Eastern Orthodoxy and Polygyny

[southernphotini]

In my faith only "serial polygamy" is allowed, in that divorce and remarriage is permitted to a limit. (No fourth marriages.)

It seems to me that the early church embracing monogamy had more to do with being acceptable in Greco-Roman culture than in the faith itself. Which seems odd because a lot of the early adherents were marginalized women.

So although I know the official doctrine of my faith regarding this, I was curious if there were any other Orthodox Christians on here? Or any pro-polygyny Orthodox resources anyone knows about?

 

[steve]

Don’t hold too hard onto a “faith” that promotes falsehood.

 

[southernphotini]

Don’t hold too hard onto a “faith” that promotes falsehood.

That's not very helpful and not the response I asked for.

 

[Bartato]

In my faith only "serial polygamy" is allowed, in that divorce and remarriage is permitted to a limit. (No fourth marriages.)

It seems to me that the early church embracing monogamy had more to do with being acceptable in Greco-Roman culture than in the faith itself. Which seems odd because a lot of the early adherents were marginalized women.

So although I know the official doctrine of my faith regarding this, I was curious if there were any other Orthodox Christians on here? Or any pro-polygyny Orthodox resources anyone knows about?

Augustine addressed it, and Orthodox folks like him alright I think (Protestant here, so not very up on Orthodox issues).

Augustine said it was only wrong since it violated their Roman laws and traditions, not fundamentally wrong in essence. Therefore, the patriarchs like Jacob did not sin.

 

[Bartato]

In my faith only "serial polygamy" is allowed, in that divorce and remarriage is permitted to a limit. (No fourth marriages.)

It seems to me that the early church embracing monogamy had more to do with being acceptable in Greco-Roman culture than in the faith itself. Which seems odd because a lot of the early adherents were marginalized women.

So although I know the official doctrine of my faith regarding this, I was curious if there were any other Orthodox Christians on here? Or any pro-polygyny Orthodox resources anyone knows about?

I don't think we have many "Orthodox Church" members here. We have a lot of disgruntled people that got kicked out of various churches.

We also have a fair number of various types of Protestants (Baptists, Pentecostals, Reformed, ect) and also a lot of "Torah Observant-Hebrew Roots" type folks, and a few Mormon related people. I'm sure I'm missing some

 

[DawoodSaar]

You'll find lots of orthodoxy here! Ortho=right, doxy=doctrine=teaching.

"Behold, the doctrine I bring is not my own, but His who sent me" "for I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my teaching" "blessed are the undefiled in the Way, who walk in the teaching of the Lord" "for Your Word is a lamp unto my feet, a light for my path" "Your teaching is truth" "the teaching of the wise is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death. "I confess, that after 'the Way' which they call heresy, so worship I the elohim of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets."

Sorry... I'm a proud heretic! My Eastern Orthodox friends have declared me so! And if I may be so bold... The fact you are even exploring the Scriptures for yourself makes you rather "unOrthodox." You aren't mindlessly sticking to the traditions of the church, but are exploring to find the truth. This is great! It'll cost you, but the price is absolutely worth it. A pearl of great price can be yours for the low low price of continued searching of Scripture.

"Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true."

Scripture is orthodoxy. And when the 1st century Jewish Bereans were searching "Scriptures" the writings of the apostles had not yet been penned.

Clement, Tertullian, Augustine? The inane babblings of infants compared to Scripture itself. "Seek ye the old Ways, wherein there is truth." The true orthodoxy predates Nicea, predates Paul, predates even Peter. Even the Messiah said His doctrine was not His own, but came from before. It predates Solomon, and David. And, it may even predate Moses. One could even argue, like John, "in the beginning, was the teaching." (Logos is regularly associated with Torah in the Septuagint, Torah, is usually translated "Law" but in Hebrew it also carries the concept of instructions or teachings.) The only right doctrine is that which proceeds from Abba.

(You'll also find a lot of debate here. We are all wrestling to find the truth, because the adversary is quite skilled at deceiving people. The wrestling is how we come to know what is orthodox.)

 

[FollowingHim]

I don't know any Orthodox members at present. I believe one person who used to be on the forum shifted to the Orthodox church, while looking to draw closer to the roots of Christianity. And the Orthodox church has certainly held fast as a rock of tradition against the onslaught of paganism and immorality in the secular world today, an onslaught which many other churches have been overwhelmed by. So I can well understand the attraction of Orthodoxy, and am honestly surprised we don't have more such believers here.

