Number 1 reason why plural marriage probably won't be a part of the Millennium and Celestial Kingdom

[Guest]

That main reason is agency. Those who we are sealed to on earth and spend 70 years with, during the Millennium we can easily have the choice not to remain with our spouse and to look for an eligible resurrected perfect bodied person. Brigham Young even said all his unhappy wives have the agency to leave him and agency is so important to our souls it was the topic of the war in heaven. So throw in all these wIves who died and husbands remarried might choose someone else in the Millennium and the'll be plenty of eligible singles to choose from. If the women in polygamy want to stay they have that agency too but God is not forcing anyone together in the next life, plural marriage included.

[eddified]

From what I know about church membership and the general prison population, it makes me think that there might be too few men to go around in the highest level of the celestial kingdom. 

[Sunday21]

Not to worry! Think of all the young soldiers killed in wars. Also more male babies than female babies have been born at various points in history but fewer male babies made it out of infancy. 

[eddified]

I wonder on the limits of our agency in the next life. Saints are taught that only those who inherit the celestial kingdom will be able to have progeny. So it sounds like there are some limits.

[eddified]

1 minute ago, Sunday21 said:

Not to worry! Think of all the young soldiers killed in wars. Also more male babies than female babies have been born at various points in history but fewer male babies made it out of infancy. 

I do admit that my suspicion about the male vs female ratio in the celestial kingdom is just speculation. I've been wrong before.

[Sunday21]

18 minutes ago, eddified said:

I do admit that my suspicion about the male vs female ratio in the celestial kingdom is just speculation. I've been wrong before.

When you get there send a dove down to the rest of us with your observations!

[Guest]

Let's also take a look at those in the scriptures who lived polygamy. Lamech was the first one and he was a wicked seed of Cain. Abraham had to shun his 2nd wife Hagar because Sarah was jealous and hated her. Isaac isn't reported to have lived polygamy. Jacob was tricked into marrying another girl before Rachel when he wanted Rachel. David was so lustful from his women that he killed Uriah cuz he lusted after his wife in the shower and fell from his exaltation. And Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines but they turned his heart away from God and got him to worship idols. Also Book of Mormon says what David and Solomon did was an abomination. Finally let's look at latter day polygamy. Brigham Young had 55 wives but only had children with 16 of them. All 57 of his children came from the same 16 wives and he didn't pay attention to the other 39. All this I wrote doesn't sound like eternal love.

Edited April 15, 2017 by Zarahemla

[person0]

Just because even righteous men struggle with keeping a law of God, does not mean, nor even hint at the idea that the law will not apply.

Quote

Marriage is eternal for those who are married by God’s word, whose marriage is sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise, and who abide in the covenant.
(The Eternal Family - Teacher's Manual)

Monogamous and plural marriages performed by priesthood power could seal loved ones to each other for eternity, on condition of righteousness.
(Plural Marriage in The Church)

If even just 1 righteous priesthood holder were to abide his covenant with 2 spouses then the marriage is eternal in relation to both spouses (the spouses could be at different times due to death).  If this happens just once, then plural marriage will be applicable in the Celestial Kingdom (even if only for a righteous few).  I tend to believe that there will be more than just a handful of sufficiently righteous practitioners of plural marriage by the time all is said and done.  Also, in terms of agency, when we are resurrected to a celestial glory, filled with righteousness and our desires are to the Kingdom of God and to abiding the principles of eternity, who will even care about plural marriage?  Will wives bicker and complain about it?  No.  Will husbands lustfully seek it?  No.  In every applicable situation will it be entered into and eternal for the right reasons?  Yes.  I seriously doubt anyone will have an issue with it once we get to that day, and there is more evidence to suggest that it will be applicable eternally than that it wont.

Also, in relation to David and Solomon: 

Quote

"David also received many wives and concubines, and also Solomon and Moses my servants, as also many others of my servants, from the beginning of creation until this time; and in nothing did they sin save in those things which they received not of me.  David’s wives and concubines were given unto him of me, by the hand of Nathan, my servant, and others of the prophets who had the keys of this power. . ."  (D&C 132:38-39)

". . . for they seek to excuse themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written concerning David, and Solomon his son.  Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord." (Jacob 2:23-24)

I would venture to say that it is more likely that the Lord is revealing information line-upon-line when speaking to the Nephites regarding plural marriage.  He had not issued a commandment to them to practice polygamy, they still wanted an excuse because of David and Solomon.  Even though David and Solomon had initially entered into many marriage covenants righteously, they also did "things which they did not receive of [the Lord]", therefore, He could righteously reveal only this precept to the Nephites because it is what they needed to hear in order to repent since they received no such commandment.

