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During biblical times, Israelites and Jews[1] practiced polygamy, often called “plural marriage” by Latter-day Saints.[2] Because this practice is foreign to most people in the twenty-first century, in this paper we will summarize what is known about Israelite and Jewish polygamy in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and postbiblical Jewish literature. A contextual understanding of how polygamy was thought of and practiced can help modern Bible readers gain additional perspective about these ancient people and their stories. We will then conclude with a brief comparison between Israelite and Jewish polygamy in antiquity and Latter-day Saint polygamy in the nineteenth century. Latter-day Saints have often used our own experience in the recent past to extrapolate what polygamy was like in biblical times, while simultaneously using biblical texts to give meaning to our own experience.[3] However, while there are important places where these biblical and Restoration experiences of polygamy overlap, there are also very significant differences regarding how we thought of and practiced it. Because simplistic and overly generalized comparisons have at times led to erroneous conclusions, we suggest the need for greater nuance and caution when comparing ancient and latter-day polygamy.

Polygamy in the Old Testament

The practice of polygamy in Israelite and Jewish culture was by no means unique: polygamy has been practiced in many cultures throughout world history. Polygamy seems foreign to people in modern, Western cultures in part because we have inherited legal traditions descending from ancient Rome that favor enforced monogamy.[4] However, a 1998 study of 1,231 modern societies found that 85 percent of them allowed for polygamy.[5] This does not mean that polygamous marriages are common in these societies, only that the practice is permitted.[6] A 2020 Pew report concluded that, based on data from 130 countries, about 2 percent of the global population lives in polygamous households, with the highest rates appearing in sub-Saharan Africa, where 11 percent of the population lives in polygamous households.[7]

The Israelites of the Old Testament lived in a geographical and cultural setting known today as the ancient Near East, and the societies in that setting were very accepting of polygamy.[8] The practice is widely assumed in ancient Near Eastern narratives, myths, and legal texts and is attested in genealogies and marriage contracts. The particulars of the practice could vary somewhat depending on where one lived in the ancient Near East, but we can observe some broad commonalities. In particular, kings took multiple wives, either for personal satisfaction or political alliances.[9] Among nonroyals, a common reason for taking a second wife was to allow a man to have children in the event that his first wife did not conceive.[10] Slave women are often described as becoming second wives to the male head of household.[11] Second marriages did not operate on an “anything goes” principle but were regulated by laws just as first marriages were. Some laws, for example, protected the legal rights of a wife and her children against the arbitrary actions of a husband who might otherwise give an unfair share of his inheritance to the children of a more favored wife.[12]

This Assyrian relief from the late seventh century BC depicts a Babylonian man with two women, possibly his wives. https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/W_1851-0902-22-a.

When viewed against this background, polygamy as described in the Old Testament is decidedly unremarkable: the Israelites practiced it for the same reasons and in the same ways that their neighbors did. As was the case with neighboring regions, the Old Testament depicts the Israelites as allowing polygamy even if it was not the majority situation.[13] As in other ancient Near Eastern texts, Israelite kings such as Solomon are depicted as marrying numerous wives for their personal pleasure and for politics (see 1 Kings 11:1–3), and nonroyals, such as Elkanah, are depicted as taking second wives when the first is barren (see 1 Samuel 1:2). Genesis 16 explains that Abraham’s wife Sarah gave her slave Hagar to her husband Abraham as a second wife so that Hagar could bear the children that Sarah could not[14] and then reports that Hagar’s new status caused trouble between her and Sarah.[15] These same situations are already anticipated and regulated in laws 146–47 of the Code of Hammurabi, a legal text from Babylon that was written around the same time Abraham lived.[16]

The statutes of the law of Moses assume that polygamy is an option and regulate what to do when it occurs. Within a section of laws called the Covenant Code (Exodus 20:19–23:33), one passage, Exodus 21:7–11, protects the rights of a slave girl who marries her male owner in the situation that he marries yet another wife.[17] This kind of protection for an existing wife finds parallels in law codes from Sumer (Laws of Lipit-Eshtar §28) and Babylon (Code of Hammurabi §148). In another section of laws called the Holiness Code (Leviticus 17–26), one statute, Leviticus 18:17, prohibits marrying a woman and her daughter, followed immediately by a prohibition against marrying two sisters in Leviticus 18:18.[18] In both these cases, polygamy itself is not a problem but rather the existing relationship of the two potential wives. Finally, in Deuteronomy’s legal corpus, Deuteronomy 17:17 mandates that a king should not take so many plural wives that it becomes excessive,[19] and Deuteronomy 21:15–17 protects the inheritance of the children born to a plural wife in the circumstance that the husband does not like her as much as his other wife.[20] In addition, Deuteronomy 21:10–14 describes how to go about marrying a woman captured in war and Deuteronomy 25:5–6 provides for levirate marriage, and while neither situation had to involve polygamy, each of them could if the man were already married.[21]

Polygamy also appears metaphorically in prophetic texts that describe God as a husband, with the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah symbolically depicted as his wives. Jeremiah 3:6–11 and Ezekiel 23 both use this image to make the case that Israel and Judah, representing Jehovah’s two wives, were unfaithful to the Lord, metaphorically committing adultery by worshipping other gods.[22] Drawing on their familiarity with actual polygamous marriages, the prophets’ audiences would have recognized the scandalous betrayal of having not just one but both your wives act unfaithfully.

In sum, while there are a couple of situations in which the Israelites treated polygamy differently than their neighbors, such as by suggesting a reasonable limit on the number of wives allowed for a king (see Deuteronomy 17:17, described above), the Israelites of the Old Testament practiced polygamy for largely the same reasons and in largely the same ways as other peoples of the ancient Near East. Even the regulations of polygamy found in the law of Moses almost always followed common cultural precedents.

Polygamy around the Time of the New Testament

Polygamy continued to be practiced among Jews down into the New Testament era. Perhaps the most famous documented example from the New Testament period is King Herod, who was married ten times (although not all those wives were at the same time).[23] Herod is hardly representative of everyday Jews, but unfortunately the marital situation of most people has not been preserved by history. One important exception comes from a cache of texts found at a site called Nahal Hever near the Dead Sea. These legal documents describe the situation of a Jewish woman named Babatha who lived in the early second century AD.[24] After Babatha’s husband died, she married a man named Judah who already had a wife named Miriam, and then after Judah also died, Babatha and Miriam had some legal disputes. Because this particular family lived in a remote, rural location, they provide an important example of polygamy among everyday Jews living close to the time of the New Testament.[25]

Excerpts from the Babatha texts. In 5/6Ḥev 26 rev. 7–8 (above), Babatha refers to “my and your deceased husband.” In 5/6Ḥev 26 rev. 13–14 (below), Miriam uses the same phrase while addressing Babatha. Images taken from Naphtali Lewis, ed., The Documents from the Bar Kokhba Period of the Cave of Letters: Greek Papyri, JDS (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1989), plate 34.

