With the help of
God
When I first published my article
"Kosher Polyamory" almost four years ago on
The reaction in
Although "Kosher Polyamory"
was originally intended for the Jewish audience, as the title of the piece
implies, it is not necessarily culture-specific and the particularly Jewish
elements in the article can be abstracted out, leaving the generally-applicable,
culture non-specific thesis intact.
While I certainly anticipated that
"Kosher Polyamory" would shake people out
of the doldrums of unsatisfying marriages, the article was most certainly not
written for the express purpose of shocking and/or outraging people or offending
their sensibilities in any way.
My considerations of the Human married
condition over a period of years that led up to the conclusion that is now
termed "polyamory", and my subsequent
adoption of a polyamorous lifestyle, were never meant
to be philosophical justification for hedonism or for irresponsible or
self-destructive or destructive emotional or sexual behavior. It was the
culmination of many years of reflection on the institution of monogamous
marriage. I saw people suffering unnecessarily, as the result of ascribing to
mistaken notions of Human needs and the unwillingness to loosen the shackles of
primitive religious tenets which hold that God is propitiated by our suffering,
and most especially so by our suffering sexual dissatisfaction, and I could not
but consider how to emancipate them from their self-inflicted misery.
I came to the conclusion that polyamory is a workable solution for married couples and
those in long-term relationships who love one another, are committed to one
another and the lives they have built together and wish to remain together, but
have arrived at a point in their lives where they need love and/or sex from
another person as well. I
consider this a normal state of affairs and I realistically anticipate that most
people involved in relationships that go over a period of years and decades
will arrive at that point at some juncture in their relationship.
When I first came to the conclusion that the
adoption of this lifestyle would ameliorate a great deal of the emotional and
physical frustration, which the institution of monogamous marriages causes to
so very many people, I did not know that a few intrepid others had come to the
same conclusion. Neither did I know that
a name had been coined for this lifestyle by those courageously honest few who
had more fully embraced the reality of their Human emotional and sexual needs
than most and who had evolved to the point of being able to separate love from
jealousy and exclusivity.
Searching for others who may have come to
the same conclusion as I did, I typed phrases like "open marriage"
and "polygamy+polyandry" into my
browser. Admittedly, at first I found a
lot of what I would consider to be "sleaze", Spiritual and physical
degradation and even depravity. I also came across a number of sites for
"swingers", which I did not want to be. Finally, I found a site
dedicated to POLYAMORY. What a relief it
was to know that I was not alone, that there were other people all over the
world, albeit few in number, who had embraced the polyamorous
way of life and are enjoying not only the stabilization, enhancement and
enrichment of their primary relationships that are as dear to them as Dan's and
my relationship is to us, but who are also enjoying the experience of opening
themselves up to new love.
The term 'polamory' has been coined only very recently. You will not find the term 'polyamory' in most dictionaries of the English
language. Even as I type, my Word™ program puts a red line under the
word polyamory, indicating that it is a misspelling.
English-speaking society-at-large is not yet willing to allow the existence of
the phenomenon, and this refusal is the reason why no accepted term for the
phenomenon is to be found in lexicons of the English language. The term 'polyamory' is used properly and rigorously mostly by those
who practice the lifestyle. The term is a synthesis of the Greek poluj (which is familiar to readers of
English as the prefix 'poly'), meaning 'many', and the Latin 'amor', meaning 'love'. The mere linguistic attaching of the
Greek prefix meaning 'many' to the Latin suffix meaning 'love' without
qualification creates a transderivational morphology
that is far too open, emotionally-charging and apt to induce associations of
cultural and religious taboo. Thus, it
is far too likely misconstrued. It
appears to say that polyamory is nothing more many
loves and that might mean many things that polyamorists,
as a group, do not, and would not, subscribe to or agree with. The strict definition of polyamory,
and the one that most polyamorists would accept and
attempt to live in accordance with, is this:
Polyamory, or ethical
non-monogamy, is the philosophy or practice of having loving, intimate
relationships with more than one person at a time, with the knowledge and
consent of all involved.
I hope that the
forgoing and the article "Kosher Polyamory"
itself will make it clear that to be polyamorous is
not to be polyamoral.
For your
convenience, "Kosher Polyamory" is recopied
below. I hope that the forgoing and the
article itself will make it clear that to be polyamorous
is not to be polyamoral.
KOSHER POLYAMORY
It happens in the best of marriages. One day, after countless
small disappointments you look at your partner and realize that this person
whom you’ve loved for years or even decades just isn’t capable of satisfying
some of your deepest needs.
The first reaction is denial. No, perhaps I’m just having an off
day, feeling a bit overly critical today. But the thought returns on another
day and then another. The second reaction is shock. Our marriage isn’t a good
one?! But we were so in love, so close. How can this be? What happened to us?
The third reaction is rage at your partner. You deceived me! You’re not who you
made yourself out to be! I want a divorce! I don’t love you anymore. I want
OUT!
