This video is the second in a series of rebuttals on the topic of polygyny. The speaker provides links to related resources on their website. They summarize the previous episodes and discuss the importance of basing theology on scripture. They mention that polygyny is becoming more culturally accepted and address arguments against it. They criticize David Wilber for using fallacies such as poisoning the well, guilt by association, and gaslighting. They emphasize the difference between polygyny and homosexuality.
Shalom, and welcome to our eighth video in this polygyny series and our second rebuttal video in a grouping of three rebuttal videos. Now before we get started, this will let you know that you can find all of the draw slides that you see here on your screen as well as the on-demand video and the notes that we took for this particular episode and transcript on our website at www.godhonesttruth.com. And to make it more convenient for you, we have also placed a link down below in the description which you should be able to find whether you're watching on a video platform or whether you're watching on an audio podcast platform.
That link is down below and it'll take you directly to the article post for this episode. Also we have links down below in the description, links to all the videos that we used from the various people that we are showcasing and rebutting tonight. You can find those links down below in the description. So now before we get into the main rebuttal part, let's go ahead and do a quick review of what we've accomplished so far in this polygyny series.
In episode one, we went over the introduction and the terminology that we will be using during the course of this series. Episode two, we went over various polygynous of the scriptures and showed you various verses that you can look up for yourselves. In episode three, we went over polygyny by the scriptures, we went through various regulations that govern and guide people in living in polygyny. Episode four, we went over polygyny in history and through history, specifically after the time of the apostles and specifically regarding mostly Christians.
In episode five, we went over patriarchy, how that comes from scripture and how that's important not only to plural marriage, but also in monogamous marriages. In episode six, we went over the advantages and the disadvantages of polygyny. And last time, we started our first rebuttal video, which was a rebuttal to a video put out by a ministry called 119 Ministries. You can find that in our On Demand section. It's about an hour and a half long and goes through several of the points that they brought up in their video, Opposing Plural Marriage.
In our next video, we're going to be doing a rebuttal to a ministry called Kingdom and Context, a ministry called Wretched, one called the Jude 3 Project, and finally, a video by Southern Seminary. And of course, in this video, we're going to be doing a rebuttal to a messianic teacher named David Wilbur, and we'll also be doing a rebuttal video to a mainstream pastor named Mike Winger. Both of these gentlemen have videos and channels online addressing a great many subjects, but we're just going to be focusing on the issue of polygyny for obvious reasons, and various videos that they have put out on the internet during the course of their ministries.
If I'm reading our culture right, then I think that polygamy is well on its way into greater cultural acceptance in a lot of the countries of our world, and that this is going to be only a more pressing issue. So, first up, we're going to be looking at David Wilbur. Fourth, since sin is transgression of the Torah by definition, when John says that sin is lawlessness, he's referring to God's law, the Torah. According to John, sin is transgression of God's law.
First John, chapter 3, verse 4, everyone doing sin also does lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness. So, here in this point, our brother David actually does get this part right, and we completely agree, just like we said in our last video in our rebuttal against 119 ministries, and also our several teachings on the issue and subject of sin. As scripture defines it, sin is the breaking of the Torah. As such, if it's not in the Torah, if it's not defined by the Torah, then doing something is not sin.
It's only when you don't do what the Torah tells you to do, or when you do what the Torah tells you not to do, that it's a sin. And if you don't find it in Torah, most likely it's not going to be a sin. We ought to base our theology and practice on what we can clearly see in the scriptures. As our brother David points out, we should base our theology on what we can clearly see from scripture.
Someone might object to this and say that if polygamy was against God's will, surely there would be a clear commandment against it, right? So, keep that in mind as you go throughout and watch our brother David's videos on polygyny, that we should base our theology on what we can clearly see from scriptures, not what we eisegetically read into scripture. Surely, if consuming certain drinks were an offense to God, the Bible would clearly prohibit it like it does consuming certain meats.
It's not like alcoholic drinks were unknown in the ancient world. We also agree with our brother David that if the Bible opposes something, that surely there should be a prohibition against it, and we should find that in the scriptures. So, if God considered polygyny a sin, we can reasonably assume that we can find a prohibition against that in scripture. After all, polygyny was not unknown in the ancient world. So, we can agree with our brother David on several points.
Sin is transgression or breaking of the Torah, and if the Bible opposes something, we should clearly find that in scriptures. And if God opposed polygyny, we should reasonably expect to find that in scriptures because it was well-known and practiced for many hundreds and even thousands of years, even by those of scripture. Followers of the Messiah who adhere to the Bible's teachings on marriage and sexuality believe that marriage is a heterosexual monogamous union, therefore we reject same-sex and polygamous marriages.
So, unfortunately, our brother David does this time and time again. This is a logical and argumentational fallacy known as poisoning the well. So, what does it mean for someone to poison the well when we're talking about discussions and teachings on stuff? Well, poisoning the well is a preemptive attack on a person in order to discredit their testimony or argument in advance of their giving it. A person who thereby becomes unreceptive to the testimony reasons fallaciously and has become a victim of the poisoner.
This is a kind of ad hominem circumstantial fallacy. So, what our brother David is doing in this particular video and also in other videos is he's trying to discredit and put certain subjects in a bad light even before he tries and shows you the evidence. Why the need to do this? There's speculations as to why certain people and our brother David does this kind of thing, but most of the time it's in order to guide you toward a certain conclusion even apart from the actual evidence.
Now, if the evidence itself can hold up on its own, you would not need to employ such fallacies as poisoning the well and other various fallacies. The evidence should be able to guide you in where you should go and what you should believe. So, if the evidence can stand on its own, you would not need these kinds of fallacies. David also employs a fallacy known as guilt by association and tries to associate ideas that he disagrees with with other ideas that most people also disagree with, but these two ideas are not related and are not compatible with each other.
And he tries to get his viewers to make the assumption that both of these things are exactly the same and that they're two bedfellows. Now, guilt by association is a version of the ad hominem fallacy in which a person is said to be guilty of error because of the group he or she associates with. The fallacy occurs when we unfairly try to change the issue to be about the speaker's circumstances rather than about the speaker's actual argument, also called ad hominem circumstantial.
So, just like poisoning the well, this is another kind of ad hominem attack. And what our brother David tries to do is associate the subject of polygyny with the subject of homosexuality. And he fails in doing this every time he tries because anyone with a reasonable mind can understand that these are two different things. With polygyny, we're talking about heterosexual unions, not homosexual unions. So, his argument falls flat. And the way he tries to employ this is putting up various quotes from homosexual advocates trying to insinuate that both polygyny and homosexuality are the same thing and that people who advocate for both sides are bedfellows and together.
But this is far from the truth. In the various slides that he shows, he puts up slides from homosexual advocates that try to make the scriptures say something they wanted to say, thereby insinuating that homosexual advocates and polygyny advocates are one and the same and that, therefore, we should not trust either one. However, these are two totally separate and different groups. Now, if he wanted to put up pro-polygyny quotes from people who believe that scripture actually promotes and endorses polygyny, he could have put up quotes from people like Martin Madden, Martin Luther, et cetera, et cetera, actual Christians who go by scripture.
But instead, he tries to poison the well and tries to make an association that actually does not exist. He also employs a form of gaslighting. Now, most of us have heard this term in modern everyday speak, even on the news and various political ads, et cetera, et cetera. Unfortunately, teachers, like our brother David Wilber, engages in this type of fallacy as well. So, what is gaslighting, if you've never heard it actually defined before? Well, gaslighting is a form of emotional abuse and mental manipulation that will leave you questioning your own reality and have you wondering if you're in the wrong in nearly every argument.
In short, gaslighting happens when someone manipulates you into thinking your version of events didn't happen the way you say they happened. They may gaslight you by questioning your authority, denying the evidence you have, or doing everything they can to make you feel like you're wrong. On the surface, gaslighting might first appear as a mere difference in opinion between two parties. But in truth, gaslighting is a tool used to make the victim second guess how they feel or what they think so the aggressor can get the upper hand.
This behavior becomes increasingly worrisome the more it happens and is very much an example of emotional and mental abuse. So, unfortunately, our brother David does this gaslighting on several occasions as well. He does this by trying to say that those who are pushing lesbianism and polygamy are in the same group, the same kind of thing. And that anyone who doesn't agree with him, who doesn't come to the same conclusions that he does, are misusing the Bible.
That they don't take scripture seriously. The people pushing things like polygamy and lesbianism, yes, I'm being serious. These people are false teachers who don't take scripture seriously. And there's just one more thing that we would like to address before we get into the main arguments that our brother David brings up in regards to polygyny. And this is in regard to some startling admissions that he has made on some of his various videos. And if you want to know what I actually believe, my views are all out there.
I'm pretty unoriginal. Basically all I do is quote conservative scholars on all of these issues. My book is basically just one giant list of quotes from scholars. Now look into the opinion and the experience and expertise that scholars have is a good thing from time to time. But at the end of the day, our basis, our foundation, should be in scripture itself. Not scholars. And if you'll notice, our brother David goes through most of his videos quoting mostly scholars.