Although archaeological evidence for practiced polygamy during this period is rare, the subject is frequently addressed in nonbiblical Jewish literature dating to the centuries surrounding the New Testament era. These texts show a remarkable diversity of opinions regarding polygamy, from outright hostility to embarrassment to positive portrayal.[26]

The most striking antipolygamy message appears in the Damascus Document, a Jewish sectarian text that appears to have been composed by the group that made the Dead Sea Scrolls.[27] In one passage, the authors attack their ideological opponents (who would have been fellow Jews) by accusing them of “fornication” due to their “taking two wives in their lifetimes.”[28] It goes on to cite three biblical texts: “However, the principle of creation is ‘male and female he created them’ [Genesis 1:27]. Also, those who entered the ark ‘entered two by two . . . into the ark’ [Genesis 7:9]. And concerning the leader it is written, ‘He will not multiply wives for himself’ [Deuteronomy 17:17]” (CD IV, 20–V, 2).[29] This condemnation of polygamy is paired with the highly unusual interpretive strategy of privileging the Genesis creation narrative over other biblical narratives and legal texts in order to establish behavioral norms.[30] The Damascus Document is aware that its antipolygamy stance is at odds with several scriptural examples and immediately brings up the situation of David, explaining that David was not made aware of what the Torah teaches until after his several marriages (CD V, 2–6). This creative yet invented explanation reveals how determined these authors were to interpret biblical scripture in light of their antipolygamy rhetoric.

Excerpt from CD IV, 21, שתי נשים בחייהם “two wives in their lifetimes.” University of Cambridge Digital Library, http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-TS-00010-K-00006/4.

Another document that implies hostility to polygamy is the Testament of Issachar. Written near the time of the New Testament,[31] the narrator, who speaks as if he were the biblical patriarch Issachar the son of Jacob, retells the story of the rivalry between the sister-wives Rachel and Leah as they competed for the affections of their mutual husband, Jacob. The discussion over the mandrakes from Genesis 30:14–18 is greatly expanded and turns into a full-blown argument complete with biting insults and scathing rebukes (Testament of Issachar 1:6–14). Later, an angel praises Rachel for only seeking intercourse in order to have children, while condemning Leah for seeking intercourse to satisfy her lust (Testament of Issachar 2:1–5). The author of this text does not explicitly condemn polygamy, but the narrative showcases the interpersonal conflict that can result from these relationships. It also strongly opposes lust and implies that plural marriages are not a desirable or even guaranteed method of bearing more children. The fact that the author uses a polygamous relationship to teach about inappropriate sexuality in marriage strongly suggests he frowned on this kind of relationship.

Another author who linked lust with polygamy was Philo, a Jewish philosopher who lived at the same time as Jesus.[32] Philo included “a lover of polygamy” as an entry in a lengthy list of ways that people can manifest lust (Fug. 153). Elsewhere, he condemned men who, despite already having a wife and children, give into their lust by marrying additional wives and then neglecting the first (Spec. 2.135; QG 3.21; Virt. 115). However, Philo’s disdain for polygamy is at odds with his high regard for the patriarchs Abraham and Jacob, whom he holds up as models of virtue. Aware of this problem, Philo goes out of his way to explain that the usual paring of polygamy and lust does not apply to Abraham: Abraham only married Hagar at Sarah’s prompting (QG 4.21), and, Philo claims, Abraham only had sexual intercourse with Hagar until she became pregnant—which happened very quickly (Abr. 249, 253). Similarly, Philo describes Jacob’s plural marriages as being approved by God (Leg. 3.146).

Josephus, a first-century Jewish historian, also had significant reservations about polygamy. In his case, the most likely explanation is that he was writing not for fellow Jews but for a Greco-Roman audience, and Josephus knew that Greeks and Romans only accepted legal monogamy and looked down on cultures that practiced polygamy.[33] Josephus wanted to present the stories of his ancestors in the best possible light, but he could not avoid the polygamous relationships that played such a prominent role in several of their stories. His solution was to creatively adjust the stories to better fit with Greco-Roman expectations. For example, Genesis routinely describes Bilhah and Zilpah as Jacob’s “wives,” but Josephus drops all these references and focuses on their other legal identity as slaves to Rachel and Leah. Roman men, while they could not marry more than one wife, were permitted to have sexual relations with slaves in their households, so with Josephus’s editing, Jacob’s relationships look more like what a Roman reader would expect. Rachel and Leah retain their status as sister-wives in Josephus’s retelling, but he downplays the drama of their rivalry as described in Genesis, which reduces the potential for readers to see their family’s situation as a scandal.

Not all Jewish sources from this period treat polygamy as an exercise in lust or as a cultural embarrassment. In fact, some sources discuss stories of polygamy in very positive terms. Jubilees, one of the most influential nonbiblical texts of the era,[34] does not seem to have an explicit agenda regarding polygamy, but when it retells the stories of the biblical patriarchs, it does highlight, more than the original Genesis version, that polygamy was God’s will for Abraham and Jacob and helped bring about God’s purposes. The relationships between various co-wives are also depicted as much more loving and harmonious, demonstrating that polygamous family relationships can be affectionate and positive.

Another document, Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum (LAB, also known as Pseudo-Philo), which was composed at the same time as the New Testament, retells the story of Samson’s parents.[35] The original biblical story describes their struggle with infertility, but in LAB’s version the husband, Manoah, pleads with his wife, Eluma, “Behold, the Lord has shut up your womb so that you do not bear children. Now let me take another wife so that I do not die without offspring” (LAB 42:1).[36] Eluma is not happy about this prospect and believes that it is Manoah’s fault that she cannot conceive. Both are unhappy with their situation until an angel reveals the future birth of Samson (see LAB 42:1–3). LAB’s treatment of this story underscores that polygamy was considered a solution to the problem of infertility, and his request for permission (which he does not appear to require legally) points to the social reality that second marriages could cause significant challenges if the first wife did not welcome the second.

LAB also retells the story of Samuel’s father, Elkanah, and his two wives, Hannah and Peninnah. In this version of the story, God reveals that Elkanah’s wives were given to him by God and that from the infertile wife, Hannah, will be born a son who will do God’s work (LAB 49:1–8). This suggests that God approves of Elkanah’s polygamous relationships. At the same time, LAB also heightens the drama between the two wives, drawing extra attention to Hannah’s grief at being infertile but also Peninnah’s grief at being less loved (LAB 50:1–2). As with the story of Samson’s parents, LAB seems to be sensitive both to the benefits of polygamous marriages (additional opportunities to bear children, or as a means of bringing about God’s purposes) but also to the complexity they could bring when practiced by real people living in challenging circumstances.

In sum, while there is little surviving evidence of the actual practice of polygamy among Jews in the New Testament era, polygamy and polygamous relationships are often mentioned in contemporary literature. This literature suggests that for various reasons, most notably the cultural pressure from monogamous Greece and Rome, Jews of this era had mixed feelings about the practice.