[An Investigator]

Well... I have done a lot of research on this topic and if I am honest going back to my previous thread, I am sure plural marriage must be a very large stumbling block for a lot of converts.  I have read some horrific things about the way Brigham Young (prophet or not) treat some of his wives and their lack of ability to exercise their agency due to financial and societal restraints, the same with various off shoots of our religion who still practice plural marriage (FLDS excluded as I don't even view them as having any relation to us) and I have no doubt we are incapable of practicing Plural marriage the way a loving God would prescribe it should it be a commandant.   

My grandparents were farmers and my grandmother and grandfather had a very different kind of love for one another, based on mutual respect and doing the best thing for the family as a whole, I believe that the way we are as people now makes us inherently selfish and self interested and this is why divorce is so rampant in society.  I really thought and prayed hard about this but the fact is, modern marriage and romantic love are a relatively new phenomenon,  before the last 150 years most pairings were to do with temporal needs and raising seed, very much like marriage in the middle east where Polygamy is practiced, the fact that you should love your spouse wasn't even considered.  It is my personal belief that modern marriage has changed in this way as Heavenly Father wants us to learn in a nuclear family environment and that is why Plural marriage in our religion is now punished with excommunication.

I am comfortable with there being Plural marriage in the Celestial Kingdom but for me personally, I would not want that for myself,  I have done a lot of pondering on the subject and if my non member husband and I ended up divorced for some reason (hopefully not).  I would rather remain single in the church then be sealed to someone who was a widow or be re married to someone in a civil ceremony either LDS or not.

Ultimately though who ever makes it to Exaltation is going to be blissfully happy, so if plural marriage is a commandment 100% then I just wont be Exalted as I doubt very much i am going to change my mind and I am ok with that, as where ever I am placed will be the best place for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

6 hours ago, An Investigator said:

Well... I have done a lot of research on this topic and if I am honest going back to my previous thread, I am sure plural marriage must be a very large stumbling block for a lot of converts.  I have read some horrific things about the way Brigham Young (prophet or not) treat some of his wives and their lack of ability to exercise their agency due to financial and societal restraints, the same with various off shoots of our religion who still practice plural marriage (FLDS excluded as I don't even view them as having any relation to us) and I have no doubt we are incapable of practicing Plural marriage the way a loving God would prescribe it should it be a commandant.   

My grandparents were farmers and my grandmother and grandfather had a very different kind of love for one another, based on mutual respect and doing the best thing for the family as a whole, I believe that the way we are as people now makes us inherently selfish and self interested and this is why divorce is so rampant in society.  I really thought and prayed hard about this but the fact is, modern marriage and romantic love are a relatively new phenomenon,  before the last 150 years most pairings were to do with temporal needs and raising seed, very much like marriage in the middle east where Polygamy is practiced, the fact that you should love your spouse wasn't even considered.  It is my personal belief that modern marriage has changed in this way as Heavenly Father wants us to learn in a nuclear family environment and that is why Plural marriage in our religion is now punished with excommunication.

I am comfortable with there being Plural marriage in the Celestial Kingdom but for me personally, I would not want that for myself,  I have done a lot of pondering on the subject and if my non member husband and I ended up divorced for some reason (hopefully not).  I would rather remain single in the church then be sealed to someone who was a widow or be re married to someone in a civil ceremony either LDS or not.

Ultimately though who ever makes it to Exaltation is going to be blissfully happy, so if plural marriage is a commandment 100% then I just wont be Exalted as I doubt very much i am going to change my mind and I am ok with that, as where ever I am placed will be the best place for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are right marrying for love is a fairly new thing and we can get all the blessings of exaltation and continuation of the seeds forever and helping create new worlds and godhood with just 1 spouse. 

[The Folk Prophet]

16 hours ago, Zarahemla said:

That main reason is agency. Those who we are sealed to on earth and spend 70 years with, during the Millennium we can easily have the choice not to remain with our spouse and to look for an eligible resurrected perfect bodied person. Brigham Young even said all his unhappy wives have the agency to leave him and agency is so important to our souls it was the topic of the war in heaven. So throw in all these wIves who died and husbands remarried might choose someone else in the Millennium and the'll be plenty of eligible singles to choose from. If the women in polygamy want to stay they have that agency too but God is not forcing anyone together in the next life, plural marriage included.

