Why it has to be legal

Because "they" will never stop. In this case "it" is Polygyny, and "they" is Canada, but human nature is the same everywhere.

Christian Telegraph - "A top law official in Canada is considering an appeal after a court threw out polygamy charges against two men, who claimed the nation's Charter of Rights and Freedoms permitted them to have several wives, reports Ecumenical News International.

'The first order of business will be to read the decision in its entirety, which I have not done yet,' said Mike de Jong, attorney general of British Columbia, after the court's 23 September decision.

'Obviously, I will talk to officials within the ministry and a decision will be made around a possible appeal.' Winston Blackmore, aged 52, and James Oler, 44, from Bountiful, British Columbia, belong to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS), an offshoot of the mainstream Mormon church, which formally renounced polygamy in 1890."

It has to be legal, or you are second class citizens at the back of the bus. In a way I hope Canada does appeal the ruling and takes it all the way to their highest court. Of course, Blackmore and Oler probably just want to get on with their lives.

I apologize for being away from this blog so long. The revelations and investigations surrounding Rozita Swinton and the FLDS and the Colorado Springs Police Department took up a lot of time, in addition, I was ill on and off again for the first part of this month. It did not completely incapacitate me, but it sapped my energy for such things.

Zygote or V12? Confronting the Church on Marriage, Part IIIa

An addendum to the "One Flesh" discussion with Woody Lauer. I have been patiently discussing (sometimes not so patiently) Genesis 2:24 with a poster named "el gayo" at CARM Discussion Forums. At times, I wondered why I was doing it. "El gayo's" steady, stubborn resistance forced the argument from the pro polygyny side into a refinement that yielded the following. I have modified the argument slightly so as to better fit this venue.

"There is nothing INHERENT in the passage Genesis 2:24, mandates or establishes monogamy.

'Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.'

The passage does not mention monogamy, it describes marriage. We know only that it refers to a marriage (the only marriage at that time) that was also monogamous.

We also know that the same marriage was a birth betrothal marriage. Here is the preceding section of Genesis 2, verses 18-23:

'And the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him. And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." '

Is the monogamy of that marriage important? It may be. It is just as self evident that we follow patterns of betrothal, from the earliest possible age if it is self evident from the passage that we follow the monogamous pattern.

It may be later that someone establishes a pattern of monogamy by referring back to this verse and the concept of one flesh, but the MERE REPETITION of the content of Genesis 2:24 cannot be said to establish monogamy any more than it would the practice of birth betrothal. That understanding must come directly from the repetition of the verse, and the commentary.

When Jesus repeats the verse, he emphasizes only that it is the PERMANENCE of Adam and Eve's union that he is interested in for the purposes of the discussion, he never discusses the monogamy of their marriage beyond the fact that he is discussing them, and we know they were monogamous.

But he is discussing them and we know they were betrothed also. For some reason we don't care about that part, we only seem to care about their monogamy.

The point is, that Genesis 2:24 does not prevent a man or a woman from marrying again over and over and over and over again. From the passage we would say that if they did, they would be husband or wife to that new spouse and be 'one flesh' with them. It is later that we learn a WIFE cannot undertake more than one spouse, but we never learn the same thing about a husband.

Most of us are conditioned to think it is one man one woman = marriage as if it were a zygote. Sperm comes together with egg. Something new is formed. Zygotes cannot unify again with other sperm. They are now closed systems.

Marriage may though, be more like a drop of water. One drop plus one drop is one bigger drop of water, that can be added to again and again and again until it's an ocean.

Maybe marriage is like an engine. One crankshaft (husband), one piston (wife), or maybe two wives/pistons, or perhaps as many as twelve. They're all engines. They're all one engine.

Some look at 'one flesh' and say 'Zygote.' Others look at one flesh and say 'engine' is a better illustration. Why is it a Zygote instead? There is no support for either notion in Genesis UNLESS you are going to adopt all aspects of the first marriage. This is why I mention birth betrothal. Both views are possible from the passage, neither are excluded.

Therefore, mere repetition of Genesis 2:24 doesn't establish monogamy as anything other than a possible form of marriage. Quoting it won't change that. Commenting on it as Jesus does in the New Testament, when he says 'see, the union was to be permanent,' is the only way discover how Adam and Eve's example, govern us."

It's Bigamy Stupid, not Polygamy

The crime, no matter how hard law enforcement tries to twist and turn in the creation of laws, and enforcement of them, is the legal registration of more than one marriage.

The Detroit Free Press - "(St. Clair Shores police Detective Margaret) Eidt said (Martha) Fleming married her second husband Jan. 30 at Christ Gospel Tabernacle Church, 30500 Harper, in St. Clair Shores. But she had been married to a man in Bay City since 1996.

Sometime shortly after her second marriage, she took the inheritance check from her second husband, cashed it in Harper Woods and took off, Eidt said.

The detective said a civil attorney representing the second husband discovered Fleming was already married. Eidt said Harper Woods police are investigating the theft of the inheritance check."

Nevertheless, the suspicion of bigamy remains probable cause when invading your home. By having your marriages be informal, instead of formal, you, as a polygynist, leave yourself perpetually open 24/7/365 to home invasion, by law enforcement.

You may not be legally registered with more than one spouse as Martha was, but your purporting to be married to more than one spouse, however tenuous, leaves you open to arrest and investigation with probable cause.

You have to hide and lay low as a result.

What sort of life is this for a Christian who is told NOT to hide their light under a bushel? Hat tip "Christian or Biblical Polygamy."

Who's Dr. Kurt?

Ok, they're starting to figure it out. "Dr. Kurt Anderson" of West Palm Beach asks "why not polygamy?" KurtAndersonville.

It's time-(UPDATED)

Someone needs to show up, in Vermont, and try to register more than one marriage. You of course will not be able to do it, but you'll set in motion the legal process that may make it happen.

Montpelier, VT (AHN) - "Vermont's gay marriage law began taking effect at exactly midnight on Tuesday, a little over four months after state lawmakers voted to override Gov. Jim Douglas' veto of the legislation and added to the number of states who have legalized same-sex marriages.

Couples and gay advocates will be marking the day with celebrations, one of which is a wedding reception in Essex that will benefit the Vermont People with AIDS Coalition and other groups.

Rallies will be held by members of the Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church at the capital city, Montpelier, to protest the new marriage law, but one of the state's leading same-sex marriage groups, the Vermont Freedom to Marry, has urged supporters not to engage with the demonstrators, saying doing so 'would only lend relevance and newsworthiness' to their opponents." (September 1, 2009 7:48 a.m. EST)

It'll be too much of a zoo, and though you can probably hear the commotion, and perhaps see it from my house, I'm 5 miles away at work. Besides, I have no video equipment to tape and then share the business with you so we'll just let it happen.