There are actually more quotes from scholars in his videos than there are from the actual scriptures themselves. And that's an issue. You should let the Bible change what you believe and direct your life, not let quotes from scholars change your mind and direct your life. That's why we here at God Honest Truth present to you mostly scripture. Time and time again, the vast majority of our videos contain scriptural information, not anything else. To read commentaries from the Middle Ages into a verse written centuries beforehand is anachronistic and unsound hermeneutics.
The commentaries of first century Jews is much more relevant. So if it's wrong to read commentaries from the Middle Ages about a verse that was written thousands of years before them, how much more wrong is it to read quotes and commentaries written today from modern scholars like our brother David does? It would be even more wrong to do that. Now yes, commentaries and quotes and evidence that is closer to the original source is always going to be a much better thing.
I completely agree. But resources and commentaries from the Middle Ages is no less relevant than commentaries and scholarship from today. Modern scholarship has the advantage of additional manuscripts and stuff like that that's been found but both modern and commentaries from the Middle Ages are important as well. And as we've seen, we have evidence that first century Jews interpreted Leviticus 1818 as a ban on polygamy generally. And unfortunately, he's absolutely incorrect here. The only source that he has ever pointed to as far as first century Jews and their take on polygamy is the sect from Qumran.
We'll be getting into that later on in this video. But for the time being, just let it be said that it was not widespread among Jews at the time. It was not the common belief. And in fact, the vast majority of Jews of the first century disagreed with Qumran and disagreed with our brother David. But once again, later on in the video, we'll be getting more into the beliefs and how widespread was this belief of first century Jews and of Qumran.
Now we've covered a lot of information about Leviticus 1818 in our previous video in our rebuttal to 119 ministries. However, our brother David brings up this same information and many of the same points. So if there's something that you did not hear addressed in this video, please go back to last week's video and watch our rebuttal video to 119 ministries. However, in this video, we're going to address some of the different aspects that David Wilber brings up in his video.
In Hebrew, a woman in addition to her sister is Isha'el Ahota, which literally means a woman to her sister. Now, some argue that the context requires that the phrase Isha'el Ahota be translated literally instead of in accordance with the idiomatic sense of the expression consistently used throughout the Old Testament. Now David here says and admits that this literally means a wife to her sister. And then he tries to say that certain people make the claim that it should be taken literally, but he thinks that it should not be taken literally, but idiomatically, and then thinks that there's other places in scripture that prove his point.
However, he doesn't really go into this list, but we will go ahead and show the list that 119 ministries put out to examine to see if this is true. So here's the list of the instances from scripture where the Hebrew phrase Isha'el Ahota is used. Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.5, Exodus 26.6, Exodus 26.17, Ezekiel 1.9, Ezekiel 1.23, and Ezekiel 3.13. So let's examine these and go over each one to see if they are the same as what we find in Leviticus 18 verse 18.
Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.3, Exodus 26.
So in each of these examples, you see the translators translating it as one to another or as to each other. I have looked in each of these verses, it's fairly quick and simple to do, and the Hebrew phrase, Isha'el hachotah, is there in the Hebrew. However, did you notice something as we were going through these different verses as to how it differentiates from Leviticus 18, verse 18. In each of these verses that we just went over, everything that's being described is an inanimate object, not a person.
What we're referring to in Leviticus 18, 18 are persons, two women, a woman and her sister. So this begs the question, is Leviticus 18, 18 and the use of Isha'el hachotah the same as every other instance? No, you've got to take context into account, and the context here is definitely different. You don't make the fallacy of thinking that everything is always translated the exact same way, because context is extremely important when it comes to the Hebrew language.
It's also important in Greek and in English as well. For instance, let's take a look at some common English idioms. For instance, the idiom, kick the bucket. You say, someone kicked the bucket. Okay, so what does that mean? In common usage, it generally means someone has died or passed away. That's what kick the bucket generally means. But it's not the same in every single usage of the term. For instance, if you're talking with someone and you have a heated argument, they get irritated and mad, and there's a bucket laying there, and they actually kick the bucket and make a mess.
Then someone says, oh, why is there this mess here? And you say, well, they kicked the bucket. Okay, you're not saying that they died or they passed away. You're using this in the literal sense that they actually kicked the bucket. Again, take a cold shower. What does this idiom mean? It generally means someone has an elevated libido, and you're telling them to take a cold shower and get over it, to calm down, to come off of their high libido status.
But it doesn't always mean that, and context is extremely important. I have heard in several different teachings from medical professionals that taking a cold shower can help you live longer and be healthier. They literally tell you to take a cold shower for your physical health, not for lowering your current libido status. So again, context is important. Finally, break the ice. So what does break the ice mean? Break the ice usually means telling a witty joke or something to help two new people who have just met each other to feel comfortable in moving forward in a conversation, to break the ice, as it were, in a setting where conversation needs to take place, but people are somewhat uncomfortable making the first move or going even further.
But again, context is important. Breaking the ice could be literal. For instance, if you're wanting to go out on a frozen lake and you want to see if it's thick enough, they actually have ice axes that you can try to break the ice to see if it's thick enough. Once again, context is key. Just like with scripture, context is key. And even though there are places in scripture where the phrase Eshah Elohotah means one to another, it doesn't always mean that.
You have to take it in its proper context, and the proper context of Leviticus 18 verse 18 is a woman to her sister. That's the way it means. We covered this more in detail in our previous video in rebutting 119 ministries, and it's the same here still. In other words, Leviticus 18.18 directly prohibits polygamy. So as we can clearly see from all the evidence that has been presented so far, and in addition to the evidence we're going to be continuing to present, Leviticus 18.18 does not prohibit plural marriage.
Directly, indirectly, and it does not matter how much eisegesis the anti-polygamy advocates throw into the mix. The people of scripture understood this as sisters. The people who translated the Septuagint understood this as sisters. The people who wrote the Talmud understood this as sisters. The people who translated and comprised the Latin Vulgate understood this as sisters. So you can go off modern scholars all you want to, but it does not negate what scripture actually and truly says.
For instance, the language, as a rival used in Leviticus 18.18, is also used in 1 Samuel 1.6 regarding the contentious relationship between Elkanah's wives. The problem is that the Bible shows over and over again that rivalry existed in polygamous marriages. But is this actually true? We went over the verse that 119 ministries put forth and that our brother David also puts forth of 1 Samuel 1.6, and we showed last time how that's just absolutely false. But does scripture continually show that rivalry exists within plural marriages in scripture? Instead of just making the statement, let's look at the actual scripture itself to see what the truth is.
Now one of the verses that David had on screen was Genesis chapter 16 verse 4. However, let's back up and see a fuller context of what is actually going on here. Genesis chapter 16 verse 2, And Sarai said to Abram, See, Yahweh hath kept me from bearing children. Please, go in to my female servant. It might be that I am built up by her. And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. And then in Genesis chapter 16 verse 4, And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived.
And when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. So did plural marriage cause a rivalry here? No. Not in the least. That's not what scripture says, and it's false to use this example as showing that plural marriage causes rivalry. What we got from actual scripture is that Sarai gave Abram another wife. She gave him Hagar. So did that cause rivalry? Not in the least. Sarai had zero issues with Abram having more than one wife.
Then we go on to look in verse 4 of Genesis chapter 16, And it's not until Hagar has a son, Ishmael, that then she is despised in her mistress's eyes. So it's not the plural marriage that caused the rivalry, it's the jealousy that Hagar had a son and Sarai did not. That was the rivalrous point. So if you want to try to make any kind of conclusion here, it's that having children causes rivalry, not plural marriage.
Another verse that David puts up to try and prove that plural marriage always causes rivalry is the same one that 119 ministries used, and that is 1 Samuel chapter 1 verse 6. Moreover, her rival also provoked her greatly to make her irritable because Yahweh had shut up her womb. Now let's read that again to see what is causing the issue here. Once again, Moreover, her rival also provoked her greatly to make her irritable. Why? Because Elkanah had more than one wife? Nope.
Because Elkanah burnt the biscuits? Nope. Because Elkanah had lied in some way? Nope. The rivalry existed, it says, from Scripture, straight from Scripture, quote, because Yahweh had shut up her womb. So once again, the rivalry here is not because of plural marriage. The rivalry is because of childbearing, just like we saw with Sarai and Abram. It's not due to the number of wives that Elkanah has. It's due to the lack of childbearing. That causes the issue.
So again, if you want to make a conclusion from Scripture, correctly from Scripture, the rivalry, you could say, is caused by not bearing children, or the lack of bearing children, not plural marriage. And finally, David puts up the example of Jacob, trying to insinuate that Jacob's plural marriage caused nothing but rivalry. But is that true? What do we get from Scripture? Let's look real quick. Genesis chapter 29, verses 25 through 28. And in the morning it came to be that, see, it was Leah.
