WHERE IS THE SHORELINE FOR SUBMISSION? Or, Is Your Husband Seeking Plural Marriage Your Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Card?

[Keith Martin]

[Now, if anyone thinks I’ve been long-winded in the past, take my advice up front: take your time reading all this – and please don’t start posting replies until you’ve read all the way through. If it’s really important to you to advertise that you can’t be bothered to read everything in this thread, perhaps you could consider starting a separate thread dedicated to slamming this one. Every single person is VERY welcome to participate right here, but I do ask that you keep your powder dry until you’ve read everything. Except perhaps for those men who were part of the project this represents and don’t mind identifying themselves as such, I really wouldn’t expect to hear from anyone for several days. This is definitely not Easy Bake Oven fare.]

[And it’s long.]

[No, really long. You’ll know it’s almost over when you get to the Wrap Up section.]


Back story: in early 2021 my family went through something I came to refer to as The Coup. The shorthand version is that my wife Kristin joined forces with our one remaining (16-year-old) child to wrestle almost all authority from me over her. That's a story all in itself, but as part of my various efforts to rise to the challenges presented, I asked a group of 10 male and female members of Biblical Families to join me in a private discussion about the situation, which I labeled 'Evidence of Failure.' That was quite beneficial, but after sanity emerged and I got a grip on my family, the group continued some processing-type discussion, and included in that discussion was a topic that, back then, was generally discouraged within Biblical Families (the extent to which first wives sabotage the introduction of additional wives into families). A dear brother encouraged me to start up a brand new all-male discussion of the topic in question as well as other related issues, and we decided it would be essential that the group have no moderators. After some negotiation and the sending out of invitations to the vast majority of Biblical Families men, we ended up with a solid group that originally included about 20 members. The title of the discussion was "SHOULD HE RULE EVERY WIFE?: or, Are We Even Allowed to Talk About This?" Immediately after this initial post, I will post the bulk of the original post that started out the discussion (warning: it's not only lengthy, but it's also not a breezy read). Following that Original Post, I will share a summary outline of what was subsequently discussed, a tiny bit about disagreements, and more about consensus and conclusions. After that, the floor will be open to anyone who wants to add to the discussion.

Our private discussion was pointedly that; members were asked to exhibit discretion about what we were discussing, and I hope you can all appreciate why that was the case in the beginning (because for a great many people, most of what we discussed has been the third rail of biblical polygamy), but as time went on, numerous members began posting things out in the public threads that directly reflected results of the nature and substance of our private discussion.

Keep in mind that this remains a Meat discussion. A couple of key women were part of the original group that led to this one that has just wrapped up, and we hated to exclude them -- and now welcome them back with open arms -- but other women here should give some serious contemplation to whether they’re even ready to read what follows, because we’ve gone after some sacred cows, and one of those is the notion that women should be exempt from serious criticism. This discussion qualifies for the phrase, "If you can't stand the heat, you should get out of the kitchen," and that even goes for men who can't stand the heat, whether they can acknowledge that they're the uncomfortable ones or prefer to believe they're only defending their poor defenseless women. But if you're ready to add something to this discussion -- as opposed to attempting to shut it down -- you're all welcome to jump on in. (Well, please briefly hold off until after everything gets posted: the Original Post and the Summary.)


Welcome back, moderators!

 

[Keith Martin]

August 24, 2021


SHOULD HE RULE EVERY WIFE?: or, In pursuit of leading plural families, are we prioritizing things incorrectly by focusing too much on proving ourselves worthy or on vetting 2nd wives -- and in the process ignoring other stumbling blocks?


This stage of discussion is all-male: no women, no strangers, no minimal participants, and no moderators. You will notice that not everyone is currently married, but the original intention wasn’t to exclude those who have been divorced but to restrict, for now, the participation of men who have never known what it is like to be married – as you’ll see, it is essential that we hear the voices of those whose wives have divorced them.

The point is to create an atmosphere in which none of us has to feel like anyone is watching over his shoulder, condemning him for being blunt, or holding what he says against him outside of this discussion. There will also be instances in which we just aren’t yet ready to discuss this with our wives, so I want an atmosphere in which each man can feel comfortable expressing even tentative thoughts that, as a group, we can help each other hone into powerful truths we can then effectively articulate to our wives. Please make the most of this structure and responsibly assist in making this a place in which difficult truths can be expressed without retribution or fear of betrayal. To ensure the success of the discussion, please do not relay anything about what we’re discussing to other members of Biblical Families or your own families, at least until the discussion has reached completion – and, even then, do your utmost to refrain from reporting who said what. Please also recognize that this is meant to be a meeting of the minds, not a competitive contest of wits -- and most certainly not a forum for drawing and quartering each other.

Once we’ve either reached consensus in this discussion or concluded that there isn’t much more to say at that point, as a group we will create a comprehensive summary of key points (just as with the earlier discussion), editing out any names or other personally identifiable information, as well as any parts of the discussion we might want to remain forever private.

And getting hold of the hand of the blind man, He brings him forth out of the village, and, spitting into his eyes, placing hands on him, He inquired of him, “Are you observing anything? And looking up, he said, “I am observing men; as trees am I seeing them walking.” Thereafter again He places hands on his eyes, and he is keen-sighted, and was restored, and he looked at all distinctly. [Mark 8:23-25; Concordant Literal New Testament]



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[Keith Martin]

I start with a syllogism, preceded by the following explanatory premises, none of which were part of the Evidence of Failure discussion:

a) The textbook/dictionary definition of ‘feminism’ is: belief in and advocacy of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes expressed especially through organized activity on behalf of women's rights and interests.

b) Feminists claim that they don’t demand a denial of gender differences but instead demand equity, defined as equality of outcome, and as long as the outcomes aren’t equal, they claim that some powerful but nefarious forces are holding them down. They further demand that they are not anti-male and are not dedicated to creating unfair advantages over men, but every feminist manifesto includes statements that define men as having used their brute strength to create an unfair advantage over women, which feminists use to justify organized activity to correct that unfair advantage.

c) Feminists have historically enlisted male allies to promote voluntary male surrender of their supposed unfair advantage in the most desirable occupations and opportunities in order to create parity or even dominance in those endeavors.

d) Feminists have not to any meaningful degree asserted their desire for equality by demanding equity participation in any of the top 10 most dangerous occupations.

e) Therefore, feminists, female or male, are those who, no matter what they say, do not believe in true equality but instead intend for women to dominate preferable opportunities and leave the non-preferable opportunities to men.

f) Thus, feminists believe in (only partial) equity but not equality, demanding their ‘fair share’ of the preferable while expecting men to continue to create, organize and provide the vast majority of the structure, protection, guidance and sacrifice that keeps the world women depend on in working order – all the while painting themselves as victims of male oppressors.

g) Some younger feminists have begun to embrace polygamy, but the majority of feminists do not. The dominant post-modern progressivist feminism with which we’re all most familiar thus also opposes anything that comes under the banners of patriarchy or polygyny, because, in their viewpoint, for a man to be the head of a woman is textbook oppression, and polygyny represents inequality of outcome (or inequity), because it’s unfair that men can have more than one wife if women can’t have more than one husband.

h) Men, for their part, are very willing to invest their blood and toil on behalf of their own wives and children but less so for the wives and children of others.

i) Paganism, for the purposes of our culture, is the Greco-Roman set of religious and philosophical beliefs antithetical to those promoted by YHWH, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, King David and the Prophets, and YHWH’s Son Yeshua, aka Jesus Christ. Greco-Roman Statism was fully intended to destroy and replace biblical tribalism with allegiance to the State, and in that effort criminalized polygyny, eventually transforming the religion of Christianity into a significantly pagan religion that carries on promotion of various pagan practices, including promoting monogamy-only.

j) Members of the Body of Christ do not necessarily have to practice or belong to Christianity (the religion). Therefore, sometimes the most self-destructive waste of time can be attempting to convince members of the Church we belong to that they should be accepting of polygamy; often, rejection of polygamy is a key tenet among many other key tenets that individual branches of Christianity have added since the close of Scripture as loyalty tests required for membership in their denominations. Sometimes, the healthy choice is to remove oneself from such an organization and find new believers to fellowship with; remaining within a system that condemns you will only promote damage to your marriages.

The syllogism (which assumes one is not married to an atheist):

1) If

a) economy of scale (more hands lightens the load; more investors lowers the per-unit cost of property or of conducting business; etc.) results in higher standards of living for all involved; this concept was probably first academically explained in the 18th century by Adam Smith and was widely popularized in the late 20th century counterculture by Stewart Brand, but it has its roots in Torah, the Prophets and the teachings of Yeshua. To oppose economy of scale is to oppose Yah-encouraged increasing standards of living; and

b) due benevolence is the biblical concept of bearing responsibility for the sexual satisfaction of one’s spouse; given lower average sex drives for women, it is frequently difficult or even a burden for a solitary wife to provide due benevolence for her husband;

2) and

a) feminism and paganism both interfere with economy of scale by demonizing polygyny; and

b) paganism and feminism both interfere with due benevolence by demonizing polygyny as a non-option; and

c) feminism interferes with due benevolence by demanding full sexual satisfaction for women but considers full sexual satisfaction for men to be an oppressive burden on women;

3) and,

a) if a woman expects to be provided for in a fashion that would only be reasonable within a situation that requires economy of scale; and/or

b) if a woman is unwilling or unable to provide full due benevolence for her man,

4) but she resists giving her husband the freedom to bring additional women into the family as sister wives in order to lighten the load and further expand implementation of his vision,

5) then, such a woman is, by definition, either a feminist, a pagan, or both. (Keep in mind that one can be a Christian and a feminist and/or pagan; in fact, most prominent Christian denominations are both significantly feminist and significantly pagan.)

In other words, if a 1st wife is unwilling to either (a) live life with major financial/labor compromises or (b) meet all of her husband’s sexual needs, and she also rejects polygyny, then she qualifies as a feminist, a pagan, or both, depending on the justifications she uses for her resistance to polygyny.


“I gave you a wife who was daughter of your lord, and I gave you the right to ask your wife for permission to take another wife if it pleases her. I let her pick among both the house of Israel and the house of Judah; and if she still didn’t want to let you take an additional wife, what am I supposed to do about it? Thus saith the LORD.” [2 Samuel 12:8; Ecumenical New Age Sunday School Version]


I see trees walking . . . but I sure do hope my vision doesn’t just get only this much better, Yeshua . . .




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[Keith Martin]

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Recently, I read part of a tract on early Talmudic commentaries on polygamy that @Frank S posted on another thread. The tract discussed evolving historical viewpoints on polygamy and for some reason reminded me of this: the Greco-Roman statist imperative that arose in the 6th Century B.C. ultimately inspired obedience to treating polygamy as anathema in non-Greco-Roman cultures, even within Judaism. The intention of introducing monogamy-only by the Greeks was not as an end in and of itself; its purpose was to be part of a multi-faceted multi-generational strategy designed to contribute to the destruction of patriarchy specifically and allegiance to family in general, transferring individual allegiance from the tribal family to the centralized state by weakening men and splitting families into smaller ‘nuclear’ units that were more susceptible to statist manipulation. The main effect of that was not even so much the enforced monogamy-only that we so regularly decry but instead the empowering of women to globally dominate marriages, because women are more vulnerable to extrinsic control. This has left the bulk of men with only the illusion of being the heads of their households. Many such men are deluded into believing that their families being dominated by the visions, desires, whims and impulses of their women and children is the primary proof of the legitimacy of their supposed headship.