Polygamy in the New Testament

In the New Testament itself, there are places where Jewish cultural conversations about polygamy may have informed the topics that the New Testament discusses. For example, 1 Timothy 3:2 instructs that a bishop should be “the husband of one wife.” The exact intent of this phrase is debated, and it is often thought to refer to divorce or remarriage, especially given the Roman virtue of the univira, or wife of one husband in her lifetime.[37] Whatever the phrase meant, it probably would have precluded polygamy as well.[38] To Christians coming from a Greco-Roman background, this would have seemed obvious. Jewish followers of Jesus, by contrast, would have inherited the complex perspectives of polygamy that existed at that time, and may have seen such a restriction as novel.

In another example, both Mark and Matthew record a story where some Pharisees asked Jesus about the propriety of divorce as described in Deuteronomy 24:1–4 (Mark 10:2–12;/ Matthew 19:3–9). Jesus invoked Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 to make the case that “from/at the beginning” a man and a woman were meant to be joined together. Jesus is participating in a trend in contemporary Jewish literature of referring to Adam and Eve when discussing marriage.[39] How might polygamy have informed this discussion about divorce? Some scholars have suggested that, if certain Jews in this period were skeptical about polygamy, marrying a second wife may have been seen as a less-viable option to solve marital problems, such as relationship troubles or infertility. If that were the case, divorce may have been seen as an increasingly attractive solution to those problems, and the increased interest may have prompted the Pharisees’ question to Jesus.[40]

Other scholars have suggested that Jews listening to Jesus may have heard an implicit argument against polygamous marriages. Jesus quoted from Genesis 1:27, which is one of the scriptures also cited in the Damascus Document as a proof text against polygamy. Although this is speculative, if Genesis 1:27 was being used widely to critique polygamy, Jesus’s audience may have heard a critique of polygamy just by his use of that scripture (and whether Jesus intended a critique or not). Even if Genesis 1:27 were not associated with an antipolygamy position, Jesus’s use of a monogamous couple to establish the way things “ought to be” might have implied for some in his audience that such relationships are ideal.[41]

Jesus’s teachings on divorce may have also had implications for polygamous marriages. Jesus indicated, “Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her” (Mark 10:11). Some scholars have argued that this privileging of a man’s relationship with his first wife could have suggested to Jesus’s audience that even second marriages in a polygamous relationship constitute infidelity to the first wife.[42]

In sum, we simply do not know enough about the assumed background knowledge of Jesus’s audience to know all the ways they may have understood his teachings on divorce. However, the reality of polygamy among Jews in the first century may have informed the reasons for asking Jesus about divorce as well as some of the ways Jesus’s counsel may have been taken. Keeping that reality in mind can help us read the New Testament with greater sensitivity to diverse family situations that existed in Jesus’s environment.

Polygamy in Post–New Testament Jewish Literature

The New Testament was not the end of Jewish engagement with the scriptural basis for polygamy, and the discussion continues into rabbinic Judaism.[43] As with Judaism around the time of Jesus, the rabbinic sages[44] of the Mishnah and Talmud inherited a biblical text in which marriage with multiple wives[45] was presumed, but they also had to respond to the broader Greco-Roman world,[46] including the Greek and Roman preferences for monogamy.[47] This means that although the sages are willing and able to discuss multiple wives, in general they remain uncomfortable with it.[48] This discomfort comes through in their legal discussions and thinking, and has led to what is sometimes called a “monogamous trend” in rabbinic thinking and writing.[49] In spite of this, there are numerous examples of polygamous marriages and allusions in the rabbinic sources, both in the Holy Land and in Babylon.[50] Like scripture readers in every dispensation (including modern Latter-day Saints), the rabbinic sages were working to live and understand scriptural law in changed social and religious circumstances.[51] Below, we will examine a few places where the sages interact in particular with the biblical perspective on polygamous marriages in order to see how that informed their perspective on living family life in a world that differed from the conditions assumed in the Bible.

Exodus 21:10 was one of the most important texts used by the sages to understand polygamy. As part of the Covenant Code, its immediate context is a series of laws about the relationship between female slaves and wives. This passage commands, “If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish” (Exodus 21:10). The Hebrew word translated in the King James Version as “her duty of marriage” appears only once in the Hebrew Bible.[52] It is generally thought to refer to conjugal rights, such that even in a polygamous relationship (that is, a relationship with “another wife”), the husband is obligated to have sexual relationships with all his wives. This is to avoid the husband favoring one wife over another.[53]

In Ketubbot, the Mishnaic tractate devoted to marriage contracts, the sages discuss the meaning of the commandment that a husband is not to diminish a later wife’s “duty of marriage.” The sages interpreted this as a wife’s right to sexual intimacy with her husband and applied it even outside of polygamous relationships. According to the rabbinic sages, the law insisted that a wife of any kind had a right to sexual intercourse with her husband. They regulated how often, however, based on the profession of the husband. Thus, m. Ketubbot 5:6 reads, “Concerning the frequency of sexual intercourse spoken about in the Law—men of leisure: every day; a laborer: twice a week; donkey drivers: once a week; camel drivers: once a month; sailors: every six months. This is according to the opinion of R. Eliezer.”[54] Note here that the law is based around how far away from the home the man is required to be by his profession.

In another passage found in the Babylonian Talmud, the sages imply a specific number of marital visits and then use that to determine a pragmatic limit for the number of wives that one person can have. B. Yebamot 44a states, “Sound advice was given: only four, but no more so that each may receive one marital visit a month.”[55] This practical limit on the number of wives allowed to Jewish men is based on the sages’ cross-reading with the Talmudic discussion of the Mishnaic passage in Ketubbot 5:6 discussed above. When the Babylonian Talmud gets to how often “scholars” are to have marital relations with their wives, we read, “How often are scholars[56] to perform their marital duties?—Rab Judah in the name of Samuel replied: Every Friday night” (b. Ketubbot 62b). According to this tradition, those who are conversant in the law (and so the ideal Jew in the rabbinic perspective) are to have sexual relations with their wives every Friday night. Since Exodus 21:10 already states that a husband is not allowed to diminish sexual relations for wives, for the anonymous sages in b. Yebamot 44a this means that the maximum number of wives is four, in order for the husband to have sexual relations at least once a month with each wife.

