“Our thinking has been so influenced by western theologians that we still continue to beat the old missionary drums which summon us to see that our cultural heritage is incompatible with Christianity.” – Rev. David Gitari, Kenyan Anglican Archbishop
A man cannot give what he does not have. We could add to this by borrowing from a Yoruba saying that he who has not been to another’s farm may erroneously assume that his father’s farm is the grandest. These maxims are fair descriptions of the European missionaries who attempted to tackle polygamy on the continent. Coming from a culture where men had multiple unmarried mistresses, the European missionaries were ill-prepared to deal with Africa’s ubiquitous form of marriage: polygyny. Polygyny is a type of polygamy in which a man has more than one wife, and this was a pretty common form of marriage in Africa before and after European encounters. Unsurprisingly, white missionaries assumed the worst about the polygyny they saw in Africa.
European Missionaries in Africa
As Douglas Falen writes, European missionaries “struggled with establishing the notions of romantic love and individualism in the face of what they perceived as the unromantic, duty-oriented style of African marriage” (52). Perhaps from a noble heart, they also particularly deemed polygyny as devaluing African women. Indeed, they judged that African men often used their women as pawns in polygynous marriages, as women “were usually the involuntary victims of the custom” (Gitari 3). Notermans echoes a similar thought when she writes that these missionaries to Africa not only “criticised polygyny as an uncivilised, unchristian, and immoral custom as it violated the universal rule of monogamy,” but they also “felt especially sorry for women because they considered them their husbands’ slaves and the powerless victims of an African tradition” (341). Of course, every African has seen a polygynous marriage gone wrong, much like every European has seen a monogamous marriage gone awful. Still, the European characterization of African women as needing salvation from polygynous marriages is not accurate. As we shall see, African women are often willing participants in polygynous arrangements.
This problem of European Christians struggling to validate polygyny plagues all Europe-derived denominations in Africa, Catholic and Protestant alike. For instance, the Catholic Church yet defers to the resolutions of a 1563 Council at Trent (Gitari, 5) when it had not even encountered sub-Sahara Africa, while Protestant denominations continue to propose “damage-control” measures to restrict the spread of polygyny. Curiously, however, denominations native to Africa like the Celestial Church of Christ, which is popular among the Yoruba people of Benin and Nigeria, openly embrace polygyny. This observation by itself suggests that the assumed issue with polygyny is more ethnocentric and racist than it is theological.
The Church Missionary Society (CMS) of the Anglican Communion was among the first to tackle some supposed pastoral problems caused by polygyny in western Nigeria (Gitari 3). Henry Venn, the Chief Secretary of the CMS in 1856, writes in a document concerning polygyny that it “is unlawful within the Church of Christ even though commenced in ignorance” and that it is “contrary to the Divine institution of marriage” (quoted in Gitari, 3). A typical early practical church solution, therefore, was to admit interested women in polygynous marriages into the fold but not the men. The men were required to banish all their wives but one before they could be accepted into Christian fellowship (Gitari 3). So, women and their children were separated from their means of livelihood and familial support in the name of Jesus.
It is worth stating, as it is often the case that there were dissenting European voices like Bishop Colenso who argued against this nefarious practice of requiring African men to banish their wives as being “unwarranted by the Scriptures, unsanctioned by Apostolic example or authority, condemned by common reason and sense of right and altogether unjustifiable” (Gitari 3). Nevertheless, the dissenting voices were unheard, and the practice lingered. What one notices is that even early in the attempts to address Africa’s polygamy, the theological arguments were not decisive. Therefore, Bishop Colenso could boldly say to the Archbishop of Canterbury that the requirement that a polygynous African man should banish his wives but one is “unwarranted by the Scriptures.” Indeed, as I shall argue shortly, the Scriptures indeed do not forbid polygyny. The European assumption to the contrary betrays ethnocentrism masquerading as a divine ideal.
