WHY DID THE LORD ALLOW MEN TO HAVE CONCUBINES AND/OR MORE THAN ONE WIFE? { CONTROVERSY Yikes }

It is Obvious From the Old Testament that Some Men Had Several Wives and Sometimes Several Concubines as Well. Why?

Was a Man With Several Concubines Considered an Adulterer?

First of all let us consider concubinage.

We may start off by considering some comments from the Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible:

'Concubinage was practised in many ancient cultures, especially in Mesopotamia.....where a private citizen might have one or two concubines in addition to his primary wife.....a concubine was often a slave or part of the booty of war (Judges 5:30). A man might have a concubine simply as an economical form of marriage, since no dowry or bride-price was required. A concubine could add to a man's prestige by giving him two wives and thus an increased capacity for children. Such offspring were normally delivered onto the knees of the legal wife, thus establishing their legitimacy as family members. The concubine was also another servant to add to his work force.' (Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, 1997, Vol 1, p504).

So there we have it in a nutshell: a concubine was essentially a servant girl whose duties included s*xual services to her master. She was seen as more 'low-born' than the wife although she was still allowed certain rights within the household. It might seem odd to women of our own day why the wives did not object to this arrangement, but in fact all the evidence is that concubines were warmly welcomed by wives into the household since they mainly became the servants of the wife. The ancient world simply did not carry the modern post-Christian expectation that a man would have only one s*xual partner, neither did wives expect it of their husbands. Of course sometimes men had two or more wives (rather than concubines). Wives had greater rights but cost their husbands a lot more!

This might all seem strange today, but we sometimes don't realize how much of the 'one man-one woman' scenario developed from Christianity which was later reinforced by the 19^th century Romantic movement (just think of the novels of the Bronte sisters with their passionate concern for private 'one man-one woman' love). Indeed, we still see the acceptance of plural marriage in cultures which have not been influenced by these things – including in parts of the Islamic world.

If we look at the period of the patriarchs, we immediately must note that concubinage etc is the expected 'norm' – note Scriptures such as Genesis 22:24; 35:22; 36:12, also note how concubinage was welcomed by wives who were barren: Genesis 16:1-3; 25:5-6; 1 Chronicles 1:32. If a concubine provided children for a barren wife, those children could gain an inheritance and real prestige (but they would legally be considered the wife's children – not the concubine's).

Some Bible commentators have suggested that the Lord allowed men to have more than one wife or several concubines during the period from the Great Flood until the Old Covenant in order to build up the world's population (which had obviously been decimated by the Flood), but from the time of Moses receiving the legal package on Mount Sinai, concubinage was banned. But this is totally incorrect for two reasons:

·         Firstly, we should not forget that the Old Covenant was given to Israel alone!

·         Secondly, the Old Covenant did make provision for a man having more than one wife. Please note Deuteronomy 21:15-17 !!

We must also note that Moses himself took a second wife who was an Ethiopian woman (Numbers 12:1). Moses had already married Zipporah (Exodus 2:21). Aaron and Miriam criticized their brother for taking this second wife, but they were immediately punished by the Lord for their criticism, making it plain that Moses had done no wrong in His sight (Numbers 12:1-15). Of course, it is possible that Moses' first wife had died, but the text gives no indication of this.

Later on people like David continued to have wives and concubines without receiving a single reproach from the Lord! David only received punishment when he added another man's wife (Bathsheba) to this group thereby clearly committing adultery.

Often Bible teachers in Sunday School are embarrassed about people like Abraham, Gideon and David having several wives and concubines – they simply don't know how to handle it! They usually react by calling David an adulterer who still had lessons to learn - but this is just not what the Bible teaches. The fact is: prior to the Christian New Covenant, God did allow this practise and it was not adultery! Adultery is taking another man's wife (or another woman's husband), but if a man had two wives and two concubines he was expected to be faithful to them all – it is clear from the Scriptures that this was not considered adultery, unpalatable though this may be for some!