So he said to Laban, What is this you have done to me? Was it not for Rachel that I served you? Why then have you deceived me? And Laban said, It is not done this way in our place, to give the younger before the firstborn. Complete the week of this one, then we give you this one too, for the service which you shall serve with me still another seven years. And Jacob did so, and completed her week.
Then he gave him his daughter, Rachel, too, as wife. So Laban understood that there was no issue in marrying sisters. Laban understood there was no issue in a man having more than one wife. So what rivalry do we see here already? None. Zero. Nada whatsoever. Jacob now has more than one wife, he has two wives, and they are sisters. Which completely contradicts what these anti-polygamy advocates are putting forth. All it takes is for you to read your Scriptures to see if what you're being taught is actual truth.
You don't go to commentaries from scholars. You go to the word of Yahweh. And continuing on with the story of Jacob, Genesis chapter 30 verse 1. And when Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister and said to Jacob, Give me children or else I am going to die. So you're starting to see a pattern here. Rachel and Leah had zero problem with their husband having more than one wife. The issue comes up once again with childbearing or the lack of childbearing.
That's where the issue occurs, not plural marriage. But then we continue on. Genesis chapter 30 verses 3 through 4. And she, referring to Rachel, said, See, my female servant Bilhah go in to her and let her bear for me, and let me be built up from her as well. So she gave him Bilhah, her female servant, as wife, and Jacob went in to her. So did Rachel have an issue with her husband having more than one wife? No.
She had zero issue with Jacob having more than one wife. She had zero issue with Jacob marrying her sister. What Rachel wanted was children. And just like Sarai, she gave Jacob her handmaid so that he could have children through her. Because Rachel wanted children. So once again, the issue is not with plural marriage, the issue is with childbearing or the lack of childbearing. But still going on, Genesis chapter 30 verse 9. And Leah saw that she had ceased bearing, and she took Zilpah, her female servant, and gave her to Jacob as wife.
Are you at last starting to see the pattern here and starting to see what it is that scripture is telling you? Once again, Rachel gave her female servant to Jacob to have children with. Now Leah has stopped bearing children, so she gives her female servant to Jacob in order to have even more children. Yes, both of these sisters, Rachel and Leah, had zero problem with their husband having more than one wife. And both Rachel and Leah, their issue was with the childbearing, or lack of childbearing, or the end of childbearing.
That was their issue, not plural marriage. And now we get into something very, very interesting and detrimental to the anti-polygyny case. Genesis chapter 30 verse 18. And Leah said, Elohim hath given me my hire, because I have given my female servant to my husband. So she called his name, Yasaskar. Why did Yahweh give her her hire? Because she had given her female servant to Jacob. Because she had given Jacob an additional wife. And interestingly enough, this word here, for giving me my hire, is often translated in other translations as reward.
So in these translations, she's saying, God has given me a reward because I gave my husband my handmaid. In fact, this very name that she named her son, Yasaskar, literally means a reward. She's saying that he will bring a reward, or there is recompense, recompense meaning compensation. Again, if you were to marry a woman and her sister, or any other woman, as I've argued, then that would be a rivalry by definition. Rivalry would be the consequence of any polygamous union, not merely sororal polygyny.
So is it literally true that marrying another woman or your wife's sister would be rivalry by definition? No. At least that's not what the word of Yahweh tells us. Would rivalry be the consequence of any polygamous union? No. That's not what the word of Yahweh tells us. What we get from scriptures is that there is zero issue that these people had with plural marriage. We see time and time and time again that it's not plural marriage, it's childbearing that they have the issue with, or more specifically, the lack of.
And in fact, this theme of fairness goes throughout the entirety of scripture on down to marry the mother of Yeshua. In fact, if you would like even more evidence to show from scripture that rivalry is not the automatic consequence of plural marriage, let's look at one more section real quick. Genesis chapter 30 verses 14 through 16. And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest and found love apples in the field and brought them to his mother Leah.
And Rachel said to Leah, please give me some of your son's love apples. But she said to her, is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son's love apples too? And Rachel said, therefore, let him lie with you tonight for your son's love apples. And when Yaakov came out of the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, do come in to me, for indeed I have heard you with my son's love apples.
And he lay with her that night. So were Rachel and Leah rivalrous with each other simply because their husband had more than one wife? No. Here Yaakov is alternating time with each of his wives, being equal, trying to even it out, etc. In fact, a lot of the polygynous families that I personally know do the same kind of concept because they have a duty to each of their wives to give them their marital rights, as it were.
So Yaakov is doing this here with Rachel and Leah. So apparently it was Rachel's night to be with Yaakov, but Leah had some love apples. Rachel wanted some of the love apples, and so they negotiated a trade there that Rachel would get the love apples and Leah, in exchange, would get the time with Yaakov that she normally would not have had. This is not a sign of rivalry. No. This is a sign of two women working together for a mutual compromise.
Rachel and Leah, there was no rivalry like that between them. They work together. They compromise. They come to a mutual understanding, and they exchange various things in order to get to this end. So once again, what we see from Scripture is that plural marriage does not in itself cause rivalry. So does polygyny cause immense harm to women and children? No. Not at all. Our brother David tries to put forth various studies to show that polygyny causes harm to women and children, but it's simply not true.
In fact, I'd be willing to bet that if you looked into those studies that he tries to put forth, there are other factors there that actually cause the harm, things like being in cults such as Mormonism or Islam or things like that, but not Christian scripturally-based plural marriage. In fact, just about the opposite can be shown, that this whole doctrine of monogamy only is detrimental to society, men, women, and children. In fact, you can find your own studies that show that plural marriage is beneficial not only for society, but also for women, children, and men.
History reports have shown that polygyny has been the norm and the natural state for many, many thousands of years for the vast majority of human history, and that it's good for women and children. But aside from what our brother David is saying, and aside from what I am saying, and aside from what any modern-day polling shows, what is it that Scripture actually shows? What can we learn from Scripture regarding the benefits or disadvantages of polygyny to women and children? James chapter 2, verses 14 through 18.
My brothers, what use is it for anyone to say he has belief but does not have works? This belief is unable to save him, and if a brother or sister is naked and in need of daily food, but one of you says to them, go in peace, be warmed and be filled, but you do not give them the bodily needs, what use is it? So also belief, if it does not have works, is in itself dead.
But someone might say, you have belief and I have works. Show me your belief without your works, and I shall show you my belief by my works. So are you showing your belief by telling women and children that they cannot have a husband or a father? By telling single parents that you cannot have a husband to raise you, take care of you, to be a father to your children? Is that the works that show belief? Is it works showing belief when you tell a single woman, hey, all the men are taken, but just keep praying and there's more fish in the sea, it'll be okay.
Is that showing your belief by your works? Or rather, is showing your belief by your works taking a woman under your wings to shelter her and protect her and to guide her in the scriptural way of doing things, to take her children under your wings as your own children and raise them and be a father to them? Which way is more of a works showing your belief? Is it just saying these nice things to these women and children and you going about your way, not really doing anything for them? Yeah, you might go and spend some time with a fatherless child.
Maybe an hour or two here or there a week or a month. Maybe you even see them for 30 minutes to an hour a day, but is that really the same thing as being a full-time father to that child? No, it's not. You donate to the Big Brothers and Big Sisters Foundation or some other club like that. Oh, well, I give money, they're taken care of. That's your works? Is that the same thing? Is that more beneficial than giving them a loving, stable home to be in? Being that manly example of showing them what a man is supposed to be like, what a man is supposed to do when treating a woman, how to treat a woman.
Which way is better in your opinion? Which way shows your belief more by your works? James, chapter 2, verse 8. If you truly accomplish the sovereign law according to the scripture, you shall love your neighbor as yourself, you do well. Is it loving your neighbor to just give them a donation or some money and saying, good luck, we'll pray for you? Or is it loving your neighbor to give them food in their bellies, clothes on their back, a roof over their head, a home, a father and a mother? Think to yourself, reason within yourself, which way is more in line with loving your neighbor? Telling that single mother to just bear it out and pray? Or is it more loving your neighbor to give that single mother and her children a loving, stable home with a good man to take care of them? Which way is more loving? Romans chapter 13, verses 8 and 9.
O no one any matter except to love one another, for he who loves another has filled the Torah. For this, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet, and if there is any other command, it is summed up in this word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Luke chapter 3, verses 9 through 11. And even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees.
Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. And the crowds asked him, saying, What then shall we do? And answering, he said to them, Let him who has two undergarments share with him who has none, and let him who has food do likewise. So this is the words of our master, Yeshua. These are the words of the Messiah, that if you have extra things, give them to those who do not have them and who need them.
So if you have a stable home, you have food that you can share with others, you have knowledge and experience in child raising, would it not be more in line with the words of our Messiah to take these single mothers and these fatherless children under your wings and give them this home and this food and this experience and give them a good life? Would this not be more in line with the words of our master and Messiah? By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.
