They were also idolators and they were so far from Him that God chose to call Abram and Sarai out from among them rather than begin His grand plan of blessing them with a family and descendants from the doorstep where they already lived comfortably. We don’t have a record of what married life was like for them, but we can probably get a good idea by considering any other polytheistic, idol worshipping, polygamy practicing nations that we know about today. Idol worship and any of the religion-based things that go along with those cultures are definitely not God’s idea. In short, nothing about the Chaldeans of Ur should be expected to look like Jesus.

There’s no record that he ever had intercourse with Hagar again after she’d conceived, however, and whenever God Himself referred to Hagar in Genesis He refused to call Hagar his wife. Then, the Holy Spirit went so far as to write Hagar and Ishmael figuratively out of Abraham’s will when He told Abraham to “Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, whom you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you” (Genesis 22:2). Before all that happened, what was the nature and characteristic of their family life once Hagar was added with Sarai’s consent and at Sarai’s own request? Genesis 16-22 reveals this union began with using Hagar as property (there is no record of Sarai ever asking Hagar’s permission) in the hopes of sexual surrogacy which led to:

• sorrow,

• enmity,

• rivalry,

• hatred,

• physical assault resulting in Hagar being driven away with Abram’s consent but forced to return for the sake of her young child,

• continued intense rivalry and hatred between children (even continuing to this day when we consider Israel & Islam) and,

• eventual ‘divorce’ and separation of the second union and the child by that union.

There is nothing on that list looks, sounds, or feels like Jesus except perhaps the one instance of God returning Hagar and baby Ishmael to the care of her mistress until he was old enough to fend for them himself. Even in that, their return to her mistress in and of itself was not any particular emotional blessing based on the hatred Sarai held for them but only a testament to the warped social structure and inequitable limits placed on women, particularly mothers without formal attachment to a male in that culture.

What was their home life like once Jacob decided to not to reject Leah but also to pursue Rachel even after he’d already been tricked into marrying Leah? Reading the biblical record in Genesis we find, clearly stated on the lines of the text:

• Intense and bitter rivalry between sisters,

• slavery resulting in sexual surrogacy introducing two other servants into Jacob’s harem which only ended up increasing rather than alleviating the rivalry between sisters,

• the first wife resorting to bribery and purchasing sexual encounters like a prostitute,

• lack of love, hatred even, for the first wife, and between wives,

• mockery,

• pride,

• antagonistic behaviour between wives,

• deceit and trickery in order to favour one’s own biological children over the others,

• intense rivalry and hatred between the children resulting in:

• conspiracy to commit first degree murder,

• physical assault,

• human trafficking into slavery and,

• decades long lies to maintain the duplicity of the brothers.

I don’t recognize anything that resembles anything from God as recognized by Proverbs 19:7 or Proverbs 30:5 there until we later read about the forgiveness of Joseph (a monogamist, by the way) and the rescuing of Jacob’s family from famine. Before that there is nothing perfect, nudging someone to conversion, nor anything wise, nor pure, there is nothing that in any way protects or lifts up the oppression of the women or children in this family’s history or conduct.

Yes, he was a man after God’s own heart but he clearly had not obtained it when it came to parenting or being a husband. His family was so dysfunctional that one of his sons made sure to publicly rape 10 of his “stepmothers” on the rooftop while his father was away. Interestingly, after that David had no more intercourse with those women and they lived as widows the rest of their days, while he continued to protect and provide for their needs. He looked like Jesus when he worshipped but apparently he reverted to a workaholic, deadbeat dad when the music faded whom some of his children hated so much that they actively plotted his political and physical downfall.

In terms of marital choices that look, sound, and feel like Jesus, King David demanded reconciliation with his first wife, Michal, even though she had been married to another man in his absence. The sorrow of her second husband at this, however, is another testament to the destructive emotional carnage of polygamous relationship structures. David’s choice to continue to care for and provide for the needs of his secondary wives which had been raped is also a fair indication of the character of Christ. He seems to have changed his mind (an attribute of repentance) about continuing in polygamy with them yet he knew that his society would not provide adequately for them if he sent them away. So King David chose celibacy where they were concerned while still providing them their own house and the food, clothing, protection that being connected to a man in that society afforded. This is a noble trait and a wise example for repentant polygamists living in cultures which legalize it, having a similar social structure that denies women and children basic rights.

