Quotes about wife
page 10

O. Henry photo
Orson Scott Card photo

“An instance of callous and cold-blooded brutality is furnished by the incident that took place on December 20, 1949 in Kalshira under P. S. Mollarhat in the District of Khulna. … The police constable entered into the house and assaulted the wife of Joydev Brahma whose cry attracted her husband and a few companions who escaped from the house. They became desperate, re-entered the house, found 4 constables with one gun only. That perhaps might have encouraged the young men who struck a blow on an armed constable who died on the spot. … the assailants fled and the intelligent neighbours also fled away. But the bulk of the villagers remained in their houses as they were absolutely innocent and failed to realise the consequence of the happening. Subsequently, the S. P., the military and armed police began to beat mercilessly the innocents of the entire village, encouraged the neighbouring Muslims to take away their properties. A number of persons were killed and men and women were forcibly converted. House-hold deities were broken and places of worship desecrated and destroyed. Several women were raped by the police, military and local Muslims. Thus a veritable hell was let loose not only in the village of Kalshira which is 1-1/2 miles in length with a large population, but also in a number of neighbouring Namahsudra villages.”

Jogendra Nath Mandal (1904–1968) Pakistani politician

Excerpted from the resignation letter of J. N. Mandal, Minister for Law and Labour, Government of Pakistan, October 8, 1950. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Resignation_letter_of_Jogendra_Nath_Mandal https://biblio.wiki/wiki/Resignation_letter_of_Jogendra_Nath_Mandal

George Lyttelton, 1st Baron Lyttelton photo

“How much the wife is dearer than the bride.”

George Lyttelton, 1st Baron Lyttelton (1709–1773) British politician

An Irregular Ode; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Cato the Elder photo
Michelle Obama photo
Kate Bush photo

“She sent him scented letters,
And he received them with a strange delight.
Just like his wife
But how she was before the tears,
And how she was before the years flew by,
And how she was when she was beautiful.”

Kate Bush (1958) British recording artist; singer, songwriter, musician and record producer

Source: Song lyrics, Never for Ever (1980)

Jeff Foxworthy photo

“(To his wife) You do not have testicular cancer. You don't even have "testiculars!"”

Jeff Foxworthy (1958) American stand-up comedian

Have Your Loved Ones Spayed and Neutered (2004)

Paul Newman photo

“In South Korea, which is a much less conservative environment, politicians do not take their wives around with them as much as their American counterparts do. Showing pride in your wife is thought of as juvenile bad form. There's a special pejorative for people who do it.”

Brian Reynolds Myers (1963) American professor of international studies

As quoted in "The Top North Korean Expert Explains What Happened to Kim Jong Un's Uncle" https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115948/br-myers-purge-kim-jong-uns-uncle (16 December 2013), by Isaac Chotiner, New Republic
2010s

Layal Abboud photo
Will Cuppy photo
Han-shan photo

“Worry for others— it does no good in the end.
The great Dao, all amid joy, is reborn.
In a joyous state, ruler and subject accord,
In a joyous home, father and son get along.
If brothers increase their joy, the world will flourish.
If husband and wife have joy, it's worthy of song.
What guest and host can bear a lack of joy?
Both high and low, in joy, lose their woe before long.
Ha ha ha.”

Han-shan Chinese monk and poet

Translated by Mary Jacob[citation needed]
It is unlikely that this poem, translated by Mary Jacob, is authored by Han-shan. In comparing it with every poem in the corpus it will be found that there is not a close match. Moreover, neither the language nor the content of this poem is that of Han-shan. Most importantly, this poem does not have the appropriate number of lines for a Han-shan poem. Jacob's poem has 9 lines; there is not a single example of a 9 line poem in all of Han-shan's poetry. All of Han-shan's poems are 4, 8, 10 or 14 lines, with a few that have more than 14. Further, Jacob's poem has an odd number of lines; there is not a single example of a poem with an odd number of lines in all of Han-shan's poetry. Finally, the 9th and final line in Jacob's poem has the words “ha ha ha.” Not a single Han-shan poem has those words as a final line. Perhaps someone is having a joke?
Disputed

Cesare Pavese photo
Jay-Z photo
Ash Carter photo
Ignatius Sancho photo
Jane Austen photo
John Prescott photo

“Because of the security reasons for one thing and, second, my wife doesn't like to have her hair blown about. Have you got another silly question?”