Within marriages, the incremental criminalization of the seeking of additional sexual partners for men (and even thus criminalizing the practice of demonstrating companionate love towards more than one woman aside from the sexually intimate) put women in a position to coerce men through their sex drives. Even those 1st wives, like mine, who have come around to not only recognizing biblical truth about polygyny but to 'officially' encouraging their men to seek additional wives, often behave in ways that prevent it from happening, and by so doing remain significantly ensconced in the driver's seat of the marriage; it may seem like they’re sitting on your lap, but they’re still maintaining a death grip on the steering wheel while you’re distracted. Using my family as an example, I'm now generally in charge (a somewhat Pyrrhic victory, given that the kids are mostly grown), but, partially due to my commitment to Torah-based due benevolence, in the realm of sexuality my wife remains the one who determines when and where. I believe it's safe to say that (one would hope, unconsciously) she even sometimes purposefully initiates sex less often than she really wants it simply to ensure that I constantly remain in a state of never getting close to being fully satisfied. The presence of another wife in the home removes that power or at least seriously diminishes it. William Luck, in Divorce and Remarriage, effectively articulates how Scripture addressed this in various Judaic cultures: men bear responsible for the sexual satisfaction of their women, but women are not responsible for the sexual satisfaction of their men -- only for the production of an heir, and after doing that wives are free to thereafter entirely abstain from sex if they so desire. However, the righteous freedom men have to marry other women creates parity in this regard, along with reinforcing the Creator-designed imperative for men to be patriarchs; this is why Paul's admonition of mutual due benevolence in I Corinthians 7:3 was not a global command but only very specifically directed to a Greco-Roman monogamy-only audience in Corinth: because they disallowed polygyny and a woman could thus expect to have a husband all to herself, the women were being informed that each one of them was now responsible for rendering her husband his sexual due, because he was left with no other legitimate outlet. If a woman isn't committed to fully satisfying her man, though, she thus has no business telling him he can't have another sexual partner. Period.

Don’t make the mistake of assuming I’m focusing only on sexual considerations, though. Tolerating polygyny-suppression from a wife has more ramifications than just having to forego additional female companionship or limiting the number of women one can bring into one’s family to more effectively expand a man’s Yah-inspired vision. The country is in some ways disintegrating around us as we speak, and much of it is a natural consequence of men having abdicated their leadership roles by allowing women to rule them. We all know one of the main reasons why men won’t stand up to their wives – in the video suggested in the invitation, YouTube’s Follown Yahshua pointed out that “most [men] chase pussy 100, 200, 500 or 1000 times faster than [they] ever chased the vision that Yah has given them” – and if we’re still doing that within our marriages, we’re perpetuating the disordered dynamics that set bad precedents in the first place, as well as potentially failing to distinguish between the concepts of pursuit and conquest – to conquer is masculine, but to chase after is decidedly less so. A brother at the (June 2021) Branson retreat very eloquently labeled that behavior toward actual or potential wives as a form of idolatry (worshiping our sexual relationship with our wife to the point that we fear losing her) – and even in an organization like this one we will often hear one another hoodwinking ourselves by elevating Proverbs 18:22a over the much-more-ubiquitous scriptural admonitions about running a well-ordered home that include the clear instruction that one's women are to be one's helpmeets. How much of a helpmeet can a woman be said to be if she is overtly and/or covertly preventing her man from bringing another woman into the home when he has determined that it is right to do so? Just as it's the man's responsibility for ensuring that his family stays on course, it’s up to him to set the course, and it is up to her to help him implement the course he has set, no matter whether she approves or doesn’t approve.

I'll go further: a helpmeet in such a situation would not just refrain from sabotage; she would be actively seeking the best next wife for her man, all the while recognizing that, even if she does find that best next wife, the choice will still not be up to her. The choice will have a two-fold focus: (1) whether the potential 2nd wife chooses to request admission into the man’s family; and (2) whether the man chooses to grant her admission. It is not up to the 1st wife; a man may consult with his wife, but that doesn’t make it her decision. Any wife who is following the lead of the man she decided to place her trust in to cover her should ensure that any input she wants to have on the selection of a 2nd wife should be shared in advance, and be done with allegiance to her husband’s vision and with proper respect by demonstrating that she knows it is not her place to make demands about who, how, what or why her man makes his choices about subsequent wives entering the family.

The problem is that the Women's Labor Union (known by many names throughout history but since the late 19th century sheltered under the term 'feminism'), in league with its semi-pagan corporate church partners, successfully shuttled off I Cor. 7:3 into obscurity, resulting in the current general cultural state of affairs that triply bastardizes Scripture in which polygyny is prohibited while it is also considered brutish for a man to expect his wife to satisfy all of his needs for intimacy, affection and sexual release but misogynistic and insensitive on his part to fail to meet all of her needs in those realms. Women may not have broken the glass ceiling, but they’ve successfully ground the glass slipper into the collective foot of the unfairer sex. And we're responsible for this, because we've collectively let them get away with it.

This is leading me to a conclusion that almost seems inescapable: without some radical masculine shift in how men lead, biblical polygyny is a practice that will never receive general acceptance nor be practiced by any more than a tiny fraction of even the people who know it to be biblical truth and want to implement it. I say this because 1st wives (even 1st wives like mine who went into their marriages appearing to be on board with polygamy) simply have far too many readily-available tools they can use to sabotage or prevent the introduction of another woman into the family -- and this will be true even if polygyny is fully decriminalized in a legal sense. While still alive, my favorite ex-mother-in-law frequently declared that she thought the most shrewd strategy a woman could utilize to prevent her husband from successfully taking a 2nd wife was to encourage him to find one, creating the illusion that she’s an advocate for what she will never allow to happen. Her assertion was that the biggest risk to such a woman's strategy was that she might have to put up with occasional short-term jealousy related to very occasional short-term sexual interaction on her husband’s part with a potential or actual 2nd wife, but in most cases a 1st wife with half a brain could prevent it from even going that far just by the subtle messages she could give the potential wife that would warn her away from becoming part of the family -- and that every woman is capable of ensuring that things don't work out should the 2nd woman actually show up in the household.

Talmudic scholars at law-journals-books.vlex.com referenced a requirement for a husband to have to pay his 1st wife her ketubah if he introduced a 2nd wife into the home, giving her the option to leave (essentially, the equivalent of being required to pay alimony to a wife you haven't gotten rid of). I certainly can't argue against the imperative for polygamous husbands to at least exhibit a somewhat higher level of competence and leadership than is expected from a husband of only one woman, but I've spoken out many times here at Biblical Families against the notion that men should have to demonstrate nearly-messianic character traits in order to qualify as husbands of more than one wife (and we will not waste our time on the men-have-to-be-pure-saints debate in this discussion). The list of increased expectations is long; we start with an elevated set of expectations, something which only provides a 1st wife additional levers she can pull to cry wolf, because, as a man works to perfect his patriarchy, she also starts feeling entitled to (100% of) this new-and-improved husbandness even before the first potential 2nd wife is identified. Add subtle disrespect, disregard and bullying toward the 2nd – or subtle or not-so-subtle sabotage of anything from chores to the nascent bond between husband and 2nd wife – and a man taking on plural marriage often resembles voluntarily walking blindly into a mine field -- because even the blind eye is turned away from recognizing the partial responsibility our 1st wives sometimes bear for destroying our dreams.

For most women, and unfortunately also for a significant number of men, even within a community like this, transparently acknowledging the partial responsibility 1st wives bear for our lack of success is an even bigger taboo than polygyny itself.

My real concern is that we’re reaching a point of diminishing returns in regard to fulfilling the righteous desires of men to expand their families. Furthermore, if we don’t collectively as well as individually up our game (in regard to our masculinity, not in regard to our sainthood -- we've already been browbeaten to death in that latter regard), while rare exceptions will occur, they’ll be the exceptions that prove the rule, and the vast majority of families seeking plural marriage will never even come close to accomplishing it. I further doubt that we represent some sort of advanced guard who will spread the news about this biblical truth so that it will be implemented by future generations. Why are supposedly patriarchal men still letting wives off the hook for prevention and sabotage of bringing additional wives into their families? If we don't face this behavior pattern, then it's utter foolishness to think it's going to magically happen elsewhere in the culture because of examples we’ve failed to set or some kind of Isaiah 4:1 spiritual awakening that’s about to erupt. I don't know about you or anyone else, but I don't yet hear any trumpets blaring.

The truth about biblical polygamy has always been right there for all to see – there have always been those who have recognized and promoted it – and, unfortunately, that has made little significant difference. The desire to fit in, to be popular, to get approval from one's peers, all of that is far more important to the average human being than implementing Yah's truth, and those forces will prevent this from being acceptable as long as the Adversary's delegated powers on Earth remain in play – and, more importantly, they will provide all the ammunition a 1st wife needs to destroy any possibility of her husband successfully taking on a 2nd wife. And do I have to point out that husbands are not even the primary victims in this situation? Much more significantly affected are the potential 2nd wives who never end up being covered because their potential husbands have been unable to overcome the dominance of their own 1st wives – and thus fail to demonstrate that polygyny is a more attractive option than spinsterhood.

We have often discussed that the main positive outcome for men who come here is their introduction to patriarchy, learning what it means to be a patriarch, and the implementation of it in their lives and families -- and I wholeheartedly agree that this itself is of sufficient value to justify Biblical Families' existence. However, it may be a matter of integrity that we make this much more clear in the 'splash screens' that people first encounter when entering this website (I dare say it is 1000 times more crucial of a message to convey than making sure people know this isn't a dating site), or even also do so at the beginning of each and every Bib Fam retreat. I recoil almost every time I hear a disclaimer about how a brother should tread lightly because so many others before him have failed – and, yes, I do know that messy failures exist in polygynous marriages, just as they do in monogamous ones – but my revulsion partly arises because that warning only focuses on how the brother can fail -- and not on the fact that it's not just a matter of insufficient manhood but an entire system that is sustained by the blood, sweat and toil of men that gives women the luxury and power to ensure that he does fail. The sisters here who are fully supportive are entirely too few and too far between.

 

[Keith Martin]

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Yes, 2nd wives have a tendency to have their own baggage and usually have some unrealistically high expectations as well, but I’m on the cusp of asserting that it hardly even matters what the standards possessed by potential 2nd wives are, because it appears to me from my own personal experience and the vast majority of what I've heard about and observed with other men seeking plural marriage that the weapons 1st wives use to sabotage and prevent plural marriage are both the primary and secondary obstacles that interfere with the implementation and success of biblical polygyny. They thus also reap the benefits of their husbands becoming stronger leaders while preventing those stronger leaders from reaping some of the most obvious rewards that I assert are due them as stronger leaders. I find it especially difficult to continue to calmly support the philosophy that asserts that the men among us who are excellent patriarchs (I'm not claiming that status for myself; I'm thinking about certain other men in Biblical Families) should just accept that they are permanently disqualified from having additional wives (no matter how many good prospects approach them wanting to join their families) just because their 1st wives have dug in their heels. Yes, as patriarchs we are handing them the loaded guns, but that doesn't mean they're not pulling the triggers. Preventing the wounding requires addressing both sides of the equation.

