Why is polygamy such a hot-button topic?

[KevinG]

That is why I think polygamy was not about just taking care of the needy. I think there really were occasions (and perhaps many of them) where the eternal happiness of two or three people was better off for them to form a partnership, and some women chose the status of sharing a good man, who they were well matched too, over having one of their own, who perhaps wasn't the one for them.

It really does get back to nurturing, and love and a strong bond.

P.S. my wife says if making babies in heaven isn't like it is here, she doesn't have any use for it then We like the strengthening the marital bond part of the routine.

[Zakuska]

I nominate DaDof7 as the official board Polygamy thread supervisor.

[MorningStar]

Bump

[Nighthawke]

No, I don't believe he was faulty in his research at all. He was however faulty in his writing of this book by not giving readers the whole picture. He should have left his enmity of polygamy at the door. I want all the information so I can make up my own mind not have Compton sift the information so that I'll arrive at the same conclusion he did.

OK, Nighthawke....Now I'm torn at NOT wanting to read the book because it's obvious he's purposely slanting the information to support his own bias, and wanting to read the book for curiosity's sake! LOL

I'm actually leaning toward not bothering to read it because unless it is clearly stated that there is a bias, it's not right to appear to be objective when you're not.

I haven't read the entire book, either.

What about reading the book, knowing there's a bias, whether intentional or not. Then gleaning what you can from the material. Unless he just fabricated the quotes, there is still truth to be found.

It may not give the whole picture, but could still provide pieces to the puzzle.

Compton's bias is pervasive in In Sacred Loneliness. I do not recommend it. I gave the example of Annie Clark Tanner earlier. Look at his style:

Compton writes:

Annie Clark Tanner wrote of her husband, "When he came to my house, he was more like a guest."

Thus the title of this book, In Sacred Loneliness.

And I responded that Compton said nothing, squat, zip, nada about:

Annie Clark Tanner's father was opposed to her marrying polygamously and that Annie defied her father and chose to marry Joseph Tanner secretly as his second wife. That a few months after her wedding her husband left on a 3 1/2 year mission to Europe and that when he returned from his mission polygamists were being arrested and jailed forcing Annie to live on "the underground." She lived under assumed names and like all other plural wives at that time frequently moved from home to home of trusted relatives and friends. Her father, Ezra Clark, spent six months in the federal penitentiary for "unlawful cohabitation." I'm sure she saw very little of her father during that same period of persecution and prosecution of both men and women who were polygamists at that time.

He leaves all of that out. He also leaves out that Annie was fully aware that polygamy was going to be difficult. That her husband, Joseph Tanner, discussed the subject of prosecution with Annie and her reply? "Prosecution is a trifling thing compared to the satisfaction of living God's laws.''

Nope, just shuts her up and boils it down to:

Annie Clark Tanner wrote of her husband, "When he came to my house, he was more like a guest."

Thus the title of this book, In Sacred Loneliness.

Compton continues:

Often plural wives who experienced loneliness also reported feelings of depression, despair, anxiety, helplessness, abandonment, anger, psychosomatic symptoms, and low self-esteem. Certainly polygamous marriage was accepted by nineteenth-century Mormons as thoroughly sacred

[liz3564]

Regarding celestial polyandry, and the biological aspect - (and I do have to admit I haven't had time to keep up with this thread, so maybe someone brought this up and I missed it)

Some of you are making the assumption that reproduction will take place in the CK the way it does here - why?

And if reproduction takes place some other way (and surely it must be different in SOME way to produce a "spirit child" instead of a flesh and blood child), then all this discussion of biology making polyandry unrealistic is unfounded.

I've wondered about this as well.

[liz3564]

P.S. my wife says if making babies in heaven isn't like it is here, she doesn't have any use for it then We like the strengthening the marital bond part of the routine.

Practice does make perfect! LOL

[onelowerlight]

Regarding celestial polyandry, and the biological aspect - (and I do have to admit I haven't had time to keep up with this thread, so maybe someone brought this up and I missed it)

Some of you are making the assumption that reproduction will take place in the CK the way it does here - why?

And if reproduction takes place some other way (and surely it must be different in SOME way to produce a "spirit child" instead of a flesh and blood child), then all this discussion of biology making polyandry unrealistic is unfounded.