John Prescott (1938) Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1997–2007)

Comment on ITN news when asked why he had taken a car 250 yards from his hotel to the Labour Party conference in Bournemouth, instead of walking (30 September 1999), as quoted in "Prescott walks it like he talks it " BBC News online (30 September 1999) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/461555.stm

John Buchan photo
Dafydd ap Gwilym photo

“I am twisted with passion – plague on all the girls of the parish! since I suffered from trysts which went amiss, and could never win a single one of them, neither gentle hopeful maid, nor little lass, nor hag, nor wife.”

Dafydd ap Gwilym (1320–1380) Welsh poet

Plygu rhag llid yr ydwyf,
Pla ar holl ferched y plwyf!
Am na chefais, drais drawsoed,
Onaddun' yr un erioed
Na morwyn fwyn ofynaig,
Na merch fach, na gwrach, na gwraig.
"Merched Llanbadarn" (The Girls of Llanbadarn), line 1; translation from Kenneth Hurlstone Jackson (ed. and trans.) A Celtic Miscellany (Harmondsworth: Penguin, [1951] 1975) p. 209.

Jopie Huisman photo

“As far as transience is concerned... You see the whole story in those shoes, that's why I paint them so accurate. The physical attitude; crooked legs, a lump. Those shoes were talking to me, and then I thought: I can see that you were so and so big, but did you also had a wife? Children? What were you doing? And what really mattered to me is my own place between them. Between those stories, that mystery. That pitch-black background [in Jopie's paintings, till c.1979-80] - I had found it. A cry for attention. Those pants, that shirt, that background, that was: here I am. But then it become mannerism. So I carried on realistically but avoiding the black background at all costs. It is as Rutger Kopland says: Whoever found it did not look well. Now I want to paint people like this, like they are made of colored mud. Color spiritualizes.”

Jopie Huisman (1922–2000) Dutch painter

translation, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018
version in original Dutch / citaat van Jopie Huisman, in het Nederlands: Wat de vergankelijkheid betreft.. .Je ziet het hele verhaal in die schoenen, daarom schilder ik ze zo scherp. De lichamelijke houding; kromme poten, een knobbel. Die schoenen praatten tegen me, en dan dacht ik: ik kan zien dat je zo en zo groot was, maar had je ook een vrouw? Kinderen? Wat deed je? En waar het me in wezen dan om ging is mijn plekkie daartussen. Tussen die verhalen, dat mysterie. Die pikzwarte achtergrond [in zijn schilderijen, tot c. 1979-80]; ik had het gevonden. Een schreeuw om aandacht. Die broek, dat hemd, die achtergrond, dat was: hier ben ik. Maar dan word je een maniërist. Dus ik ben realistisch doorgegaan, maar koste wat het kost die zwarte achtergrond vermijdend. Het is zoals nl:Rutger Kopland zegt: Wie het gevonden heeft, heeft niet goed gezocht. Nu wil ik de mensen zo schilderen, als zijn ze van gekleurde modder. De kleur die vergeestelijkt.
Mens & Gevoelens: Jopie Huisman', 1993

Jerry Falwell photo

“Today the world has gone sex crazy. Illicit sex has become the downfall of many in the Bible. Movie stars not married to each other, having babies and making headlines all over the world as though they were doing some great thing. Big deal! Just another moral pervert. And for them to become heroes for our kids. My wife and I will be married 49 years the next anniversary.”

Jerry Falwell (1933–2007) American evangelical pastor, televangelist, and conservative political commentator

Televised sermon at the Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia (25 June 2006), as quoted in "Falwell on the "moral pervert[s http://mediamatters.org/items/200606270003" in Hollywood: "[Y]ou almost got to be a homosexual to be recognized in the entertainment industry anymore" at Media Matters for America (27 June 2006)]

Conrad Aiken photo
John Eardley Wilmot photo

“The husband is not liable for the criminal conduct of his wife.”

John Eardley Wilmot (1709–1792) English judge

Lockwood v. Coysgarne (1764), 3 Burr. Part IV. 1681.

Toby Keith photo
Stendhal photo

“It is with blows dealt by public contempt that a husband kills his wife in the nineteenth century; it is by shutting the doors of all the drawing-rooms in her face.”

