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John Chrysostom acknowledges Poly.

rockfox

rockfox

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Not long ago @Verifyveritas76 brought to light an early church father who acknowledged that the Apostle Paul taught polygamy in 1 Cor 7...

Verifyveritas76 said:
Clement of Alexandria

On Marriage
Miscellaneous III
...It is of second marriage that the apostle says, If you burn, marry.

Interestingly enough, Clement has just listed all three forms of acceptable states. Unmarried, mono and Poly.
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A point begrudgingly acknowledged by Tertullian, though he opposed polygyny.

I ran across another early church father echoing this same teaching. This time it is John Chrysostom, one of the most important and prolific fathers and contemporary to Augustine, in his Homily 20 on Ephesians, writing some 200 years after Tertullian and Clement.

But what will they say, who are knit together in second marriages? I speak not at all in condemnation of them, God forbid; for the Apostle himself permits them, though indeed by way of condescension.
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This was in the context of a long and valuable discussion on the role of fear and love in marriage (from Eph 5:33).

He also makes a related comment about one of the more famous polygamists in the scripture:

Consider Abraham, and Sarah, and Isaac, and the three hundred and eighteen born in his house. Genesis 14:14 How the whole house was harmoniously knit together, how the whole was full of piety and fulfilled the Apostolic injunction. She also "reverenced her husband"; for hear her own words, "It has not yet happened unto me even until now, and my lord is old also."
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At least at that time, they weren't construing ALL polygamous marriages as unharmonious and nasty. It is only fitting to think that Abraham, of all people, would generally have a harmonious house (ignoring certain isolated controversies) and to a noteworthy extent at that.
 
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rockfox said:
John Chrysostom said:
But what will they say, who are knit together in second marriages? I speak not at all in condemnation of them, God forbid; for the Apostle himself permits them, though indeed by way of condescension.
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Hell, even we speak of second marriages with condescension: We advise to wait. Pray. Go slow, back off, forget it altogether, don't seek it, count the cost, and wait some more. 1,500 years from now maybe someone will construe that we condemned them outright! o_O:D But of course we don't and apparently neither did Chrysostom and others.
 
PassionatePatriarch said:
Question, maybe this seems a bit dull of me...but how do we know he is not talking about second marriages as in, marrying after a divorce?
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I thought of that too, but there seemed to be no qualifying language. In that day and age, I wonder what was more prevalent, divorce or polygyny? Any clues or guesses?
 
The context of the discussion of "Second marriages" by Clement and Tertullian is clear it refers to poly.
 
mystic said:
Read. OP provided a link.
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Haha... thanks. I've read well past that section in Homily 20, and I'm not seeing any clear indication that he's referencing plural marriage with "second marriage". In fact soon after that he seems to indicate that he didn't really view Hagar as a wife, but rather that Abraham owed it to Sarah to forsake Hagar specifically *because* Sarah was actually his wife.

Maybe I'm missing something.
 
PassionatePatriarch said:
I'm not seeing any clear indication that he's referencing plural marriage with "second marriage".
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In Homily 20, no it's not clear. That is simply because it is a one sentence digression to mention he does not condemn second marriages; he presumed his readers knew what that meant (that and the digression itself indicate this was 'an issue').

But the very same language looks like it was used by Clement of both PM and remarriage after death of a spouse. Same for Tertullian. See the thread on Clement for more discussion and links. Here Augustine uses 'second wife' to indicate PM.
 
This is actually kind of complicated because it looks like remarriage after death of your wife was a topic of conversation and frowned upon by some. But while some might claim 'second marriage' is unclear if not defined; we could also say it means any and all second marriages (regardless of whether the first wife is dead, divorced, or still in the home).

And then sometimes they do things like Clement here who both condemns and excuses polymarriage in one paragraph...

We agree with him that the law is the old man and the gospel the new, and say the same ourselves, but not in the sense in which he takes it since he would do away with the law as originating from another God. But it is the same man and Lord who makes the old new, by no longer allowing several marriages (for at that time God required it when men had to increase and multiply), and by teaching single marriage for the sake of begetting children and looking after domestic affairs, for which purpose woman was given as a "helpmeet." And if from sympathy the apostle allows a man a second marriage because he cannot control himself and burns with passion, he also does not commit any sin according to the Old Testament (for it was not forbidden by the Law), but he does not fulfil the heightened perfection of the gospel ethic.
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That from section 82 makes it clear his earlier reference in section 4, quoted by VV above, was about Poly.

Now it takes some fancy footwork to say poly marriage is both 'no longer allowed' and 'not sin'. But thats the contortions you must do when you're trying to conform scripture to Greek culture.

And thats the real gist of the matter. OT was undeniably polygamist and the NT does not clearly condemn it. The best you can come up with is in 1 Cor 7 but the very verse used there to condemn it was viewed by the early church fathers to excuse it. In truth, monogamy came not from God but was pulled into the church from Greek culture (a process that started even before Christ preached His message).
 
Add to that the tradition that, for some, "one man, one woman, for life" is literal. There is no allowance for remarriage after the death of the spouse. Women were expected to remain unmarried widows for the rest of their lives. I have no reference right now. I'm just working off of recollection.

I'm wondering if that has something to do with these treatises.
 
Some schools of thought in Greek culture were very negative against sex and marriage in general. Several of these authors had to justify marriage itself as being not sinful. I suspect monogamy was simply a middle ground compromise between strict ascetic abstinence from all sex and licentious orgies.
 
Rabid is a good adjective for how I feel about such nonsense. You might as well bring back widow burnings.
 
Mojo said:
Women were expected to remain unmarried widows for the rest of their lives.
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1 Timothy 5:11 (KJV) But the younger widows refuse: for when they have begun to wax wanton against Christ, they will marry;
14 I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.
 
The evidence is overwhelming when you read the corpus of the church fathers. Look at the state we are in now.
"Christians" are having 2-3 children max. Pastors/Priests deep down know the farce they are promulgating.
 
Sonny Chancelor said:
The evidence is overwhelming when you read the corpus of the church fathers.
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Could you expound on that? My working knowledge of the early church father's writing is sadly limited.
 
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