Later, some Europeans somehow managed to recognize that native South African polygamous marriage actually “constitutes both a real bond and a real responsibility by custom and morals” (Gitari, 4). They recognized that this marriage arrangement was not quite like the one common in Europe, where a man was more committed to his wife than he was to his mistresses. This recognition led to the easing of the fellowship requirements for polygamous African men. They no longer had to banish their wives. Instead, they had to wait for all the wives but one to die before they could be baptized (Gitari 3). Of course, this new ruling required that the men could not take new wives. As a general rule, this stipulation has changed little across Africa today. It remains the assumed position that polygyny is unchristian, as evidenced by various churches’ official positions on the matter. However, just how unchristian is polygyny? Let us next explore relevant biblical data and interpretations on the issue.
Polygamy in the Hebrew Bible
It is a common assumption in Christian circles that the creation narrative prescribes monogamy, but this notion is not without its problems. According to this narrative, God wanted to make humans who would manage the earth. Interestingly, he chose monogamy as the means to go about it. If time were a critical factor in God’s project of populating the planet, one would expect him to have opted for polygamy or several simultaneous monogamous relationships. (This argument assumes that Genesis affirms that there were no humans outside the garden; that is, it assumes that Adam and Eve were the genetic ancestors of all humans—not mere genealogical ancestors. See our treatment here). Nonetheless, Genesis is silent about God’s reasons for opting for monogamy. We know from the account that God created a man and a woman to populate the garden and the earth. Concerning what may be established by the text regarding polygamy, Herbert Ryle writes in his commentary:
The relation of the man to his wife is proclaimed to be closer than that to his father and mother. By the words, “shall cleave unto his wife … one flesh,” is asserted the sanctity of marriage. Polygamy is not definitely excluded, but the principle of monogamy seems to be implied in the words “cleave” and “shall be one flesh”.
In other words, one may not conclude that the passage excludes polygamy without additional data. What is sure from the text is the sacredness or divine provenance of marriage.
Furthermore, notice the incongruence that Genesis 2:24 introduces to the narrative:
Genesis 2:24 ESV
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
In a creation account that informs readers that Adam and Eve are the first human pair, talking about their “father and mother” is meaningless. Besides, the picture of marriage that emerges here, requiring the man to leave his parents to join the wife, is decidedly the opposite of how ancient Israel practiced marriage. It was the woman who left his parents to cleave to her husband. Lastly, notice how Genesis 2 reads more smoothly if one skips verse 24 and continues to verse 25 from verse 23. As Angelo Tosato observes, Genesis 2:24 is a biblical redactional element – an editor inserted the verse into the original composition later (396).
The reader should note that redactions are very common in the biblical text and are an admitted component of Jewish understanding of divine inspiration. Another well-known example is how reading Exodus 24 right after Exodus 19 produces a smoother reading. Exodus chapters 20 to 23, which are about various laws, including the Ten Commandments, are editorial insertions known to the Israelite and Jewish communities.
Why the redaction in Genesis 2? It was very likely done to introduce a correction to curb increasing, indiscriminate cases of divorce initiated by ancient Israelite men against women (Tosato 405). As we shall soon see, that problem continued even in Jesus’ time. Also, to the extent that divorce is serial polygamy, the redaction might have been introduced as an anti-polygamy measure, too. Whatever the reasons for the editorial addition, Genesis 2:24 was no part of the original composition.
As mentioned en passant, monogamy was the exception in the lived experiences of the ancient Israelites. According to Genesis, by the seventh generation from Adam, Lamech had figured out polygyny (Genesis 4:19). And the key point to observe here is that there is nothing in the text to suggest that Lamech has sinned or done anything wrong by multiplying wives – though the attentive reader may notice the deviation from the creation Genesis 2 matrimonial account. Hence, the first recorded biblical case of polygamy was not condemned. From Lamech onwards, polygamy and monogamy coexisted. This, of course, was the exact state of things in Africa when European missionaries arrived. To say that polygyny thrived in Africa is not to deny that many Africans also opted for monogamy. Typically, a polygynous marriage begins with monogamy.
Many of the key figures in Hebrew history were polygamous. Noah had one wife, and Abraham had three wives. Similarly, while Isaac had one wife, his children had multiple wives. Esau had three wives. Jacob, through whom the Jews would later descend, had four wives. Therefore, the literal tribes of Israel through whom the Messiah would trace his human ancestry are products of polygyny. Once again, it is critical to note that the text never condemns a polygamous arrangement in these cases.