C'est à coups de mépris public qu'un mari tue sa femme au XIXe siècle; c'est en lui fermant tous les salons.
Vol. I, ch. XXI
Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black) (1830)

Philip K. Dick photo

“What about [my] books? How do I feel about them?
I enjoyed writing all of them. But I think that if I could only choose a few, which, for example, might escape World War Three, I would choose, first, Eye in the Sky. Then The Man in the High Castle. Martian Time-Slip (published by Ballantine). Dr. Bloodmoney (a recent Ace novel). Then The Zap Gun and The Penultimate Truth, both of which I wrote at the same time. And finally another Ace book, The Simulacra.
But this list leaves out the most vital of them all: The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. I am afraid of that book; it deals with absolute evil, and I wrote it during a great crisis in my religious beliefs. I decided to write a novel dealing with absolute evil as personified in the form of a "human." When the galleys came from Doubleday I couldn't correct them because I could not bear to read the text, and this is still true.
Two other books should perhaps be on this list, both very new Doubleday novels: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and another as yet untitled Ubik]. Do Androids has sold very well and has been eyed intently by a film company who has in fact purchased an option on it. My wife thinks it's a good book. I like it for one thing: It deals with a society in which animals are adored and rare, and a man who owns a real sheep is Somebody… and feels for that sheep a vast bond of love and empathy. Willis, my tomcat, strides silently over the pages of that book, being important as he is, with his long golden twitching tail. Make them understand, he says to me, that animals are really that important right now. He says this, and then eats up all the food we had been warming for our baby. Some cats are far too pushy. The next thing he'll want to do is write SF novels. I hope he does. None of them will sell.”

Philip K. Dick (1928–1982) American author

"Self Portrait" (1968), reprinted in The Shifting Realities of Philip K. Dick (1995), ed. Lawrence Sutin

Roger Ebert photo
Francis Place photo

“It may be supposed that I led a miserable life but I did not I was very far indeed from being miserable at this time when my wife came home at night, we had always something to talk about, we were pleased to see each other, our reliance on each other was great indeed, we were poor, but we were young, active cheerful and although my wife at times doubted that we would get on in the world, I had no such misgivings.”

Francis Place (1771–1854) English social reformer

Source: The Autobiography of Francis Place: 1771-1854, 1972, p. 7; Cited in: Jeremy Wickins. " An Overview of Francis Place's Life, 1771-1854 http://www.historyhome.co.uk/people/place2.htm," historyhome.co.uk, last edited 12 january 2016.

Jim Rogers photo
Arsène Wenger photo

“Everyone thinks they have the prettiest wife at home.”

Arsène Wenger (1949) French footballer and manager

In response to Sir Alex Ferguson's jibe that his team weren't deserving league and cup champions — "They are scrappers who rely on belligerence - we are the better team", (May 2002) http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/1975624.stm

William Faulkner photo
John Banville photo
Wilhelm Canaris photo

“Badly mishandled. Nose broken at last interrogation. My time is up. Was not a traitor. Did my duty as a German. If you survive, please tell my wife…”

Wilhelm Canaris (1887–1945) German admiral, head of military intelligence service

Final message to Colonel Landing, in the cell next to his. Quoted in "Canaris‎" - by Heinz Höhne - 1979

Plutarch photo
C. N. R. Rao photo
Sufjan Stevens photo
David Irving photo
Chris Cornell photo
Paul of Tarsus photo

“So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.”

Paul of Tarsus (5–67) Early Christian apostle and missionary

5:28 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians+5&version=KJV;SBLGNT
Variant translation:
Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.
Epistle to the Ephesians

William the Silent photo

“My legal wife is to me dead; the only ecclesiastical authority I recognise pronounces me free; the attacks and threats of men do not disturb me. I am acting according to a clear conscience, and am doing hurt to no man. For my conduct, I will answer to my maker.”

William the Silent (1533–1584) stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland and Utrecht, leader of the Dutch Revolt

William talking about his personal life, as quoted in William the Silent (1897) by Frederic Harrison, p. 176

Robert G. Ingersoll photo
Richard Russo photo

“I was shamed into helping the unborn after 12 years of silence, in 1986. Since then, my only client has been the unborn. I don't work for a movement. I don't work for a party. I don't work for candidates. I work for the unborn, and I don't give a flying flick about what people want to do on paper with bylaws, and all that kind of stuff, because it's just like the Pharisees, who had all their rules about the Sabbath, but they didn't know that the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath! I will stand for the unborn, and I will not relent! I don't know Mr. Clymer, but Howard Phillips has lost ALL of my respect, because he stands for people who want to kill ONE, only ONE, innocent child, and that's all that counts! If you want ONE innocent child, GO with this man, but I'll tell you what- I've got my paperwork filled out. All it lacks is my signature, and my wife's signature, and we're the hell out of here, if you vote to stay with a national party that will put up with ONE dead baby, much less many thousands of dead babies. And you sir [pointing at Jim Clymer] need to repent! Because the blood will be on your hands when you stand before God. You won't be able to argue about procedural votes, and keeping the party together before God! You'll be standing there quaking in your boots, wishing you'd washed yourself in the blood of the Lamb. That's all I've got to say…The only thing that matters to me is doing my job to stop the killing of the unborn.”

