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<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid"><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2><BR>From: Zev Sero <A
href="mailto:zev@sero.name">zev@sero.name</A><BR><BR>Rich, Joel
wrote:<BR><BR>> Question: What was the driving force behind the takkana of
rabbeinu<BR>> gershom on monogamy?<BR><BR>Wasn't it his own experience of
the consequence of lack of sholom bayis?<BR><BR>--
<BR></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV>
<DIV>>>>>><BR>There seems to be some disagreement on that
point. Some think the story of his unhappy domestic life with two wives is
an urban legend. (I think that Marcus Lehman wrote a novel about it -- the
first wife was a tzadekes but childless, the second wife was a machsheifa
-- I don't remember the whole story.) Many seem to think that he was motivated
by a concern that the Jews not seem to be on a lower moral plane than their
Christian neighbors.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>R' Berel Wein writes: "[I]n a Christian society where even monogamous
marriage was viewed as a concession to the devil, polygamy was seen as outright
immorality, a societal crime of lewdness which cast the Jewish community in a
negative light in the eyes of society at large. Perhaps in order that Jews
not seem less 'moral' than their gentile neighbors did Rabbeinu Gershom ban
polygamy at this time [c. 1100]" R' Wein does not mention domestic discord
at all.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Grayzel writes, "The Bible permitted Jews to have more than one wife.
As time went on, however, the Jews adopted monogamy as their rule, although,
since the law on the subject had not been changed, there was a Jew now and then
who married more than one woman. This gave their Christian neighbors a chance to
speak ill of the Jews. It probably also resulted in quarrels within the
family." Nothing about R' Gershom's private life.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>BTW I once met a man whose mother was one of two co-wives in a Sefardi
family and he told me that his mother and the other wife squabbled constantly
and that he would never think of taking a second wife himself. He said his
father treated both wives as if they were two more of his squabbling children,
and the women were not treated with respect.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I can't understand modern-day feminists who, when you tell them gay
marriage may lead to polygamy, respond, "So what?" I don't know how they
can fail to see that in a polygamous society women's status is drastically
compromised.</DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#0000ff size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"><B><BR></B><BR><B>--Toby
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