If this is to be overcome, what we have to develop among us is (1) a decrease in warning about the pitfalls of polygamy, as well as (2) a decrease of toleration of efforts on the part of women to sabotage plural marriage or promote other efforts to dominate their husbands. [Removed some verbiage here related to both initial administrative resistance and a straight-up effort to derail the discussion by someone committed to keeping it from happening, so SHREW became SHREW II) After finally having fresh eyes that see things clearly in my own family, I'm determined to leave no stone unturned in search of solutions, even when those solutions may entail grave discomfort. In other words, I’m already uncomfortable, and I’m ready to become even more uncomfortable. What's that saying about pain being weakness that's leaving the body?

A man should first develop his own manhood and leadership, as well as teaching his 1st wife biblical truth and maintaining loving patience towards her as she processes those truths and the strong emotions they inspire. However, personally, and in regard to my posture toward other men who have recalcitrant wives who refuse to accept plural marriage, I'll be transparent here: I'm coming to believe that, as men, we should draw some clear lines in the sand about all this. Yes, we're to avoid divorce – so I'm not talking about threatening to put a wife away -- and, yes, our Creator expects us to continue to treat our 1st wives as cherished creatures with whom we are one flesh -- but, if we're looking to Scripture Itself rather than to the Roman or Anglican Churches (or their offshoots, or their many purposefully-corrupted translations) for our matrimonial guidance, isn't the choice about whom we marry a core, bedrock, essential aspect of what defines us as men? Don't we recognize that the pagan expectations promulgated by our denominations and culture that demand that men live up to all of their commitments while women only have to bear children and avoid adultery but don't have to consider themselves fully responsible for our due benevolence or for fully being our helpmeets – or even have to refrain from divorcing us and removing our children from us – are part and parcel of why our world is crumbling around us? No matter how much we cherish, honor, love and respect our 1st wives, and no matter how much financial or legal leverage they have at their disposal to discourage us from holding them accountable or expecting that they make uncomfortable adjustments, isn't there still something cowardly about letting those 1st wives get away with saying, "Over my dead body . . . " – no matter what realm of our headship they want to invalidate?

A brother whom I met at the Branson retreat, new to me but not new to Biblical Families, repeatedly used the phrase, "Unto-Death Vow," (referring to "forsaking all others, until death do us part"), and during the Saturday late-night gathering of men, beer and flavored whiskey, we discussed this for a time. Some asserted that, if we made that vow before God and State, we are then permanently bound to it if our wives don't release us from it. Well, as far as the State or the Church is concerned, it probably doesn't matter if our wives have released us from it, because those entities will always honor the woman's prerogative to change her mind back to expecting that guarantee. As men that evening, we were in general agreement that no one should ever make such a vow, no matter how firmly committed we are to permanence, because we don't owe our allegiance to Church or State, but, even if we did make it, does having done so entirely trump whatever biblical truths we may discover subsequent to making what amounted to an uninformed promise? And, if so, why is that vow the one thing that also trumps all the other promises made by the two parties to the marriage? Why do men have to wait perhaps forever for permission from their 1st wives to take on a 2nd, when those 1st wives don't have to seek permission along the way as they gradually stop having, holding or cherishing in the manner that was well-understood at the beginning of the marriage?

The chain of command in Scripture is clear: seek only the approval of Yah and His Son, not that of one's fellow human beings, and that instruction most definitely includes not seeking the approval of one's wife. If anything, she should be seeking the approval of her husband. The price for taking this stance may be steep, but the price for being unwilling to risk the consequences of one’s wife's disapproval seems to me to be a much higher price to pay.

Optimism is generally my strong suit, but there are times -- and I believe this is one of them -- when, if one doesn't squarely face the monkey on one's individual or collective back no matter how dark it is on the horizon or how vigorously some brothers attempt to convince us we're despicable for asserting authority or deplorable for having the sex drives with which Adonai endowed us, one has no power to shake it off or prevent that monkey from generating failure and destruction. So I'm not resigned to some dire fate, but I'm also perceiving that we will generally be spinning our wheels whilst whistling Dixie if we don't squarely face the fact that 1st wives are perhaps an even bigger direct obstacle than the culture at large. It's possible that the much-vaunted civilizing effect women have on men is a two-sided coin: on the one hand, it means that women keep us from being as self-destructive as we might be without their influence, but, given that the civilizing predominantly takes the form of insisting on conformity so we don't run afoul of social morés, isn't the other side of the coin properly stamped with preventing us from influencing the culture to more properly reflect the Will of Yah? Can we shape the culture if we're collectively giving in to it? Consider this dilemma, for example, while watching current events unfold; imagine how different outcomes would be in many situations if the masculine were catered to more often instead of the feminine.

Think privately about the situation in your own family: isn’t your wife, as the head female in your life, the most likely one to implore you to cave in to societal stigma pressure? Who was more likely to appeal to conformity, your father or your mother? Weren’t your sisters more prone to promoting going along to get along than your brothers were? If you doubt this dichotomy, go to my Intro III forum thread (https://biblicalfamilies.org/forum/...rmer-online-dating-profile.15296/#post-220882) that chronicles my recent experiences on dating sites and read the comments from the women who reject me (almost all of whom, by the way, are essentially interviewing to become someone’s next 1st wife). Paraphrased, one of the most common examples is, “I don’t judge you for what you do in your life, but there is no way in hell I would ever share a husband!” That’s the comment from both widows and divorcees, both of whom have already been 1st wives, and the comment reflects a truth they rarely realize and only occasionally face even when they do: that they’d rather be lonely than have to share, because, for most women, avoiding stigma is more important than avoiding loneliness, poverty or misery. This is a motivation that leads to blind obedience as it's multiplied in the culture.

My assertion in the discussion that preceded this conversation was that 1st wives purposefully preventing plural marriage is a much more significant determinant of the existence or success of plural marriage than we have collectively been willing to acknowledge; one chat participant labeled that a conspiracy theory. My reaction to this was to articulate a concept well-known to most of us: as the patriarch of my family, I’m 100% responsible for everything that does and doesn't happen in my family, and this is true for me and for all men who take on headship. That, for some, could be used to close the books on this discussion: 100% is 100%; it's all the men's fault, end of story: the man is 100% responsible for not having more than one wife. The problem with that analysis, though, is that this isn’t a zero-sum game. There is legitimately such a thing as shared responsibility, which doesn’t mean, for example, that the husband and wife are each 50% responsible as if there’s some kind of egalitarian, mutual-submission malarkey going on. Instead, the husband remains 100% responsible for everything that occurs in his family, and his wife is 100% responsible for everything that occurs within the realm of what has been delegated to her or for interfering with what has not been delegated to her – and children are up to 100% responsible for any action they take to the extent that they know it runs counter to what is expected of them and hasn't been encouraged by one of their parents.

How does this relate to 1st-wife sabotage of potential additional wives? We’ve already established that the husband is 100% responsible. He's responsible for any failings in his own leadership capabilities. He's also responsible not only for failing to inspire potential 2nd wives to seek him out as a husband, but also for over-pickiness that hardens his heart to those who would be willing and able to truly assist in implementing his family vision. And on top of those things, any man who permits his 1st wife to prevent him from having a 2nd wife is 100% responsible for allowing her to rule him. It is, I'd declare, only general human nature that (a) (not all but) most women tend to be poor leaders but (b) will attempt to dominate their families any time they have a chance while simultaneously having little or no desire to take responsibility for the full ramifications of the decisions they want to make as part of that domineering spirit. But what is also generally a part of female nature is a tendency to want to sweep important unresolved issues under the rug. It is, therefore, human nature for a woman to do this, but that doesn’t stop her from being 100% responsible for her efforts to lead her husband into denial. Sweeping things under the rug, though, is generally antithetical to male nature. As men, we are therefore 100% responsible for that sweeping-under-the-rug behavior if we exhibit or tolerate it, and I'll go even further by stating that it's usually not just tolerance: when it's occurring, it's generally a matter of condoning or encouraging the effort to avoid properly facing things ourselves -- and that orientation, therefore, is the opposite of being a patriarch; it is instead evidence of a man being a woman. Nothing at all wrong with a woman being a woman, but there is something wrong with a man being one.

And what I fear is that the elephant in the room, the obstacle that will be the most difficult for us in an organization like this one to overcome, is that, not uniformly but collectively, we men are therefore active participants in colluding with our 1st wives to prevent the implementation of what we all know intellectually to be biblical truth: it isn't the business of any of our wives to determine whether we will have other wives, who those wives will be, or when we will bring them into our families. We can seek input from them, but the decisions are ours to make. To argue otherwise is to elevate sensitivity over leadership. It may be kind, compassionate and efficacious to keep our 1st wives in the loop the entire time, but if we tolerate their efforts to get in the driver’s seat about it, we are failing to provide leadership. This principle, by the way, applies across the board, not just to the issue of expanding our families.

Some of us will never have another wife because the odds are against us and we're incapable of ever inspiring another woman to want to join us, but most of us will never have another wife for a completely different reason: because we aren't even the leader of the family with one wife that we already have. Our wives are letting us feel like we're in charge with smaller issues (especially when it already suits them), but when it comes to the really monumental ones, most of us are letting our wives wear the pants in the family. They may have the head coverings and the modesty thing going on, but they’re the ones with the invisible leashes in their hands – the other ends of which are attached to those rings in our noses.

We can continue to blame the problem on lack of community support and available qualifying women, but I beg to differ on both counts. Each is an obstacle, but in the case of the latter, we have no control over the extent to which that is the case, and in the case of the former, I will assert that the only reason we don't have community support is that, generally speaking, we simply don't have enough men with the backbone to sufficiently stand up to their wives to create those supportive communities; instead most of us are waiting around for some other men to start such things so we can join them and be the hangers-on who would have never had enough of a spine to stand up to our wives on our own. Any one of us who does that becomes part of the problem instead of part of the solution.

I’m a big believer that one can almost always tell exactly what a person really wants simply by observing what s/he either already has or is already doing. Talk is cheap; people proclaim left and right that they want things that never show up in their lives. If it hasn’t manifested, if you’re not in the active process of bringing it to fruition, or if you manage to sabotage it by consistently snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, you should just be more honest and admit that you really don’t want it all that badly.


If a man says he wants another wife, but he isn’t willing to stand up to the one he already has who wants to prevent him from having another one, does he really even want another wife? And why would he? It’s a drag having to serve two masters.

And, if a man waits for other men to support him before he asserts his manhood, is he even really a man?


Thank you for your patience with this extended (and now mildly-tweaked) analysis.