In addition to Exodus 21:10, the Sages also responded to the issue of polygamy in Deuteronomy 17:17, which commands, “Neither shall he [the king] multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away.” Mishnah Sanhedrin 2:4–5 specifies the number of wives a king can have: “He shall not multiply wives—only eighteen” (m. Sanhedrin 2:4).[57] There is no explanation given in the (typically terse) Mishnah about where it is deriving its numbers from, but the additional interpretation in the Babylonian Talmud explains that it comes from the intersection of 2 Samuel 3:2–5 and 2 Samuel 12:8.[58] One of the biblical interpretive principles used by the ancient sages was the notion that every word in the Hebrew Bible was significant, and it is from this principle that the argument for the number of wives allowed to a king proceeds.[59] Second Samuel 3:2–5 lists six wives for David. The sages then compare the list of David’s wives in 2 Samuel 3 with 2 Samuel 12:8, where the Lord tells David that he has already given David blessings of land and wives and the kingship: “And if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto thee such and such things.” The anonymous sages of the Talmud argue from this,

Whence do we deduce the number eighteen? — From the verse, And unto David were sons born in Hebron; and his first-born was Ammon of Ahinoam the Jezreelitess; the second, Chileab of Abigail the wife of Nabal the Carmelite; the third Absalom the son of Maacah; and the fourth, Adonijah the son of Haggith; and the fifth, Shefatiah the son of Abital; and the sixth, Ithream of Eglah, David's wife. These were born to David in Hebron. And of them the Prophet said: And if that were too little, then would I add unto thee the like of these, [�����ŧ�Բ�â] and the like of these, [�����ŧ�Բ�â], each ‘kahennah’ implying six, which, with the original six, makes eighteen in all.[60]

The part translated as “such and such things” is the Hebrew word �����ŧ�Բ�â, which is the comparative particle k- combined with the demonstrative pronoun ��ŧ�Բ�â, so that it literally means “like these.” In the Hebrew text of 2 Samuel 12:8, �����ŧ�Բ�âis repeated twice for emphasis, but the Sages understood each �����ŧ�Բ�â as a duplication of David’s blessing of wives—he already had six wives, and would have been given six more wives for each �����ŧ�Բ�â promised by the Lord, for a total of eighteen wives, the number given in m. Sanhedrin 2:4.

Returning to the Mishnah, the limit of wives to eighteen is not the only opinion recorded. R. Judah states, “He may multiply wives, provided they do not turn aside his heart.” In many ways, R. Judah’s position is simply an extrapolation of the law already in Deuteronomy 17:17, which already gives the reason for not multiplying wives as “that his heart may not be turned away.” Judah’s position is that the problem is not the multiple wives per se, but only in how they affect the covenant loyalty of the king. Mishnah then records the opinion of R. Shimon, “Even if there were only one who would turn away his heart, he may not marry her.” Shimon’s opinion takes R. Judah’s position even further, making it clear that it is the turning to idolatry that is the actual problem here, since even a monogamous marriage that leads to idolatry is forbidden. Because each word in scripture matters in rabbinic discourse, the Mishnah then asks, “Why is written He shall not multiply wives?” The anonymous voice of the Mishnah wonders, if the problem is idolatry, not polygamy, why then does Deuteronomy command that the king should not multiply wives? The Mishnah’s response is somewhat obscure: “Even if she be as Abigail.[61]” Although it can be difficult to see because of the distinctive nature of Mishnaic discourse, this is a statement strongly in favor of monogamy. According to the anonymous Mishnah, the king should not multiply wives, not only if they do not turn his heart to the worship of non-Jewish gods, but even if they are as virtuous as David’s wife Abigail. This is an even stronger extrapolation of R. Shimon’s position and represents a statement in favor of monogamy against polygamy.

The rabbinic discussion on multiple wives continues after the Talmudic era, with two main strands of legal thinking developing. One strand developed in the largely Christian-dominated Ashkenazic Jewish communities in Europe. This strand grew away from polygamy, with multiple wives eventually being banned in a decree by the medieval German rabbi Gershom ben Judah of Mainz (AD 960–1040).[62] The other legal and interpretive strand arose in Sephardic Judaism in largely Muslim-controlled areas. This strand followed the thinking in earlier rabbinic literature that allowed for multiple wives. Even in Sephardic communities, multiple wives were and are extremely rare.[63] The State of Israel outlawed polygamy in 1977, and although that has not totally ended the practice, polygamy is not, practically speaking, a moving concern in modern Judaism.[64]

Latter-day Saint Polygamy in Light of the Israelite and Jewish Experience

Following revelations given to Joseph Smith, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints practiced plural marriage for about half a century, beginning in the 1840s in Nauvoo.[65] The Israelite and Jewish experience of polygamy shares both overlap and variance with the Latter-day Saint experience. Some examples of overlap include our mutual experience of persecution and ridicule from cultures with a monogamous standard,[66] the utility of polygamy for integrating women from outside the community into family structures,[67] and the increased opportunities for having children that came to polygamous husbands.[68] Some examples of variance include the Mosaic law against marrying two sisters (which Latter-day Saints did not follow),[69] the requirement for Latter-day Saints to seek permission from Church authorities (no ancient text describes the need for this kind of permission),[70] or the example set by some (but not all) biblical men of marrying again only after their first wife has been unable to conceive children (Latter-day Saint men often married a second wife even if he already had children).[71]

From the beginning, the Latter-day Saint experience with plural marriage was conceptually linked to scriptural precedent.[72] The only canonized revelation authorizing plural marriage, Doctrine and Covenants 132, invokes the examples of biblical polygamists Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, and Solomon.[73] The story of Sarah’s giving Hagar to Abraham as a second wife is recalled (Doctrine and Covenants 132:34), as is the existence of Abraham’s concubines (Doctrine and Covenants 132:37; compare Genesis 25:6). The specific circumstances of David’s many marriages are also described, including the idea that God “gave” wives to him (Doctrine and Covenants 132:39; compare 2 Samuel 12:8).[74]

Although Doctrine and Covenants 132 is saturated with biblical examples and language, it is also important to recognize that in many ways the revelation changes and expands what the Bible says. The biblical practice of “having many wives and concubines” is described not as a cultural practice but rather a “principle and doctrine” (Doctrine and Covenants 132:1). Isaac is implied to be a polygamist even though Genesis never suggests this (Doctrine and Covenants 132:1, 37). Sarah’s giving Hagar to Abraham as a wife is transformed from a matter of expediency to an act of obedience to divine command (Doctrine and Covenants 132:34, 65). Jacob’s marriages are similarly described not as a make-do response to deception and desperation, but as a response to God’s commandments (Doctrine and Covenants 132:37). Nathan the prophet, who ministered to king David, is said to have held priesthood keys enabling him to perform plural marriages (Doctrine and Covenants 132:39). Most significantly, Abraham is said to have “entered into his exaltation” (Doctrine and Covenants 132:29; see also verse 37) and is described as having an “innumerable” posterity that will “continue . . . out of the world” (Doctrine and Covenants 132:30), a blessing that is explicitly linked with Abraham’s obedience to God’s laws, including eternal marriage through priesthood authority (Doctrine and Covenants 132:31–32, 37).[75]

Joseph Smith’s revelation on polygamy radically reframes the significance of the practice as found in the Bible. For Latter-day Saints, this opens up entirely new ways of understanding biblical polygamy. At the same time, we are caught in a rather striking contradiction: while Doctrine and Covenants 132 declares that at least some examples of Old Testament polygamy were commanded by God, helped fulfill his purposes, were performed by the authority of priesthood keys, and helped bring its participants to eternal life, we find very few hints of any of that in the Old Testament itself. Almost everything we know about Israelite and Jewish polygamy—from the literature of the ancient Near East, from the Bible, and from the extra biblical Jewish literature—suggests that Israelite and Jewish polygamy was a cultural practice that followed traditional procedures for dealing with temporal situations.[76]

