I Want to Know What Love Is

I Want to Know What Love Is
Genesis 29:32-30:3

I have just read a review of a TV program about polygamy in the United States. It incidentally notes how one motivation for polygamy is that it can be a route to more children and more money, which fits with the assumptions about polygamy in the Old Testament (the Old Testament adds that multiplying wives is a sign of status). The review also includes the following comment: “In spite of its seeming celebration of diverse family arrangements, the show bristles with so much pain that nearly every character seems marked for spiritual death, the way characters on ‘The Sopranos’ used to be marked for actual death.” We are inclined to assume that marriage has something to do with love, and we may then have a hard time understanding polygamy. (People in other cultures may assume marriage has something to do with commitment and may have a hard time understanding divorce.) What is the place of love and commitment in a polygamous marriage?...