What we do have in common is a desire to get closer to the roots of our faith, to "true Christianity" as it were. That same fundamental desire takes us on different paths, it can draw one person towards Hebrew Roots and another to the Church Fathers. Sometimes it draws the same person to one and then the other.

Although the Orthodox church prohibits polygamy officially, there has been an increasing promotion of polygamy in Russia in recent years, and there is apparently a reasonably sizeable Orthodox polygamous subculture in that country. Unfortunately there is very little information on this that is written in English, the online groups are Russian speaking. You might find this article very interesting:

There is polygamy in Russia, and here is how it works

“Looking for a second wife, a Slavic woman with blue eyes from a large family, who wants to give birth to as many children as God grants,” ads like...

www.rbth.com

It would not at all surprise me if there was a similar polygamous subculture in the Orthodox communities in the Middle East - but I have no direct information on this. There are too few Orthodox believers in the English-speaking Western countries to expect to find such a subculture over here, hence why most of us have a Protestant background - we simply come from countries where most Christians are Protestant.

 

[steve]

That's not very helpful and not the response I asked for.

We all come to the place where we are forced to decide between adding this one truth to the religious system that we are comfortable in, or do we go beyond that system searching for the rest of the truth that has been denied us.
Be prepared for a journey on which the answers are beyond what you ask for.

Somehow I am reminded of, “He is not tame……. but he is good”,

 

[southernphotini]

It would not at all surprise me if there was a similar polygamous subculture in the Orthodox communities in the Middle East - but I have no direct information on this. There are too few Orthodox believers in the English-speaking Western countries to expect to find such a subculture over here, hence why most of us have a Protestant background - we simply come from countries where most Christians are Protestant.

Thank you. I know a lot of Orthodox people from Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. I don't believe it is practiced there, although it more likely has to do with setting up a distinct difference between Arab Christians and Muslims over the years. I know Orthodox Jews in Israel have slowly begun to re-embrace polygyny.

 

[southernphotini]

The fact you are even exploring the Scriptures for yourself makes you rather "unOrthodox." You aren't mindlessly sticking to the traditions of the church, but are exploring to find the truth.

This statement makes me think you don't know very much about Orthodoxy. This doesn't describe 95% of the Orthodox people I know, either in my church or from around the globe. You might find the Lord of Spirits podcast interesting.

 

[southernphotini]

Augustine said it was only wrong since it violated their Roman laws and traditions, not fundamentally wrong in essence. Therefore, the patriarchs like Jacob did not sin.

Yeah, my understanding was it was an adherence to Greco-Roman culture (in which prostitution was rampant) and not doctrine that caused the change. In the early centuries Christians and Jews were also trying to make themselves distinctive from each other, leading to the abandonment of the multiple persons of God of Second Temple theology and rise of Rabbinic Judaism.

It must have been an interesting thing to try to determine how to best care for widows when plural marriage wasn't an option. Psalm 113 suggests that was the compassionate response to widows.

 

[rockfox]

Poke around the forums here. In one place it was discussed out the Ethiopian Orthodox practiced polygamy until around the 12th century. Another it was discussed the early church fathers and how one of them taught that Paul was supporting polygamy in 1 Cor 7.

In the first century world the Greek and Latin cultures were politically, and culturally, united. Both were monogamous in legal marriage but not in sex. The church comes along and combines no sex outside of marriage with legal monogamy and you have the tradition of the church. Augustine was plain that it's foundation was cultural not scriptural. It is from this cultural foundation which the Romans Catholic Church (latins) and the Eastern Orthodox Church (greeks) got monogamy; not any literal teaching of the Bible of even much discussion of it in the fathers. Tertulian was about the first in 300 a.d. and he made plain it was a new teaching.

 

[southernphotini]

In one place it was discussed out the Ethiopian Orthodox practiced polygamy until around the 12th century. Another it was discussed the early church fathers and how one of them taught that Paul was supporting polygamy in 1 Cor 7.

Oh fascinating. I don't know any Ethiopian Christians but I work with an Eritrean Orthodox Christian. He would likely be scandalized if asked him about polygamy.

That makes sense about Ethiopia, though. They were insulated geographically from other early Christian communities and so retained some parts of Orthodoxy that were de-emphasized among the Greeks, such as Enoch.