I remember when I was a missionary to Alpha, she had a couple of questions like this once. And I was talking about it later with my companion, and he had a good response.

The question: by what mechanism are spirit children created?

The answer: by the power of God. Nothing more, nothing less.

Kind of like how people ask about how Moses parted the Red Sea. They ask, "how can that be physically possible?" So then they either stop believing that it happened, or they find out some way that it could be conceivably possible, either through science or pseudo-science, and when that happens, they just say "oh, it wasn't a miracle - it actually happened quite naturally." So there really is no exact answer that drives out the spirit of the whole thing, so the best (and possibly only) answer is: BY THE POWER OF GOD.

If it were essential for us to understand the character of God, and thus understand what it means to become like God, he would have revealed more about this mechanism to us. He hasn't - except that it's done BY THE POWER OF GOD.

Besides, whenever posters on this board start wondering about the nature of God's intimate relations with his eternal companion(s), threads tend to get shut down.

So, I don't think it's really essential to know about this; that you can understand plural marriage without going there.

[Dale]

I believe Jesus created spirits. (collossians 1:16) I do not believe New Testament proof-texts for God being the literal Father of spirits really work.

[MorningStar]

I've been wanting to add my 2 cents to this topic, but it will be more like $2 and I can't bring myself to write anything really lengthy right now because either I'll be interrupted or someone will write something really offensive and get the thread shut down right before I hit "add reply". I don't know if I would have anything to say that hasn't been said already anyway, but I might. Perhaps I'll slowly work on a word document in hopes that this thread will still exist by the time I get done with it.

[beastie]

I hate to break it to the men, but just the fact that the infant mortality rate has always been higher for male infants than female infants will result in millions more males in the CK than females.

Just look at the figures. The human population, added up from 1 AD (which, obviously, is an underestimation) is over 18.9 billion. (someone will probably need to check my horrible math)

http://desip.igc.org/populationmaps.html

I'm not sure what the overall comparison of male infant mortality to female infant mortality, but in well fed Canada it is a constant 1.3

http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/rhs-ssg/factshts/mort_e.html

That seems like a conservative guess for the overal rate (I imagine it's probably higher overall).

Overall infant mortality rate varies quite a bit, but since the US is at 7.6 (per thousand) another conservative guess would be 8 per thousand. Unless my math is really messed up (always possible) that means there will be millions more males in the CK than females.

Uh oh. Time to turn the tables. Belly up to the angst bar, boys.

[beastie]

BTW, the actual figure of how many more infant males than infant females have died since 1 AD, based on the figures I used above, would be 35 million more males than females in the CK, based on infant deaths alone.

(according to my significant other, who is a heck of a lot better at math than I am... and even if the male infant mortality rate was the far more conservative 51 to 49 percent, that would still leave us with 6 million more males than females who went straight to the CK)

[charity]

The question has never been about how many males. It has always been worthy males. Now, shall we get into a really worthwhile discussion on how many angels can stand on the head of a pin?

[alannasaunt]

The question has never been about how many males. It has always been worthy males. Now, shall we get into a really worthwhile discussion on how many angels can stand on the head of a pin?

Males who died in infancy just came here to get a body.

If what we've been told is true, that those who die before age 8 go straight to CK, these males are worthy. Much more than the female babies who survived.

[onelowerlight]

Uh oh. Time to turn the tables. Belly up to the angst bar, boys.

The question has never been about how many males. It has always been worthy males. Now, shall we get into a really worthwhile discussion on how many angels can stand on the head of a pin?

Yeah, I'm not too worried about it. I only offered the argument to open up a new way of thinking about the issue. Looks like you've been thinking, and I appreciate it - but I wouldn't take it too seriously if it leads you into a new dilemma. I've learned not to take doctrinal speculation too seriously.

My experience is all it takes to make most people's concerns about the church change from troubling and unsettling to silly and nonthreatening is a fresh perspective.

[alannasaunt]

I've been wanting to add my 2 cents to this topic, but it will be more like $2 and I can't bring myself to write anything really lengthy right now because either I'll be interrupted or someone will write something really offensive and get the thread shut down right before I hit "add reply". I don't know if I would have anything to say that hasn't been said already anyway, but I might. Perhaps I'll slowly work on a word document in hopes that this thread will still exist by the time I get done with it.

