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Polygyny, Matt. 5:28, and Attraction

N

NS4Liberty

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Male
Since being married about 3 years ago, my wife has asked me some hard questions. We were watching a movie and a scantily clad woman came on the screen and she asked, "What does it do to you when you see a woman dressed like that?" I didn't have an answer. At the time I believed the traditional translation of Matt. 5:28. Then she asked, "What are we gonna tell our kids about lust?"

Then I was playing the 2011 Tomb Raider. This was the reboot where they redesigned the main character, Lara, to be more realistic. She is wearing a tank top with a camisole underneath as the default outfit. She is also not real. My wife commented she didn't like me playing a game with an attractive character dressed like that. Again, I had no answer. I was still under the impression any sort of attraction or level of arousal to anyone but my wife was adultery.

This struck me as odd, though. Is it wrong to prefer to see attractive people in movies and other entertainment?

Then I discovered the better translation of Matt. 5:28 and polygyny. A wife doesn't have exclusive right to their husbands arousal and lust isn't what we were taught.

This also has implications for modesty discussions. Most modesty discussions I have heard involve Matt. 5:28.

It seems to me Matt. 5:28 has been weaponized to keep men in constant shame and submissive to their wives. Am I getting the right impression?

Does the better translation of Matt. 5:28 and polygyny change how you view and weigh entertainment and modesty?
 
If attraction is lust, then we would have to enter into sin on our way to our first marriage.
 
Guilt and fear are what the enemy wants us to live in.
Creating misunderstandings like this one is one of the ways that he accomplishes it.
 
Cracked me up when the pastor of my church used that verse to explain lusting after a woman was adultery and that you couldn’t be attracted to a woman enough to want to marry her without transgression of that verse.

Made me want to call him an adulterer for lusting after his fiancée before they married just to point out the stupidity of his argument and lack of critical thought.
 
frederick said:
The sad thing is he uses some otherwise good preachers to promote the guilt and fear. So we need to be careful we don't become one of them promoting some other misunderstanding. We would be just as guilty.
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Yes, none has perfect theology and we need to be humble because we don’t know which point we are off in.
Someday I will fully realize this.
 
NS4Liberty said:
It seems to me Matt. 5:28 has been weaponized to keep men in constant shame and submissive to their wives. Am I getting the right impression?
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Amen.

We don't even properly divide the truth of Scripture when it comes to the concept of lust; it has specifically been weaponized to assist women and Organized Churchianity to dominate men -- by assigning it not only some kind of specificity targeted only at sexuality, but by expanding that to condemn almost all levels of sexual desire. By doing so, proponents are positing a Hateful God, who endowed us with these desires only to set us up for even having them, much less acting on them.

Count me out. Adultery is someone not married to her having sex with a married woman. What it's usually useful to acknowledge, even if only intrinsically, is that women's guilt-trips about 'lust' are most likely in most cases a matter of pure projection.
 
I guess I should have specified what I meant by "better translation of Matt. 5:28." I think the best translation is, "but I say to you that everyone who gazes intently at a [married] woman in order to covet her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." (Source)

Based on this idea of coveting, when I read the story of David and Bathsheba, other than David not being with his men on campaign, I don't think he sinned until his servant told him Bathsheba was married and he sent for her anyway. The traditional view is that looking at Bathsheba bathing was when he sinned.

This translation is also why I think tying Matt. 5:28 to the modesty discussion is a stretch. Coveting a wife is a lot more than thinking someone has a hot wife.
 
NS4Liberty said:
I guess I should have specified what I meant by "better translation of Matt. 5:28." I think the best translation is, "but I say to you that everyone who gazes intently at a [married] woman in order to covet her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." (Source)

Based on this idea of coveting, when I read the story of David and Bathsheba, other than David not being with his men on campaign, I don't think he sinned until his servant told him Bathsheba was married and he sent for her anyway. The traditional view is that looking at Bathsheba bathing was when he sinned.

This translation is also why I think tying Matt. 5:28 to the modesty discussion is a stretch. Coveting a wife is a lot more than thinking someone has a hot wife.
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Matthew 5:28 is basically saying the same thing as the 10th Commandment. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife (or anything else that belongs to your neighbor).

Coveting his goods is "theft in your heart", just like coveting his wife is "adultery in the heart".

It seems alright to say "my neighbor has an awesome house/truck/rifle/farm etc"
 
frederick said:
Yup! But more than that, I feel free to comment to my wives about attractive women.
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This is one of the advantages of accepting polygyny, even if not living it, that I mentioned (see link below)
in a ladies discussion long ago. I don't want my hubby having to pretend about anything.....never did. So there is another level of honesty and understsnding that can be there if his first wife is secure in the marriage.

Please share the advantages of being poly minded

So I've been thinking about this for a while,thought I'd finally get around to asking the other poly minded ladies here to share the upside to biblical poly thinking.....even if you don't live it! I am the first and so far only wife of my dear husband, but one of the advantages that I see is...
biblicalfamilies.org biblicalfamilies.org
 
Bartato said:
It's probably best not to think too much about those things that belong to your neighbor
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Bartato said:
On the other hand, an unmarried woman
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Ahh. But your neighbor's daughter is NOT on the do not covet list. She is expected to build another man's house. The only problem you might run into is thinking about her after her Dad says no way.
 
I heard one time and have applied it to my life that Coveting is the practice of desiring something that I cannot legally obtain. I like my neighbors suv and would enjoy it immensely but it is not for sale so therefore I turn to other avenues. Same goes with wife#2 or #3 etc. If she is married to someone else then she is not obtainable. Coveting is a precursor to the other sins like adultery and theft. I want that suv so bad that I will just take it for myself. It is quite insidious in its trickery. I find that lust is just plain desiring something, the rightness or wrongness waits to be seen, the scriptural context reveals sin. The presence of oodles and gobs of skin is a temptation to most if not all men. We are hard wired to desire and if wifey doesn't like that then she is fighting nature and husbands are unnecesarily condemned. The very same desire that wife wants for herself she condemns. Now prostitution is nowhere mentioned in the Big 10 but it is used many times in the idol worship so the priests and priestesses can make a little money, hence a sacrifice for some cleaving action.
 
NS4Liberty said:
I guess I should have specified what I meant by "better translation of Matt. 5:28." I think the best translation is, "but I say to you that everyone who gazes intently at a [married] woman in order to covet her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." (Source)

Based on this idea of coveting, when I read the story of David and Bathsheba, other than David not being with his men on campaign, I don't think he sinned until his servant told him Bathsheba was married and he sent for her anyway. The traditional view is that looking at Bathsheba bathing was when he sinned.

This translation is also why I think tying Matt. 5:28 to the modesty discussion is a stretch. Coveting a wife is a lot more than thinking someone has a hot wife.
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Now that's a horse of a different color, @NS4Liberty. The translation you quote gets to the heart of the matter, because it necessarily entails coveting, which itself requires something far beyond desire; in fact, I'd assert that it goes even beyond wishing. Some level of intent to take has to be involved to qualify as coveting, and we are not permitted to intend, which arises from our spiritual heart, to steal another man's wife. That is clearly adultery in our hearts.

Maddog said:
I want that suv so bad that I will just take it for myself.
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Well said, @Maddog!
 
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