But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth. Let us love in deed and in truth. So it says, do not let us love in a bunch of words. By going out and saying, oh yeah, we'll pray for you, good luck. Or oh yeah, something will come along, just hang in there, you'll be okay.
That's a bunch of words. What are your deeds? What are your works showing? A work is taking that single mother under your wings. A work and a deed is taking that fatherless children and take them under your wings, give them a good home, food in their stomach, clothes on their back, a good raising, instead of being raised without a father. James chapter 1 verse 27. Clean and undefiled religion before the Elohim and Father is this, to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world.
So clean and undefiled religion, true religion, is to visit the widows and the orphans in their time of need to take care of them and in other places it even includes what we call the fatherless, aka what we say nowadays as children of single mothers. So polygyny, plural marriage, would actually be in keeping with the commands from scripture, not monogamy only. Now some people are called to a monogamous marriage. Other people have a calling for polygynous marriage.
This is exactly in line with scripture. But you cannot argue that a polygynous marriage would be in keeping with the command of scripture to visit the widows and the orphans and the fatherless in their time of need to take care of them, to provide for them. I know several widows, but they're all up in years. They have no desire to have more children. They don't have the ability in most cases. And they've had a good marriage for 30, 40, 50 years even.
So they're not interested in getting married anymore. But there's a lot of women out there who are widowed at a young age and as scripture tells us that if they cannot contain themselves, then let them marry or remarry, get married again. So yeah, let's get carnal for a moment. Women have needs just like men have needs. And if a woman is widowed at a young age and still in that time of her life where she has those needs, then she needs to marry.
As we covered previously in a previous episode, women outnumber men in marriageable age categories. So if we just do this monogamy only, there's not going to be enough men to go around. Therefore, we need polygyny. Again, we need polygyny for good godly men because they're not there in the same proportions even in church. For instance, this study from Pew Research shows that even from 1972 all the way up to today, there has been a gap amongst the women that go to church and the men that go to church.
Now it's been sort of that gap has sort of been decreasing over time, but there's still a significant gap. So with the model of monogamy only, what do we do with these extra women? Just tell them to pray about it and hang in there. There's plenty of fish in the sea. God will have somebody for you. When the statistics do not bear this out and scripture gives us a solution for these women who cannot be paired to a man in a monogamy only system.
And more information from census.gov that the number of children who live with a single mother has grown, actually doubled since the year 1968. And I quote, children living with a mother only is the second most common U.S. living arrangement, a number that has doubled since 1968. About 7.6 million children lived with their mother only in 1968 compared to 15.3 million in 2020. So what are we to do with these massive amounts of single mothers with children? How are we to take care of them? Write them a check, make a donation.
Maybe it'll go to the right place. Maybe it won't. Maybe it'll be used in the right way. Maybe it won't. No. Scripture gives us a solution. And that solution that we see directly from scripture is polygyny. First Corinthians chapter 7 verse 6 through 9. And I say this as a concession, not as a command, for I wish that all men were even as I myself, that each one has his own gift from Elohim, one in this way and another in that.
And I say to the unmarried and to the widows, it is good for them if they remain even as I am. But if they do not have self-control, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn. So here the Apostle Paul is telling us that if widows still have those needs and those desires, if they are still burning, to let them marry. There's nothing wrong with that. But we see from the numbers that is held out year after year after year that they've done the census, that women of marriageable age outnumber the men of marriageable age.
And monogamy only, that policy is just not tenable. Ephesians chapter 4 verse 28. Let him who stole steal no more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, so that he has somewhat to share with those in need. James chapter 2 verse 24. You see then that a man is declared right by works and not by belief alone. So someone steals, stop stealing, labor, and then when you have something to give, give it to those who are in need.
And that a man is declared right by his works and not by belief alone. So what works can we do that we see from Scripture to take care of these widows, these single mothers, these fatherless children? We see the example that Scripture gives us, polygyny. Polygyny is providing a home, food, clothing, experience, raising these children. Is that immense harm that you're speaking about here, Brother David? No. This is immense good, immense benefit for these women and these children.
That's the advantages and the benefits of polygyny. That is one of the scriptural forms of marriage that we see from the Bible. Matthew chapter 19 verses 3 through 9. And the Pharisees came to him, trying him, and saying to him, Is it right for a man to put away his wife for every reason? And he answering said to them, Did you not read that he who made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh, so that they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Therefore what Elohim has joined together, let man not separate. They said to him, Why then did Moshe command to give a certificate of divorce and to put her away? He said to them, Because of the hardness of your hearts, Moshe allowed you to put away your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you, whoever puts away his wife, except on the ground of whoring, and marries another, commits adultery. And whoever marries her who has been put away commits adultery.
When Yeshua cites this verse in support of his teaching that marriage is a sacred institution ordained by God, he quotes from the Septuagint, strongly implying that he understood monogamous marriage in particular to be God's design. Also a prohibition of polygamy can be logically deduced from Yeshua's statement in Matthew 19, that a man who divorces his wife without warrant and marries another, quote, commits adultery. So this is an age-old argument that has been debunked a long time ago, and it's actually surprising to see people still trying to use this argument.
Does our Messiah, Yeshua, in Matthew 19, give a direct prohibition against polygamy here? No. All you have to do is look in the scriptures for yourself, like we just did, we just read it for you. And you can see for yourselves that what Yeshua is talking about here is divorce, not plural marriage. He's saying that once you get married, it should be for life. That's what he's talking about here, not marrying additional women. So what's happening here with our brother David and with many other anti-polygyny advocates is they're using something called eisegesis.
And just to give a reminder from last week, eisegesis means reading something into the text, usually your own preconceived notion. The converse of that is exegesis. Exegesis means reading something out of the text to let scripture guide you and your thoughts and your beliefs, not reading your own interpretation back into the Bible, trying to change what scripture itself says. So in other words, exegesis is what you get out of scripture, eisegesis is what you try to put into scripture to make scripture say what you want it to say.
And what our brother David and many others are doing here in Matthew 19 is eisegeting the text, reading their own desires and dogma back into the text instead of letting the text and scripture itself change what they believe. And at one point, due to his zeal to try and come against the scriptural marriage of plural marriage, David actually contradicts scripture itself. In 1 Kings 11, the biblical author is clear that Solomon's idolatry and eventual downfall were the direct result of his polygamy.
But was Solomon's downfall the direct result of polygamy? Let's examine scripture itself to see what it tells us. 1 Kings 11 verses 1-4 And sovereign Sholomo loved many foreign women in addition to the daughter of Pharaoh, Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, from the nations of whom Yahweh had said to the children of Israel, You do not go into them, and they do not go into you, for they shall certainly turn away your hearts after their mighty ones.
Sholomo clung to these in love, and he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines. And his wives turned away his heart, and it came to be, when Sholomo was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other mighty ones. And his heart was not perfect with Yahweh his Elohim, as was the heart of his father Dawid. So look on your screen right here. It says right here that Yahweh told the children of Israel, Do not go into these foreign nations, for they shall turn your heart away to other gods.
And what does this scripture also tell us? That Sholomo, or Solomon, loved these foreign women, even though he wasn't supposed to. So what can we exegete from scripture? That it was these foreign women that were the direct result of Solomon's downfall. Not his number of women. Contrary to what our brother David has stated here, he's contradicting scripture. Further evidence and proof can come from Nehemiah chapter 13, verses 25 and 26. Then I contended with them, and cursed them, and struck some of them, and pulled out their hair, and made them swear by Elohim, saying, You do not give your daughters as wives to their sons, nor take their daughters for your sons or yourselves.
Did not Sholomo, sovereign of Israel, sin because of them? Among the many nations there was no sovereign like him, who was beloved of his Elohim. And Elohim made him sovereign over all Israel. Even him foreign women caused to sin. We'll read that again. Even him foreign women caused to sin. Is it like our brother David said, that multiple women caused him to sin? No. The word of Yahweh, direct scripture here, explicitly states, even him foreign women caused to sin.
It was the foreign women, not the number of women. Solomon's idolatry and eventual downfall were the direct result of his polygamy. Some people will say, see, how can God be against polygamy if he has laws regulating polygamous families? This is similar to how the Torah condemns theft while also providing instructions for restitution. Although God's perfect will is for humans not to steal, since it happens, the Torah gives guidance on how to handle those situations. There are laws for restitution in the Torah, for example, but those laws don't legitimize theft.
So are the regulations on polygyny the same as the regulations regarding the restitution of theft? No. It's not the same thing. With theft, you see direct statements from scripture saying, do not steal. Direct prohibitions against stealing. Exodus 20, verse 15, you do not steal. Leviticus 19, verse 11, do not steal, do not lie, do not deceive one another. Leviticus 19, verse 13, do not oppress your neighbor or rob him. The wages of him who is hired is not to remain with you all night until morning.
