July 25. 2008 02:23

Wow, what a great post! When I hear the word "Polygamy", I get my warrior battle armor on, my battle-ax ready to go....but you are thinking quite rationally about the whole issue. I'm impressed!

I totally agree: the human heart can only truly love one person at a time....serial monogamy works because (although you have had more than one partner) you are true to your partner while you are with him/her.

My grandmother was the daughter of a polygamist man in Colonia Juarez, Mexico. She told me stories that would make your hair stand up on end. Such as, her mother and aunt were the two wives and you are absolutely right, those two sisters were the actual bonded pair. My great-grandmother insisted that he marry her sister along with herself because she always wanted to be with her! Everything went along swimmingly until, at the age of 60, my great-grandfather decided he was going to take a third wife....a long red-haired sprite of a girl, who rode bareback horses at breakneck speed through the town....a girl of 17 named Maud. That marriage broke everything. The first two wives told him he was persona non grata and not to come back. The tale is that he would go from house to house, asking to spend the night....only to be turned away by my great-grandmother and great-great aunt and also by Maud, who said, "Come back in two days". It was bad news.

I met Maud when she was a 90 year old woman....I liked her. She still had fire in her eyes. But I think she was sacrified on the altar of male dominance and lust.

Cyn

Cyn

July 25. 2008 03:21

I agree! Great post! We here in Havana are on Season Two of Big Love. It's also Big Laughs! No Big Cigars though...

Fidel

July 25. 2008 04:09

Great post Lisey! I have seen the first few disks of Big Love and while it made polygamy a more 'reachable' subject since the audience can see a modern, dramatized version on how it "works", we see that in truth, polygamy just doesn't "work". Not ever. You're totally right in that it is impossible to love more than one person truly and deeply. I thought that was what marriage was supposed to be about; forsaking all others and bonding with another human being where your strengths and weaknesses complement each other. Polygamy does not allow for that. Even Barb, the 'bonded' wife can't be as bonded because she has to compete for her husband's attention. Having to sneak around with your own husband and fight tooth and nail to have time with him is not productive to a healthy relationship.

Polygamy has always made my hair stand on end and a wave of nausea soon follows... After seeing how the FLDS families live recently in the news, I've been thinking a lot about the scripture 'by their fruits ye shall know them' (Matt 7:16). The fruit of polygamy is just plain and simply awful. I've wrestled with the notion of polygamy ever since I found out about it (which was after I had gained a testimony of the gospel...or else I would not still be here today...) and I just don't see how it could produce good fruits. Yes, there's always the argument that God needed the budding church to grow super fast and that was the fastest way, but I look at the women who are affected by polygamy now (and imagine what I’ve heard and read about in the 19th century), and see that the FLDS church is a fruit of our church history. How can it be good?

These questions maybe rhetorical, but hey, I feel like 'mining' today!

Nicole

July 28. 2008 19:24

I haven't seen Big Love, so I can't comment on that, but I'm going to have to disagree as far as polygamy in general. I think there are people that really can make multiple simultaneous relationships work. I think they're in the minority, but I think it can happen. Look at the various people practicing polyamory today.

Additionally, looking at things from an eternal perspective, for those who have had spouses die and remarried...I can't see how it could be heaven if they're being forced to choose between loves and such. My maternal grandmother died before she was forty and my grandpa got remarried and was married to the grandmother I knew for over forty years. There's another woman I know who is currently a fairly young widow. She's not planning on getting remarried at this point, but if things ever break down completely with an ex-fiance's marriage (which has been rocky for decades), they've still got such a connection that they'd probably get married. Knowing how she feels about both men...again, if such a thing does happen, I can't imagine her being forced to choose.

Polygamy and polyandry absolutely aren't for everyone, but I hesitate to make blanket condemnations. All I know is my own selfish heart and many people don't share the same faults I have.

Firebyrd

July 29. 2008 03:04

Firebyrd, you make interesting points in your comment. My own maternal grandmother was sealed to her first love, who died at the age of 21, leaving her pregnant with my mother. She remarried the man I knew as "Grandpa" several years later and had a large family with him. She always dreaded "having to choose".

Well, the Church now seals a woman to every husband she was legally married to in life. Therefore, I should re-seal my grandmother to her first husband (that sealing was personally cancelled by George Albert Smith...). However, I am loathe to do it. I don't know why.

I personally believe that although we are sealed to only one person in the afterlife, our dear loves, friends and family are "sealed" in some way as well....that they continue their association with us throughout the eternities.

Cyn

July 29. 2008 04:29

Lisey,

Or as Swedenborg indicates in his vision of the kingdom he called "Celestial" (writing 30 years before Joseph Smith's first vision):

In heaven, people are married....and the Lord is the matchmaker.

I find that if the Lord brought someone to me and said, "This is your eternal husband", I would immediate accept that because I know that the Lord knows both of us better than we know ourselves and has our eternal happiness in mind.

For those lucky enough on earth to have had the Lord's intervention in their courtship, Lisey, I am filled with holy envy.

Cyn

July 29. 2008 19:51

This is where a lot of people would consider me going off into crazy, evil speculation land, but I think you're exactly right about fairness. If there is polygamy in heaven, I'm sure there's polyandry as well, and my guess is that there is indeed both. The Church now quietly allowing dead women to be sealed to multiple men just confirms my bias, even if the official line is that it's done so they can choose one from among all the spouses.

I admittedly don't have experiences with having a strong romantic bond with multiple people at the same time, so I don't know how hard that must be. I wouldn't even suggest that most people could do it, but some seem to be able to make it work, or at least they claim that they can. I'm not even going to go into the FLDS church, though, as that whole situation just makes steam come out of my ears (but I don't think they qualify with what I'm talking about!).

Firebyrd

August 25. 2008 13:32

Lisey: "That said, my rebuttal to anyone who tells me "God needed to 'grow' his people with polygamy." - "What of Adam & Eve?" If there was ever a time growth was needed it was right after the fall."

The efficacity of polygamy for population growth is negatory unless there's a considerable male/female imbalance. Unless your position is that Adam and Eve happened to have way more daughters than sons, I think you need a different rebuttal.

Tertium Quid

August 25. 2008 13:38

Why is the requisite of fairness that women should also "get" multiple husbands? This reminds me of children, arguing that their cookie had to be exactly as big as their brother's.

I know God is fair, and that's why I'll get to have babies in eternity?

Tertium Quid