Intimacy, Modesty And Sexuality: A Total Reverse Look at Conventional Wisdom
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That was great Reply
To: London Boy
A possible answer to your question:
If you read the biblical narratives that describe Abraham and Jacob's multiple marriages, you will see that they did not take second wives by desire, but rather due to extenuating circumstances--it seems that polygamy was not an ideal, but sometimes necessary.
Why necessary for the man? A man has a biblical obligation to procreate; a woman does not have such an obligation (as a biblical command). Therefore, it seems the Torah allowed for men to marry more than one wife if necessary to fulfill this obligation.
It seems that polygamy was preferable to divorcing a wife that was loved, but unfortunately barren. The second wife was often conferred a lower status (such as a concubine), thus maintaining some level of exclusive status or relationship between the man and first wife.
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Re: download Thanks for asking! Rabbi Friedman's classes cannot be downloaded, but they can be purchased via the link that's under the player above. In general if a class is available for download you'll notice a 'download' link under the player. Reply
download hi, is there any way to download these speeches so that I can listen to them in the car? Reply
Exclusive?
Very interesting and I have been thinking about this talk.
Rabbi, kindly tell me something though, how is it that before Rabbeinu Gershon we men were allowed more than one wife. How was such a reality in any way exclusive? Fine, from the woman's perspective she only lets one man into her life, one master and in that sense exclusivity is retained; but from the man's perspective there is what I will term an 'expanded exclusivity' - any number of wives within reason (4 I believe, yet David HaMelech had 18.
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This is really confusing.