One possible way to reconcile these conflicting perspectives is to assume that an understanding of eternal marriage and priesthood keys was available in ancient Israel, as described in section 132, but that this understanding was limited to certain men and women in certain times. Building on Doctrine and Covenants 84:23–26, several modern prophets have taught that, in ancient Israel, individual prophets held the higher priesthood and administered its ordinances on a limited basis, even as most of Israel was confined to the administration of the lesser priesthood.[77] In a similar way, it is possible that most Israelites and Jews in antiquity understood and practiced polygamy as modeled by neighboring cultures, while certain exceptional individuals held a higher perspective as presented in Doctrine and Covenants 132. Even when such exceptional individuals held a higher perspective, this would not have completely replaced the marital frameworks that were assumed in their cultural environment: even today, Latter-day Saints may learn about eternal marriage in the temple, but a great deal of how we understand marriage and live our marital relationships is still influenced by contemporary social norms.[78]

While granting, then, that an Abraham or a Nathan may have occasionally known about eternal marriage or priesthood keys, we should assume that in most of Israelite and Jewish history, the men and women involved would not have understood polygamy in the same ways as Latter-day Saints. Doctrine and Covenants 132 suggests that Latter-day Saints practiced polygamy for four fundamental reasons: (1) to restore all things, (2) to give the Saints an opportunity to sacrifice during great trial, (3) to give more people the opportunity to enter into the new and everlasting covenant of marriage, and (4) to bring children into the world.[79] Significantly, the first two reasons could not have applied to Israelites and Jews: a practice not yet lost cannot be restored, and a practice that is widely accepted does not require a test of faith to engage in it. The third reason, as we have suggested, may have been understood but only on a limited basis. The final reason, bringing children into the world, is the only reason for which most ancient Israelites and modern Saints may have shared some common ground.[80]

In sum, while polygamy was primarily a religious principle for nineteenth-century Latter-day Saints, for most ancient Israelites and Jews the practice was not explicitly religious but cultural. Even in cases where scripture records that God commanded a man to take additional wives or accepted a man’s decision to do so, these are presented in the Bible as cases of God using an existing practice for his own ends. While Latter-day Saints should be grateful for the new insights revealed in Doctrine and Covenants 132, we should also recognize that some doctrines were not clearly taught in ancient times but were “kept hid” until they could “be revealed . . . in this, the dispensation of the fulness of times” (Doctrine and Covenants 128:18). The historical and literary evidence from ancient Israel suggests that our modern understanding of eternal marriage is one of those doctrines that was not widely understood.

There are certainly connections between biblical and Restoration polygamy, and it is not inappropriate to compare them. However, given the differences between how polygamy was practiced, as well as the different frameworks and rationales invoked for it, we should be careful not to simplistically equate these experiences as one and the same. Keeping their respective contexts in perspective also allows us to better appreciate how the Lord is “acquainted with the situation of all nations . . . and has made ample provision for their redemption, according to their several circumstances.”[81]

Notes

[1] The terms Israelite and Jew are not fixed terms and there can be some confusion over their usage. In Hebrew, “Jew,” “Judean,” and “Judahite” all translate the same Hebrew word “Yehudi,” so modern distinctions between these terms are not present in Hebrew. Likewise, in the Mishnah, the earliest codification of Jewish law, those to whom the laws are addressed are usually referred to as “Israel” and “Israelite,” even though it is certainly a “Jewish” book. For convenience in this chapter, “Israelite” refers to the experience of Israel and Judah before the Babylonian Exile and “Jew” refers to the experience of this people after the Exile.

[2] Polygamy, from a Greek word meaning “often married,” is the most common English term for marriages in which a man marries more than one wife simultaneously (monogamy, by contrast, means “once married”). Some people prefer the term polygyny, which is the more specific situation of a man married to more than one wife, as opposed to polyandry, in which a woman marries more than one husband. Although polygamy can technically mean either polygyny or polyandry, most English speakers use polygamy in the former sense, which is how we use it here. In certain Latter-day Saint contexts, the term “plural marriage” has been preferred, but we use it here interchangeably with “polygamy.”

[3] For example, in 2013, a new introductory heading was added to provide context to Official Declaration 1 in the Doctrine and Covenants, which contains the announcement of Wilford Woodruff’s revelation ending plural marriage. That heading states that “monogamy is God’s standard for marriage unless He declares otherwise,” and it cites 2 Samuel 12:7–8 as a biblical source for that claim.

[4] Walter Scheidel, “A Peculiar Institution? Greco-Roman Monogamy in Global Context,” History of the Family 14 (2009): 280–91; John Cairncross, After Polygamy Was Made a Sin: The Social History of Christian Polygamy (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974).

[5] J. Patrick Gray, “Ethnographic Atlas Codebook,” http://eclectic.ss.uci.edu/~drwhite/worldcul/Codebook4EthnoAtlas.pdf. This study was conducted through the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.

[6] Miriam Koktvedgaard Zeitzen, Polygamy: A Cross-Cultural Analysis (Oxford: Berg, 2008), 14.

[7] Stephanie Kramer, “Polygamy Is Rare around the World and Mostly Confined to a Few Regions,” Pew Research Center, December 7, 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/12/07/polygamy-is-rare-around-the-world-and-mostly-confined-to-a-few-regions/.

[8] Marten Stol, Women in the Ancient Near East, trans. Helen Richardson and Mervyn Richardson (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016), 165–92.

[9] Elisabeth Meier Tetlow, The Ancient Near East, vol. 1 of Women, Crime, and Punishment in Ancient Law and Society (New York: Continuum, 2004), 41, 142, 207–8. Jacob, in the Book of Mormon, seems to acknowledge this; in his condemnation of multiple wives, he rebukes kings David and Solomon, but not patriarchs Abraham and Jacob (see Jacob 2:23–24).

[10] For example, one marriage contract (Emar 6: 31) stipulates that if the man’s wife cannot bear a child then he will be permitted to marry a second wife.

[11] For example, one Assyrian marriage contract stipulates that if the wife cannot bear a child then she herself will provide a slave girl for her husband to marry. See Stol, Women in the Ancient Near East, 189–90.

[12] For example, in the Laws of Lipit-Eshtar, composed around 1930 BC in the city of Isin, §§24–28 deal with polygamous situations, with §24 instructing that a father’s inheritance be divided equally among the children of his various wives. See Martha T. Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor, ed. Piotr Michalowski, 2nd ed., Writings from the Ancient World 6 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 24–35.

[13] In the biblical record, at least twenty-six Israelite men had plural wives. One list of Israelite polygamists can be found in David T. Lamb, Prostitutes and Polygamists: A Look at Love, Old Testament Style (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2015), 68–69, although some of his examples could be modified and additional examples added.