But you don’t want out. You still do
love this person very much. You’ve built so much together. You’ve raised
children together, established a home, perhaps a business. You two share so
many memories. The bond between you survived so many difficulties. How can it
be broken now? Yet the gnawing feeling of being deprived and dissatisfied won’t
relent.
The fourth reaction, which can occur only if you allow the rage
and depression to pass and if you trust your partner implicitly, is to sit and
talk honestly with this person who, for so many years, has been your best
friend. The two of you reminisce, the shared memories
are still precious to both of you. You honestly can’t imagine life without this
person, the friend and lover of your youth.
You are no longer young and you have
different needs than when you first met this person and fell in love. You’ve
both grown. The basic values you both shared when you were in your twenties are
still there if this is a healthy liaison, but now in your thirties or forties
or more there are other aspects of your character that have come to the fore
and they need to be addressed.
Paradoxically, the very fact that your marriage has been
successful is what caused you to grow and change, to mature. There is no point
in lying to ourselves. We have grown apart in some very meaningful ways. There
are parts of me you cannot know, cannot satisfy, cannot
share. There are parts of you too, you are now honest enough to tell me, that I
cannot touch and never have. But we still love one another very, very much.
What are we to do? I want you to be happy and I know you want me to be happy
too.
We look deeply into ourselves and
come to a startling conclusion. I am capable of loving someone else, too, even
while I still love you. These loves need not contradict. They may even
compliment one another. I can imagine the other person/s that I love being a
dear friend of yours. Moreover, I can imagine you loving someone else in
addition to your love for me. I am at peace with that thought. It rouses no
jealousy in me. The thought actually brings me peace.
What thoughts! Polygamy! Polyandry Blasphemy!
Have I gone mad? No, I’ve gone brutally honest. I’m an adult now. The childish
need to be cherished exclusively, as I wanted so much from my parents has worn
away. I need to be loved as a mature adult now. The love I need now is far more
complex than the love of my youth. It is far less selfish too. I can share you
now. I no longer need to be your one and only dear one.
All well and good. But this person is not just my
partner. This person is my spouse, to whom I am wedded in accordance with the
sacred vows of my People and my religion which I took upon myself the day I
wed. Herein lies the problem. We are indeed married.
We’re not just friends, not just lovers. We are man and wife.
Jewish law unequivocally forbids polyandry. Polygamy was ruled
out by our Rabbis one-thousand years ago, except in rare instances. Yet we
learn that up until the time of King David individuals who were not betrothed
or married were allowed to engage in sexual relationships with one another.
This practice was done away with thereafter because of the risk of widespread
licentiousness. (The Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin 21:1-2). The story
of Amnon and Tamar (Samuel II, 13) supports our
position. The words “single” refers not only to young single people, who are
likely to be overwhelmed by the sexual-emotional freedom of Polyamory,
but also to divorce/es, widow/ers
and mature people who never married. The latter three are also “single” but
more emotionally complex and therefore more likely to be in need of more than
one partner. There is however, a “loophole” in Jewish Law which would allow for
the satisfaction of the need of the mature human to be loved by someone in
addition to their life partner – simply not marrying. There is no Jewish law
which compels a person to marry. The commandment of “be fruitful and multiply”
is directed toward the male alone and this commandment means to bring one male
child and one female child into the world, not with the wife of another man.
Authentic Judaism satisfies the needs of the whole Jew; from the highest
spiritual levels to our most basic instincts. The fact that we are not
commanded to marry means that we are intended to grow into a
spiritual-social-physical state in which monogamous marriage does not exist.
This is the ultimate solution to the problem of bastard children as well. In
other words, ancient Jewish Law recognized the real needs of real people and a
way of living within the strict confines of the Law, while giving the soul and
the body that which they yearn for, is provided. Moreover, the laws concerning
bastard children are written as they are in Torah in order to arouse within us
feelings of compassion for these children and the desire to solve the problem.
There is a threat of licentiousness creeping into a society if
sexual-emotional ties were allowed to be established and dissolved at whim. Polyamory is not promiscuity. It is exactly as the prefix
and the suffix says: much /many erotic loves (loves, not adventures, not
extra-marital flings). The reader will not find this prefix and suffix together
as one compound word in a dictionary, as Western society refuses to admit to
the possibility of such an institution. (My word processor puts a red line
under this word as well.). This is not child’s play. It is not intended for the
young, who, by virtue of their youth tend toward irresponsibility and to demand
the immediate gratification of their childish wants. It is intended for
responsible adults who wish to establish relationships of love and
understanding with more than one partner. It is not the youthful desire for
numerous experiences, but the honest recognition of the fact that no one human
being, no matter how wonderful and suited to our character, can be expected to
fulfill all of our physical, emotional and psychic needs for years, even for
decades. Likewise, I too recognize my fallibility and limitations. I cannot give
anyone everything they need. To make such a demand on any given person,
including oneself, is to set both partners up for
disappointment and to instill in one another a feeling of abysmal failure. How
many beautiful friendships were dashed against the rocks of the myth of
exclusive love! Love is not exclusive, by its very
nature it cannot be possessive.