Although Solomon was the wisest man who ever lived (before Jesus) and he apparently had the great love of his life as his bride (see Song of Solomon), he ended his life in depression, idolatry and sin because his lust led him to multiply wives in defiance of the Lord’s command against that very thing, embracing the beliefs of the idolatrous women he was addicted to, and the one son that is mentioned in biblical records, Rehoboam, looked nothing like one who was raised “in the nurture and admonition of the LORD” and despised the wisdom of his father’s counsellors so much that the first thing he did was replace them with his younger buddies. His decisions led to rebellion and the splitting of Israel, but this itself was a prophetic consequence of Solomon’s polygamy: According to 1 Kings 11:1-13, Solomon had broken the mandate of the Law (Deuteronomy 17:17) by marrying many wives, on top of that he continuously broke the prohibition against marrying foreign women (Deuteronomy 7:3) and as happened just as God said it would, he was influenced by them, worshipping and building shrines to the Moabite and Ammonite gods. We read in 1 Kings 11:

⁹ So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice, ¹⁰ and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods; but he did not keep what the Lord had commanded. ¹¹ Therefore the Lord said to Solomon, “Because you have done this, and have not kept My covenant and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom away from you and give it to your servant. ¹² Nevertheless I will not do it in your days, for the sake of your father David; I will tear it out of the hand of your son. ¹³ However I will not tear away the whole kingdom; I will give one tribe to your son for the sake of My servant David, and for the sake of Jerusalem which I have chosen.”

Rehoboam's mother, Naamah, was an Ammonitess, and thus one of the foreign wives whom Solomon married. It does not appear that she was his first wife, although she was the only woman of his 1000+ consorts that was named in biblical record. Solomon appears to have turned from the Lord shortly after receiving the wisdom he’d asked of Him and building the Lord’s temple. He seems to have relied on his own wisdom to direct the course of his life even from shortly before that time forward. At the finishing of the temple we see that Solomon has already taken his first mentioned wife, the daughter of Pharaoh, which historical record characterizes as a political move that greatly benefited the kingdom of Israel but nevertheless was in a direct violation of several of the explicit commands of the God of Israel concerning both foreign marriages in general and relations with the Egyptians in particular.

Solomon seems to be deliberately refusing to marry any women of Israel because he identifies that “no wife of mine” can dwell in the city of David because it is holy (and by implication they are not!). Read more on that in the books of Kings and Chronicles and also in this fascinating article. Finally, Solomon's polygamy causes his heart to depart completely from the Lord, yet God restrains His hand of righteous judgment for the sake of his father, King David, and brings the consequences through Solomon's son, David’s grandson, instead. Such a declaration makes one wonder whether Solomon entered eternity and was carried to Abraham’s Bosom (see Luke 16:19-31) or Hades, the place where the rich man, guilty of much less than Solomon in Jesus’s account, was eternally separated and in torment! As for the end of his life on Earth, we know that Solomon because of his idolatry, which was directly connected to his polygamy, was the last ruler of a united kingdom of Israel.

There are only three children recorded in the Bible to have come from Solomon’s harem of 1000+ women. The three prevailing explanations for this are that:

• These children, though born to the highest leader of the land of Israel, were so insignificant to biblical and political events during that time that they were not even worthy of mention, although the bible is full of seemingly insignificant and unknown names in the rest of its genealogies,

• Solomon and his wives are explicitly stated to have been active in worshipping Molech and other false gods who demanded child sacrifice, so these children were burnt on the altar of Molech in tribute to these demons (or more on that see this eye-opening article). OR,

• Solomon and/or most of his wives were struck with infertility and barrenness such that he was able to produce only three children out of all the dalliances with the thousands of women with whom he consorted over the years. We see a similar judgement against unlawful polygamy in the account of Sarai being betrothed to the King of Gerar (Genesis 20).

Nymphomania, idolatry, depression, infertility, child sacrifice, and disunity so vast it ripples out on a national scale doesn’t look, sound, or feel like Jesus. Solomon was known far and wide for his wisdom yet he chose his wisdom over the Lord’s command in order to craftily use his acquisition of wives to ally Israel with many powerful political regimes, including Egypt. Even the Queen of Sheba was in awe of what Solomon had accomplished and accumulated, but guess what we have no record of anyone ever walking away trying to emulate nor claiming was an amazing example of the blessing and wisdom of God on his life? His harem.