Paul deParrie (1949–2006) American activist

The Last Words of Paul deParrie http://www.constitutionpartyoregon.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=111&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

Lyndon LaRouche photo
Robert Hunter (author) photo

“What no wife of a writer can ever understand, no matter if she lives with him for twenty years, is that a writer is working when he's staring out the window.”

Burton Rascoe (1892–1957) American writer

Quoted by Bennett Cerf in Shake Well Before Using http://books.google.com/books?id=gVZAAAAAIAAJ&q=%22What+no+wife+of+a+writer+can+ever+understand+no+matter+if+she+lives+with+him+for+twenty+years+is+that+a+writer+is+working+when+he%27s+staring+out+the+window%22&pg=PA118#v=onepage (1948)

William T. Sherman photo

“Letter to his wife (2 June 1863), as quoted in "The Oxford Dictionary of American Quotations" (2005) edited by Hugh Rawson and Margaret Miner.”
Vox populi, vox humbug.

William T. Sherman (1820–1891) American General, businessman, educator, and author.

1860s, 1863, Letter (June 1863)

Frederick IV of Naples photo

“It seems to me that the Pope's son, the Cardinal, is not in a condition for me to give him my daughter to wife. Make a cardinal who can marry and take off the hat, and then I will give him my daughter.”

Frederick IV of Naples (1451–1504) King of Naples

Dated 1498 or earlier. Quoted in Sarah Bradford, Cesare Borgia / His Life and Times (1976, George Weidenfeld and Nicolson Limited. London. Reprinted 1981. ISBN 0-297-77124-8), p. 72

Anton Chekhov photo
Willa Cather photo
Bill Engvall photo
Bill Engvall photo
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus photo

“I have a wife, I have sons; all these hostages have I given to fortune.”
Coniunx<br/>est mihi, sunt nati; dedimus tot pignora fatis.

Coniunx
est mihi, sunt nati; dedimus tot pignora fatis.
Book VII, line 661 (tr. J. D. Duff).
Pharsalia

Edouard Manet photo

“Goodbye my dear Suzanne [his wife], your portraits are hanging in every corner of the bedroom, so I see you first and last thing..”

Edouard Manet (1832–1883) French painter

Quote from Manet's letter to his wife, Suzanne Leenhof, 3 December 1870; as quoted in Manet by Himself, Correspondence & Conversation; Paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, ed. Juliette Bareau-Wilson; Macdonald (1991)
1850 - 1875

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson photo
Henry Adams photo
Dana Gioia photo
Laura Bush photo

“I will not ask my wife to buy toilet paper.”

Lim Keng Yaik (1939–2012) Minister of Energy, Water and Member of ParliamentCommunications

disparaging comment on The Star
Malaysian Politicians Say the Darndest Things [Vol I]

Warren Farrell photo
David Hunter photo
Jeff Foxworthy photo
Gautama Buddha photo
Kurt Schwitters photo
Robert Burns photo
Edgar Rice Burroughs photo
Susan Faludi photo
Aron Ra photo

“Remember, [in the Bible] it's adultery only if the woman is already married. It doesn't matter if the man is married. If he is, she may just become another one of his wives, and a man can have sex with other women who aren't his wives, and that's not cheating either, as long as they live with him, because a man is also allowed to have concubines, and a concubine is a sort of sexual servant who serves no other purpose and has no claim to your estate. Your wife may not have a claim to your estate either, because when you die your wife may become your brother's sexual property. That's how the Bible defines marriage! The Bible does not prohibit multiple wives or incest either. In fact, both are promoted. However, when your father dies, your mother does not become your wife, and you can't inherit any of his other wives either, and the reason that the Bible gives for that is because that would be like looking up your father's skirt… So, a man can have multiple wives and a collection of personal harlots, but he can also have sex with his slaves, and that's not cheating either. You've heard of friends with benefits? You can call this your property rights. That's the only way that makes sense, because according to the Bible all women are property, and property doesn't have rights. Now, some people equate having sex with slaves to rape, because the slave doesn't have any choice. But, according to the Bible, women don't have any choice anyway, and rape can be a prelude to matrimony; if you're a Bronze Age Israelite and you see some young cutie walking unescorted, if you like her, you want her, you can have her, even if she doesn't want you. Now, if you rape a married woman, that's a death sentence for both of you (because the Bible is stupid like that). But if she's not promised to someone else, and you rape her and you get caught, you have to pay her father fifty shekels of silver and she's yours. He may not want her back after that, even his own child, because an unmarried woman who wasn't a virgin was considered damaged goods back then, so they had this rule that "if you pop it, you buy it." So your victim becomes your bride and you're stuck together forever, and can never get divorced (so be careful who you rape). There's actually a cheaper [and] easier way to get a bride; if a man takes a wife and decides he doesn't like her, if he can prove she wasn't a virgin (or if he can convince other people that was probably not a virgin), she she will be murdered on her father's doorstep because, according to the god of infinite mercy, that's the moral thing to do. But if she can prove that she was a virgin, then she must remain married forever to the man who hates her, because that's divine wisdom too. That unpleasant arrangement for both of you will also cost you a hundred shekels, whereas you can marry your rape victim for half the price. So, if you're a complete loser, and you can't get any woman who appeals to you by the normal way, just rape whoever you like and she's yours forever.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