*************

 

[Keith Martin]

THE SHREW II SUMMARY:

• DEFINITIONS AND GROUND RULES: Initial introductions to each other as necessary, which included some declarations about how general issues of failure to assert leadership have impacted both family stability and pursuit of polygyny. One brother injected this relevant quote: “you will never win a war until you are prepared to die for your cause." Another brother asserted that the zone of success in marriage lies somewhere between blind obedience and constant challenging. Yet another provided a testimonial about how thoroughly submissive his wife is, with one major exception: when the possibility of another woman joining the household becomes real.
• Some divorced members chimed in with describing pitfalls created by insufficient leadership on their part that led to the dissolution of their marriages.
• Clarification of cultural differences among members hailing from as far and wide as the United States and The Lands Down Under.
• Recognition of the need for some common definitions:
• a. Polyamory: sexual relationships not limited to monogamy. Some polyamory is closed (the participants only have sex with those to whom they have committed relationships), some open (some may be committed, but participants are permitted to have sex with people who are not committed to others to whom one is committed). Generally speaking out in the mainstream culture, the woke crowd now restricts usage of the term ‘polyamory’ to refer to open-ended polyamory and includes not only swinging but entirely open-ended sexual relationships that don’t have to involve one bit of commitment. However, the following terms are actually technical subdivisions of the real definition of polyamory.
  b. Polygamy: generally, when we use it we mean polygyny, but technically ‘polygamy’ refers to one person being married to more than one other person without prejudice regarding the genders involved. It is a form of closed polyamory. Polygamy includes both polygyny and polyandry.
  c. Polygyny: one man with multiple wives, a form of polygamy that is the model in Scripture. When referring to polygyny as polygamy, it is best to use the phrase, “Biblical polygamy,” because polygyny is Biblical polygamy, but ‘polygamy’ could be polyandry.
  d. Polyandry: one woman with multiple husbands, also a form of polygamy but one that is prohibited by Scripture, given that the biblical definition of adultery specifies that it involves sex between a married woman and a man other than the one man she's permitted to marry.
  e. Throuples (or trouples): closed committed relationships within which all three members have sexual relationships with both other members (this can also be expanded to quadrouples, quintrouples, etc., but those are quite rare). Technically, throuples can consist of one man and two women, one woman and two men, three men or three women. Throuples generally include some level of mutual commitments among all participants but not always, because, generally speaking, the group requires a leader, and in most cases, the leader is considered to be married to the other members. For our purposes, though, within Biblical polygyny, one man would be married to two or more women, and the women would be sexual with each other as well as with their husbands, but they would not be strictly considered married to each other – and in many if not most cases the women would only be sexual with each other when being sexual with their husband. This type of arrangement has been discussed in at least a couple dozen other threads here on Biblical Families, so I request that we not debate the legitimacy or illegitimacy of it – unless, that is, someone can discover the up-until-now entirely-elusive Scripture that condemns women having sex with other women. Just be aware that, while some among us consider this illegitimate, some among us – including myself – consider this family structure to be entirely scripturally legitimate. As one of this discussion group's members so wisely stated in at least one other discussion: according to Scripture, “the marriage bed is undefiled.” Period.
  f. Marriage: this word has a gazillion definitions, but for our purposes, I'm asserting we should limit it to the commitment a man and woman make before YHWH to be one flesh for life that is sealed by the consummation of the relationship. This has nothing to do with marriage licenses or regulation by churches or government entities.
• WARM-UP: Once the initial introductory period was over, the discussion continued with a relatively loose structure, punctuated by questions mostly inspired by particularly-pointed comments; I'll included examples of most as this summary proceeds.
• Comment: "Enter the Spirit with the Word and maybe just maybe the woman wasn't the full manifestation of the solution to the dilemma of isolated man." Question: "if we stipulate that woman is only a partial manifestation of the solution to the dilemma of isolated man, and if we also stipulate that the Spirit and the Word and the Father and the Son are crucial parts of the equation, what else is required to complete the puzzle? What else are we being exhorted to bring into manifestation in order to solve the isolated-man dilemma?" One particularly useful response in the ensuing discussion was that it's a mistake to attempt to reverse-delegate responsibility for leadership back up to Yah by excusing oneself with phrases along the lines of, "It's my woman's -- or my child's -- problem, because she's being rebellious against God."
• CHAIN OF COMMAND: Conversely, after some suggestions were made that proper leadership entails putting the needs of one's wife and children ahead of one's own, I posed the following question: "Are you suggesting that the Yah=>Yeshua=>husband=>wives=>children=>animals hierarchy should be changed to Yah=>Yeshua=>wives=>children=>husband=>animals?" If so, or if not, is elevating the needs of wives and children above ours the truly loving thing to do in a world in which they rely on our organization, creation, implementation and protection? This theme wove itself in and out of many subsequent topics, but one comment stood out: "Society tells us that 'If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy,' and everyone [inappropriately] accepts that as fine. There is some truth hidden in there just getting obfuscated by the backwards matriarchy.' I offered the following as a rhetorical question: "imagine being part of the Blizzard Family, stuck in a blinding snowstorm on a mountain top; the lot of you have been trudging endlessly through white-out conditions across rough terrain for days with nothing to eat and only snow-melt to provide water. The seven of you come across a full-but-already-opened can of kosher army rations, and given how loaded those are with preservatives and how cold it is outside you're not about to be worried about whether they're spoiled. Seven people, and almost a full daily ration for one person. Shangri La might be right around the corner, but at this point in time there is no evidence of any definite civilization for what might be a week's trek through what you're all in the middle of -- or worse. Most of you have been wondering which one of you you'll all have to eat like the Donner party in order to survive. The strength of each of the seven is nearly depleted. Assume that consuming half the ration can will boost the strength of one person enough to go on for several hours and that the entire can would inspire a whole day's effort. Assume also that eating less than a fourth of the can would do little more than create the equivalent of a half-hour's sugar high. How do you divide up the contents of the can? The socialism thing to do would be to give each person 1/7 of what's left. The pragmatic socialism thing to do might even be to give slightly larger portions to people based on their weight, so dad might get 25%, and the littlest kid might just get a nibble. The feminist thing would be to give the females bigger portions in order to correct historical injustices. But then there's the survival choice: who among everyone there is the most important person to survive the next several hours? The youngest child, because s/he has the longest life ahead of hir? The mother, because as long as she survives she can always find another husband and have additional children to replace the ones she left behind in the blizzard? I assert that the bare minimum of half the can should be consumed by the man -- if not even more, with perhaps a quarter given to the mother and nibbles for the five children. Because when the future is uncertain -- which it almost always is -- the family's survival is more dependent on and shouldered by the father than by anyone else in the family. If the Blizzard family makes it through the next day, they can all recuperate from exhaustion, frostbite and bleeding wounds, but only the man -- or a very prepared older male child -- has the potential in such a situation to bring them through such a thing. Life isn't a Disney movie; in 99 out of a 100 cases, the mother is not going to be able to lead the family to safety. Giving the whole can to the 4-year-old may make everyone feel emotionally whole, but it's also a certain script for death for them all. That's clearly an extreme example, but it makes my point: it is more important that the man's needs and desires be paramount than it is to address all the needs and desires of everyone else in the family. He is The Rock, and everyone benefits from The Rock being well taken care of. This, I assert, is also true in the sexual realm. I'm bone tired of all the virtue signaling men do to prove that they've got their Piety Merit Badges, pretending that sexual satisfaction isn't a human need that comes close to rivaling the need to eat, to drink and to sleep. The family wouldn't exist if it weren't for the Yah-endowed sex drive, because it's the only thing that inspires overcoming the mountains of foundational differences between men and women that are a pain in the a** to traverse. Those kids whose idyllic childhoods we waste our time worrying about wouldn't even exist, period, if it weren't for the inspiration to experience sexual satisfaction which Yah included as part of our makeup. Instead of us or our women or our children acting like wanting to engage in sexual behavior is something we should be embarrassed by, I say we need to tell those women, those children, and even ourselves if we're even partially brainwashed by the Feminized Condemnation Christianity Culture, that they should be damn thankful their husbands and fathers have such a strong desire to get laid, because it's part of the backbone of what it takes to make men willing to do all the unbelievable amount of stuff they already have to do in order to take care of their families. My sexuality is none of my children's business, and if my wife is unwilling to or incapable of keeping up with my sex drive, then, yes, for the sake of maintaining a healthy, successful family led by a patriarch who lives life according to the dictates of Yah and Yeshua, every one of my family members, out of self interest, should want me to get another wife if I believe -- for whatever reason -- that I need one, even if only for the purpose of sexual satisfaction. Despite all the stereotypes and unfair efforts to demonize polygyny, that the only reason a man would want another woman permanently in his life would be sexual satisfaction is rarely the actual case, but even when it is, it's time we men stopped encouraging other men to be ashamed of it."
• Comment: "This is precisely where adversity comes in - the adversity mostly indirectly targets men in an attempt to undermine men in the long run - men unafraid because we fear God alone. That same adversity would directly nip at the heels of your wives and children to pull them into the darkness. How are you going to deal with this? Everyone is handed different adversity. Why would it take one form? We know that adversity attacks weakness by nature - and as the strong man - keeping that adversity as far away from our household as possible is the goal. In fact, it’s only in a rebellious household that adversity can even find footing."
• To address a growing elephant in not only the SHREW II room but in numerous other public Biblical Families threads, I posed the following question: "Is there anyone among the group who believes that authority and discipline should not be tempered with love?" Starting with some discussion about this being something we men tend to fear will be leveled against us, our consensus was clearly that authority and discipline should be tempered with love.
• This led to a discussion of the importance of keeping the proper hierarchy in place when a family has more than one wife, as well as recognizing that Scripture doesn't place earlier wives in authority over subsequent wives.
• IS PITY EMPOWERING? Introducing (1) the importance of distinguishing between (a) pity/sympathy/feeling sorry for others and (b) true compassion, as well as recognizing that feeling sorry for others or worrying about them does little to benefit them.
• Which went off into a tangent about the degree to which focusing on outside-authority contracts (even so-called covenant contracts through religious authority figures) provides opportunities for wives to sidestep full submission.
• Next question was rhetorical: "Which is more loving: encouraging self-pity and success through manipulation of others, or encouraging self-empowerment combined with respect for others?” General consensus ensued.

 

[Keith Martin]

