. These tensions are documented in Genesis 29 and Genesis 30.

David: Though David was a man after God’s own heart, he was not perfect. For political and personal reasons, he took eight wives and multiple concubines. His first wife was his predecessor’s daughter, another a woman who saved his life after she was widowed. Famously, he committed adultery with another man’s wife, Bathsheba, and when she fell pregnant he murdered her husband and took her as his final wife. His inappropriate desire led to the destruction of his family, as it gave his son Absalom the fuel he needed to start planning his own coup. While David was successful in keeping his throne, his family was broken. Details regarding David’s polygamy can be found in 1 Samuel 18, 1 Samuel 25, 2 Samuel 3, 2 Samuel 12, and 1 Chronicles 3.

Solomon: The man with the most wives in the Bible was Solomon, the wise thinker who contributed three books to the Old Testament. Like his father David, Solomon took wives for political expediency and personal pleasure. Ultimately, he had 700 wives and 300 concubines. Many of these wives were the daughters of kings, pharaohs, and other powerful rulers of the day. Through these foreign brides, many idols were introduced to Israel, such as the Asherah pole dedicated to a Canaanite goddess. This idolatry eventually led to the nation turning its back on God, which eventually led to the exile to Babylon. The record of Solomon’s wives are in 1 King 11. 

On an interesting note, after the return from exile, there is no documented evidence of Israelites taking multiple wives amongst leaders or common people. 

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In the lives of the men in the Bible, polygamy is not overtly condemned, but is not glorified either. In each of the examples earlier in this article, Jacob, David, and Solomon must face the repercussions of their decision to marry more than one woman, as well as to take concubines. There is no polygamous relationship in the Old Testament that is free of contention.

Sin includes actions taken or behaviors that fall outside the will of God, so from that perspective polygamy is a sinful act that God works for His glory and man’s good. For example, Jacob became a polygamist in part as a byproduct of the deceit of Laban - Leah and Rachel’s father - and he took concubines because of inappropriate competition between the sisters; ultimately God used these painful situations to lay the foundations for the twelve tribes of Israel.

There are verses in which the Bible expressly forbids from taking multiple wives:

“When you come to the land that the Lord your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, ‘I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,’...And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold” (Deuteronomy 17:14, 17).

“Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money” (1 Timothy 3:2).

“Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well” (1 Timothy 3:12).

Kings, deacons, and overseers - another word for bishop or pastor - are obligated to only have one wife. These men are supposed to be pillars of society, models for their communities, and setting the example for those around them. God wanted the leaders in the community to only have one wife. God’s expectation is monogamy.

Because some cultures and societies do sometimes engage in polygamy, God does set boundaries, rules, and guidelines which were meant to protect the wives. God views marriage as a sacred covenant, which should only be contracted between two people. But when someone entered a polygamous relationship, God gave parameters.

“If a man has two wives, the one loved and the other unloved, and both the loved and the unloved have borne him children, and if the firstborn son belongs to the unloved, then on the day when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the unloved, who is the firstborn, but he shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the firstfruits of his strength. The right of the firstborn is his” (Deuteronomy 21:15-17).

“If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights” (Exodus 21:10).

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While polygamy may not have been God’s plan, He did use these sinful relationships for His good. For example, a man marrying multiple women could give the women protection. Daughters were not as valuable to the family in ancient times, since they were unable to work in the fields. Abraham and his descendants were also shepherds, who were away for half the year taking sheep places to eat and drink. This left women at home, with few options for independence, and few men in the area.

If one wealthy man had more than one wife who could also vet the character of his employees, that man gave protection to the women he married, and to other women in their families, who could possibly marry men in his employ. It created a social network of protection. 

Despite these benefits, polygamy was never God’s intended goal for marriage. He always allowed the man to suffer the repercussions of the decision. When Jacob married Leah and Rachel, he had to deal with their bickering, and even had to accept this affected the relationship between his sons. The Lord often blessed the women in these marriages with sons and daughters, which gave the woman protection for the rest of her life in their culture.

Though polygamy created tensions for the women in marriage, in the Old Testament God ensured that each wife who sought Him had protection and security, and often used those children mightily for His kingdom.

In 1 Samuel, Hannah was the barren wife in a polygamous marriage, and the other wife was cruel to her for this barrenness. God blessed Hannah with a son who went on to be a powerful prophet.

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Beyond the practical issues of creating tensions, dissension, jealousy, and confusion, polygamy pollutes and confuses the symbolism of what marriage represents. Often, the church is spoken of like a bride, and Christ as the bridegroom. In Ephesians 5, Paul outlines the duty of a husband and a wife like Christ and the church. Men should love their wives to the same extent that Jesus loved the world, willing to lay down His life. Likewise, women should submit to their husbands like the saved should submit to the will of God.

In the Book of Revelation, the new Jerusalem is where those who received salvation will live for eternity as the Bride. “Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, ‘Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.’ And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal” (Revelation 21:9-11).

Jesus will reign in Heaven forever, over the church from Jerusalem, where the church will live forever. Marriage should represent this eternal love through commitment to one person. 

There is also the importance of monogamous relationships as a symbol for faithfulness to God. As noted, Solomon’s reign was the height of polygamous behavior in the Old Testament for the men who knew God, and through his wives, idolatry grew deep roots among the Jewish people. Through the Bible, God uses women to symbolize what the appropriate love between Himself and His people should be. Instead of looking to many gods, people should look only to the one true God, just as a husband should look only at one woman, his wife, and she only at her husband. 

When considering the blessing of marriage, it is important to remember one of the most poignant pictures of it in the Bible, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh” (Ephesians 5:31). If God sees a husband and a wife as one flesh, then they should function as one. The covenant is sacred, lifelong, and meant to represent the relationship between God and His people. Polygamy creates tension, inappropriate situations, and pain. In the Bible, it is always shown to have negative repercussions, and even played a role in Israel embracing false gods for a time. God’s intent was monogamy, and a true union between two people, an earthly portent of eternal joy to come.

Sources

Brooke, George. The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005. 

Keller, Timothy and Kathy. The Meaning of Marriage Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God. New York: Penguin Books, 2011.

Witte Jr., John. The Western Case for Monogamy Over Polygamy. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015.

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