King David’s immediate lineage is very instructive here, for they pushed the boundaries of polygyny. David was married to eight women in his lifetime. He even secretly murdered a man so he could inherit his wife. God sends the prophet Nathan to David to inform him that his murderous sin is not hidden after all when Nathan delivers the following message (2 Samuel 12: 7-9):
This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you all Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes?
The prophet says God himself gave David his master’s wives and that he would have added more wives to David had he gone about things the right way. If polygamy was inherently sinful, this would be an excellent place to read about it. Instead, we read about God claiming through his prophet to have taken part in David’s polygamous life.
King Solomon deserves an honorary mention for his little contributions to polygyny. The Bible records Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines—he was cut out from a different substance (Vibranium, maybe?) than most men today! Much of those unions would probably have been political alliances, assuming the numbers are literal historical figures. The relevant point to track here is that even at this extreme, the text does not condemn Solomon for having so many wives. Instead, the text renounces Solomon for having foreign wives who remained devoted to foreign gods. That the wives were foreigners was not the issue—after all, Ruth was a Moabite. The problem is the wives’ devotion to their local gods and the corruption of the worship of Yahweh that ensued from the unions.
Unsurprisingly, no one uses the Old Testament per se in the defense of monogamy, except for the citation of a phrase that recurs in the New Testament. Nowhere in the Hebrew Bible is polygamy condemned in its own right. This does not mean that the Hebrew Bible prescribes polygamy for all. In fact, Deuteronomy 17:17 specifically prohibits Israel’s kings from multiplying wives, “And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold.” Notice, however, God’s given reason for the prohibition. The concern is that multiplying wives might turn the king’s heart away from a believing loyalty and commitment to Yahweh. No, this verse does not imply that women are inherently evil for kings. On the contrary, the language anticipates that Israel’s kings may marry foreign wives for political reasons, just as Solomon eventually did, and foreign wives are devoted to foreign gods.
Polygamy in the New Testament
When European missionaries condemned the polygamy they saw in Africa, they did so on an assumed authority of the New Testament. They concluded that both Jesus and Paul forbade polygamous unions. The following are the key passages informing such reasoning against polygyny: Matthew 5:31-32, Mark 10:2-12, Matthew 19: 1-9, 1 Corinthians 7:2-16, Ephesians 5:22-23, 1 Timothy 3:1-2, and Titus 1:6. Let us zoom in on each of these passages.
What’s up with Matthew 5:31-32, Mark 10:2-12, and Matthew 19: 1-9?
These passages document the same event. The Matthew 5 passage seems to be a conclusion from the more extended Matthew 19 account. In the story, some law experts came to test Jesus on a very controversial subject of the day: divorce. Based on the text of Deuteronomy 24:1-4, two Jewish schools of interpretation competed during Jesus’ time. There was the conservative, strict, and Israel-centered school of Rabbi Shammai, who restricted the conditions for divorcing a woman. There was also a more liberal, Gentiles-welcoming school of Rabbi Hillel, who immensely expanded the grounds for divorcing a woman. Like the other Pharisaic testing of Jesus, the goal of this question on divorce was to get him to lose goodwill with people and lose some of his followers. The questioners assumed Jesus would answer one way or another within the existing schools of interpretation. Had Jesus fallen for the trap, he would likely lose the support of those offended by his explanation. However, the Gospels repeatedly show that Jesus often knew about a better third option that the questioners typically did not consider.
Matthew 19:3 reports the Pharisees questioning Jesus this way: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?” The questioners here assumed the Hillelite position on the matter. In Mark’s account, Jesus replies by asking the questioners what the law says. They correctly reply that “Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away” (Mark 10:4). Jesus tells his interlocutors that this part of the Torah is not really God’s ideal. He then teaches from the Genesis creation account that the union of a man and a woman was meant to be permanent and that “‘the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh” (Mark 10:8). Jesus later teaches his disciples, according to Matthew’s account, that marriage ought to be indissoluble except for marital unfaithfulness (Matthew 19:9, 5:32). Like the Shammaite school, Jesus also severely restricts the conditions for divorce.