• PROPER ROLES IN PATRIARCHY: Fourth major question: "Are we too quick to explain away resistance to our headship by labeling it innocent weakness on the part of our wives? If (a) the leadership a man demonstrates or (b) the direction that man provides in response to, for example, his woman’s cry for help is rejected but any acquiescence the man demonstrates to the demands behind a cry for help is accepted by her, was it a sincere cry for help or a damsel-in-distress-over-not-getting-her-way posture seeking to manipulate her man or others around her into white-knighting her?" Great comment that spoke for the general consensus: "So I will contend that consistency is key. It is far more important that they learn that they can trust us (and how) than it is we cater to emotions, outbursts, and whims, that we are more likely called to help them THROUGH."
• Participants were then asked to view a video by the late Kevin Samuels:
  , which introduced into my lexicon a very useful definition for submission: simply, 'respectful cooperation.’ The video also emphasizes that women are generally not raising their daughters to be the kind of wives that men prefer. "We're not your friends; we're your husbands. We love you, but we don't like you like that." [Current note: I recommend immersing oneself in Kevin Samuels videos; they are not what his detractors did their best to portray them as being. I give strong credit to that man for inspiring me to have a full backbone, and I also have to wonder if the fentanyl overdose he died from was truly an accident.] Comment: "it is striking to me how much the success of our marriages today is determined by hormones and feelings (infatuations) labeled as love. In the second it touches on that as well. We look to our spouse to be our best friend and trusted confidant. Look how obviously that disrupts the ideal roles in marriage. He lay his stress about the leadership of the family at her feet and she lay all of her emotional baggage at his as best friends and confidants. Both become ensnared in this and function less properly within their roles." Comment: "One statement that jumped out at me was 'There’s no way to nest in insecurity.'”
• The first follow-up question: “Can we all agree that wives should be consulted (or asked, or informed, or given a chance to give input) and that it would be a mistake not to do so? That is, isn't it the case that we wouldn’t be building a nest if we created insecurity through just making demands without first getting some input?” Great discussion ensued, ending in consensus that generally speaking it’s best to provide wives opportunities for input but that sometimes what is called for is to make decisions without doing so. Followed by another set of follow-ups: “if the man asks his wife for her opinion, he considers her input, and then he presents his plans in a way that reflects having considered the input from his woman, but then she continues to resist what he has decided, even if she resists predominantly because she just doesn’t want her nest to be upset, isn't she creating insecurity in her man's family nest (or team) by selfishly demanding that her individual nest not be upset? In other words, who is entitled to an entirely stable, peaceful, comfortable nest? And isn't it a bit contradictory to upset the peace of the family nest as part of demanding that the peaceful continuity of the individual nest not be interrupted?” Consensus was: yes, she is; no one is entitled to that, and yes, it’s contradictory to upset the team to insist on no upset for oneself as an individual.
• Subsequent follow-up: “isn’t it the case that female responsibilities have been lessened over the past 60 years, while male responsibilities have not only remained but have been added to in regard to both having to be their wives’ friends and more significantly having to grant their emotional demands?” No quibbles there, so we moved on to answering, “has marriage itself actually changed in the last 50 years, or is it mainly our definition of marriage that has changed? Looked at from the other direction, isn’t what Yah considers to be marriage the same as it has always been? And, if so, isn't perhaps even the majority of what we tend to call 'marriage' in present day more accurately characterized as 'pretend marriage?'” This led to a discussion of the change from sex=children to sex=fun and how the Pill expedited this decoupling of sex from reproduction in a way that greased the skids for the shift within male-female relationships from patriarchy to partnerships. Following that we discussed: “We not only expect too much from marriage; we also expect too much from parenting in regard to what is required of us to be labeled sufficient parents. On the whole, have these greater expectations (friendship and fulfillment for our wives; idyllic childhoods for our children and even attempts to create guaranteed well-adjusted outcomes for them as they enter adulthood) contributed to or degraded the strength of our families?” Some discussion about lowering standards of outcome for raising children vs. the higher expectations placed on parents re: ensuring that one’s offspring have easy lives – but general agreement that this has further burdened the family and discouraged being fruitful and multiplying. And the last follow-ups in this section of the thread: “isn’t it the case that something has been taking place in our culture that can more properly be labeled as demasculated patriarchy: a long, slow, certain transition from (a) the last vestiges of full-throated patriarchy into (b) totalitarianism that requires, as part of its success, a near-complete abandonment on the part of men of their historical imperative to stand up against tyranny? Furthermore, what’s the tangible evidence, even within this organization that consciously promotes patriarchy, that we’re actually having patriarchal relationships?” These questions were sobering, and I suspect more private than shared contemplation went into the latter, but the comments were affirmative regarding the former; comment: “Yes. Without question. As we were warned [by the prophets].”
• FEMINISM, PAGANISM and ORGANIZED RELIGION: Introduction to fifth major line of questioning: “Does anyone here deny that our mainstream culture – in fact, the mainstream culture of the entire Western world – is dominated by progressivist postmodern feminism as defined by emphasizing equity (equal rights and outcomes) over equality (equal opportunities, privileges and responsibilities)? Can we at least stipulate that our culture promotes a philosophy that demands equal privileges for men and women but simultaneously promotes expecting men to do most of the heavy physical and mental lifting?” No disagreement there. First follow-up: “If we stipulate that the culture in which we all swim is dominated by feminism, doesn’t that also mean that the default setting for anyone who doesn’t actively challenge the mindset of the culture will lean toward feminism? Isn't it also, therefore, correct to assert that every one of us is susceptible to being or becoming a feminist unless we actively resist it?” Best of many good comments: “It is far easier to sit down, shut up, and tend toward feminism in this culture. An active effort is required to depart from the path of least resistance which feels like the current of the Mississippi in modern culture.” One brother emphasized, though, that men have very often used feminism as an excuse to share the effort of driving the culture into the ditch, so the questioning shifted somewhat; here are the next four feminism follow-up questions: “Have women actually thrown themselves into the deep end of the competitive pool, or have they generally waded into the kiddie pool while expecting that they be considered competitive swimmers in controlled lanes -- and to be reimbursed for it at Olympic wages to keep them from crying foul?” “Have women really even raised the bar?” “If women have raised the bar, how have they raised it?” and “If women haven't raised the bar, isn't it instead the case that they and their male-traitor allies have instead lowered the bar while expecting men in general to invisibly (i.e., without acknowledgment) do the additional heavy lifting on their side of the see-saw required to make it look like the bar has been raised by women’s supposed new contributions?” The comment that made further discussion superfluous began with, “I'm not sure there IS 'a bar', much less that 'women' have raised it.” The assertion was made that the bulk of women associated with men in our organization exhibit partial resistance to feminism but also partial acceptance of it. One brother had earlier proposed a potential motivation for opposing polygyny on the part of first wives being a ‘cry for help,’ the question was asked: “isn’t the test of the legitimacy of whether this is a motivation separate from feminism whether the woman either (a) is entirely overwhelmed by her fear of social stigma from the feminist mainstream culture or (b) actively uses the mainstream culture as either a justification for her position or a weapon to fight against polygyny? In other words, if it walks like a feminist (appealing to issues of supposed unfairness or elevating social stigma over adherence to Scripture), isn’t it actually a feminist even if not a Gloria Steinem?” This question was applied to men as well as women. The comments were vigorous in support of recognizing this tendency to slip into feminism and the importance of actively standing up against it. One brother pointed out that indictments of feminism are nearly interchangeable with indictments of paganism.
• Another follow-up question for this group: “Does organized-religion promote centralized authority even more than our governments do?” Responses ranged from yes to there’s-no-difference. Next questions: “Don’t most churches promote systems in which, to one degree or another, they improperly insert themselves into more than one place in the Yah => Yeshua => Man => Woman => Children => Animals hierarchy of leadership? Isn’t this perhaps sometimes even especially true in the churches in which women are prohibited from positions of leadership? Is it possible that women at such churches find being denied such roles a convenient excuse for avoiding responsibility while retaining the prerogative to exercise domination either through their husbands or through the pastors or priests? Isn’t this analogous to the manner in which feminism rewards women for demanding shared privileges while escaping most responsibility in the context of failing to recognize men for their contributions?” More agreement. “When pastors or priests insert themselves in-between a man and his God or between a man and his children or perhaps most especially between a man and his woman, whether it be for the purposes of teaching or preaching, isn’t that an insidious assault on male patriarchy? Doesn’t that diminish the authority a man has in his own home, if his woman or children can resist submission and obedience by appealing (a) to what they’re learning from the pastors or (b) to the difficulties patriarchy or polygyny might present to their social positions within a church’s hierarchy?” Ditto. Then, the paganism corollary: “so, as with the question related to feminism, in the case of the identified alternate motivation for tangible opposition to polygyny -- the cry for help (or any other imagined alternate motivation) -- if it doesn’t fail the is-it-feminism test, isn’t the remaining test of the legitimacy of whether this is a motivation separate from paganism whether the woman either (a) is entirely overwhelmed by her fear of social stigma from the paganist cultures or (b) actively uses either the governmental or church paganistic culture as either a justification for her position or a weapon to fight against polygyny? In other words, if it walks like a pagan (appealing to issues of proper obedience to government or church authorities over adherence to Scripture – “but it’s the law, honey!”), isn’t it a pagan?” No disagreement.
• INSUFFICIENT GRATITUDE?: Sixth major question group started with, “There is a saying familiar to all of us: ‘What have you done for me lately?’ In general, almost automatically, we will associate that with women, as in, almost always it’s being spoken by a woman. What, as men, keeps us from turning that around? I am in no way suggesting anything other than lifelong, committed responsibility for protection, provision and due benevolence, but why are we so willing to point to what a woman in our life did for us months or years ago to justify why we continue to provide them with what they want in the here and now – but we don’t point to what we did for them months or years ago to justify expectations we have for them in the here and now?” No arguments there. “A comment was made that a man’s woman saved his life years ago. Clearly that is something for which one should be very thankful, but does even a man whose life was saved owe his woman lifetime obedience in response? We owe Yah and Yeshua that level of obedience, but is there anything that a woman can do for us that justifies being in submission to her? If the answer is, ‘Yes,’ please articulate how anyone in the family benefits from a man submitting to his woman.” No one answered Yes. Another follow-up: “if we refrain from thoroughly driving home to our wives, potential wives, daughters, sisters and mothers the point that women fail to recognize how dependent they are on the men in their lives, why do we refrain from doing so?” One brother quickly upped the stakes on the question: “Why are we afraid to tell people the Truth about what is going to get them KILLED? (In any sense you care to ponder.)” The responses to these were varied, with some identifying their own families as already comprehending these truths and being hesitant to focus on such things with other women outside their immediate families – while others agreed with the need for women to fully recognize their dependency on men, not just their supposed partial dependency on the government for entitlements, which is just indirect dependence on men.
• SHOULD SHE STAY OR SHOULD SHE GO?: Next major question series began with, “related to the phrase, “driving away our wives,” does a distinction exist between casting away one’s wife and being willing to let her leave?” Comment: “The term ‘man up’ seems apropos. Either be willing to cast her out - for CAUSE - or do the right thing and work on the problems. If she leaves otherwise, she is breaking covenant.” Q further clarified: “related to the phrase, ‘driving away our wives,’ does a distinction exist between casting away one’s wife and being willing to let her leave if she insists on leaving no matter how dedicated one is to working on any problems?” General agreement, albeit with differences about how to define responsibility; one great comment: “This is classic manipulation strategy. ‘This isn't my fault, you drove me away.’”
• Next question in same series: “Re: Proverbs 18:22, what qualities qualify a wife as being a ‘good wife?’” The comment that couldn’t be outdone: “One who chooses to make you the center of her universe. Chooses to get behind your vision and do her utmost to assist it to come to pass.” Follow-up: “does a wife have ongoing obligations that deem her qualified to be labeled as ‘good?’” Few responded, and those who did turned the focus to excusing women for being incapable of living up to expectations or bemoaning the dearth of available 2nd wives, so we moved to this question: “if a wife is not a horrible wife but doesn’t qualify as a good wife, does she deserve exemption from the expectation for submission?” That invoked solid No’s; best comment: “I have said a few times; ‘I don’t know why this should be so hard, it looks to me to be a damn sight easier to follow than to actually have the responsibility to lead.’” Q: “is it more loving or less loving to exempt one’s wife from higher expectations of submission?” Less loving, exemplified by these two comments: (a) “Is this not an expectation set by God? If Yes: Who are you or I to offer an exemption to this expectation?” and (b) “If she will not submit to YHVH, why would any one of us expect her to even LISTEN to His Word, much less to us?” Next question to tie together the series: “what does being willing to exempt one’s wife from higher expectations of submission say about one’s own capacity for leadership?” We believe it says a lot . . . and, last question: “are we driving our wives away or casting them aside when, in our judgment, we develop higher-level expectations for our families than fit our wives’ current comfort levels?” The answers said, No; it’s on our wives to follow . . . and my favorite comment: “If walking in more light as we receive it causes her to choose a different path, the only thing that we could actually be guilty of would have to do with how we attempted to lead her in that way. Yah does everything perfectly and people choose to not walk with Him. He is not to blame. I am a bit less perfect, so I could easily be to blame.”
• TRULY TRIGGERED BY BIBLICAL TRUTH?: Series 8: Q: “as distinct from acting on biblical truth, is speaking biblical truth something that can drive away a wife and/or is hearing biblical truth something a wife can legitimately use to justify leaving a marriage she doesn’t want to be bothered with?” Those that responded did so with No and No, and in response to one brother’s comment, the follow-up question: “is ignorance or disbelief or coercion something a wife can legitimately use to justify leaving a marriage she doesn’t want to be bothered with?” Best comment: “She can use anything to justify anything, but none of it is justified in the court of Heaven.” Continuing with the next two questions: “is speaking biblical truth about polygyny therefore something that can drive away a wife, or is hearing biblical truth about polygyny something a wife can legitimately use to justify leaving a marriage she doesn’t want to be bothered with?” (No) and “is it a potential major failure of leadership on the part of a man to fail to recognize that his woman’s submissiveness in regard to smaller issues can be a manipulative tool to camouflage the fact that she continues to expect him to (a) submit to her on larger ones and/or (b) purposefully refrain from implementing his vision for the family?” (Yes)