[14] Genesis 16:3 calls Hagar Abraham’s “wife” (Hebrew ’iššâ), not his “concubine” (Hebrew ��î���𲵱�š), although some scholars have understood “concubine” to be a better description (see Tammi J. Schneider, Mothers of Promise: Women in the Book of Genesis [Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008], 106–7). The English word “concubine,” which unfortunately has Orientalist connotations, is used in the King James Version to translate the non-Semitic word ��î���𲵱�š, which only appears 37 times in the Hebrew Bible (see the discussion in HALOT, 929). As it is used in the biblical text and in the broader ancient Near East, concubines were wives who had lesser legal status and whose children might have lesser legal status. See the excellent discussion in Stol, Women in the Ancient Near East, 193–99. Note, for example, Genesis 25:6, where Abraham gives gifts to the children of his “concubines” (��î������šî��), but not an explicit part of the inheritance. By contrast, Rachel, Leah, Bilhah, and Zilpah are almost always described as Jacob’s “wives,” and all of Jacob’s children seem to inherit more or less equally, regardless of who their mother is. (Genesis 35:22 labels Bilhah a ��î���𲵱�š, but this contrasts with her depiction elsewhere.)

[15] On the interpersonal dynamics between Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar, see Avram R. Shannon, “Abraham: A Man of Relationships,” in From Creation to Sinai: The Old Testament through the Lens of the Restoration, ed. Daniel L. Belnap and Aaron P. Schade (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021), 295–300.

[16] CH §146–147 state, “If a man marries a �Բ���ī�ٳ� [a class of woman], and she gives a slave woman to her husband, and she (the slave) then bears children, after which that slave woman aspires to equal status with her mistress—because she bore children, her mistress will not sell her; (but) she may place upon her the slave-hairlock and reckon her with the slave women. If she does not bear children, her mistress may sell her.” “The Laws of Hammurabi,” trans. Martha Roth (Context of Scripture 2.131:345).

[17] Thomas B. Dozeman, Commentary on Exodus, Eerdmans Critical Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009), 529–31. For a brief discussion of the various law codes recorded in the Old Testament, see Daniel L. Belnap, “The Law of Moses: An Overview,” in New Testament History, Culture, and Society, ed. Lincoln H. Blumell (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2019), 19–34; and Matthew L. Bowen, “‘I Will Give Judgment unto Him in Writing’: The Three Law Codes of the Pentateuch,” in Belnap and Schade, From Creation to Sinai, 527–60. The Covenant Code is discussed in Belnap, “Law of Moses,” 21–23; and Bowen, “I Will Give Judgment,” 534–40.

[18] For a discussion of the Holiness Code, see Belnap, “Law of Moses,” 23–27; and Bowen, “I Will Give Judgment,” 541–49.

[19] On kingship in Deuteronomy, see Patricia Dutcher-Walls, “The Circumscription of the King: Deuteronomy 17:16–17 in its Ancient Social Context,” Journal of Biblical Literature 121 (2002): 601–16; Bernard M. Levinson, “The Reconceptualization of Kingship in Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomistic History’s Transformation of Torah,” Vetus Testamentum 51 (2001): 511–34; Gary N. Knoppers, “Rethinking the Relationship between Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomistic History,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 63 (2001): 393–415. Deuteronomy 17:17 seems to be behind the condemnation of the wives of King Solomon in 1 Kings 11:1–8, and perhaps the wives of King Noah in Mosiah 11:1–4. On Solomon, see Amos Frisch, “A Literary and Theological Analysis of the Account of Solomon’s Sins (1 Kings 11:1–8) [Hebrew],” Shnaton: An Annual for Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies 11 (1997): 167–79. Knoppers suggests that there is not a strong link in the biblical text between Solomon’s polygamy and his fall from grace; see Knoppers, “Rethinking Deuteronomy,” 410; and Knoppers, “Solomon’s Fall and Deuteronomy,” in The Age of Solomon: Scholarship at the Turn of the Millennium, ed. Lowell K. Handy, Studies in the History and Culture of the Ancient Near East 11 (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 392–410. On Noah, see Taylor Halverson, “Deuteronomy 17:14–20 as Criteria for Book of Mormon Kingship,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 24 (2017): 7–8.

[20] Bruce Wells, “The Hated Wife in Deuteronomic Law,” Vetus Testamentum 60 (2010): 131–46. For a discussion of the Deuteronomic Code, see Belnap, “Law of Moses,” 27–30; and Bowen, “I Will Give Judgment,” 550–59.

[21] Levirate marriage (from Latin levir, “husband’s brother”) has been practiced in many societies and requires a dead man’s brother to marry the dead man’s widow. In Deuteronomy, the practice allows for a childless dead man to have a legal heir born to him through the union of his brother and his widow.

[22] For the development of this image, see Nelly Stienstra, YHWH Is the Husband of His People: Analysis of a Biblical Metaphor with Special Reference to Translation (Kampen: Kok Pharos, 1993).

[23] Peter Richardson and Amy Marie Fisher, Herod: King of the Jews and Friend of the Romans, 2nd ed., Ancient Bibliographies (London: Routledge, 2018), 383–85.

[24] Philip F. Esler, Babatha’s Orchard: The Yadin Papyri and an Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).

[25] John J. Collins, “Marriage, Divorce, and Family in Second Temple Judaism,” in Families in Ancient Israel, ed. Leo G. Perdue et al., The Family Religion, and Culture (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1997), 122.

[26] Joshua M. Sears, “‘An Ancestral Custom of Ours’: Second Temple Interpretations of Polygyny in Biblical Narrative” (PhD diss., The University of Texas at Austin, 2018).

[27] The exact relationship between the authors of the Damascus Document and the community at Qumran is a matter of debate. See the evaluation in John J. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2010).

[28] Not all scholars have understood that this passages has reference to polygamy, but that is the current majority position. See David Instone-Brewer, “Nomological Exegesis in Qumran ‘Divorce’ Texts,” Revue de Qumram 18 (1998): 561–79; and William Loader, The Dead Sea Scrolls on Sexuality: Attitudes towards Sexuality in Sectarian and Related Literature at Qumran, Attitudes towards Sexuality in Judaism and Christianity in the Hellenistic Greco-Roman Era (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009), 113–18.

[29] Our translation, with the modern biblical references added.

[30] Christine Hayes, What’s Divine about Divine Law? Early Perspectives (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2015), 101–5.

[31] The dating and provenance of this text, which is part of a larger collection called the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, has been a matter of intense debate. Although the oldest surviving copies date to the tenth century AD, are written in Greek, and show clear signs of Christian editing, we are following scholars who believe the text was originally written around the first century BC, in Hebrew, by Jews. See David A. deSilva, “The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs as Witness to Pre-Christian Judaism: A Re-Assessment,” Journal for the Study of Pseudepigrapha 22, no. 4 (2013): 21–68; and James L. Kugel, introduction to “Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs,” in Outside the Bible: Ancient Jewish Writings Related to Scripture, ed. Louis H. Feldman, James L. Kugel, and Lawrence H. Schiffman, 3 vols. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society; Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2013), 2:1697–1701.