The relevant portions of the story are the uses of the singular “wife” and the phrase “one flesh.” Some have argued that this phrase forbids polygyny as the story explicitly says one man and one woman become one flesh. However, such reasoning is flawed. First, ancient Jews had no legal or religious provisions against polygyny. They were culturally polygamous until Rome took over the land. Second, the passages above were directed primarily at divorce. This being the case, Eugene Hillman writes (160):
No matter how many wives a husband may have, the action of divorce is normally directed against only one “wife” at a time. The fact that Jesus spoke of the “wife” in the singular is, therefore, just what might be expected in a discussion about divorce according to the law of Moses. It is surely too much to construe this use of the singular as an argument, a teaching, or a statement against simultaneous polygamy.
By “simultaneous polygamy,” Hillman refers to having more than one wife concurrently, as opposed to serially marrying and divorcing wives, one at a time.
Similarly, the “one flesh” language is no argument for monogamy. In context, the Genesis creation account uses the phrase “one flesh” to refer to a new, almost indissoluble unity—a newly formed bond to be respected. The man leaves his parents to join with his wife so that the couple can forge a new and distinct identity, separate from their parents’ ways of doing things. Being raised by different parents, a new couple must necessarily slowly negotiate what their norms would be. Edward Schillebeeckx writes:
“The idea of ‘one flesh’ provides an answer to the question: How can the division of the old clans and the foundation of the new clans be justified? ‘A man leaves his father and his mother’ (Gen. 2:24) in order to found a new clan, a ‘new house,’ or a new ‘one flesh’” (quoted in Gitari, 6).
Notice that there is nothing in this “one flesh” idea that forbids polygyny. A polygynous man would be “one flesh” with each of his wives. As already argued, many central figures in Israel’s history engaged in simultaneous polygyny. Are we to think that Jacob, for instance, was not “one flesh” with all the wives who produced the 12 tribes, including the one from which the Messiah descended? That would be nonsense.
Besides, another Jewish understanding of “one flesh” is worth considering. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6:16, “Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, ‘The two will become one flesh.’” Chastising the Corinthian church for sexual immorality, Paul teaches them that anyone who sleeps with a prostitute becomes “one flesh” with her and then references Genesis 2:24. Surely, Paul is not teaching that the promiscuous men ought to marry the temple prostitutes now that they have become “one flesh” with them. Notice that some loose men were married, as evidenced by 1 Corinthians 7. Did they cease to be “one flesh” with the wives that they had been legally sleeping with since they got married? Of course, not. As Paul would write in the next chapter, he encourages each man to have sexual relations with only his wife. Hence, “one flesh” is no argument for monogamy. Instead, in this case, it is a figure of speech for sexual intercourse.
The two thoughts above about “one flesh” raise an interesting question: if the phrase argues for monogamy, as the European missionaries to Africa thought, how is it possible for a widow or divorcee to remarry? A widow and a divorcee have been “one flesh” with different men. Do they yank off their bodily portions from previous marriages to join with men in new marriages—and are they whole in the new marriages? Pushed too far, this idea of “one flesh” symbolizing monogamy generates absurdities.
What about 1 Corinthians 7: 2-16 and Ephesians 5:22-23?
Whereas the context of the Gospel passages we just considered is Jewish, these current passages from Paul’s letters were directed to Gentiles in the Greco-Roman world. Some Christians have hastily reasoned from Paul’s uses of the singular “wife” in these passages to conclude that Paul teaches monogamy as the Christian ideal. Ephesians 5:23 even likens the union of a man and a woman to that of Jesus and his Church. Do these passages really teach monogamy?
This kind of reasoning is guilty of making a doctrine from the incidental details of a passage. It is as good as arguing that because it is recorded that Jesus walked on water, all Christians ought to jump into the nearest lakes. That Paul assumed monogamy in these passages, especially in 1 Corinthians 7, does not amount to a teaching against polygyny. The question may be raised, “Why did Paul assume monogamy in these passages?”
Greece, and later Rome, had a definite family structure that dated all the way back to the days of Plato, possibly earlier. In descending order of authority and value, a family unit comprised a husband, one wife, children, and slaves. In his Politics, Aristotle even forcefully argued in defense of this family structure, where he defended the ontological inferiority of women and Greco-Roman slaves. So, the Greco-Roman world was culturally monogamous. That they were monogamous does not mean that their marriages were godly or Christian in practice. In fact, because of the near-absolute power the husbands wielded, they could be—and typically were—as promiscuous as they wanted. Ancient Greece also culturally practiced pederasty, where older men had sex with young boys in some sort of acceptable educational arrangement of the time.