 

[Keith Martin]

• SHARED RESPONSIBILITY CONSIDERATIONS: Major questions group 9: “where do each of you stand on the matter of whether there is some degree of shared responsibility in marriage? Stipulate that the buck stops with us, but does that absolve a woman of all responsibility for not only her behavior but shared responsibility for outcomes she influences within a family?” Great discussion that included emphasizing that the buck stops with us – but doesn’t relieve our women of their responsibility; best comment: “Sure, we bear her guilt. But our guilt becomes even greater if we don’t do something about it. Nothing absolves her of her responsibility.” Then a lengthy and mainly rhetorical question in its context: “secondly, stipulating also that, for the most part, it is admittedly a matter of reflection of a man’s leadership whether his 1st wife supports and encourages plural marriage or discourages and sabotages it (or any other aspect of a man's vision), as well as that a man’s leadership capability is also reflected in his choice of a 1st wife, which includes her potential to encourage or discourage plural marriage (or, again, any other part of his vision). However, (i) given that one can’t operate in a vacuum, (ii) given that the surrounding culture is so averse to polygyny, and (iii) given that 1st wives have plentiful opportunities to enlist back-up for their resistance to polygyny, how many here believe that the only relevant dynamic is the degree to which a man is capable of leadership? In simpler terms, while the buck stops with us, is it even responsible for men to absolve women of their own responsibility for why other women who haven't scored in life's monogamy-only lottery remain shut out in the cold of not being covered?” Great discussion ensued, including emphasis on the importance of 1st-wife choice – as well as of certain ways in which 1st wives can seem cooperative but sabotage with the crafty maneuver of supporting the husband in coming up with ever-higher standards for potential 2nd wives until those standards become hopelessly unrealistic.” Another rhetorical follow-up Q: “doesn’t a 1st wife’s sense of entitlement to the fringe benefits of her man’s incremental acquisition of the attributes of patriarchy only further enhance her intention (and perhaps even her ability) to hold her husband hostage to her demands about whether he will take a 2nd wife or the manner in which he does so?” So rhetorical that no one had a response, but the correct answer was Yes. Next follow-up: “in my original post, I assert that waiting until one has fully convinced one’s 1st wife before taking a 2nd wife effectively gives her dominative power in the marriage. Who here believes that, in a situation in which a 1st wife simply refuses to be supportive, the only avenue forward is to expect oneself to attain a standard that demonstrates the level of leadership that persuades the 1st wife to drop her opposition?” Best comment came quickly: “I believe that one should live that high of a standard regardless of the outcome. To expect her to be changed by it is probably naive, though.” Keep the expectations high but don’t beat up oneself just because they aren’t always met.
• LEADER/HELPMEET POWER BALANCE: Question 10 ended up being a standalone, because the discussion was definitive: Q: “what is a power balance in a marriage?” My favorite response: “There is no balance. The power belongs to the leader/husband and is shared as he sees fit. Empowering his wife/wives should be his goal, sharing some of the responsibilities with them, but owning the final responsibility for the results of what happens. Too many focus on the power, when in real life accepting responsibility is what leadership looks like.”
• INSINCERE SUBMISSION?: Series 11: around this time, partially due to some things I learned and observed at a Biblical Families gathering, my questions began to partially reflect a growing awareness that many wives in our organization were not only sabotaging potential plural marriage but outright pretending to support biblical polygamy: “What is the difference between male authority and male responsibility?” Comments: “they are the same but seen from different perspectives [from within and from without]” and “we have the responsibility to use the authority He gave us.” First follow-up question underwent some alteration after some discussion: (ia) how does a man determine if a potential 2nd wife is capable of submission? (iia) how does he determine if his actual 1st wife is capable of submission? (iiia) if your answers to these two questions are different, why and how are they different? (ib) how does a man determine if a potential 2nd wife is inclined toward submission? (iib) how does he determine if his actual 1st wife is inclined toward submission? (iiib) if your answers to these two questions are different, why and how are they different?” The ultimate conclusion was that the answers to each pair should match each other, with the answers to the latter being that it takes some questioning and observation, combined with resistance to fooling oneself into being undeservedly optimistic, and the answers to the former being that all women are in fact capable of submission: “It is only when they disagree with you that you find out whether or not they will choose to submit.” . . . and . . . “Any vestige of feminism is the tattletale.”
• A brother then suggested going to see the then-new movie Redeeming Love, especially for “those with a heart to minister to single women who have strikes against them.” Highly recommended. For men and women.
• Returning to 11-series questions: “what if it were stipulated for the sake of argument that any man who has achieved near-perfect leadership in his family will, as a matter of course, be married to a woman who will now – no matter how much she may have done so in the past – offer no resistance toward nor sabotage of him entering into plural marriage? In such a case, couldn’t we agree that the only impediment to such a man who desired plural marriage would be the lack of available 2nd wives or his own restrictive interpretation of who constitutes a worthy potential 2nd wife?” Full disclosure here: I started out the discussion unconsciously assuming that the hypothetical stipulation would consistently result in a perfect response, but one brother with multiple wives very effectively pointed out that his experience was that, the greater leadership he demonstrated, the more resistance he received. Best answer: “I’d say lack of willing women, unless he is rejecting the ones that aren’t perfect.” Discussion included testimonies about the temptation of letting wives off the hook due to ‘special’ societal pressures inspired the following follow-up: “could the surrounding community produce sufficient tangible preventive sabotage of such a man having a plural family?” Main consensus was that, no, if we stand tall, the evidence is already in place in the form of existing plural families that societal pressure does not possess the power to prevent polygyny. However, one brother created an excellent reformulation of the question that provided a more optimistic alternative perspective: “Could the surrounding community end up producing sufficient EVIDENCE to all concerned that plural marriage is not just a valid solution, but VITAL?” Follow-up: “is it possible for an individual man to achieve full headship competence without at least a small number of other men in his life honoring and encouraging that pursuit?” Best comment: “Honoring and encouraging would conceivably make a man better, sharper, more skilled at what he is attempting. Otherwise, what practical value does it have?” Next question: “how would men properly honor each other in regard to supporting pursuit of the achievement of full headship?” Best comment: “Fellowship seems a small start. I'm probably stating the obvious here but I wanted to do it anyway. I hear often about how iron sharpens iron, but sometimes a need can be as simple as ‘Here, let me carry that with you, Brother.’ God is the ultimate source from which we should derive our enlightenment, our courage, and our motivation. Having said that, He also created us as social creatures who are often improved by simply being listened to by one another.”
• Followed by this Q: “could a lack of support from other male heads potentially prevent a man's success? If so, how?” Wow; this question elicited more vitriol among us than anything in the course of our year-long discussion. At the heart of it were varying interpretations of the word ‘interdependence,’ but it wasn’t just a definitional conflict. Brothers simply possess sincerely-held differences of opinion about whether relying at all on other men is necessary – as well as possessing strongly-held convictions about whether other men can even be counted on to provide useful support. This discussion clearly struck numerous nerves, and my conclusion was that I handled it inartfully. Therefore, it was time to table that and shift to a new focus.
• CHALLENGES ASSOCIATED WITH ESTABLISHING FOLLOWERSHIP: Question 12a: “What would each of you suggest would be a proper incremental approach to establishing leadership and followership within one’s family? In other words, if one anticipates that adding a 2nd wife to one’s family would be a severe challenge to a 1st wife’s ability to submit, what would be a list of typical lower-level challenges a husband should consider introducing prior to introducing polygyny?” – which was partially reworded as, “what are some lesser challenges that a man should introduce to his 1st wife prior to challenging her (his 1st wife) to accept plural marriage?” The following were suggested: (1) refraining from always asking for your spouse's vote; (2) occasionally making choices/decisions that do not align with what your spouse would prefer; (3) teaching wives Torah; (4) teaching that the Adversary will attack acceptance of plural marriage. Because these are clearly behaviors we should be exhibiting as husbands to our wives whether polygyny is in the picture or not, it inspired a follow-up question: “is it also a given that the only significant thing standing in the way of ending any sabotage or resistance to plural marriage is failure to be a full husband to one's wife?”
• During a combination lull/distraction, I recommended watching the following two videos:
  and
  , from which the following quote was culled: "Pain always leaves a gift. Pain can either make you bitter or make you better."
• Eventually, I added to the list of challenges a man should introduce to his 1st wife prior to challenging her to accept plural marriage: (5) discussions about the baseline differences between men and women, including both capabilities and primal drives; (6) reviewing the very distinct differences between what men bring to the table and what women bring to the table, including a discussion about how easy it is in our church cultures as well as our overall culture for women to predominantly take for granted what men provide, as well as having a discussion in which one's 1st wife is asked to articulate why, in worlds in which constant calls for 'equality' and 'equity' are being made, men should be willing to continue to shoulder much more than their share of the burden; (7) Scripture: teaching one's 1st wife the full meaning of I Corinthians 7:3-5 and how this was, in effect, Paul's warning to the monogamy-only Greeks in Corinth: in the context of monogamy-only, wives become responsible for 100% sexual satisfaction of their husbands; (8) discussing the distinction between what it means to be a good husband and what it means to be a good wife; (9) having pointed discussions about the differences between what parents should teach their boys about being good husbands and their girls about being good wives -- and what one's 1st wife's contributions to that teaching should be; (10) discussing the concept of economy of scale; (11) Scripture: teaching one's wife Exodus 21:10; (12) Scripture: various: teaching one's wife the essential nature of covering females; (13) discussing a possible future in which one's 1st wife becomes a widow; (14) discussing the possibility of making arrangements in advance for how one's 1st wife will be covered if she becomes a widow; (15) discussing the universal-across-cultures imbalance between the greater number of unmarried, uncovered women and the lesser number of unmarried men -- expecting one's 1st wife to brainstorm what can be done about this imbalance, ensuring to discuss at some point how stingy it is for any woman to demand exclusivity with her husband when it's obvious that that exclusivity necessarily results in uncovered, lonely and mostly poverty-stricken women and children. One brother sought to amend point (15) by asserting that the imbalance exists because so many men are not reasonably capable of leading a family, but that argument is countered by two things: (a) that’s not the reason for the statistical imbalance; the statistical reason why there are always 50% more unmarried women than men is that the missing men are mostly dead due to the combination of their vast-majority-participation in dangerous occupations and the elevated tendency of young men to engage in other dangerous behaviors; and (b) if one is going to judge whether men are reasonably capable of leading a family, one would also have to judge whether women are reasonably capable of following a leader. One great comment: “The stat that matters, of course, is how many single women actually want to be married. I believe that Isaiah 4:1 shows us that large numbers of them don’t believe that they need a covering, until the time that they realize that they do. Which ain’t happened yet. A lot of today’s women are going to grow old and die alone, as they wait for that Prince Charming one percenter to realize that they are the one-in-a-million that they have been searching for all their life.”
• LUSTING FOR APPROVAL: Question 13: “in the context of our private discussion here, to what extent should we be pursuing approval from the organized-religion (mainstream, corporate, denominational) churches?” General agreement that we should not, and one particularly poignant comment: “It’s really disappointing that one has to accept so many worldly beliefs to blend in well with the modern church.” Another brother summed it up: “I have taught for years that we should NOT ‘forsake the assembling of ourselves together...’ because I followed the common teaching that assembly is critical to our maintenance and growth. Since that time I have indeed done what was discouraged namely ‘Forsaken’ the assembly. Here's why- I don't trust a lot of believers to pray and encourage in my family's best interest. Should I be telling my deepest feelings and secrets to Brother Jones or Sister Sue when they have a rather waggly tongue? I have found that confession is indeed good for the soul but quite detrimental to one's reputation. I have gained a bit of a thick skin as a result. And, ‘Frankly my Dear, I don’t give a damn....’ Is this a bad attitude? Probably.” No, it’s not.