"Agency" being the reason would be equivalent to arguing that sinless perfection won't be a part of the Celestial kingdom because of agency. God won't force anyone to be sinless and perfect. That does not mean that those who are are sinful and imperfect will be in the Celestial kingdom.

Agency is not the right to choose whatever you want and still get the same reward as those who chose differently. Agency is the right to choose which kingdom we go to by obedience. If the law of the Celestial kingdom is plural marriage then it is the law. God will not force anyone to live that law, just as God will not force anyone to live any law. That makes no argument whatsoever as to whether said principle is a law or not.

You're making the argument that because people have the right to disobey laws that God will allow them to attain exaltation anyway because...agency?

There are two parts to agency. You are ignoring the second one. Agency is choice AND accountability. You're making the argument that it is ONLY choice. It is not. We stand accountable for the choices we make. We are free to choose, and according to those choices we will have our reward.

I'm not arguing that plural marriage WILL be a part of the Celestial kingdom. But "agency" is no proof one way or another.

Edited April 15, 2017 by The Folk Prophet

[The Folk Prophet]

15 hours ago, eddified said:

I wonder on the limits of our agency in the next life. Saints are taught that only those who inherit the celestial kingdom will be able to have progeny. So it sounds like there are some limits.

Once again, agency is NOT freedom. It is freedom related to accountability.

Can you fly like Superman? No? So that must mean you don't have agency?

That's nonsense, of course, because being limited in the choices we can make is only a part of agency, and choices that are irrelevant to salvation are irrelevant to the gospel principle of agency. Agency relates only to the choices we make concerning good and evil as far as we understand them. And we stand accountable.

Per the "progeny" thing...what of couples who cannot have children in this life. Do they have no agency? Less agency? Less chance for salvation? Less ability to choose good over evil?

That being said, I agree on the wondering about how "agency" works in the next life. Agency, as a gospel principle, seems directly related to our choice for salvation or damnation. Once we have been saved or damned then the choice is made and such agency seems at an end.

[The Folk Prophet]

6 hours ago, An Investigator said:

and their lack of ability to exercise their agency due to financial and societal restraints

Again... Agency is NOT freedom. You cannot take away someone's agency by removing freedom. We ALL have lack of freedom at some level or another. Poor people do not have less agency than rich people. Dumb people do not have less agency than smart people. Parents do not have less agency than the single. People living under a tyrant do not have less agency than people living in a free society. Slaves do not have less agency than free men. And the higher our taxes go year by year has absolutely no effect on our agency either.

Agency is a gift from God that cannot be taken away by removing freedoms. It is the right to choose salvation or damnation, good or evil, and is directly related to accountability. And one can do this even if in jail, tied to a chair being slowly murdered by their fellow inmates. The ability to think right thoughts, forgive, turn to Christ, etc., does not go away because of the removal of physical, social, or economic freedoms. If the ability to choose right from wrong DOES go away (brain injury, etc.), then one isn't accountable any longer, and agency no longer applies.

Edited April 15, 2017 by The Folk Prophet

[Guest]

Bottom line question I have. Is it wrong to desire plural marriage in the afterlife and Celestial Kingdom if the reason you are desiring it is because other past good men lived it and it means a large sacred family and are desiring it for family reasons. Is that ok or do you consider anyway wanting it even for good reasons to be bad? Why or why not? Explain. Especially if you are single and haven't vowed yourself to anyone yet.

[Guest]

I only ask the question above because we're talking about our eternal family and sacred family relationships when we talk about plural marriage. We talk about the marriage sealing in and I want to make sure I do everything right by God because right now my main focus is on trying to follow Jesus Christ's life around this Easter season and trying to return to Heavenly Father exalted so I can live with Him and Jesus and Heavenly Mother forever never to be serparated, but in the meantime I'd like to learn the most I can on what families are going to be like or could be like in the next life since eternal families is why we do temple work.

[Guest]

This seems like a topic of obsession that might be worth discussing with your therapist. 

Maybe consider that it might be enough to know that Heavenly Father loves you deeply, and whatever happens will bring you the utmost happiness. He knows what will make you happiest more than you do. 

[Guest]

Just now, Eowyn said:

This seems like a topic of obsession that might be worth discussing with your therapist. 