Mark chapter 10, verse 19, you know the commands, do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not rob, respect your father and your mother. Romans chapter 13, verses 8 through 9, owe no one any matter except to love one another, for he who loves another has filled the Torah. For this, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet, and if there is any other command, it is summed up in this word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Ephesians chapter 4, verse 28, let him who stole steal no more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, so that he has somewhat to share with those in need. So time and time again, we find direct, explicit prohibitions against stealing. And you can look from Genesis to Revelation, all throughout Scripture, and you will not find one single verse stating something similar to, do not marry more than one woman. It's nowhere in there.
So no, it is not like the laws of restitution, it's not like the laws of theft, because with theft, it's directly and explicitly prohibited. And Scripture, time and time again, never prohibits plural marriage. For instance, the commands against hating someone and coveting have no civil punishment. But the lack of legal penalties for transgressing those commandments obviously doesn't invalidate the commandments. Yes, the lack of legal punishment does not invalidate the commandments, but we can see there are actual commandments against hating and coveting.
Leviticus chapter 19, verse 17, do not hate your brother in your heart, reprove your neighbor for certain, and bear no sin because of him, Exodus chapter 20, verse 17. Do not covet your neighbor's house. You do not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, or whatever belongs to your neighbor. Now once again, take context into consideration. Hating and coveting are a matter of the heart, a matter of the mind, if you will, even.
It's not a tangible act. Yes, there are explicit prohibitions against hating and coveting, but these are not tangible acts, and therefore there is no way to disperse with punishment regarding this until an actual act is undertaken, such as if you first hate someone in your heart and then you kill them, there is the punishment for the killing. If you covet your neighbor's wife and then you commit adultery with them, then there is a punishment for that act of adultery.
But hating and coveting are non-tangible things, they're not an act, it's a matter of the heart, and therefore there is no surprise that we do not see any punishments listed for hating and coveting, even though we see the direct explicit prohibition against hating and coveting. In contrast, we find zero prohibitions against plural marriage. The plural marriage is a tangible act of which there could be and should be punishments against if the Torah, if the Bible, actually prohibited it.
Leviticus 18.18 can be categorized as a Lex Imperfecta, a law which prohibits something without thereby rendering it invalid, reflecting a society which would have lacked the requisite means of enforcement in any case. In other words, practically speaking, carrying out a civil punishment for transgressing this law would have been difficult to enforce in the ancient world. But is that true? Would it have been difficult to enforce monogamy only? Would it have been difficult to punish polygamy if it were actually prohibited by scripture? No.
These are actual, tangible, physical acts that can be punished if it were illegal. For instance, in today's day and age, if someone commits the act of bigamy in America against the state, then there are legal consequences that can be dished out. And back in biblical times, they had the ability to dispense with punishment for physical acts such as polygamy if polygamy were prohibited by scripture. For instance, let's look at a few examples. In Exodus chapter 22, verse 19, they had the ability to put someone to death for bestiality.
In Leviticus chapter 20, verse 10, they had the ability and the punishment for people who commit adultery. It was the death penalty. In Leviticus chapter 20, verse 13 through 14, they had a penalty and a way to disperse punishment for people who commit homosexuality. And likewise, they had the ability to dispense punishment on people who committed incest. So this idea that back then they didn't have the ability to render punishment for polygamy is just nonsense. It's eisegesis, once again, because they did have the ability to dispense punishment in these kinds of tangible, physical ways, for these tangible, physical acts.
But the reason we don't see punishment for polygamy in scripture is because scripture never prohibits it. Objection, but God gave David multiple wives. When the Bible lists David's wives, Saul's wives are not mentioned. But is this a valid point to make to show that David actually did not marry Saul's wives even though Yahweh said that he gave David Saul's wives? No. It's not a point at all to say that scripture does not list the names of Saul's wives.
Let's look at scripture real quick to see what I mean. In 2 Samuel, chapter 2, verse 2, we see that two of David's wives are named here, Ahinoam and Abigail. In 2 Samuel, chapters 3, verses 2-5, we see it list out Ahinoam, Abigail, Maacah, Hagis, Abital, and Eglah. But then as we go on and look in 1 Chronicles, chapter 3, verses 1-9, we see Ahinoam, Abigail, Maacah, Hagis, Abital, Eglah, Teshua, or Bathsheba. So we get pretty much the same list, but down there at the bottom it says, besides the sons of the concubines, and does not name the concubines.
So does that mean that David did not marry these concubines since they were not named? No. David was still married to these concubines even though they're not named. So just because Saul's wives are not mentioned in scripture as David's wives by name does not prove any kind of point. All it proves is they're not listed as David's wives by name. In fact, we see this in some other places in scripture as well. In Judges chapter 8, verses 30-31, we see Gideon had many wives, but his wives are not named.
Does that mean he wasn't really married to those wives? And then in 2 Chronicles chapter 24, verses 2-3, it lists Joash, and Joash did what was right in the eyes of Yahweh all the days of Jehoiada the priest, and Jehoiada took for him two wives, and he brought forth sons and daughters. So was Joash actually married to these women because they're not named? Yeah, he was actually married. They don't have to be named by name. And then we remember King Solomon, and King Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines.
A thousand wives. Yet scripture only lists three children of Solomon, Taphath, Vasemath, and Rehoboam. Now I ask you, a man who has a thousand wives, is he going to have more than three children? I would think so. Even if it was just a 50% conception rate, that would be 500 children. That would take up a lot of room in scripture. So does that mean that Solomon only ever had three kids? Well quite possibly, but it certainly does not discount the high, high probability that most likely he had more than three children, they're just not named.
So stating that Saul's wives are not mentioned by name is a non-starter. Ancient Jewish commentary may shed some light on the meaning of Leviticus 1818. We know that at least one Jewish community around the time of the Messiah, i.e. the Qumran community, understood Leviticus 1818 as a prohibition against not merely sororopolygyny, but polygamy generally. This is significant primary evidence that may shed some light on how ancient Jews may have interpreted this commandment. This indicates that such teachings were probably widely accepted among broader Judaism.
Now just like 119 ministries, David Wilber only points to one specific group which opposed plural marriage back near the first century, the sect of Qumran. But he tries to make it seem as though this was widespread amongst Judaism as though every one, every Jew at that time opposed plural marriage. But is that true? Is that the case? What can we see from actual evidence? We find out from Josephus that about the time of the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, there was about 1.1 million that were slain and another 97,000 that were sold as slaves.
But this is just speaking of Jerusalem, so almost 1.2 million just in Jerusalem. However, we go down and look, the estimated number of Jews during the second temple period reached a peak of about four and a half million. So this is not just Jerusalem at the time of the destruction, but all over. 4.5 million. Keep that number in mind. And then we go on to discover that Josephus writes that there was about 4,000 of the Essene sect.
Now remember, Qumran were the Essenes, which is generally accepted, there's some dispute, but generally accepted that the Essenes were the ones that were at Qumran. But out of all the Essenes, they numbered about 4,000. However, those who lived at Qumran were no higher than a few dozen people. Just a few dozen out of that 4,000. Now it could have been a little bit higher than that. Other estimates put numbers at about 150 or 200. Larger estimates put it at 1,500, but that's largely unsupportable.
So we're going to go with about 200 people at Qumran. Now if you take 4.5 million Jews at the time, 4,000 of those were of the Essene sect, and only about 200 were at Qumran, that means that those who were at Qumran make up only 5% of the Essenes and way less than 1% of all Jews. So those at Qumran definitely did oppose plural marriage. No doubt about it. But how widespread was that? We know that the Pharisees, whom the Essenes at Qumran were writing against in this matter, the Pharisees accepted plural marriage and they understood Scripture correctly in this matter, especially Leviticus 18.18, because it actually means sisters, and to take as a rival.
It doesn't mean plural marriage in general. The Pharisees accepted this, and those of the Pharisene sect were the vast majority of Jews at the time. So was this opposition to plural marriage widespread within Judaism as our brother David tries to insinuate? No. If we go just by the one single instance that David in 119 ministries puts out, that one single instance of Qumran, those that opposed plural marriage amongst the Jews at that time were way less than even 1%.
So it's not widespread. In fact, it's pretty much an anomaly at the time. So in fact, we can say just the opposite, that at the time of the first century, around the time of Qumran, the acceptance of polygyny amongst Jews was widespread, not the opposition to. By the way, we know this interpretation was held by some first century Jewish groups, such as the Qumran community. Exactly. It was only some of the first century Jews, not all, and it was certainly not widespread.
To read commentaries from the Middle Ages into a verse written centuries beforehand is anachronistic and unsound hermeneutics. Basically all I do is quote conservative scholars on all of these issues. My book is basically just one giant list of quotes from scholars. So to read modern scholars and what they have to say about the issue and read it back into what we see in history is anachronistic and it's a fallacy. Instead, we should go by the evidence we get from the time and the evidence we get from the scriptures themselves, from the Septuagint, from the Talmud, from the Vulgate, from those who lived at the time, the numbers just don't add up.