 

[Keith Martin]

• STANDING ATHWART HISTORY: Question 14: “if we look at the issue of whether we should engage in the kind of righteous rebellion that takes the form of standing up to social stigma, where are the dividing lines between (a) when it's forgivable to knuckle under to it, and (b) when giving in to social-pressure cowardice is inexcusable?” The sentiment was expressed that this should be left to individual patriarchs to determine, so the follow-up was, “When are we willing to get a little bit into the lanes of others in order to promote some common good?” Clarification was requested about whether “knuckle under” was intended to have a bad connotation; that was affirmed by asserting that “that some level of choosing being socially acceptable is undesirable, negative, weak or counterproductive.” Best comment: “There are things not worth fighting for, and things worth dying for. The real question is: Do we know the difference?”
• UNCOVERED WOMEN: SUPPLY AND DEMAND: Question 15: “Which number is greater within our cultures at any given age level?: the number of unattached and undivorced women who were previously married but whose husbands have died, leaving them without husbands, or the number of men who desire to bring another wife into their families and are prepared to do so?” Stipulated by numerous brothers that one needn’t narrow down the category of women needing covering just to never-divorced widows, but we had agreement that even that subset outnumbers the available men prepared to take them in. The question was then re-asked in its exact form except for substituting willing men for prepared men. As the question was rhetorical and obvious, no one offered an opinion, but I stated ‘out loud’ that, given the fact that even taking all the men who are just willing to be plural husbands still wouldn’t come close to being a full solution for covering just the non-divorced widows – not to mention all the divorced and never-married (previously referred to as spinsters or old maids) – I concluded, “that, rather than the primary problem being men being insufficiently prepared to be husbands of more than one wife, the real problem is that, as of now, we still inhabit a cultural situation in which there are far too few men willing to be plural husbands. Therefore, instead of being so cautionary about it, what we should be doing as men is encouraging far more men to be willing to take on the responsibility of an expanded household. This would also have the benefit of bolstering the number of men out there promoting this. This logic may go against a tendency to have a feast-or-famine mentality, especially when we seem to be confronted with a situation in which we daily and fruitlessly log on to sisterwives.com or elsewhere to expend effort putting ourselves out there for what looks like a very small pool of available and willing females. My response to that is two-fold: (1) we're looking in all the wrong places and/or we're expecting the mountain to come to Mohamed; and (2) women remain reluctant to participate because, thus far, we have failed to enroll enough mainstream support among men. If more men were out in the world declaring their support for and/or desire to participate in polygyny, many more women would become comfortable doing the same. This may be a case of men mistakenly thinking that all that is required of them is to be ready to be leaders in their own little kingdoms. Maybe we're exhorted to exhibit leadership in this regard out in the world. Just moving out of the shadows is likely to make us come across more like the kind of leaders women will want to follow.” In other words, our biggest adversaries may be (1) our own fears about stigma, and (2) the millions of men around us we let off the hook by failing to even attempt to persuade them that they should join us on our quest to promote biblical polygamy, whether our reticence about doing so comes from fear of disapproval or fear that we’ll generate additional competition for what appears to be a scarcity of available 2nd wives. This led to pointing out that the divorced and never-married constitute an even larger group of uncovered women, further necessitating the essential nature of expanding the number of men who actively support the creation of plural families.
• MINISTERING TO LEFTOVER WOMEN: Which segued into Question 16: “in addition to recognizing that it's counterproductive to expect men of one wife to jump through unreasonable hoops to qualify to be husbands of more than one wife, is it possible that our standards for 2nd wives are too high?” This started with lots of disagreement but moved toward consensus as the discussion progressed. Best comment: “I have heard so many different ideas on [biblicalfamilies.org] as to what makes a woman acceptable as a potential wife that it makes my head spin. A virgin, never married, no kids, a renounced nun; I myself have judged, maybe unfairly, several potential wives looking to join my family. The only real requirement is will they benefit and fit in my family, get along with the rest of my family. The divorced woman, battered and abused for years left her husband to keep from being beaten is not worthy because she is divorced? Are these not the women that need a righteous husband? Do they not need the cover of a good man and a loving family?” Another reasonable one: “Are we just called to do what's easy? Aren't almost all of the highly-spiritually-qualified women already scooped up and married to husbands of one wife? Doesn't it make sense that the women who are most in need of our covering would be more broken than average, more challenging than average and, yes, I'll say it, less attractive and initially less respectfully cooperative than average?” Which led to four follow-ups: “Question 16b: if we're called to be polygynists, isn't it part and parcel of such a calling that it would involve increasing challenges, and therefore is it possible that having the same standards for second wives that we have for first wives fails to fully take into account that we don’t deserve to have the same expectations that a single man should have when seeking an only wife?: and “Question 16c: if the answers to 16b are yes and yes, then is it possible that we should very purposefully be willing to accept a greater degree of brokenness when seeking additional wives than we would be willing to accept when seeking a first wife? And aren't these questions increasingly relevant the older we get?” and “Question 16d: if the answers to 16b are yes and yes and the answers to 16c are also yes and yes, would it behoove us to determine how our individual strengths may equip us to be best paired with particular female weaknesses?” and “Question 16e: “And I guess what I'm getting at here is that, if all the above is the case, it would benefit us as a brotherhood of men to refer potential wives to other brothers who would be better suited or more attracted to the potential wives to whom those other brothers would be better suited -- expecting, of course, that our brothers would do the same for us. Does anyone have a problem with that?” Obviously, this would require of us that we let down our gotta-do-it-all-on-our-own walls, but the best comment was, “The Walk is different in everyone’s house, but not completely different.” I would say the discussion indicated that food for thought was ingested but will also take varying lengths of time before each of us is ready to produce a fully-digested set of personal conclusions. The seeds for cooperation among patriarchs in this manner were, however, definitely planted in fertile ground.
• JEALOUSY CAMOUFLAGE FOR SELFISH DOMINATION?: Questions 17: “Which of these two manifestations of jealousy (the woman's discomfort with knowing she is sharing her man with another woman; or the efforts of a woman to prevent her man from having another woman) is more prevalent in our world?; and, which of these two manifestations of jealousy (the woman's discomfort with knowing she is sharing her man with another woman; or the efforts of a woman to prevent her man from having another woman) causes more problems for her man and other people around her?” 10 days of dead silence, so clearly our discussion was drawing to a close; I posted the following comment/response: “What gets discussed the most is the effect on the woman, as both women and men fall all over themselves to demonstrate their sensitivity to the feelings of jealousy women feel about the idea of sharing their husbands, but my opinion is that women put more effort into preventing having to share their husbands than they experience actually feeling jealous about it. Even a significant portion of the expression of feelings of jealousy is part of manipulative efforts to sabotage the possibility. This doesn't just apply to wives of men who believe in and/or seek plural marriage. In addition, handling a wife's actual jealousy pales in regard to the degree to which her sabotage and prevention efforts create disturbances for their husbands.” I will also add that my experience tells me that stinginess and desire to dominate are each a greater motivation for most women to sabotage plural marriage than is actual sexual jealousy.
• Participants were asked to watch another Kevin Samuels video, this one from September 2021 on domestic abuse considerations:
  , as well as to read a couple somewhat related American Thinker articles: https://www.americanthinker.com/art...ce_monster_has_its_claws_in_both_parties.html and https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/06/where_are_all_the_men.html.
• IRON SHOULDERS SHARPENING IRON BACKBONES: Last question (18): “given the proof offered by scriptures such as Habakkuk 1:5-6 that the chaos of the world is directed by YHWH, what, in addition to standing tall within our marriages and standing tall on behalf of all forms of biblical marriage, should we as true men be standing tall for?”
• WRAP-UP: Discussion closed up with some stray comments, some housekeeping items, and these two worthy responses among what had been a year of worthy responses: “A bit late but I'll throw my two cents in. I think the greatest commandment (Love) is fulfilled primarily through application of the first blessing (fruitful, multiplicative, replenishing dominion). Obviously this brings us into discussions of the law and its purpose in engendering and protecting these things, and that ultimately reveals our need for Yeshua, who can then transform us into the obedient and informed. So, stand for the full authority and unchanging eternality of the scriptures, and evaluate the specific problems your generation faces (figure out the enemies’ plans), and then openly oppose those plans by informing with scripture in as loving a way as possible, without being weak or submissive, those you have any influence with.” – and “Walk the walk that has been given to you by Yah. Ask Him for more understanding of His expectations for your walk. It is individual, but as we each explore it it becomes corporate. The more that we get closer to Him and His design, the closer we will be to each other.”
• Lastly, I suggested watching a section of one final Kevin Samuels video not just to view by oneself but perhaps to “present to either recalcitrant 1st wives or potential 2nd wives who put up the argument that they'd be devaluing themselves to accept an arrangement in which they're sharing a man: start at 1:37:37 and watch through to 1:48:30”:

OK, we're looking forward to your participation.

Keith

 

[Michael Moon]

I'd like to express my appreciation and sincere gratitude to all of the men who documented their thoughts and findings. And thank you also to @Keith Martin for organizing it for me (and for us all) to read.

I am sorry that I don't have anything to add to this discussion at this time. But I just wanted to express something: the wisdom shared here, and on this forum in general, has been a great blessing to my life and to my walk with Yah.

Thank you all for speaking truth in an age of lies.

 

[Keith Martin]

Watch this before it also gets blue-pill black-holed:

I pray this man doesn't make any significant adjustment to the manner in which he presents his thoughts. Those who supposedly object to the way he says things will never stop unearthing a way to justify vilifying him.

 

[MeganC]

I deeply appreciate the thoughtful information @Keith Martin presented here.

I guess the main thing to start out with is that mono-marriage and poly-marriage are distinctly different and I don't have to go very far to find an example to demonstrate this difference.

Steve and Shari married in 1987. They were both raised in poly families and both of them understood it well. They had three daughters and sometime after the youngest was born Shari wasn't interested in having more kids. Which is not unusual in today's world. She was very much the first wife that Keith so extensively wrote about here. She was also a closeted feminist (which to me is a profane insult).

