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Implications of Infertility

S

Stranger

Member
Male
To preface: I'm not sure if I am putting this in the correct forum section. I am interested in your thoughts concerning a measured moral response to a health issue as relates to polygyny.

I am (without God's intervention) infertile. It may be due to having undecended testacles when born. This was addressed as quickly by my parents as was then recommended but current medical opinion now recommends taking care of this sort of issue twice as fast as it did then precisely because of people like me.

All of that information is superfluous however. My question is: now having the knowledge that I am infertile would it be irresponsible for me to practice polygyny in relation to the command to be fruitful and multiply?

Knowing that I cannot (apart from God deliberately intervening in the course of natural events) give even my current wife children, would marrying a second woman who could/would otherwise marry a man capable of giving her children be contrary to the will of God?

I'm not sure here if I should be calling to mind Isaiah 56:3 or not.
 
I appreciate your dilemma, it cannot be an easy row to hoe.

First and foremost, I believe in the value of prayer and Divine healing. Not that I believe that He is obligated, but that He can and His face should be sought in the matter.
Second, THE baddest thing, imo, is to let someone else develop feelings for you without telling them the full truth.
You might try and find someone who cannot physically get pregnant.
Third, there are single moms that need husbands.

Research “Snowflake children”, although there are lots of possible problems.
 
steve said:
I appreciate your dilemma, it cannot be an easy row to hoe.

First and foremost, I believe in the value of prayer and Divine healing. Not that I believe that He is obligated, but that He can and His face should be sought in the matter.
Second, THE baddest thing, imo, is to let someone else develop feelings for you without telling them the full truth.
You might try and find someone who cannot physically get pregnant.
Third, there are single moms that need husbands.

Research “Snowflake children”, although there are lots of possible problems.
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If I were to begin seeking a second wife divulging this information would be amongst my top priorities.
I have considered looking only for women who fall into the categories you mentioned and apart from significantly reducing the already small quantity of women who would consider polygyny, it does have strong merits. My condition would make me uniquely prepared to support and/or understand their own struggles.

My wife and I already plan to do an embryo adoption when we are financially able to. We are also hoping to become involved in fostering children (not sure how that will fly with polygyny, but one battle at a time).
I do believe in the power of God to work miracles and I do pray for healing in this regard. I also know that God is under no obligation to me but that I owe Him all that I am. As such I intend to make my obedience to Him a prayer in itself by doing what I am able to help the fatherless and widow (uniquely positioned on that one since my wife's father is deceased and we are now living with her mom to help her fix up and renovate her house). It might be that it will please Him to heal me. It might also be that I am exactly as He needs me to be and someday in this life or the next I will understand why.
 
My hat is off to you, you have an excellent balance and perspective on the situation.

If you are serious about foster care, I would start the process while you are still just the two of you. If you build relationship with the social workers, it may be somewhat organic to slide a future wife into the situation.
Being “non-traditional” is sometimes a plus with them, depending on who you draw.
 
If you're an older man then there's no reason why you can't court older women. Or like Steve said there's a lot of single moms who need husbands and who would be very happy to have you! Being a husband is more than just having kids.
 
MeganC said:
If you're an older man then there's no reason why you can't court older women. Or like Steve said there's a lot of single moms who need husbands and who would be very happy to have you! Being a husband is more than just having kids.
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I don't exactly fall into the category of "older" yet. Still got a couple of months until my 30th birthday.
Finding single moms to love and support sounds like a worthy focus to have and would help secure myself from seeking a wife merely for the sake of sating my own lusts.
The difficulty then will be navigating through the minefield of divorce and remarriage since more women are likely to be in that condition as a result of divorce in America than from death of their spouse, especially at the age bracket I would likely be interacting with.

As a side note, it is my conviction that the church (or at least those within the church with the same conviction) should corporately provide for women who are single divorcees and give them the material means to not have to resort to adultery to sustain themselves and their children. I am guessing there is another thread on here somewhere concerning peoples thoughts on the divorce/remairrage issue which I will have to find and read through at some point.
 
Stranger said:
I am guessing there is another thread on here somewhere concerning peoples thoughts on the divorce/remairrage issue which I will have to find and read through at some point.
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You will find that some have very strong opinions about not marrying a divorced woman. My view is that we are in a very fallen society and women have not had the protections that Yah designed for them. To condemn them to return to non-husband husbands or forever remain single is not Yah’s heart, IMO.
Stranger said:
As a side note, it is my conviction that the church (or at least those within the church with the same conviction) should corporately provide for women who are single divorcees and give them the material means to not have to resort to adultery to sustain themselves and their children.
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That is what polygyny is for.
Making it financially advantageous for them to be single is what our government has already cursed us with.
 