Polygyny was widely accepted amongst Jews at that time. We can't read modern scholars back into history and try to change history, therefore changing scripture. It just doesn't work. And as we've seen, we have evidence that first century Jews interpreted Leviticus 1818 as a ban on polygyny generally. And don't forget, like we covered in a previous episode, Josephus writes around this time that King Herod had more than one wife. In fact, King Herod the Jew had multiple wives, nine wives in fact.
And Josephus also writes that it's the ancient practice among us, among the Jews, to have many wives at the same time. And again, he writes that King Herod the Jew had multiple wives, he practiced polygyny. We also remember seeing from Justin Martyr that writing in the second century that the Jews were still permitting other Jews to have more than one wife. So this is not something that was all but abandoned in the first century by the Jews.
In fact, as we can see from the evidence, the opposition to polygyny by Jews was of a small, very minute minority. And the acceptance of plural marriage, the acceptance of polygyny was widespread amongst the Jews. Even the second person we're going to speak about in tonight's rebuttal video, Mike Winger, and he knows and understands that Judaism practiced plural marriage in the first century. That among the Jews in Jesus's time, not so much the Greeks, sometimes they had bigamy, they had concubines, but they didn't so much do polygamy.
But among the Jews in Jesus's day and in the first century, they did have polygamy going on and there's no direct command in scripture to break up any of those marriages, even though a lot of people were getting their lives right with God. The biblical authors intentionally and consistently paint polygamy in a negative light, therefore discouraging it. For example, you need to look no further than Abraham, right? And the conflict between Sarah and Hagar. Of course, you have Jacob's situation with his wives and the disaster that was and so forth.
But is polygamy always portrayed in scripture in a negative light? No. Hardly ever, if any, I would posit. The examples he gives of Sarah and Hagar, that wasn't due to polygamy. That was due to childbearing, as we saw for ourselves from scripture. Jacob, Leah, Rachel, Bilhah, and Zilpah. There was no conflict and no rivalry there due to him having more than one wife. Once again, what we saw directly from the scriptures with our own eyes. The conflict that was there was because of childbearing.
So again, you cannot show any instances that I can find that this rivalry and strife was caused by a man having more than one woman. You can't show it from Solomon because we saw directly from scripture also that it was foreign women that caused this, not the number of women. So what our brother David is doing here is instead of showing you the evidence, he's just making these statements and assuming you're not going to check up on it.
Please, brothers and sisters, whenever someone makes such a statement, go and test it to see if it's actually true. Read your Bibles. Do some research. We have the internet now. We can find this out. You don't have to have six degrees from three different universities. Go do some research. Read your Bibles. Learn this stuff to see if what is being said is true because going by this same type of thinking, we can say that monogamy is portrayed in a bad light.
Say for instance, Joseph and Mary, they were monogamous and therefore since Joseph thought Mary was having an affair, monogamy is bad. No, that's simply not true. We can look at Isaac and Rebecca. Since Jacob fooled his father into thinking he was Esau, therefore Jacob and Rebecca's monogamous marriage shows that monogamy is a bad thing. We can't take all these separate, unrelated issues and apply it to polygyny. It's not because of the number of wives that Solomon had a downfall.
It's not because of the number of wives that there was some jealousy within Jacob's marriage and his wives. It's not because of the number of wives that Sarah and Hagar had issues. No. It's not the number of wives. It's other separate different issues. So the negative consequences of polygamy throughout Israel's history is actually probably why the Jewish people pretty much abandoned the practice by the first century. But did the Jews really abandon plural marriage by the first century? No.
This is another incorrect statement by our brother David. We can see from the evidence that we get from actual primary sources, Josephus, Justin Martyr, etc., that plural marriage was still going on well after the first century. Once again, our brother David is not expecting you to verify what he's saying. He's just expecting you to accept it wholesale. Go back through this video. Go back through our previous videos. Look at the evidence that we put up for your eyes to see.
Again, go forward and do your own research. Find additional information and you'll see that no, the Jews had not abandoned it by the first century. In fact, they hadn't even abandoned it by the 12th century. And just here recently, I found a article from Israel talking about a sect of Sephardi Jews who are pushing for plural marriage nowadays in our own time. I haven't verified all this yet, so I'm not going to say it's true, but it makes sense given the historical information we have and that scripture itself even okays plural marriage.
So, one of the biggest issues that our brother David has a problem with is the issue of submission. Now, as he understands it, there should be mutual submission between the wife and the husband. He goes into great detail attempting to prove this point. In the end, it falls flat when you compare it with actual scripture. He writes in an article on his website regarding the subject that the concept of mutual submission logically demands that the Messiah be in submission to the church, which is absolutely incorrect.
No doubt about it. Our Messiah was not in submission to the church. Our Messiah is only in submission to the Father, Yahweh. There's no doubt about it. Now, he goes on to try and clarify that if submission were to be understood as involuntary obedience to authority as is used in military context, then David would agree that Christ did not submit to the church. But that's the problem. The idea of submission as we get it from scripture and the lexicons as we'll see in just a moment is that submission is being in voluntary obedience to those in authority above you.
In fact, in one Facebook post that David wrote on behalf of 119 Ministries states, So Yeshua did submit to the church by freely becoming a servant in his earthly ministry, especially in his work on the cross for us. He said that's literally what he came to do. Unfortunately, our brother David is getting some wires crossed here. He's getting submission and serve conflated with each other. Now, our Messiah did not submit to anyone but Yahweh the Father.
We submit to Yeshua. Our wives submit to us, their husbands, and children submit to their parents. 1 Corinthians 11 3 And I wish you to know that the head of every man is the Messiah and the head of woman is the man and the head of Messiah is Elohim. So we can see the hierarchy of authority here. That Yahweh is over Yeshua. Yeshua is over the husband or the father. The wife is over the children. And it's the wife that submits to the husband just as the husband is supposed anyways to submit to Yeshua.
And Yeshua does submit to Yahweh. Submission always goes up in rank. Not across to each other. There's no equality here like the woke agenda now says. No. Submission is always to those who are in authority above you. And in fact, when we read in scripture, we're never told not one single time that the husband is supposed to submit to the wife. Never. It's always directly and specifically stating that the wife is to submit to her husband.
So what are some of the reasons for that? We can look in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verses 8 through 12. And we see, Because of this, the woman ought to have authority on her head. Because of the messengers. However, man is not independent of woman nor woman independent of man in the master. For as the woman was from the man, even so the man also is through the woman. But all are from Elohim. And then we see directly from Ephesians chapter 5 verses 22 through 24.
Wives, subject yourselves to your own husbands as to the master. Because the husband is the head of the wife. As also the Messiah is head of the assembly. And he is savior of the body. But as the assembly is subject to Messiah, so also let the wives be to their own husbands in every respect. So again and again, we see that it's the wives who submit to the husbands and never the other way around. It never states husbands submit to your wives.
You won't find that in the scriptures. And this was established even back at the beginning. Genesis chapter 3 verse 16. And your desire is for your husband and he does rule over you. You can't argue with scripture. This is what scripture states. Not this equality thing of modern woke progressive agenda. In fact, what we see about the Messiah and the assembly or the church. Matthew chapter 20 verses 27 through 28. And whoever wishes to be first among you, let him be your servant.
Even as the son of Adam did not come to be served but to serve. And to give his life as a ransom for many. And that's what serve is. Serve is to be attendant to someone. To be attendant towards their needs. This is the Strong's G1247. And it literally means the same thing. To be of service. To tend to someone. To tend to their needs. And this is what Jesus, Yeshua, did. And this is what we are to do to each other.
Even husbands are to serve their wives. To serve their family. But they are not to submit to their wives. Or anyone else except Yeshua. So again, wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands. The assembly is submitted or submissive to Messiah. So also let the wives be submitted to their own husbands. Submit means to yield to authority. When you submit to someone, you're submitting to their authority. Voluntarily, not involuntarily. He's trying to poison the well back in his article.
He's got it on his website. He's trying to poison the well again. Trying to say that it's involuntary submission. When in all actuality, that's just a term for slavery. Biblical submission is voluntary, willful surrender of your will to the authority of another. This comes from Strong's G5293. And it means to put yourself in subjection to. To be obedient to. That's what the biblical definition and meaning of submit actually means. So there's a difference between serving and submitting.
The biblical understanding tells us to serve one another. As far as submission goes, children are to submit to their parents, their father and their mother. The wife is to submit to her husband. The husband is to submit to Yeshua. And Yeshua always and always has submitted to Yahweh. 1 Peter 3, verse 1. In the same way, wives be subject to your own husbands, that if any are disobedient to the word, they, without a word, might be won by the behavior of their wives.
So what we see from scripture is mutual service to one another. Not mutual submission. Yeshua did not submit to the church. Yeshua did not place himself under obedience to the authority of the church. Yeshua did not place the authority of the church over and above him. That is absolutely false and incorrect. Yeshua submitted to the father. The church submits to Yeshua. Wives submit to their husbands. Because the husband is the authority of the wife and the whole family unit.