[32] Daniel R. Schwartz, “Philo, His Family, and His Times,” in The Cambridge Companion to Philo, ed. Adam Kamesar (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 9–31. For a general assessment of Philo’s views of marriage and sexuality, see William Loader, Philo, Josephus, and the Testaments on Sexuality: Attitudes towards Sexuality in the Writings of Philo and Josephus and in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, Attitudes towards Sexuality in Judaism and Christianity in the Hellenistic Greco-Roman Era (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2011), 61–65.

[33] Scheidel, “A Peculiar Institution?,” 280–91; Scheidel, “Monogamy and Polygamy,” in A Companion to Families in the Greek and Roman Worlds, ed. Beryl Rawson, Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), 108–15.

[34] James L. Kugel, introduction to “Jubilees,” in Feldman, Kugel, and Schiffman, Outside the Bible, 1:272–82.

[35] Howard Jacobson, introduction to “Pseudo-Philo, Book of Biblical Antiquities, in Feldman, Kugel, and Schiffman, Outside the Bible, 1:470–72.

[36] The English translation is taken from Howard Jacobson, A Commentary on Pseudo-Philo’s Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum, with Latin Text and English Translation, 2 vols., Arbeiten zur Geshichte des antiken Judentums und des Urchristentums 31 (Leiden: Brill, 1996), 1:162–63.

[37] Compare the Roman virtue of univira, which held that a woman would ideally marry only once, even if her husband dies before her. See David Wheeler-Reed, Regulating Sex in the Roman Empire: Ideology, the Bible, and the Early Christians (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017), 10–11.

[38] Ed Glasscock, “‘The Husband of One Wife’ Requirement in 1 Timothy 3:2,” Bibliotheca Sacra 140, no. 559 (July–September 1983): 244–58.

[39] Michael L. Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), 58–61.

[40] William Loader, The New Testament on Sexuality, Attitudes towards Sexuality in Judaism and Christianity in the Hellenistic Greco-Roman Era (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2012), 54; Loader, Sexuality in the New Testament: Understanding the Key Texts (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2010), 82.

[41] David Instone-Brewer, “Jesus’ Old Testament Basis for Monogamy,” in The Old Testament in the New Testament: Essays in Honour of J. L. North, ed. Steve Moyise, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Suupplementa Series 189 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2000), 97–98, 105; Instone-Brewer, Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Literary Context (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002), 137–39; Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 190.

[42] Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 469; Phillip Sigal, The Halakhah of Jesus of Nazareth According to the Gospel of Matthew (Atlanta: The Society of Biblical Literature, 2007), 114–5.

[43] For a discussion of post-Second Temple Jewish polygamy generally, see Mark Goldfeder, “The Story of Jewish Polygamy,” Columbia Journal of Gender and Law 26, no. 2 (2014): 234–315.

[44] Sage is how the authors and tradents of rabbinic literature described themselves. See Avram R. Shannon, “Rabbinic Literature and the New Testament,” in Blumell, New Testament, 122–38. There is a chart with definitions of various rabbinic terms on pages 124–25.

[45] As in earlier periods, polygamy in rabbinic Judaism properly means polygyny, or multiple wives. The Babylonian Talmud notes in b. Kiddushin 7a that a woman is not eligible to be the wife of two husbands.

[46] The Babylonian Talmud largely reflects a Sassanian Persian context, and this can have some intriguing elements in the discussion of marriage. For example, the Babylonian Amoraic sages Rab and R. Nahman are described in b. Yoma 18b as contracting temporary marriages when visiting Jewish communities in other cities. This has been shown to reflect Persian practice at the time. See Yaakov Elman, “Marriage and Marital Property in Rabbinic and Sasanian Law,” in Rabbinic Law in Its Roman and Near Eastern Context, ed. Catherine Hezser (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 227–76. Because of the present focus on the New Testament, we will highlight the Greco-Roman background.

[47] For a general discussion of the embeddedness of the sages in the broader world of Greek and Roman thought and practice, see Saul Lieberman, Greek in Jewish Palestine/Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1994). The two closely related books are published together in a single volume, but are paginated separately. For a discussion of this point in regards to marriage specificly, see Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 190–1; Louis M. Epstein, Marriage Laws in the Bible and the Talmud (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1942), 14. For a discussion of the remarkableness of the Greek and Roman perspective on monogamy and marriage, see Scheidel, “A Peculiar Institution?,” 280–91.

[48] Contra this position is Aaron Glaim, “Polygyny in Rabbinic Literature” (master’s thesis, The University of British Columbia, 2006). Glaim argues that there is no strong evidence that the Sages were uncomfortable with polygamous relationships.

[49] Salo W. Baron, A Social and Religious History of the Jews (New York: Columbia University Press, 1952), 223–9. Adiel Schremer traces this view of a trend to monogamy back to the nineteenth-century rabbi and scholar Zecharias Fraenkel. See Adiel Schremer, “How Much Jewish Polygyny in Roman Palestine,” Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research 63 (1997–2001): 181–223, discussion on pp. 184–85. It is perhaps significant that Fraenkel was an Ashkenazic Jew living in Europe, and that Ashkenazi Judaism had rejected polygamy in the Middle Ages, in distinction to the Sephardi Jews who lived under Muslim rule and still theoretically allow for it to this day.

[50] See Schremer, “How Much Jewish Polygyny,” 187–90.

[51] Lieberman, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine, 47–82.

[52] HALOT, 855; BDB, 773.

[53] The impetus behind this law can be seen in the interactions between Rachel and Leah in Genesis 30:14–16, where Leah has to bargain for her husband’s sexual attentions.

[54] Translation of the Mishnah is our own. There is a convenient English edition of the Mishnah by Herbert Danby, The Mishnah: Translated from the Hebrew with Introduction and Brief Explanatory Notes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1933), which has been reprinted numerous times. For the convenience of our readers, we have included references to Danby with all of our citations from Mishnah. Other translations of rabbinic literature are used as noted. For a discussion and description of the Mishnah, see Hermann L. Strack and Günter Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash, trans. Markus Bockmuehl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 108–48. There is an accessible introduction from a Latter-day Saint perspective in Avram R. Shannon, “‘Torah in the Mouth’: An Introduction to Rabbinic Oral Law,” Religious Educator 19, no. 1 (2018): 139–59, with discussion of the Mishnah on pp. 144–46.

[55] Translation from the Soncino Translation of the Babylonian Talmud. This translation is in the public domain, and there a version housed at http://halakhah.com/. At least one scholar has suggested that this rabbinic law is the source of the similar limit in Islamic practice. See Epstein, Marriage and Law, 19.

[56] Literally, “students of the sages.”

[57] Danby, Mishnah, 384–85.

[58] B. Sanhedrin 21b. See also Danby, Mishnah, 384, no. 12. For a discussion and overview of the Gemara and the Babylonian Talmud, see Strack and Stemberger, Introduction to Talmud and Midrash, 190–224.

[59] James Kugel, The Idea of Biblical Poetry: Parallelism and Its History (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), 96–134, especially 104.

[60] B. Sanhedrin 21a.

[61] Abigail was one of David’s plural wives, and is described in 1 Samuel 25 as a paragon of virtue. She marries David after the death of her first husband in 1 Samuel 25:40–42.

