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It's not about love.

Tlaloc

Tlaloc

Member
I think I can state as a foregone conclusion that marriage is not foundationally about love as in eros, though I believe that eros is a great and necessary part of it.

But I can also say that true love is not the foundation or the reason for marriage. We are outright commanded to love essentially everyone, everyone we know at least, from our neighbors to our enemies and on. Love is much to broad a criteria for marriage, and quite honestly love in marriage doesn't receive any kind of special boost. There are no doubt times when its harder to love your spouse than it is to love your enemy. Of course love is crucial to marriage, but love is crucial to every aspect of a godly life.

Marriage goes beyond love, love is broader, marriage deals with a special relationship that includes love but is much deeper. I don't think I'm at a point where I can describe what I mean other than saying its a little picture of what the Gospel of John described. Early on 'God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son' and yes, God loves the whole world, but in the end Christ says 'I pray not for the world but for those that you have given me, because they are yours.'. Love is for everyone, but marriage is about trust(Faith) and likeness and becoming as one and complimenting one another's personalities. But not just complimenting, that is much to weak a word, in marriage we glorify one another. Just as our glory is in Christ, and we live to glorify Christ, good marriage is a hint of that.


This is just another way in which the common poly objection 'how can you love more than one person?' makes no sense. We had better be able to love more than one person poly or not, if we don't we are failures as Christians and as human beings. Yes, marriage needs love, but it also needs to go way beyond love.
 
Observations:

  • I firmly believe that the objections to polygyny by the marriage forbidders is not rooted in a desire to follow scripture. The motivation is rooted in self idolatry.
  • There is never a single passage given by the marriage forbidders that has God conveying a dislike of multiple wives.
  • All of the passages given have other primary meanings. We are always told to accept the secondary supposed inference. **

**To put it another way, any verse from bible cited against polygyny will always be dealing with a different issue. For instance, Matt 19 is dealing with divorce, not about polygyny. 1 Cor 7:2 has the inspired writer reasserting the right to marriage because of the rampant pagan sex worship, not about polygyny. I Tim 3:2 deals w/ qualifications of a deacon, not about polygyny.

Where is a single passage dealing with polygyny primarily?
 
Marrying for love and the huge emphasis placed on finding love before marriage is actually a very modern concept.
Marriage amongst anyone with any property (which is a lot more people these days) was usually a business decision. That didn't mean that there was no love in marriage or that marriages were miserable just that it came later as a result of mutual respect and co-operation with one another. Building a life together created love.

Concepts like courtly or romantic love were originally a medieval folly. Fantasy, like Mills and Boon, not supposed to be a model for real life. Loving is supposed to be a freely given gift but it's distorted to be an expectation, something we believe we deserve. It's negotiated, has conditions placed upon it. It has been given limits and your average modern women will want every last scrap of it for herself as her due. "Sharing with others means she gets less" and you will see that in books, magazines and movies, everywhere.
Polygamy has some massive hurdles to get over before we can reach anything that resembles acceptance. I think it's possible though, gays managed to do it.
 
"Building a life together created love"

In any good case I think that happens.

Good post, thanks for that Mel
 
All good points about love in marriage. I have a couple of opinions.

1. Men are commanded to love their wives. I think that a man can love as an action, plain an simple. Men that are close to God should be able to receive God's love and disperse an honest application of love to his home and to wife/wives. This is not just being a good provider, leader, and father. It is real love dispersed into his home.

2. There is not much comandment in scripture about a woman loving her husband. Theres no need to. as with her children, her husband receives love from her in a natural complete way. She just loves. It is how God made her.

3. The term "soul mate" leads to false expectations and if there are problems then the "soul mate" has failed or must never have been right. Dreams can fail and we can fail. God needs to be the marriage cause and the sustainer.

4. Both men and woman sometimes love with conditions. There are too many expectations and standards. We make each other too breakable.

5. Love should be fun/pleasant. (I know, someone will say it can be work, but isn't work sometimes desirable if you love?)

6. Plural gives us more people to love.
 
1. Definitely,

2. Its a very good point, I agree that love comes much easier for her in marriage, she will have trouble with different areas.

3. Agreed that marriage needs something much much more than soul mate ideology, it needs a firm reason

4. Yeah, we need to learn unconditional love, but it is hard to do.

5. In every case it should be, but I think loving ones enemies is always tough to enjoy.

6. :) yep, in the best way.
 
