Otabil got it wrong on polygamy

The head pastor of the international church, pastor Otabil claimed the perfect marriage in the Bible was monogamy, he even went on to claim that Abraham engaged in adultery by sleeping with Hagar. He further claimed Abraham's engagement with Hagar was responsible for what is currently happening in Gaza.

In short, he was portraying the war in Gaza as a consequence of an adulterous relationship that led to the Palestinian and the Arab populations as a whole coming into existence. What he failed to understand, is the fact that Jews and Muslims have more similarities than Christians.

A Jew is permitted to pray in a mosque if there is no synagogue around, but forbidden to enter a church. Jews see the doctrine of the trinity as idol worship. Most Jews will tell you Jesus was born out of an adulterous relationship. There are monotheists as Muslims. Muslims to a large extent recognize Jesus.

Jews don’t. Such preachers can easily destroy the peace a country enjoys among its ethnic and religious groups.

Otabil has been over westernized, he has failed to do basic research on the origin of words he commonly uses. Adultery, as he understands, is completely different from its biblical meaning. Among the Jews, even today, adultery is sex with a married woman. David committed adultery, not because he had several wives and concubines, but because he had sex with a married woman. The child who came out of his adultery was not made to live. However, Hagar had Ishmael, and God blessed him to be a father of several nations.

God’s laws are forever, and even David, a man of His own heart, was not spared.
I wonder if those by the name Ishmael and Hagar will ever enjoy listening to him after referring to them as a product of adultery.

21:13 Genesis:

I will make the son of the slave into a nation also because he is your offspring. The Western world's definition of adultery is not sex outside marriage, but sex with the opposite sex outside marriage. This is an ancient Roman definition; which we still have in our family law books till today.
The ancient Romans, whom Otabil saw as enlightened, were actually homosexuals. While the nobles were engaging in sexual relationships with boys and young men, the commoners, who could not afford that lifestyle were sleeping with women.
This led to an increased population of commoners.

The Nobles, fearing the rapidly growing population of the commoners being a threat to them, decided to curb their numbers by passing the adultery law as we have now. They came up with this definition of sex with the opposite sex outside marriage. In today’s England, Rome, and many Western countries, a married woman, cannot accuse the husband of adultery, if he should have sex with another man.

Their definition of Adultery, rather promoted same-sex relationships since that acted as an escape from losing one property in divorce. No wonder same-sex relationships have taken over the Western world. Let’s now come to the issue of polygamy. Otabil sees the Western lifestyle as more important than God’s commandments and status.

Polygamy is not a cultural thing, but a carefully regulated religious marriage.
God instructed men, whether married or unmarried, to take their late brother’s wife and have at least a son with her, if the brother died without a son.

Genesis 38:8-10:

Then Judah said to Onan, “Sleep with your brother’s wife and fulfill your duty to her as a brother-in-law to raise offspring for your brother.” 9 But Onan knew that the child would not be his; so, whenever he slept with his brother’s wife, he spilled his semen on the ground to keep from providing offspring for his brother. 10 What he did was wicked in the Lord’s sight; so, the Lord put him to death also”. Onan had a wife, but for not impregnating his late brother's wife, God killed him. Levirate-Marriage has been a commandment of God since creation.

Matthew 24:24-28:

24 saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise offspring for his brother.’ 25 Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no offspring left his wife to his brother. 26 So too the second and third, down to the
seventh. 27 After them all, the woman died. 28 In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her Jesus did not say they should put Moses law aside. He rather told them in heaven there is no marriage, so their concern doesn’t exist.

In short, God punished men for not being polygamous in such a situation, polygamy was not an option but a requirement. It is strange, that you mention Jesus who came from the line of David, and yet claim polygamy is not a desirable marriage.

You could not have had Jesus and used his name to build your church and live comfortably had it not been for David’s polygamy. Why should God reward men with a full year of leave, anytime they take additional wives, if he is against polygamy?

Deut 24:5:

When a man takes a new wife, he is not to go out with the army, nor be assigned any duty; he shall be free at home for one year and shall make his wife whom he has taken happy. I know modern Bibles have deliberately reworded this verse and replaced “if a man takes a new wife with a recently married man. The aim is to hide the polygamy acceptance in this verse.

Again, have you ever heard of Jehoiada in the Bible? He was the chief priest, and he was described as righteous. He guided a young king by the name of Joash. When the king was of age to marry. This was what the righteous chief priest did.

2 chronicles 24:3:

Jehoiada chose two wives for Joash, and he had sons and daughters.

Is Otabil saying he knows God better than Jehoiada?

What about Leviticus 18:18?

18 “‘Do not take your wife’s sister as a rival wife and have sexual relations with her while your wife is living”.

Did the above Verse suggest you could not have more than one wife?

Exodus 21:10

If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing, and marital rights. When Jesus used the parable of the ten virgins, in which 5 ended up marrying one husband, was he using a sinful analog?