Stranger said:
I am guessing there is another thread on here somewhere concerning peoples thoughts on the divorce/remairrage issue which I will have to find and read through at some point.
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Indeed. This isn't my personal recommendation, but if you're intent on avoiding divorced women, you might check out @Daniel DeLuca's new dating website for polygynists who are unwilling to consider divorced women.

steve said:
You will find that some have very strong opinions about not marrying a divorced woman. My view is that we are in a very fallen society and women have not had the protections that Yah designed for them. To condemn them to return to non-husband husbands or forever remain single is not Yah’s heart, IMO.

That is what polygyny is for.
Making it financially advantageous for them to be single is what our government has already cursed us with.
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I myself second @steve's perspective on both of these issues. We are all broken, so I find it unlikely that God has assigned us the limited task of only improving on perfection.

And I see nothing in Scripture to assert that church organizations are any more fit than governmental ones to be righteous bureaucratic enabling machines that replace and therefore destroy fatherhood and husbandhood.
 
Stranger said:
If I were to begin seeking a second wife divulging this information would be amongst my top priorities.
Click to expand...

One thing to keep in mind, you are best to limit yourself to women in their late 30's or older in this case (or women already with children). Childless women younger than that may say they don't want children (and honestly mean it at the time) are quite likely to change their mind when they hit their mid 30's and the biological clock starts banging loudly.

Stranger said:
church (or at least those within the church with the same conviction) should corporately provide for women who are single divorcees and give them the material means to not have to resort to adultery to sustain themselves and their children.
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Yes, let's get the church in on the game of incentivising marital destruction.
 
rockfox said:
One thing to keep in mind, you are best to limit yourself to women in their late 30's or older in this case (or women already with children). Childless women younger than that may say they don't want children (and honestly mean it at the time) are quite likely to change their mind when they hit their mid 30's and the biological clock starts banging loudly.



Yes, let's get the church in on the game of incentivising marital destruction.
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I do tend to get along well with older women so I suppose that is an option. Even my wife is older than I, but only by 5 months. These days it isn't hard to find younger women who don't want children but you make a good point that some significant percentage of them change their outlook as they get older. Besides, I do want marrital partners interested in the responsibility at least of raising children (fostering/adopting/etc.).

I might take a look at the divorce/remairage conversation on this forum sometime and weigh in there and explain my perspective more thoroughly.
If I do so any more here this thread will quickly lose its intended focus.
 
Stranger said:
If I do so any more here this thread will quickly lose its intended focus.
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Perhaps, but it may be nigh unto impossible to divorce questions related to the ramifications of choosing an additional wife given your infertility from issues of divorce and remarriage.
 
Keith Martin said:
Perhaps, but it may be nigh unto impossible to divorce questions related to the ramifications of choosing an additional wife given your infertility from issues of divorce and remarriage.
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Understood. I'd still rather discuss that topic in the relevant forum thread though.
 
Stranger said:
Understood. I'd still rather discuss that topic in the relevant forum thread though.
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? If you understand that one can't divorce the two issues (your infertility and your marriage considerations), how does discussing it here violate your original intention for this thread?
 
The Revolting Man said:
It’s always struck me how many godly people in scripture struggled with infertility; Abraham, Hannah, Zachariah etc. I don’t know why that is.
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I understand it as demonstrating God as the source of life. When dealing with post-menopausal women, men in their 90's, virgins, the dust of the earth, or a man's rib, there is no opportunity for human srength to be credited.
In some sense it is a foreshadowing of Christ's resurrection:
"Sheol, the barren womb, the land never satisfied with water, and the fire that never says, “Enough.”" Proverbs 30:16
Nevertheless, though it is out of season and well beyond the point of anyone's reasonable expectation, God is able to raise life out of barren wombs and souls out of sheol.
 
Keith Martin said:
? If you understand that one can't divorce the two issues (your infertility and your marriage considerations), how does discussing it here violate your original intention for this thread?
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Discussing the morality of that particular consideration doesn't violate my original intention but it could easily take over the whole thread and discussion about other aspects of the situation could be crowded out. And most of what would be said already has been said on the other thread. It would be lawful, but I suspect it would not be expedient.
 
Stranger said:
Discussing the morality of that particular consideration doesn't violate my original intention but it could easily take over the whole thread and discussion about other aspects of the situation could be crowded out. And most of what would be said already has been said on the other thread. It would be lawful, but I suspect it would not be expedient.
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'Expediency,' like 'trying,' is sometimes just another word for giving oneself permission in advance for failure -- except that with 'expediency' one also does whatever one can do to get it over with as quickly as possible.

I advise taking your time with this one. I don't know if you ever listened to Rush Limbaugh, but he was a big fan of tangents, as long as you keep your break-off point well marked, because tangents have the potential to turn abstract ideas into 3-dimensional architecture.
 
Adopt children, or marry a widow who already has children. Doing either of these gets you children. If you have 3 wives you could adopt and raise 3 times more children.
 
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