Shari sabotaged her husband's dream and desire to start his own business instead preferring he have a job working for someone else. He went ahead and started a business anyway and that was a source of conflict for the two of them. She also denied him in the bedroom. This went on for a few years and then Steve started looking for a second wife. He did talk to Shari about it but she opposed it.

Steve met Christie in 2006 and the two of them very quickly connected. Steve informed Shari of this and as I have heard about it there was a pretty epic fight. And then Steve brought Christie into the home anyway and started having babies with her. Then along came me and more babies. And then Macy and more babies.

Shari ended up leaving, moving to Seattle, and becoming the feminist she always wanted to be.

As I look at it the problem that Steve and Shari had was they never planned on being poly when they got married. And then Shari was forced to choose with going along with it or leaving and she left.

Which brings me to my point:

Steve spent a lot of years building a very beautiful canoe. It's beautiful and perfectly suited to being a canoe.

Then one day he wanted an airplane.

Making an airplane out of the canoe would have been possible but it wasn't practical. And I think its far easier to make an airplane out of a canoe than it is to make a mono-marriage woman into a poly woman.

The answer here, and I direct this at the single men on here, is to start with a woman who accepts your idea of a bigger family right from the start. Don't expect your canoe to become an airplane when it suits you. Start by building a marriage that can fly.

Steve's two daughters Stephanie and Lauren married men who grew up in poly and who made clear they wanted to be poly. Stephanie and Lauren accepted that from the start and both families have since added a second and a third. I've never heard of any problems accepting this. They have other problems like anyone else does but this was never one of them. Lauren made it even easier for her husband by encouraging him to court her best friend.

That's really the recipe for success is to start out building what you want instead of trying to make a canoe into an airplane.

 

[frederick]

I deeply appreciate the thoughtful information @Keith Martin presented here.

I guess the main thing to start out with is that mono-marriage and poly-marriage are distinctly different and I don't have to go very far to find an example to demonstrate this difference.

Steve and Shari married in 1987. They were both raised in poly families and both of them understood it well. They had three daughters and sometime after the youngest was born Shari wasn't interested in having more kids. Which is not unusual in today's world. She was very much the first wife that Keith so extensively wrote about here. She was also a closeted feminist (which to me is a profane insult).

Shari sabotaged her husband's dream and desire to start his own business instead preferring he have a job working for someone else. He went ahead and started a business anyway and that was a source of conflict for the two of them. She also denied him in the bedroom. This went on for a few years and then Steve started looking for a second wife. He did talk to Shari about it but she opposed it.

Steve met Christie in 2006 and the two of them very quickly connected. Steve informed Shari of this and as I have heard about it there was a pretty epic fight. And then Steve brought Christie into the home anyway and started having babies with her. Then along came me and more babies. And then Macy and more babies.

Shari ended up leaving, moving to Seattle, and becoming the feminist she always wanted to be.

As I look at it the problem that Steve and Shari had was they never planned on being poly when they got married. And then Shari was forced to choose with going along with it or leaving and she left.

Which brings me to my point:

Steve spent a lot of years building a very beautiful canoe. It's beautiful and perfectly suited to being a canoe.

Then one day he wanted an airplane.

Making an airplane out of the canoe would have been possible but it wasn't practical. And I think its far easier to make an airplane out of a canoe than it is to make a mono-marriage woman into a poly woman.

The answer here, and I direct this at the single men on here, is to start with a woman who accepts your idea of a bigger family right from the start. Don't expect your canoe to become an airplane when it suits you. Start by building a marriage that can fly.

Steve's two daughters Stephanie and Lauren married men who grew up in poly and who made clear they wanted to be poly. Stephanie and Lauren accepted that from the start and both families have since added a second and a third. I've never heard of any problems accepting this. They have other problems like anyone else does but this was never one of them. Lauren made it even easier for her husband by encouraging him to court her best friend.

That's really the recipe for success is to start out building what you want instead of trying to make a canoe into an airplane.

Totally agree except some of us never discovered flying until God opened our eyes to the amazing skies above.

 

[MeganC]

Totally agree except some of us never discovered flying until God opened our eyes to the amazing skies above.

That applies to me too!

At age 16 the life I had planned was college, career, and maybe marriage. Just like so many of my friends. Things happened and suddenly everything I had wanted before seemed like a lie. God opened my eyes to what could be and made me look and here I am.

But it took a major trauma for me to consider this life. Absent that trauma I'd probably be working in an office somewhere and having a string of shallow relationships just like the TV says we should have.

I really have no idea how to convince a first wife to accept a second. Just saying that any of our young men would do well to find a woman who is equally yoked with them in this regard.

 

[Keith Martin]

I deeply appreciate the thoughtful information presented here.

I consider it imperative to note that Megan was a member of the Evidence of Failure group and also a prime proponent of starting the SHREW discussion. I hated to have to exclude her, but it was essential for the discussion's success that it be all-male to begin with.

That's really the recipe for success is to start out building what you want instead of trying to make a canoe into an airplane.

Great analogy, and I absolutely loved everything you wrote. However, I do have one question for you in the context of what Frederick wrote:

Totally agree except some of us never discovered flying until God opened our eyes to the amazing skies above.

Megan, would you assert from your perspective that everyone who started out with a 'canoe' should refrain from aspiring to fly in an 'airplane?'

 

[The Revolting Man]

I deeply appreciate the thoughtful information @Keith Martin presented here.

I guess the main thing to start out with is that mono-marriage and poly-marriage are distinctly different and I don't have to go very far to find an example to demonstrate this difference.

Steve and Shari married in 1987. They were both raised in poly families and both of them understood it well. They had three daughters and sometime after the youngest was born Shari wasn't interested in having more kids. Which is not unusual in today's world. She was very much the first wife that Keith so extensively wrote about here. She was also a closeted feminist (which to me is a profane insult).

Shari sabotaged her husband's dream and desire to start his own business instead preferring he have a job working for someone else. He went ahead and started a business anyway and that was a source of conflict for the two of them. She also denied him in the bedroom. This went on for a few years and then Steve started looking for a second wife. He did talk to Shari about it but she opposed it.

Steve met Christie in 2006 and the two of them very quickly connected. Steve informed Shari of this and as I have heard about it there was a pretty epic fight. And then Steve brought Christie into the home anyway and started having babies with her. Then along came me and more babies. And then Macy and more babies.

Shari ended up leaving, moving to Seattle, and becoming the feminist she always wanted to be.

As I look at it the problem that Steve and Shari had was they never planned on being poly when they got married. And then Shari was forced to choose with going along with it or leaving and she left.

Which brings me to my point:

Steve spent a lot of years building a very beautiful canoe. It's beautiful and perfectly suited to being a canoe.

Then one day he wanted an airplane.

Making an airplane out of the canoe would have been possible but it wasn't practical. And I think its far easier to make an airplane out of a canoe than it is to make a mono-marriage woman into a poly woman.

The answer here, and I direct this at the single men on here, is to start with a woman who accepts your idea of a bigger family right from the start. Don't expect your canoe to become an airplane when it suits you. Start by building a marriage that can fly.

Steve's two daughters Stephanie and Lauren married men who grew up in poly and who made clear they wanted to be poly. Stephanie and Lauren accepted that from the start and both families have since added a second and a third. I've never heard of any problems accepting this. They have other problems like anyone else does but this was never one of them. Lauren made it even easier for her husband by encouraging him to court her best friend.

That's really the recipe for success is to start out building what you want instead of trying to make a canoe into an airplane.

This is a brilliant post and describes eerily accurately my first marriage as well.

 

[MeganC]

Great analogy, and I absolutely loved everything you wrote. However, I do have one question for you in the context of what Frederick wrote:

Megan, would you assert from your perspective that everyone who started out with a 'canoe' should refrain from aspiring to fly in an 'airplane?'

Wow. That's a tough question and I don't have any really good answers.

I will also be open and admit that all of my experience is from the perspective of a plural. It is tons easier to be a plural and then to accept another plural into the family than to be the first wife and accept an unwanted change. I know this and I extend my sympathies to those women who married a guy with a canoe and who now wants an airplane.

But for those men who are equally yoked they are abundantly blessed because their first wife looks forward to adding to the family. And there are some women on this site who absolutely awe and humble me with both their wisdom and their faith in action when it comes to this subject.

 

[Keith Martin]

Before I wade into this, I should mention to those who aren't already aware of this that you and I are very good friends.

Megan, would you assert from your perspective that everyone who started out with a 'canoe' should refrain from aspiring to fly in an 'airplane?'

Wow. That's a tough question and I don't have any really good answers.

I asked because you appeared to be stopping just shy of making that assertion; everything you wrote, however, leads right up to making that conclusion. And, as I indicated, your analogy is excellent and is certainly worthy of consideration. If that's the conclusion of the analogy, though, that would argue for the majority of male members of Biblical Families to abandon their aspirations to implement plural marriage -- not to mention somewhat invalidating any of the already-existing plural marriages that started out with mono marriages with forsaking-all-others vows, with the very rare exceptions being those marriages that transitioned with 1st wives who were enthusiastic about sharing their husbands. The remaining handful of people could meet in a large booth at McDonalds!

And sometime after I asked you the question, it occurred to me that, had your husband kept his 'canoe,' I never would have met you, because you never would have married him and thus wouldn't be the Plural Exemplar you are today.

All of which leads me to a couple other thoughts:

• The biggest reason why men don't discover that polygyny is a righteous option before they marry is because they've been raised in cultures dominated by the mainstream churches that have themselves been dominated by women for centuries. I know some will argue that it's only been decades, because it appeared until recent decades that Catholicism, its male priesthood, and typical structures in Catholicism's many denominational offshoots have been run by men -- but something easy to discover when studying organized Christianity is that, seriously, for centuries, most of those male priests/pastors/elders/deacons have catered to the whims of their female parishioners -- and most major Christian social movements in our cultures have been started and dominated by women. Men hold the 'positions,' but women have been pulling the strings -- and they've certainly dominated what's taught in Sunday School. I've recounted more times than I can remember how I finished my first full read of The Bible at age 5 and immediately began a practice of asking every pastor I've ever had (in many denominations) when polygamy was outlawed in Scripture. I've had some semi-heated discussions about this with certain preachers, but the vast majority were calm and polite about it, but, let me tell you, I can't remember a time when I asked a Sunday School teacher the same question and her response was calm or polite; usually it went straight into Hell-hath-no-fury territory. My point is that women especially have ensured that boys and men don't discover that polygyny is an option, so my consequent question is: are men to be discouraged from implementing something that was an option all along but that they were dishonestly dissuaded from discovering until they had the time the average man has to fully study Scripture?
• I do understand that a 1st wife operating under the assumption that she deserves to have a man all to herself is asked to suffer the sense of loss that comes along with learning that just being female doesn't grant one the right to expect that plural marriage isn't going to be part of her life script, but I guess I balk at concluding that their shattered expectations trump what occurs with everyone else in the equation (and have grown weary watching men and women falling all over themselves to express sensitivity and deference). Why are the wants and needs of those unwilling to share considered to be more important than the wants and needs of the women who will otherwise be poor and lonely without plural marriage or the wants and needs of the men willing to take on that much responsibility?

 

[frederick]

Why are the wants and needs of those unwilling to share considered to be more important than the wants and needs of the women who will otherwise be poor and lonely without plural marriage or the wants and needs of the men willing to take on that much responsibility?

That, my dear Watson, is the question!

 

[Keith Martin]

That, my dear Watson, is the question!

Thanks, Frederick.