Kind of related, & my opinion

The marriage is a replica of Christ & the Church, & I go with the "you need to love them as He commanded us", but I realize sometimes it was marry 1st, love later. Not in the case with Isaac & Rebekah though!

anyhow, thinking about that model, I feel thats why people have problems with their relationship with Jesus. Many are already "married" (at least what they know about this societies ideas marriage), & come to Christ later in life. As people begin to know that Christ & the Church is a model of marriage, they tend to build their relation ship with Christ based on their experiences so far with marriage. That may be a reason they dont fully trust Him, leary of a blessing or healing, jealous of what blessing God may give another believer, wonders if He is really faithful when times seem tough, etc. The correct action would begin to modify their marriage & family structure to follow the examples in the Bible.

2 cents
in His Love
john
 
I've been thinking a lot about that lately John. Especially jealousy among Christians, every denomination feels like it has to be it and it has to be the real church or closer to God than the others. They can't accept that they just have a different relationship because they are a different assembly, because there is only supposed to be one church (how they figure that I can't say)
 
I should have specified that paragraph 2 was dealing with love as in agape, I just assumed that since 1 was dealing with eros most people would assume I meant agape for 2. While we often use the word love as slang for 'I really like' thats not at all what I'm talking about. The love I'm talking about is loving another as you would love yourself, and cant be applied to material objects ect...

Now, not only are we able to sacrifice our needs for another outside of marriage, we are commanded too when needed. That's what Love they Neighbor is about and that is what the Law was about. That's why Christianity is hard, thats why its a narrow way. The deepest love that most people experience is only scratching the surface of how a mature Christian behaves.

The love that initially attracts is usually eros, and its fleeting, thats why I dismissed it earlier as a basis for marriage. If you mean something else by the love that initially attracts please explain, because I'm not sure what else that could mean.


"No one fights for nothing, but for someone at home that they love"
This line proves my point very much. Typically armies are composed mostly of single young men, who they love is their family at large or their nation as a whole or their city. Even if demographics have changed considerably the point is that while everyone might fight to protect people they love, it is by far and wide not only married people who go off to war. Love is wider than that.


As Christians its even further than that, and we must also love our enemies. We must effectively love everyone we know in a way that we would sacrifice for them when push came to shove. At worst we must even be ready to die as martyrs as witness to them (because we know that many times those who have killed us have seen our testimony and joined us, even Paul who was Saul, Martydom is foremost a witness to our enemies) and 'No greater love has any man than this, that he would lay down his life for his brother'. There isn't any room for a special level of love in marriage, we already must do our best to everyone.

And that is why marriage cannot be specifically about love, it must go deeper than that. Yes love must be in marriage, its so important that it is a special command of husbands, but loving someone is not a good reason to marry them. First, we must love everyone, and second loving someone does not mean they are compatible or even acceptable as a spouse. We must love those outside the faith, but we cannot marry them.

I agree that living plurality can teach us about the love of Christ, even studying it has.

Dr. Raymond Mossie's teachings deal very directly with the situation you laid out. Sickness can force someone to learn to love, but it is much better if you don't need that kind of thing to teach you. I should note that I find that terming someone with cancer as unlovable is offensive to me, and quite outrageous to my wife. I understand you don't mean it that way, but there are better words to describe what you mean in the future.

The set way to love is to care about someone as you would yourself. The actions you take to love someone are different for every person as what they want and need are different, and understanding their needs is part of loving them. The goal of love is the same in every case, though I very much agree that the application is different.

Bless you,
Jair
 
Jair,

This is a very interesting thread. I see where you are coming from and agree with what you are saying. Some may misunderstand, but marriage is about covenant. Love is a decision, (agapeo) and not a physical feeling, (eros). The feelings and physical attraction will grow in support of the decision to love someone as a spouse or sister wife, if one will allow them to come by DECIDING to walk in love toward the spouse or sister wife.

We ARE called to love our enemies and this is one of the measures of perfection or maturity in Christ, (Matt. 5:43-48). I would like clarity on the idea that you may or may not be saying that we are called to lay down our lives for our enemies. Though you did not directly say this, I think some may read it into what you said, so I wish to clarify. We are called to love our enemies, NOT to lay down our lives for them or even for disobedient Christians. We are only called to lay down our lives for OBEDIENT Christians...

John 15:12-14 -

12This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. 14You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.

The Holy Bible, New King James Version, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, Inc.) 1982.