Yeshua is the authority of the husband and the entire assembly. And Yahweh is the authority over Yeshua. In fact, this whole equal thing, men and women equality, gender equality, mutual submission thing, reminds me more of the whole wokeness idea nowadays that we see within liberal secularism and liberal Christianity than it does with actual scripture. Again, brothers and sisters, just go out and read for yourselves from scripture. You can do your own study. Test these things. Test what I'm telling you.
Test what other people are telling you. And come to the truth that scripture tells us wives submit to their husbands. And husbands are never once told to submit to their wives. I just want to take a quick moment of detour here and address one issue that our brother David seems to have a major issue with. And this is a man by the name of Pete Rambo. Now, Pete is a really good guy who advocates for the correct interpretation of scripture, which endorses or at least accepts plural marriage.
Unfortunately, our brother David has a lot of issues and he's spent a lot of time trying to come against Pete for various things and slander Pete in a number of ways. But I can tell you from personal experience that Pete is a wonderful guy. He's a great, true American. He's a Christian, a father, a husband, and you really should get to know Pete. In fact, Pete was seminary trained in the Reformed tradition, eventually earning a Master's of Divinity.
At some point, he started to understand the correct scriptural way of thinking instead of the traditional church way of thinking. And at some point, it came out of the traditional churchianity, like most of us have done in our lives, especially those of you watching this right now. Pete is an Army Ranger who served in Desert Storm, and he's an established author with several books and papers under his name and has actually done a very great job in explaining marriage and patriarchy and headship and plural marriage.
If you would like to find out more about Pete, the links are down below to his website, his YouTube channel, and go check out Pete and see what he's really all about, if he's this monster that David is making him out to be, or if he's actually a good Christian brother in Messiah, like most of us who actually know him, to actually be. And in one of his videos, coming against Pete, David makes this statement. We can't assume that something that isn't clear to my critic must also not have been clear to the original audience of Leviticus.
And in fact, it was clear to the original audience of Leviticus. They understood it correctly as a wife to her sister, and they understood it to be referencing rivalry, not a prohibition against beligening. Then, in another part of this video, he again tries to poison the well. He tries to gaslight in response to something that our brother Pete had made. The people pushing things like polygamy and lesbianism, yes, I'm being serious, these people are false teachers who don't take Scripture seriously.
And yet again, he tries to slander our brother in Messiah here, and he again gaslights and tries to poison the well. The Word of God is just a tool to them that they misuse to try to justify their fetishes and manipulate others. Now, this is a false statement and a mischaracterization of our brother Pete and those of us who understand what Scripture actually says about beligening. Pete and myself and other advocates that we know, this is not a fetish for us.
This is something that we have come to see from Scripture through exegesis instead of eisegeting church tradition back into Scripture. This is something we've come out of the mainstream church over, amongst other things, but we understand and we see for ourselves what Scripture says and not what tradition is trying to push down our throats. And unfortunately, I think our brother David has forgotten his own words about people who may or may not agree with everything that we can see from Scripture.
Nobody's theology is perfect, and we're all doing the best we can with what we know. And on this point, our brother David is correct. We're all just trying to do the best we can with what we know. Unfortunately, with this gaslighting and the mischaracterization and the slander and trying to poison the well, I'm afraid our brother David has forgotten this very important point to keep in mind. So this is a Christian pastor named Mike Winger. And he, in general, disagrees with the practice of legionning.
However, there's a lot of points that he actually understands correctly from Scripture, and this is one of the points. If you do take another wife, you can't lessen the provisions and the rights of the previous wife. Our brother Mike understands that Exodus 21 here is referring to plural marriage, and that if you take an additional wife, your previous wife, her provisions are not to be diminished. Not her food, not her covering, and even not her marital rights.
So in contrast to 119 ministries and David Wilber, Mike Winger actually gets this right and understands what Scripture is actually trying to say in this regard, that this is about plural marriage. Now some would argue they were never married in the first place. I don't think that's biblically tenable. I don't think you can say that Judah was an illegitimate son. I don't think you can say these types of things because if you look at the marriages of polygamy in the Bible, while they're not approved of in the sense of being God's plan or design or desire, yet the children seem to be legitimate.
And he's, for the most part, correct about this. Because polygamists in Scripture and polygynists of today really are married. They really truly are married. It's not like a fake marriage. It's not like a just shacking up together. They're really married. And this is something that our brother Mike gets right with Scripture. It's a point that we and our brother Mike can agree on. Because polygynists really are married. This is really and truly marriages. In the Old Testament we see, specifically with kings, they're told not to have multiple wives, not to multiply wives.
So there's that with kings in particular. However, this is the part where he starts to get things incorrect regarding what Scripture has to say about polygyny. He's referring here to Deuteronomy chapter 17, verses 14 through 17. And he's trying to make the case that this was a prohibition against kings to not have more than one wife. However, this is taking the entire section out of context and misusing it. Because if this passage forbids a king from having more than one wife, then in context it would also be forbidding kings to have more than one piece of silver or more than one piece of gold.
It would also be forbidding kings from having more than one horse. Now we know this is absolutely not true. And he also tries to imply that Solomon got in trouble for having multiple wives. But as we saw last week in our 119 Ministries rebuttal, as we just saw from our rebuttal to David Wilber, this is not the case. Solomon did not get in trouble for having multiple women, multiple wives. Solomon got in trouble for marrying foreign wives.
That's what Scripture explicitly tells us was the reason for Solomon's downfall, not his multiple wives. In fact, Jacob, more often than not, is a bad example in Scripture. So our brother Mike here doesn't actually provide any examples or any reasons as to why Jacob is a bad example from Scripture. He's just trying to insinuate that since Jacob had more than one wife, therefore he's a bad example. But that's not what Scripture tells us about Jacob. In fact, we see that Jacob was blessed with two sisters and a total of four wives and multiple children, twelve sons who became the twelve tribes of Israel.
So I ask you, brother Mike, how is Jacob a bad example? When we look at Scripture itself, the only issue that we see here is when his wives have issues with childbearing. But they never have issues with him having multiple wives. So I ask you again, how is Jacob a bad example? We see Solomon with his multiple wives as a bad example. No, again, that is incorrect. We do not see Solomon as a bad example because of his multiple wives.
Read the Scriptures. And the Scriptures tell us that Solomon is a bad example for the sole reason that he married foreign women. This is not only applicable in polygynous situations, but it is applicable in monogamous situations as well. Even if you're going to go with this whole monogamy only theory, you still have to agree that we should not go in to foreign women. We should not allow our daughters to go in to them either. Even the A.K.A.
New Testament, we're told, do not be unevenly yoked with unbelievers. So Solomon's bad example was due to his marrying foreign women, as Scripture clearly, directly, and explicitly tells us, not his multiple wives. When I join to some other separate second wife, I am committing adultery. Polygamy in itself is adulterous. And I think that polygamy creates, it seems to me, a situation where at least one person in that marriage is constantly committing adultery against the other people in those marriages.
Unfortunately, our brother Mike here doesn't understand the biblical concept of what adultery actually is. Adultery involves a married woman sleeping with someone that she is not married to. Want to see some examples? Well, let's go look in Scripture and see what Scripture has to say about this topic directly and explicitly. Exodus, chapter 20, verse 17. You do not covet your neighbor's house, you do not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, or whatever belongs to your neighbor.
And a man who commits adultery with the wife of another man, who commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, the adulterer and the adulteress shall certainly be put to death. Ezekiel, chapter 16, verse 32. The wife who commits adultery who takes strangers instead of her husband. So, time and time again, we see that the biblical understanding of adultery is when a man sleeps with a married woman who is not his wife. Or, conversely, when a married woman sleeps with a man who is not her husband.
It's all dependent on the status of the married woman. So now, just like our brother Mike said beforehand, these religious marriages are actual marriages. They're actually married to each other. Therefore, it cannot be adultery. These are two contradictory statements. Because a man who is married to three wives cannot commit adultery with any of his wives because he is actually the man that is married to them. And that is not adultery. Another example. This is from the story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife.
Genesis, chapter 39, verses 7 through 9. And after these events, it came to be that his master's wife lifted up her eyes to Joseph and said, But he refused and said to his master's wife, Look, my master does not know what is with me in the house, and he has given into my hand all that he has. No one is greater in this house than I, and he has not withheld whatever from me but you, because you are his wife, and how shall I do this great evil and sin against Elohim? So what is the great evil and sin that Joseph is talking about here? It's the great evil of adultery.
It's the great sin of adultery. Because Potiphar's wife was a married woman and she was not married to Joseph. Therefore, Joseph sleeping with her would have been adultery. However, if you remember, Joseph's father was Jacob. And Jacob had multiple wives. Joseph understood that a man having multiple wives was not adulterous. But sleeping with another man's wife, that is adultery. And also keep in mind what Scripture says about adulterers and the kingdom of heaven. 1 Corinthians chapter 6 verses 9 through 10.