Hi Morningstar,

We've been pretty good,so far, don't ya think? Hopefully, nobody's going to start messing up now.

I would be very interested in what you have to say. Just please don't use the angry face.

[Ralph Man]

I hate to break it to the men, but just the fact that the infant mortality rate has always been higher for male infants than female infants will result in millions more males in the CK than females.

There's actually a slightly higher chance of a woman giving birth to a male child than a female child. The ratio is around 1.05/1. It is also true that males tend to have a higher infant mortality rate and otherwise are more likely to die before they hit the age of reproduction than females. As you say, more men are getting the early-death CK card.

---------------------------------

On an aside,

So the fact that male births are a little more frequent is evidence of a wise, good God anticipating infant morality and planning ahead so there would be a roughly 50/50 ratio of men to women come marryin' time, right? After all, the odds that this would happen by chance are astronomical.

Someone famously made this argument:

Among innumerable Footsteps of Divine Providence to be found in the Works of Nature, there is a very remarkable one to be observed in the exact balance that is maintained, between the number of Men and Women; for by this means it is provided that the Species may never fail, nor perish, since every Male may have its Female, and of a proportionable Age. The Equality of Males and Females is not the Effect of Chance but Divine Providence, working for a good End, which I thus demonstrate..

You win a cookie if you tell me who. If ya see anything wrong with this argument, feel free to start another thread.

[alannasaunt]

I don't know the answer Ralph, but I am dying to know it.

Please don't make me wait too long. Patience is another virtue I haven't really mastered.

[asbestosman]

Isn't the whole number of males and females only a problem when dealing with finite numbers. Once there are an infinite number of both, we can pair them up 1:2, 1:10, or 1:1 just as one can pair up all the multiples of 3 to all the integers and not have any left over on either group.

Of course you might have to wait around literally forver to get a spouse, but I suppose it could all work out in the end. Well, not that there is an end. And maybe you wouldn't have to wait if things are done in parallel or if time can somehow flow differently.

[thesometimesaint]

beastie:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/infant_mortalit...zkxBHNlYwN0bQ--

[liz3564]

I know that Beastie was somewhat joking, but something struck me that Charity pointed out. Let's see if I can combine the two ideas here.

Charity is correct....the males in question have to be worthy males...However, if we are speaking about males who died in infancy, then they would be considered perfect...so, in that sense, they would definitely be worthy to enter the Celestial Kingdom.

However, here's something that can once again make the off-shoot subjects as clear as mud... I had read somewhere that if a child dies, the parents will have the opportunity to raise that child in the next life....so...even though there are many males...they're all still children that will need to be raised first. So maybe that potentially could bring us back to the same dilmena.

Getting back to the original stance of the thread....my initial question was...How could a concept like polygamy, which seems to so innately go against the grain of the nature of many of us who are faithful Latter-Day Saints be of God?

There has been a lot of talk here about the natural man, about sacrifice, about social indoctrination, about different forms of love.

I think, after all is said and done, it comes down to gaining a personal testimony of whether or not polygamy is a principle of God through study and personal prayer.

This thread has really helped me open up some avenues to study...which I will continue to do. The next part I'm going to seriously pursue is prayer. And, to be honest, I'm a little scared of what I might find.....but I do love the Lord, and I trust that He will lead me in the right direction.

I appreciate everyone's contribution here. Even though we are all relative strangers, I do feel that you have been an answer to my prayers of wanting to gain a further understanding of this principle. I sincerely thank all of you for that.

I look forward to what we can continue to share.

[beastie]

I know that Beastie was somewhat joking, but something struck me that Charity pointed out. Let's see if I can combine the two ideas here.

I'm not joking.

I'm an atheist, so I don't believe any of this is actually going to take place, but, if the LDS are correct, and this all is going to take place, I think it is unavoidable that there will be many more males than females in the CK. (unless the church has retracted the teaching that children who die before the age of accountability go straight to the CK)

When I was a believer, my own resolution to this problem, obtained through study and prayer, was that Joseph Smith was mistaken when he introduced polygamy as God's will.