A true brother is an obedient Christian, not a disobedient one or any other enemy. We must be careful to avoid any person who calls themselves a Christian brother and does not do what Jesus said to do. Unfortunately this greatly narrows the field.

I Corinthians 5:9-13 -

9I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. 10Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. 11But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner not even to eat with such a person. 12For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside? Do you not judge those who are inside? 13But those who are outside God judges. Therefore put away from yourselves the evil person.

The Holy Bible, New King James Version, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, Inc.) 1982.

II John 4:9-11 -

9Whoever transgresses and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not have God. He who abides in the doctrine of Christ has both the Father and the Son. 10If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him into your house nor greet him; 11for he who greets him shares in his evil deeds.

The Holy Bible, New King James Version, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, Inc.) 1982.

Be blessed,

Ray
 
Ah, thanks for that clarification Kmelt, I apologize for the misunderstanding mason.

Ray,

I think what I mean is close to what your saying but not exactly it, I need to do some study to articulate it properly and my time is short tonight. I'll reply to that later.
 
Rom 5:6-10 For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

In John 15:12, quoted in your post, we see that it is our command to love one another as he has loved us. He loved us, and even died for us while we where yet his enemies, so we could be reconciled to him. I'm not talking about keeping company or heeding the doctrine of evildoers, but I am talking about being willing to accept martydom at the hands of the wicked if it comes to that. While Christians have accepted it for Christ, they also die as a witness to the unsaved. Its an emulation of when Christ died to fulfill the will of his father AND to save us.

Such heavy events have been a great witness and lead persecuters to salvation. One could stipulate that we need only to die for those who will be saved by it, but we have no way of knowing who that will be until judgment, so the effect is the same.
 
Melanie said:
Marrying for love and the huge emphasis placed on finding love before marriage is actually a very modern concept.
Marriage amongst anyone with any property (which is a lot more people these days) was usually a business decision. That didn't mean that there was no love in marriage or that marriages were miserable just that it came later as a result of mutual respect and co-operation with one another. Building a life together created love.

Concepts like courtly or romantic love were originally a medieval folly. Fantasy, like Mills and Boon, not supposed to be a model for real life. Loving is supposed to be a freely given gift but it's distorted to be an expectation, something we believe we deserve. It's negotiated, has conditions placed upon it. It has been given limits and your average modern women will want every last scrap of it for herself as her due. "Sharing with others means she gets less" and you will see that in books, magazines and movies, everywhere.
Polygamy has some massive hurdles to get over before we can reach anything that resembles acceptance. I think it's possible though, gays managed to do it.
Click to expand...


freebird said:
I believe marriage IS about love, but a certain type of love. For example, I love ice cream. I also love a good book. But my love for my husband is rooted very deeply. I believe it's only in love in a marriage that you can truly sacrifice your fleshly needs for the other person. It is this love that intially attracts a person together, but through time it becomes a normal feeling that most people forget and take advantage of the inital deep rooted love. There is this saying that we had in the military when someone deploys,

"No one fights for nothing, but for someone at home that they love"

It is this love that Christ died for us and if you have children, you know exactly what this kind of love is. For us living in a fallen world, we have to constantly work at developing this type of love. Having babies, it seems to come like second nature. Living in marriage, not as much :)

I believe one of the ways we can learn to love as Christ loved is to live Plurally. Most women that I talk to that live polygyny say that it wasn't until something bad happened ( ie. death, sickness) that they truly learned what it means to love thier sisterwives by leaning and supporting each other through the crisis. One woman in particular I'm thinking of is the first wife of three. Her husband has been married to ALL three women for over fifteen years. She explained to me through this time, she was jealous, abrasive, controlling, etc. and then five years ago she wsa diagnosed with cancer. It was the same sisterwives that nursed her back to health.That is true love, being a support and loving the unlovable. Living plurally brings to light all the fleshly emotions that do not align with the Word of God.

I believe there is NO set way to love and it's different with every person. My husband loves me differently then he will love number two, but it doesn't mean he loves her any less. There is so much beauty and joy in the world, how can you not love?

In Christ
Nikki
Click to expand...

This is an important issue to me because the two main things I want to focus on learning about in a plural marriage are love and jealousy. At first, I was torn between both of you guys post regarding marrying out of love or building the love after you marry, but I think you both may be right in a way. Tlaloc's first post on page 2 helped to clarify some things and put them into perspective. Thanks for the great posts.
 
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