Adulterers shall not inherit the reign of Elohim. So if polygyny is adultery, then those who engage in the act of polygyny will not inherit the reign of Elohim. They will not inherit the kingdom of God. However, notice also what Scripture says about certain polygynists of the Bible. Matthew chapter 8 verse 11. And I say to you that many shall come from east and west and sit down with Abraham and Yitzhak and Jacob in the reign of the heavens.
So here we see that the polygynist Abraham and the polygynist Jacob will be in the kingdom of God. So either Scripture is contradicting itself or our brother Mike has an incorrect understanding of what adultery is. And I think that our brother Mike needs to understand that polygyny is not adultery. These are actual marriages where they're really and truly married to one another. And it's not adultery because it's not sleeping with another man's wife. It's sleeping with your wife.
Therefore, as Scripture states and clearly exemplifies, polygyny is not adultery. In Scripture, adultery is a legitimate cause for divorce. It is a proper justification for divorce that does free one to marry another. Here I'm worried about putting a burden upon people that doesn't seem clearly demanded in Scripture. Number two, divorce is serious, man. Divorce is really serious. Second reason why I lean this way. It's not a quick and easy solution to tell someone to just get divorced.
And in this particular video, our brother Mike is stating that when missionaries go out and they go into these polygynist cultures and they want to convert to Christianity, a lot of times these missionaries will tell them that they have to divorce all but one wife. And our brother Mike here is stating that this is a burden placed on people that is not clearly stated in Scripture. And he's absolutely right because Scripture has no opposition to plural marriage.
And he's also right in that divorce is a very serious thing. And a lot of times it causes a lot more issues than what is originally existing. It causes financial issues. It causes issues in children. Legal issues. Divorce is acceptable in some circumstances. For instance, the circumstance of adultery. If your husband or wife commits adultery, that is biblical justification for divorce. It's not required that you get divorced, but it is biblical justification for divorce. So again, brother Mike is right in that divorce is a very serious problem.
And that when we go to these other cultures doing missionary work, we should not require them to divorce all but one of their wives in order to convert into the actual true faith. The impact on the children is pretty significant here. And again, he's absolutely correct. Divorce impacts children immensely. It leads to all kinds of life problems, self-esteem problems, amongst a host of other things. And one of these other things that we can see from studies is that enforcing monogamy only on other cultures who practice polygyny is detrimental to the education of that society.
And we can see from one study that was done that these missionaries' insistence on monogamy lowered African demand for education in sub-Saharan Africa. These mission schools that were teaching the children, they promoted monogamy only. And often it would serve as a requirement in order for these children to go to these schools. As a result, the children stopped really going. And these mission's insistence on monogamy decreased the local demand for education. And the polygamous localities continue to have lower educational outcomes all because of this monogamy-only insistence by the vast majority of mainstream Christianity and these missionaries that are going out to these various societies.
For anyone who would like to read this study and what was put out on this paper, you can follow the link down here on your screen, or you can go to the link for this article post for this dross at www.godhonesttruth.com, or click on the link down below in your description and look at the show notes. So we may be casting women into poverty by demanding their divorce. And again, he's absolutely right. When these missionaries go to these polygamous societies, such as in Africa or other parts of the world, and they demand that they divorce all but one of their wives, all these divorced wives are at risk of being in poverty, of going hungry, not having the shelter and the clothing and the provisions that they need.
This whole monogamy-only idea is detrimental in a lot of situations. Instead, we need to get back to Scripture and understand that Scripture does not prohibit or oppose plural marriage. So unfortunately, our brother Mike does engage in some eisegesis in various points in his videos. For instance… Because from Genesis to Revelation, marriage is made up of one man and one woman, and no other unity is accepted in the Bible, and no polygamy is not endorsed. And unfortunately, Mike, you're eisegesis-ing the entirety of Scriptures because from Genesis to Revelation, monogamy is not the standard.
We can see time and time again that people of Scripture engaged in plural marriage, and sometimes even plural marriage is endorsed. For instance, when Yahweh gave Saul's wives, plural, to David. When Yahweh rewarded Leah for giving her servant to Jacob as an additional wife. So monogamy is not the standard that's set out in Scripture. And even in certain cases, polygyny is not only endorsed, but commanded. See, leverate marriage for one. Some people did that in Scripture, and God condemns it.
Unfortunately, this is also an example of eisegesis, reading back into Scriptures what you already perceived. We never find one instance where anyone is condemned for having more than one wife. Once again, David had multiple wives, but was only condemned for the matter of Uriah. Solomon had multiple wives, but was only condemned for marrying foreign women, etc., etc. No one is ever condemned or punished for having more than one wife. The very nature of polygamy, in my opinion, is enough to show you that it's sinful.
When you get married, part of the whole deal is one man, one woman, one flesh. So, Brother Mike, what is it about the nature of polygamy that is sinful? After all these videos that we've went through, we've seen the evidence from Scripture. We've seen the evidence of how those in Scripture understood plural marriage. We've seen those who, in history, have understood plural marriage. So, what is it about polygamy that, by its nature, is sinful? We already know that polygamy is not adultery.
We just went over what the biblical understanding of adultery is. So, what is it about the very nature of polygamy that makes it sinful? Because nowhere in Scripture is it ever prohibited or opposed. Jesus, in his words, implied that you should not have polygamy. 1 Corinthians 7 shows you shouldn't have polygamy. Jesus, in his words, implied you shouldn't have polygamy? This is straight-up eisegesis, reading something back into the text of Matthew 19. We've already read that with the case of David Wilber.
We've seen that it was not talking about polygyny. It was talking about divorce. Therefore, no, Yeshua, a.k.a. Jesus, was not implying monogamy here. He was speaking on divorce. You're creating a messed-up display of what marriage is meant to be, which pictures Christ ultimately in the church. Polygyny creates a messed-up display of Christ in the church? No. To the contrary, polygyny is more representative of the analogy between Christ and the church. There are many of us in the church.
One Messiah. Monogamy, on the other hand, does create a messed-up display of Christ in the church. Because then you're kind of putting forth the implication that Messiah can only have one person who's saved, can only have one follower instead of multiple followers. So this monogamy-only standard does damage to the analogy of Christ and the church. And they're going to be facing in greater numbers in the near future as our culture continues to devolve into mortal make-believe on the topic of sexuality and marriage.
And this might shock you, but I actually agree with our brother Mike here. We're going to be facing this in even greater numbers as we go into the future. However, I also agree with him that we're going to be facing this issue of polygyny largely probably because of the wrong reasons. Not because it's in Scripture. Not because it's scripturally acceptable. Not because men are wanting to step up to the plate and take care of these women and children.
No. Instead, I think, like our brother Mike said, it's because of the downfall in the morals of society as a whole. And as we get into all of these nonsensical things that people are spouting about women being men and men being women and men with men and women with women in polyamory, for heaven's sake, we can already see the decline of the moral structure and the various things it's already leading to that we're already having to face.
So I agree with our brother Mike that we will be facing this more and more, but we're going to be facing it for the wrong reasons. Not for the right reasons. Not for the good, just, and biblical reasons. And finally, we'll end up with some good advice from our brother Mike. Read the Word and just let it sanctify you. Let it bring you comfort. Yes, read the Word. Let it change you. But you don't try to change the Word.
Exegete, don't isegete. Learn what Scripture has to say. Don't just go off the rantings and ravings of someone that's in a pulpit or someone that's on the Internet. Read the Bible for yourself. Examine these things that are being said. Study for yourselves. Get into the Scriptures. And when you set aside tradition, when you set aside the emotions, when you set aside the well poisoning and the gaslighting, and you just get to Scripture and let Scripture speak to you, and let the Spirit of the Holy guide you, you will come to understand the truth from God's Word.
And the truth is that nowhere in Scripture is polygyny prohibited, is polygyny condemned, and nowhere in Scripture is anyone ever punished for having multiple wives. And that's just the God-honest truth. We'd also like to take this time to extend an invitation to our brother in Messiah, Mike Winger. If you'd like to come on and have a chat with us, a friendly, brotherly chat, then send us an email at teamatgodhonesttruth. Let us know and we'll get something set up.
Or if you so feel the need to put out a rebuttal video to this one, that's fine. We look forward to watching and reviewing that video as well. But I just wanted to extend that invitation to you, brother Mike, if you wanted to come and have a chat nonetheless. Now for anyone wanting the information that was presented in these screens tonight, make sure to go down below in the description, and that should be down there whether you're watching on a video platform or an audio podcasting platform.
And the link for the article for this video will be right down there in the description. There you'll be able to find the on-demand video, the slides that you have seen on your screen tonight, as well as the notes that we took for this and the transcript of this entire video. You can also find that by going to www.godhonesttruth.com. We'd like to thank you for joining us tonight. And if you got something out of this, make sure to go down below and leave us a comment about what it is that you learned, what it is that you got out of this.
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