I wrote a series on the Lord’s statement in Genesis 2:24 ten years ago, from November 2008 through early January 2009, in response to the claim by some clerics that the Heavenly Father was against polygamy. And that He was instituting monogamy when He said in the verse above that: “And so shall a man leave the parents and cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one.” Some of them even claimed that no polygamous man can make the Kingdom of Heaven because God created only Eve as wife for Adam because He wants a man to marry only one spouse.
I am returning to the issues now because of the discussion I had last week with some Christians in Lagos who included Pentecostal prelates who still have misconception on the statement of the Ancient of Days in Genesis 2:24 and that He is not against polygamy. So, there is a need to enlighten them in the light of the Lord’s explanation to me on the issues. I am also writing this to let them know that they are lying and committing sin if they claim that Almighty God, Jesus Christ or the Holy Spirit told them polygamy is evil and that a man should marry only one wife. This is because God made no law against polygamy in the Old Testament neither did Jesus or the Apostles speak against it in the New Testament. During the Sermon on the
Mount when Jesus spoke on marriage he only talked about divorce and adultery.
My effort a decade ago was a huge success in that pastors, including a university professor who is a cleric, who were writing columns or occasional articles in the Sunday Vanguard stopped making such claims. The General Overseer of a very popular Pentecostal church who in an interview he granted the newspaper in 2008 said that God created one wife for Adam because He wanted men to be monogamous has also not come out to say so again.
The points I made in my series on the Lord’s statement in Genesis 2:24 and polygamy, which nobody in Nigeria, if not anywhere in the world, had come up with made some readers urge me to turn my articles on the issues into a book. But more significantly, the series made an American university, the Zoe Life Theological College in Philadelphia in the State of Pennsylvania, to confer me with the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity on March 15, 2009. The story of the award ceremony, which took place in Lagos, written by Tessy Igomu was published ten days later with three photographs on Page 44 of the Daily Sun of Wednesday, March
25 with the headline: “Adedipe’s Day of Cheers and Garlands.”
In the 92 – year history of newspaper publishing in the country, the late Dr. Tai(wo) Solarin, the founder and Principal of Mayflower College, Ikenne who wrote in the Daily Times and the Nigerian Tribune and myself are the only columnists in Nigeria bestowed with a honorary doctorate degree. He was honoured in the 1970s by a university in Romania.
Contrary to the belief of most Christians in Nigeria, especially the clergy, the Ancient of Days from His explanation when I raised the issue with Him was not instituting monogamy with His statement in Genesis 2:24. What He was putting in place was the type of marriage the men in ancient Israel were to have. This was the situation in which a man had to serve the father of the girl or woman he wanted to marry for seven years before she is released to him. As was the case with Jacob who worked for Laban for fourteen years to marry his daughters, Leah and Rachael (Genesis 29:1 – 25).
Jacob’s marriage is the only one in the Bible where the seven – year service condition was made known. As a result, I had thought it was peculiar to him and that Laban took advantage of his situation to treat him that way. It was to know the true position of things that made me raise the issue with the Heavenly Father ten years ago. And His reply was that it was the common practice in Israel and that it was what He was putting in place with His pronouncement in Genesis 2:24: when He said and so shall a man leave the parents and cleave to the wife; and the two shall become one.
More to come on Wednesday, next week
Phenomenal Matriarch of the Adedipes, Falaes, Ade – Ojos & others (4)
As his mother predicted when our patriarch, High Chief Adedipe I, was about a year old, he not only became the wealthiest person in Akure as from the 1860s, he also succeeded his father as the Elemo. As also foretold by his mother, his descendants have since his death in 1916 continued to be the Elemo, the third in the hierarchy of Akure traditional chiefs and in the Council of Kingmakers.
In other words, none of the descendants of our grandfather’s uncles, cousins or his half – siblings has been an Elemo since his transition one hundred and two years ago, and none of them could ever be again unless they changed their surnames to Adedipe. The next three Elemos after our patriarch, High Chief Adedipe I were his sons. He was succeeded by High Chief Adejuyigbe Adedipe II (1917 – 19), High Chief Akomolafe Adedipe III (1920 – 58) and my father, High Chief Josiah Orisabinu Adedipe IV (1959 – 72).
To be continued next week
Ebenezer Babatope, the great (6)
It was not until five years later in a book Ebino published in 1989: “Inside Kirikiri (Prison Memoirs of a Politician), a copy of which he sent to me that I got to know why General Tunde Idiagbon threatened to arrest me in 1984. On April 9 of that year and two days before he died, Ebino’s 75 year – old dad, Reverend Daniel Oke Babatope, had sent a letter to General Muhammadu Buhari from his sickbed at the University College
Hospital, Ibadan where he was receiving treatment for chronic bronchitis.
He had pleaded that if he died, Ebino should be released from prison detention to attend his burial, even under military or police guard. Although I was not aware of the old man’s letter, Idiagbon thought I made the same request in my column of Sunday, April 15, 1984 because Ebino had briefed me on his dad’s appeal. And that I was out to embarrass their government as an administration of callous military officers if they failed to release my friend, to at least attend the burial of his dad.
To be continued next week