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Purpose of plural marriage
Contents
Important introductory material on plural marriage available here
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 RESOURCES
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Joseph Smith era:
Post-Joseph Smith:
Post-Manifesto–present |
 PERSPECTIVES
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 MEDIA
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This article is a draft. FairMormon editors are currently editing it. We welcome your suggestions on improving the content.
Question
Why would the Lord have commanded the 19th century Saints to implement plural marriage? What purpose(s) did polygamy accomplish?
Note: Some critics provide their own reason—they claim Joseph Smith and the Mormons implemented plural marriage because of lustful motives. That charge is addressed elsewhere. See: Polygamy_because_of_lustful_motives
Response
It is often not the Lord's pattern to give reasons for His commandments. Any "reasons" which we attach, in retrospect, to plural marriage can only be based on supposition and intelligent deduction.
It seems clear, however, in retrospect that plural marriage accomplished several things. Any or all of these things could have been intended by the Lord for the benefit of the Church and the Saints. Other benefits which we do not yet see or understand could also have been intended. We should remember the caution of Elder Dallin H. Oaks:
- ...It's not the pattern of the Lord to give reasons. We can put reasons to commandments. When we do we're on our own. Some people [have] put reasons to [commandments] and they turned out to be spectacularly wrong.[1]
Any such list as this is tentative. But, it reminds us plural marriage may have accomplished more than we sometimes appreciate. Some benefits which have been suggested include:
Endnotes
None