[62] Goldfeder, “Story of Jewish Polygamy,” 286–88.

[63] Goldfeder, “Story of Jewish Polygamy,” 307–9.

[64] On the rare exceptions, see David Sedly, “In Defiance of Israeli Law, Polygamy Sanctioned by Top Rabbis,” The Times of Israel, 27 December 2016, https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-defiance-of-israeli-law-polygamy-sanctioned-by-top-rabbis/.

[65] Joseph Smith’s experience with plural marriage began earlier in Kirtland, but he did not began teaching others about it in earnest until the Nauvoo period. For treatments of Latter-day Saint polygamy published by the Church, see “Plural Marriage in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Gospel Topics, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/plural-marriage-in-the-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints, as well as the series Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, 4 vols. (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2018–). For works that aim to contextualize nineteenth-century polygamy for modern Saints, see Brian C. Hales and Laura H. Hales, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy: Toward a Better Understanding (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2015); and Brittany Chapman Nash, Let’s Talk about Polygamy (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021). Numerous academic treatments of Latter-day Saint polygamy exist, including Kathryn M. Daynes, More Wives than One: Transformation of the Mormon Marriage System, 1840–1910 (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2001); Newell G. Bringhurst and Craig L. Foster, eds., The Persistence of Polygamy: Joseph Smith and the Origins of Mormon Polygamy (Independence, MO: John Whitmer Books, 2010); Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women’s Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835–1870 (New York: Knopf, 2017); and Brian C. Hales, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy, 3 vols. (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2013).

[66] Daynes, More Wives than One, 173–87; Saints, 2:293, 308, 372, 399, 408–9, 458, 477, 486–89, 532, 596–98; Sarah Barringer Gordon, The Mormon Question: Polygamy and Constitutional Conflict in Nineteenth-Century America, Studies in Legal History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002), 27–54.

[67] In nineteenth-century polygamous Utah, “ethnic intermarriages were increased, which helped to unite a diverse immigrant population.” “Plural Marriage and Families in Early Utah,” Gospel Topics, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/plural-marriage-and-families-in-early-utah. The Old Testament describes marriage as a means through which a foreign woman could be integrated into the Israelite community. For the law regarding foreign women captured in war, see Deuteronomy 21:10–14; for a narrative example, see the eponymous heroine of the book of Ruth.

[68] “Studies have shown that . . . [in nineteenth-century polygamous Utah] fertility at the societal level … was enhanced because of the near universality of marriage among women and the abundant opportunities for remarriage among previously married women of childbearing age.” “Plural Marriage and Families in Early Utah,” n. 6.

[69] See Leviticus 18:18, but note that the patriarch Jacob (who lived before the law of Moses) marries two sisters in Genesis 29. Joseph Smith himself set a Latter-day Saint precedent for marrying sisters with his sealings to Eliza and Emily Partridge, which occurred within days of each other in March 1843. See Saints, 1:482–84. Joseph’s clerk, William Clayton, also married two sisters, Ruth and Margaret Moon, but when William expressed interest in marrying their sister Lydia, Joseph told him that “the Lord had revealed to him that a man could only take 2 of a family except by express revelation. . . . To have more than two in a family was apt to cause wrangles and trouble.” As cited in Ulrich, House Full of Females, 98.

[70] Nash, Let’s Talk about Polygamy, 51–53.

[71] In a very biblical fashion, there are also examples of Latter-day Saint women initiating their husband’s second marriage only after they had been unable to bear children themselves. See Nash, Let’s Talk about Polygamy, 75.

[72] In addition to the Joseph Smith revelation that became section 132 of the Doctrine and Covenants, Elder Orson Pratt frequently used biblical precedent to explain and defend plural marriage. See David J. Whittaker, “The Bone in the Throat: Orson Pratt and the Public Announcement of Plural Marriage,” Western Historical Quarterly 18, no. 3 (1987): 309.

[73] See the discussion in Andrew H. Hedges, “Eternal Marriage and Plural Marriage,” in Raising the Standard of Truth: Exploring the History and Teachings of the Early Restoration, ed. Scott C. Esplin (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2020), 309–22, discussion on pages 311–12. Note that polygamy is also discussed in the Book of Mormon (Jacob 2:23–35), but the instructions there are aimed at an ancient, not latter-day, audience.

[74] For a detailed study of section 132, see William Victor Smith, Textual Studies of the Doctrine and Covenants: The Plural Marriage Revelation, Contemporary Studies in Scripture (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2018). Although we do not agree with all of Smith’s conclusions, it is a useful study of the history of Doctrine and Covenants 132.

[75] It is worth noting that even though eternal marriage and plural marriage are closely linked in Doctrine and Covenants 132, even here they are not identical topics. See R. Devan Jensen, Michael A. Goodman, and Barbara Morgan Gardner, “‘Line upon Line’: Joseph Smith’s Growing Understanding of the Eternal Family,” in Esplin, Raising the Standard of Truth, 283–308. On p. 296, Jensen, Goodman, and Gardner note, “Although not synonymous, it would be a mistake to think that the concepts of eternal marriage and plural marriage are unrelated.”

[76] “Another reason for Latter-Day Saint polygamy was that it was commanded by God, and felt by many to be essential to obtain eternal salvation. Jews, on the other hand, did not treat polygamy as a commandment, but more like a natural part of the culture, neither positive nor negative in biblical times.” Russell K. Ryan, “And Then There Was One: An Analysis and Comparison of Polygamy among Jews and Mormons,” Jewish Law Annual 9 (1991): 230.

[77] This idea began with Joseph Smith, who taught that “all the Prophets had the Melchizedeck Priesthood.” “Discourse, 5 January 1841, as Reported by William Clayton,” p. 5, The Joseph Smith Papers. See also the sources cited in Robert L. Millet, “Prophets and Priesthood in the Old Testament,” in Sperry Symposium Classics: The Old Testament, ed. Paul Y. Hoskisson (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2005), 48–68.

[78] As just one example, the amount of housework done by a husband or a wife is often influenced by identities attached to culturally-determined gender roles. See M. Sue Bergin, “A House Undivided,” Y Magazine (Summer 2017), https://magazine.byu.edu/article/a-house-undivided/.

[79] See Hales and Hales, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy, 1–14; Nash, Let’s Talk about Polygamy, 65–71; Hedges, “Eternal Marriage,” 311–12.

[80] Given that child bearing is the most closely-aligned rationale for polygamy shared by the Bible and by the Doctrine and Covenants, it is significant that this is also the only rationale for which the Book of Mormon allows for the possibility of polygamy (see Jacob 2:30). The contrast between the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants is creatively explored in Mark T. Decker, “Jacob and Joseph Smith: Polygamy,” in As Iron Sharpens Iron: Listening to the Various Voices of Scripture, ed. Julie M. Smith (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2016), 15–24.

[81] Joseph Smith, “Baptism for the Dead,” Times and Seasons, 15 April 1842, The Joseph Smith Papers.