Maybe consider that it might be enough to know that Heavenly Father loves you deeply, and whatever happens will bring you the utmost happiness. He knows what will make you happiest more than you do. 

That's an answer you only give when you have no substance or know you got nothing. I make a thread on sacred family relationships and you bring up therapists in a personal attack. I'm reporting you. You shouldn't be a mod if this is how you answer posts. How am I ever going to learn if you just don't answER the darn question?

[The Folk Prophet]

29 minutes ago, Zarahemla said:

Bottom line question I have. Is it wrong to desire plural marriage in the afterlife and Celestial Kingdom if the reason you are desiring it is because other past good men lived it and it means a large sacred family and are desiring it for family reasons. Is that ok or do you consider anyway wanting it even for good reasons to be bad? Why or why not? Explain. Especially if you are single and haven't vowed yourself to anyone yet.

I don't think any of those questions matter. What matters is that we want God's will. Period. Nothing else. Pure, 100%, absolute humility and consecration of ourselves to His will.

When and if the church declares plural marriage to be God's will in this life again then we should seek it. Until then we should treat it like the ex-communicable sin it is. As far as our "desire" for it in the afterlife...leave it to God and trust in him implicitly. To declare that we know better than God what will make us happy is the embodiment of pride.

The way we exercise agency to salvation is by choosing God's will, just as the Savior did.

Edited April 15, 2017 by The Folk Prophet

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Zarahemla said:

That's an answer you only give when you have no substance or know you got nothing. I make a thread on sacred family relationships and you bring up therapists in a personal attack. I'm reporting you. You shouldn't be a mod if this is how you answer posts. How am I ever going to learn if you just don't answER the darn question?

Nope. It's not a personal attack. It's not from me knowing nothing. It's from me having some experience with this and having a personal understanding of where you are coming from. If you want to dismiss people who are honestly trying to help you instead of patting you on the head and telling you what you want to hear, that's your choice. I would ask you, though, not to make such accusations of me when I'm only trying to help. 

Maybe you should count how many threads you've started on this topic. I don't mean that as an attack. Make a count, and tell your therapist (who is there to help you, for crying out loud) so he/she can get a sense of how much this occupies your mind.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Eowyn said:

This seems like a topic of obsession that might be worth discussing with your therapist. 

Maybe consider that it might be enough to know that Heavenly Father loves you deeply, and whatever happens will bring you the utmost happiness. He knows what will make you happiest more than you do. 

Pam your admin told you to stop bringing up my mental health and you disobey. I reported your post and suggested you be removed as a mod since you don't have the professionalism that goes along with it with the personal attacks that I've already complained to you about in the past.

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Eowyn said:

Nope. It's not a personal attack. It's not from me knowing nothing. It's from me having some experience with this and having a personal understanding of where you are coming from. If you want to dismiss people who are honestly trying to help you instead of patting you on the head and telling you what you want to hear, that's your choice. I would ask you, though, not to make such accusations of me when I'm only trying to help. 

Maybe you should count how many threads you've started on this topic. I don't mean that as an attack. Make a count, and tell your therapist (who is there to help you, for crying out loud) so he/she can get a sense of how much this occupies your mind.

You disobeyed Pam and kept the personal attacks about my therapist and mental health coming when I said to stop and who knows maybe plural marriage is a good thing. Ever think of that? Now go away before I really start hating you. Stay out of my personal business and be more professional.

[Guest]

I'm not attacking you. I'm sorry you see it that way. Again, I have been where you are, with this very topic, albeit on the other side of it. I wasn't trying to inflame you. I don't recall that instruction from pam, but I won't comment on this thread again. I could go your route and insist on an apology, but clearly you're more interested in being mad at me than resolution of any kind.

[The Folk Prophet]

1 minute ago, Zarahemla said:

you don't have the professionalism

Personally attacking someone for perceiving that they personally attacked you...

Hmm. 

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Eowyn said:

I'm not attacking you. I'm sorry you see it that way. Again, I have been where you are, with this very topic, albeit on the other side of it. I wasn't trying to inflame you. I don't recall that instruction from pam, but I won't comment on this thread again. I could go your route and insist on an apology, but clearly you're more interested in being mad at me than resolution of any kind.

That's your excuse for not attempting an apology? I dunno this site must get it's mods off the streets.

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, The Folk Prophet said:

Personally attacking someone for perceiving that they personally attacked you...

Hmm. 

You dont know the hI story of her bringing up my mental health and what Pam the admin said to end it.