the above cited passages. Besides, it would be quite against the spirit of the Hebrew idiom to translate the firstnoun, literally a wife, and the second noun (ackothah), figuratively another. We have here no alternative, but must either translate both nouns literally or both figuratively, and as the rendering one to another would make no sense, we have no choice but to adopt the rendering of the text given in our authorized version, which rendering has also been adopted by all ancient versions.
But objectionable as the marginal rendering is in a philological point of view, it will be found even more so when we come to examine its bearing upon other portions of Scripture, since the verse would then afford a distinct law against polygamy, whilst we have, on the contrary, undeniable proofs that no such law could have existed among the ordinances of the Pentateuch, although we have certainly reasons to believe that the prevailing feeling among the Hebrews seems to have been in favour of monogamy. We can never for one moment suppose that Moses would be guilty of such an inconsistency as instituting in one place a positive prohibition against the plurality of wives, and immediately afterwards laying down such a law, that in case "a man have two wives, one beloved and one hated; and they have born children," he was on no account to confer the privilege appertaining to the first born upon a son of the favourite wife, if by rights it belonged to a son of the hated one. (Deut. xxi. 15-17.) So in Deut. xvii. 17, where Moses lays down rules for the guidance of Kings, he does not say that a King may not have more than one wife, but that he was not to "multiply wives to himself," which is immediately followed by the injunction, "neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold." Nay more, according to 2 Sam. xii. 8, God Himself mentions as one of the favours vouchsafed to David that