Christianity has a misconception, that it takes only two to become one. This is never true. A polygamist is one with each of his wives. Jesus said if you even join yourself with a prostitute, you become one with her. In short, you are one with anybody you have had a sexual relationship with.

1 Corinthians 6:16-18

16 When you join yourself to a prostitute, you become one with her in body. Don’t you know this? Scripture says, “The two will become one.” (Genesis 2:24)
Is the Otabil congregation worshiping the God who gave David the many wives of Saul? Or he has carved a new God for them? The true God never changes and has warned us not to add or take anything from his laws and status.

Deuteronomy 4:2
2 Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it, but keep the commands of the Lord your God that I give you.

Deut 12;32
See that you do all I command you; do not add or take away from it. Since God created everything in pairs, why didn’t Otabil suggest all his congregation must only keep their livestock in pairs as well?

Why do we keep a few cocks with several hens on farms?

Were they not created in pairs? Did not all the animals enter the Ark of Noah in pairs?

Christianity is the only religion where their pastors can condemn the laws of their God and yet claim to be worshipping him.

It is these misguided preachers that have caused so many ladies to outgrow their fertility ages. Women seem to be more in church houses BECAUSE they are either praying for husbands or praying that no woman takes their husbands.

The church is making so much money by telling them prayers and paying tithes will get them husbands. Church should be honest to the needs of their congregation. When the multitude were hungry, Jesus provided them with food, not prayers. Only honest and bold preachers can directly tell their congregation the truth about polygamy. Most will want to be seen as belonging to the “civilized” world and will walk the line of Western-imposed doctrines as that of God.
No wonder the church has become more open to same-sex partners than to polygamists.

The large number of unmarried women and baby mamas are the product of preachers like Otabil. While I agree polygamy is challenging, it does not suggest the alternative is better. Monogamy produces the highest divorce rate. Even in the Bible, monogamous marriages had challenges. The first murder recorded in the Bible was between brothers whose parents were in their first-ever monogamous
marriage. Cain and Abel. Later we saw Isaac's sons at each other’s throats, leading to Jacob running away to live with an uncle.

In our world today, most men including pastors are practicing serial monogamy. They divorce their older wives for younger ones. Strangely, the church sees this as more acceptable than those who still keep the wife of their youth and would rather marry more.

In one of Otabil's old sermons, he called born-again Christians foolish, and can easily be deceived. He knows your weakness; you cannot read the bible for yourselves. The Pauline doctrine cannot be used to replace God's laws. Paul clearly stated that most of his statements are purely his views.

In giving his “opinion,” on the various aspects of marriage, Paul was simply stating that the Lord had not given a specific “command” addressing these particular issues (i.e., 1 Corinthians 7:6; 1 Corinthians 7:12; 1 Corinthians 7:25; 1 Corinthians 7:40) during His earthly ministry as He had in 1 Corinthians 7:10 Please note that Paul also gave his “opinion” in 2 Corinthians 8:8 and 2
Corinthians 11:17 – the Lord had not given a specific commandment during His earthly ministry regarding these issues either. We can’t stand before a congregation and preach based on someone's opinion even if it contradicts
the laws of God in the same bible. A man, who believes marriage is not important should not be our standard in determining how marriage should be.

1 Timothy 3:2

2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach. Not everyone is expected to be a bishop, so limit your monogamy to bishops and those who want to take
the title of church elders.

Even with all these, we know church elders who have side women, and we are also aware, that many so-called churches that expect their pastors to be celibates are engaging in homosexual relationships and have higher HIV rates than the general population. Men naturally have a higher sex drive; they are designed to go forth and multiply. Their very health is based on this. Doctors say a man needs to have 21 ejaculations a month to reduce the chances of getting cancer and cardio issues.

Our fathers who were polyamorous in rural areas with no healthcare easily exceeded 90 years. The Bible warns men not to deprive their wives of sex. Exodus 21:10. The holy book did not say wives should determine how often their husbands can have sex. Sex is medicine for men. Just like one must not be deprived of his daily medication, so should sex be for men. Research has shown that women who deprive their husbands of sex, become sexually active as soon as their husbands get an extra wife.

The benefits of regular sex have been known since time immemorial. As Aristotle said, “The worst form of equality is to make an unequal thing equal “. The church assumes males and females are the same. This is the most childish reasoning ever.

Psalm 127:3-5:

Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him.

Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one’s youth.

Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them.

They will not be put to shame when they contend with their opponents in court.
Otabil belongs to a class, that believes successful people are the rich class who have chosen to have fewer children, married to one, and can divorce and remarry at will. Have a big house with lots of SUVs and exotic expensive dogs.

He can stay with such people in that earthly class. He should not be telling those who have decided to live simple lives and have chosen to use their worth to become a husband or more than one wife, using their wealth to have bigger families instead of using their wealth on SUVs and expensive dogs.

Maybe the go forth and multiply is a foolish commandment for him, He has now grown wiser than his God. Let his group of men multiply cars and dogs. He should leave the polygamist alone.

James 3:1

“Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness”. If you are not bold enough to be truthful, stay away from preaching the word.