The author has searched the Internet for websites concerning Polyamory. The findings were quite disappointing. Much of
the Polyamory that appears on the Internet is
associated with weird cults, paganism, even Satanism!!! It is as though, in the
mind of Western man, monogamy is the earthly parallel of monotheism. A woman is
to have one husband, who in turn has one God. A general atmosphere of confusion
surrounds the issue of Polyamory. As it is portrayed
on the Internet it seems far from holiness, indeed. Actually, none of this is
very surprising. It is taught in the Kabbalah - the
mystic teaching of Judaism - that the holier an expression of God is, the stronger
the vessel must be to contain it. The results of not being able to contain
holiness are what is called “breaking of the vessels”:
insanity, blasphemy and premature death. Indeed, there lurk many dangers in
irresponsible Polyamory.
There is yet another issue to be considered which has made Polyamory unthinkable to the Western mind: it is the idea
of Eve being given to Adam and them becoming one flesh. Herein lies a very interesting point: People in a state of
restricted consciousness imagine themselves to have only one body which is
limited to one place at one time, and in which their one personality is
trapped. Most people do not allow themselves to love so much that no one body
or personality could possibly contain so much love. When we do reach a state of
expanded intelligence and emotional expansion, we realize that we are not
jailed within cells. We begin to be able to imagine that just as our soul is
now projecting itself into the physical world in one form,
it could project itself into physical reality in many forms. Each of these
forms would need to express love and be loved. We see that to become one flesh
is a much larger concept than we could have dreamed of when we were limiting
ourselves by limiting our ability to love. Hints of this truth exist in people
who are in a state of restricted consciousness. Women typically think that they
are not beautiful enough. Many women would like to have the face of so and so,
the body of someone else and the hair of yet someone else. Men too wish to be
stronger, taller, more athletic. They fantasize what
it would be like to be a composite of a number of other men. Similarly, the
mythologies of the Peoples of the earth are replete with fantastic characters
that can transmogrify. These are primitive expressions of the real ability
which lies dormant in every human being to project themselves into the physical
world as need be in order to express and receive the love the soul needs. In a
higher state of human existence, Polyamory would be
not only natural, but necessary.
It is essential that a social structure which can support the
existence of Polyamory in purity be established. Such
a society would be one distinguished by the sharing of all of human needs –
physical, intellectual, cultural and spiritual. Those living such a lifestyle
must be free of jealousy. The genuine desire for the happiness and fulfillment
of their beloved ones needs to fill their hearts. They must understand that
they cannot fulfill all of the needs of even those they love the very most and
not make this demand of another. They must be able to free themselves of all
feelings of possessiveness of their children. A community in which all of the
members take part in the rearing of the children as ours needs to be
established. Perhaps the most obdurate reason that women are forced to accept a
life of being the wife of one man is that traditionally men did not want to
work to support the children of other men. The words of the prayer Jews say
after eating bread expresses male possessiveness very clearly: “May The
Compassionate One bless the master of this house, the master of this repast,
him, his sons and his wife and everything that is his.” It is the author’s
prayer that The Compassionate One bless this “master”
with the gift of surrender. Relationships are to be established on the basis of
on-going genuine love and respect. In order for Polyamory
to be pure, it must exist within the context of a society in which the ideal of
sharing and community responsibility for fulfillment of the real and valid
needs of real human beings is the societal norm in all spheres of life. The
author is in no way promoting a free-for-all. It needs to be a society in which
both the women and men alike have transcended the base egoism of proprietary
feelings in all spheres, even concerning the children of the community.
Spiritually evolved human beings understand that others are capable of giving
our children what we cannot. (Actually, every parent who sends his/her child to
school thereby admits to this.) This is in accordance with the recognition that
another beloved can give to my beloved that which I cannot give. When humanity
acquires the emotional and spiritual ability to live with this generosity of
spirit, we will be relieved of the stifling aspects of partnership in adult
human relationships as we suffer them today. We will be unburdened of much of
the suffering of the parent-child relationship that we experience today as
well. Truly, as the African proverb has it, it does indeed take an entire
village to raise one child.
(The author has a friend whose grandfather immigrated to
The fact that there is no compound word “Polyamory”
in Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary means that in the English
speaking world, and in the cultures overtaken by the Western way of thinking,
the issue is out of the bounds of discussion. This writer is convinced,
however, that the issue needs be considered, and considered very seriously.
There are too many couples who live with one another dreadfully unhappily
because they have very real physical, emotional and intellectual needs that
their partners cannot satisfy. Having no outlet for these needs, which cause
them great distress going unfulfilled, they cannot appreciate that which their
partner does give them. It seems far more humane to allow for a responsible and
mature expression and satisfaction of our needs as human beings on all levels
of our being than to suppress them and to cause internal rage, conflict and
depression in the name of “civilization”. It is not a betrayal of one’s beloved
to admit to oneself that we can love someone else too. It is an unburdening
them of an impossible task.
Doreen Bell-Dotan,