This Greco-Roman family structure is reflected, though with a subtle but powerful subversion, in Ephesians 5 and 6, where Paul addressed each family member: husbands, wives, children, and slaves. Of course, Europeans once used this text to argue for slavery. However, that erroneous reasoning is also behind arguing for monogamy based on Paul’s uses of the singular “wife.” It is a mistake that results from ignorance of (historical) context. In summary, Paul used the singular “wife” to address a monogamous culture. Had Paul written a letter to any of the polygamous people of Africa or even his polygamous Jewish people, he would have assumed the plural “wives.” These texts teach nothing about what marriage form is ideal or Christian.
These pastoral passages have also been cited to defend monogamy. Both passages require an elder to be “faithful to his wife” or be “a one-woman man.” Once again, some Christians hastily latch onto the singular use of “wife” as a defense of monogamy. Even without digging too deeply into the non-universality of the requirements in these letters, they indeed do not teach against polygamy among Christians. A polygamous Christian may choose not to become an elder in the church, and he can keep his wives.
However, we can say more. That Paul writes to a church requiring the leadership to not appoint a polygamous man to the position of an elder plausibly suggests that polygyny existed in that church. If polygamy was inherently sinful or unchristian, these passages would be suitable spots to read about them. William Wenstrom writes that the phrase faithful to his wife or, as some translations have it, husband of one wife “does not emphasize the man’s marital status but rather his character” (4). The Faithlife Study Bible further adds in a note on 1 Timothy 3:2, “Since polygamy was already considered immoral in Graeco-Roman society, it is unlikely that Paul specifically prohibits it here.” So, we see again that Paul here assumes what was culturally normative for the recipients of the letters.
Besides, the eldership requirements of these letters cannot be universalized without problems. For instance, does this requirement imply that unmarried people, like Timothy and Paul himself, cannot be elders in the church? Certainly not, for the two were already elders! So, maybe in a culture that is primarily monogamous, polygamy would be a litmus test for marital unfaithfulness, causing Paul to exclude such men from leadership positions in that location. However, this is not necessarily true of all cultures. In particular, the sociological dynamics of a primarily polygamous culture would be different. What would a church established among polygamous people do about electing elders – function without choosing elders because no one is monogamous or choose elders purely because they are monogamous, even if otherwise unfaithful?
In summary, we see that the reasoning or, better still, the assumption that monogamy is the Christian form of marriage with Scriptural and apostolic sanction is likely merely a case of hooded ethnocentrism. It certainly was a case of European missionaries pushing their cultures as Christian ideals in Africa. Not a single text in the Old or the New Testament either condemns polygyny or commends monogamy to all believers.
Works Cited
Barry, John D., Douglas Mangum, Derek R. Brown, Michael S. Heiser, Miles Custis, Elliot Ritzema, Matthew M. Whitehead, Michael R. Grigoni, and David Bomar. 2012, 2016. Faithlife Study Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.
Falen, Douglas J. “Polygyny and Christian Marriage in Africa: The Case of Benin.” African Studies Review, vol. 51, no. 2, 2008, pp. 51–74. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/27667340. Accessed 20 Mar. 2021.
Gitari, David. “The Church and Polygamy.” Transformation, vol. 1, no. 1, 1984, pp. 3–10. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43052879. Accessed 20 Mar. 2021.
Hillman, Eugene. Polygamy Reconsidered: African Plural Marriage and the Christian Churches. New York: Orbis, 1975. Print.
Notermans, Catrien. “True Christianity without Dialogue: Women and the Polygyny Debate in Cameroon.” Anthropos, vol. 97, no. 2, 2002, pp. 341–353. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40466036. Accessed 20 Mar. 2021.
Ryle, Herbert E. “Genesis.” Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1921. Genesis 2:24, Genesis 2 Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (biblehub.com). Accessed April 10, 2021.
Tosato, Angelo. “On Genesis 2:24.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 3, 1990, pp. 389–409. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43718091. Accessed 30 Oct. 2024.
Wenstrom, William E. “Exegesis and Exposition of Titus 1:6-9.” Academia. March 24, 2021.