[liz3564]

The other possibility that I have thought more and more about while reading posts...Dadof7 posts, in particular...is that if polygamy was God's will, it was not being practiced correctly which is why it was taken away.

It's something that we are just in no way ready to truly understand or accept.

My internal conflict with this philosophy is that if I don't understand it now, how am I going to understand it then, since my basic personality is not going to change.

OK...it's late...time for me to sleep on it.

'Night everyone!

[charity]

Just one more comment about males in the Celestial Kingdom. Yes, children who die before age 8 will be automatically in the Celestial Kingdom to my understanding. But that doesn't mean there will be more males there than females. Because what if a lot more males than females who live past 8 are just plain bad guys? Or unworthy? There could still be a surplus of worhty females.

But to get completely back to the topic, so I won't be deleted or slapped, the real reason why polygamy is a hot button topic is because 1. it requires the most Christlike attributes to live, and 2. because Satanic tries to cheapen and degrade the most holy principles. And to the degree that many, if not most people, focus on the sexual relationship aspect, he succeeds.

[beastie]

Just one more comment about males in the Celestial Kingdom. Yes, children who die before age 8 will be automatically in the Celestial Kingdom to my understanding. But that doesn't mean there will be more males there than females. Because what if a lot more males than females who live past 8 are just plain bad guys? Or unworthy? There could still be a surplus of worhty females.

Enough to not only compensate for, but put into deficit, the 35 million excess?

Wow. Why are males so much worse than females, in general?

You know, even with the minor modifications some have offered here, my reasoning appears pretty sound. LDS realize that children who die before the age of 8 are guaranteed entrance into the CK, and likely realize the infant male mortality rate is higher than the female, but just aren't taking into account how large that number would eventually be, multiplied over time.

Why is that polyandry appears to make people so uncomfortable that they seem determined to deny it even as a possibility - even when supported by simple logic and math?

[onelowerlight]

My internal conflict with this philosophy is that if I don't understand it now, how am I going to understand it then, since my basic personality is not going to change.

Your basic personality may not change, but I can guarantee that your understanding and perspective of things will change. As will mine. I'm looking forward to it. But your understanding can change independant of your personality. At least, I hope it is - because I hope that you are constantly learning and growing!

About the whole CK males vs females, it would be very narrow minded to only look at infant mortality rates - what about gender ratios of child mortality rates? Such as up to age 8, until which the CK status is still guaranteed? What about the millions of girls born in China over the past century - many of whom, undocumented, have been murdered or abandoned to die? Are any of us capable of factoring in the ratio of accountable CK bound women to men? After all, throughout history, women have generally been the oppressed, not the oppressors, and as such I would think they would be more liable to enter the CK. Are any of us REALLY capable of calculating this thing with any degree of accuracy? Then lets not worry about it.

When I brought up the possibility of a gender imbalance in the CK, it was not meant as a serious answer to the question "why would God command polygamy?" It was just meant to be food for thought.

I don't take gospel speculation seriously, and I seriously recommend that nobody here takes it too seriously, either. I do it for fun and also to keep myself from becoming too rigid in my world-view.

my initial question was...How could a concept like polygamy, which seems to so innately go against the grain of the nature of many of us who are faithful Latter-Day Saints be of God?

I don't think it necessarily goes against our nature as latter-day saints. A lot of our reactions to church things depend upon the culture that nurtured us.

For example, 1 Nephi 4, with Nephi killing Laban, was a VERY difficult thing for one of my investigators to reconcile - we spent many visits discussing this topic, even searched through www.lds.org to find things to help him with it. And yet, I heard that when Hugh Nibley was teaching Book of Mormon at BYU, a lot of the arab students in his class also had difficulty with that chapter - that is, difficulty understanding why Nephi would WAIT to kill Laban! It's a cultural, social conditioning thing - not a human nature thing.

And honestly, for me, I don't feel that plural marriage (polygyny, not polyandry) goes against the grain for me. And think that that holds true for Charity, Dadof7, and Del March as well.

Which goes to show that if the discomfort with this doctrine is connected with some part of our humanity, it ISN'T connected with a part of our humanity that can't change without leaving our basic personalities intact.