Expert: Dean Gade - 3/20/2008

Question
I have been studying David and Solomon of the Old Testament with their many wives and concubines.  Was God pleased with this?  Was marriage different in the Old Testament.  Was it permissible with God to have more than one wife if that woman was not another man's wife?  I know David was a repentant man but it is not recorded in the scriptures that he was repentant of his concubines.  I know that he was repentant of Bethsheba but it implies because she was another man's wife and he had the husband killed.

Answer
I have no definitive answer to your question.  It is a question that I have had in my mind myself for many years.  But I can find no answer in the scripture and all else is simply opinions; which might be right..or wrong.

It does SEEM (opinion only) that God doesn't have the same hang-ups that our sin oriented society has with sex.  When Adam and Eve were created, and had concreated righteousness, they were "naked and not ashamed".   Only when they were adversely effected with the consequences of their rebellion and sin were they ashamed of their nakedness before God AND before each other.

In the NT there are clear enough references for monogamy.

1 Cor 7:32-34
33 But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world — how he can please his wife — 34 and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about the Lord's affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world — how she can please her husband.
NIV

1 Tim 3:12
12 A deacon must be the husband of but one wife and must manage his children and his household well.
NIV

I am not a true "dispensationalist" but it does seem (opinion only)that because of the times (needing to populate the earth) or the evil weakness in the heart of man, God allows some things for a while and then calls them back to His original intent:

Mark 10:2-9

2 Some Pharisees came and tested him by asking, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife ?"

3 "What did Moses command you?" he replied.

4 They said, "Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away."

5 "It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied. 6 "But at the beginning of creation God 'made them male and female.'   7'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife ,   8 and the two will become one flesh.' So they are no longer two, but one. 9 Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."
NIV

Sorry that I can't be of any real help in answering your question.