Barbara's views on polygamy

Polygamy

Polygamy is a doctrine that even though we know it was in our church's past and we are taught and believe it is part of the celestial kingdom, it is still a doctrine which troubles many people. I do not claim to understand it completely but will share the thoughts I have on the subject.

1. The rest of the world, especially the so-called Christian world, act like polygamy is something that somehow the church needs to explain. They do this without feeling that they have to explain the polygamy in the Old Testament. I feel that David and Solomon's polygamy was unjust in the eyes of God but I don't think you could say the same thing about Abraham and Jacob. So there is evidence in the Old Testament of polygamy among those chosen of God as his righteous leaders. I think we as a Christian religion unite the Old and New Testament better than any other. It seems to me that most Christian religions are based on the New Testament and life of Christ but they don't know what to do with the Old Testament so it is the source of some good stories and some quotable Psalms but by and large, the Old Testament is ignored and many of the rich doctrines (temple being the main one) found therein are just not part of the other Christian religions.

2. I see Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, John Taylor and others of that era as immanently moral men. The type of immorality that is rampant today was unknown to them—at least in terms of a personal choice they would make in how to live their lives. I think that there is no way they could have taken multiple wives without a personal confirmation that it was from God because, otherwise, it would have seemed just too repugnant to them. To me, this is the greatest evidence that it was a commandment from God.

3. Polygamy in the early latter-day church served at least a couple of functions—it provided care and husbands for many women who would have had neither in an era where marriage was pretty much the only option for women. It also quickly increased the membership of the church with all of the children born into polygamy. I personally do not see its withdrawal as just capitulating to the pressures of the US government. It had fulfilled its role for the time and the greater role of taking the gospel to the world necessitated it being set aside for the time being. It did provide a refiner's fire in the church then and even now and it does make the church a peculiar people which still keeps us a little different than mainstream.

4. Polygamy will also be in our future. The necessity of this is seen in almost any grouping of saints. There are more righteous, dedicated women than men. If each woman is to have the opportunity of marriage and being the mother, there is no way she can do that if there are not enough men to go around so this doctrine becomes fundamental to our understanding of men and women's roles in the eternities. Those who will be practicing it will have hearts pure enough that the jealousies or other problems we imagine would not be part of the scene. On the other hand, those not practicing it, according to doctrine, will not even be living in a married state.