Youtube, Other, Biblical Family Values https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bldw8X5apnY (July 11, 2015)

Buckminster Fuller photo

“I set about fifty-five years ago (1927) to see what a penniless, unknown human individual with a dependent wife and newborn child might be able to do effectively on behalf of all humanity…”

Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist

From 1980s onwards, Grunch of Giants (1983)

Richard Matheson photo

“My wife and child and I were on a camping trip and we stopped in Virginia City. In the Opera House, I saw a photograph of Maude Adams, the famous American actress. It was such a great photograph that creatively I fell in love with her. What if some guy did the same thing and could go back in time?”

Richard Matheson (1926–2013) American fiction writer

On his initial inspiration for the novel Bid Time Return (1975), as quoted in Behind the Scenes of Somewhere in Time (1980) http://erasofelegance.com/OldFiles/Movies/sitmovie.html"

Washington Irving photo

“His wife "ruled the roost," and in governing the governor, governed the province, which might thus be said to be under petticoat government.”

Washington Irving (1783–1859) writer, historian and diplomat from the United States

Book IV, ch. 4.
Knickerbocker's History of New York http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/13042 (1809)

“A husband only worries about a particular Other Man; a wife distrusts her whole species.”

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Marriage

Boris Johnson photo
Victoria of the United Kingdom photo

“All marriage is such a lottery -- the happiness is always an exchange -- though it may be a very happy one -- still the poor woman is bodily and morally the husband's slave. That always sticks in my throat. When I think of a merry, happy, and free young girl -- and look at the ailing aching state a young wife is generally doomed to -- which you can't deny is the penalty of marriage.”

Victoria of the United Kingdom (1819–1901) British monarch who reigned 1837–1901

Source: Letter (16 May 1860), published in Dearest Child: Letters Between Queen Victoria and the Princess Royal Previously Unpublished edited by Roger Fulfold (1964), p. 254. Also quoted in the article "Queen Victoria's Not So Victorian Writings" http://www.victoriana.com/doors/queenvictoria.htm by Heather Palmer (1997).

Poul Anderson photo

“"I'm not sure I ever 'got it' when it comes to how to live my life in a way that was original and free," reflected Steven Salt, a retired businessman. "Of course, like most men, I always believed I had the answers and that I was not going to live my life the stupid way other men do. I was going to be unique and avoid their mistakes, but instead I'm just another male stereotype. I started off thinking that being an achiever and a 'winner' would be the key to real freedom. So all my energy went that way and I faked everything else when it came to caring about other people. Then I thought I'd marry the 'perfect' woman and be the 'perfect' dad and husband, not like the other married men. I'd be different. But no matter how I tried I was forcing it and probably fooling no one but myself. My wife finally left and I barely know who my kids really are. When we talk it's mainly 'business.' I fell into all the traps. Now that I'm in my seventies, I'm becoming just like all those guys I felt sorry for when I was younger— guys with no real friends and with no patience for anyone else's ideas or opinions. I can barely stand to talk to anyone and yet I'm still looking to fulfill myself by meeting the 'perfect' woman. I've become a macho cliché. It's taken me this long to realize that even if she existed I really wouldn't know how to be with her and make it feel good anyway."”

Herb Goldberg (1937–2019) American psychologist

The Personal Journey of Masculinity: From Externalization to Disconnection to Oblivion, p. 9
What Men Still Don't Know About Women, Relationships, and Love (2007)

Wolfram von Eschenbach photo

“Any brother of mine and I make one person, as do a good man and his good wife.”

Mîn bruodr und ich daz ist ein lîp,
als ist guot man unt des guot wîp.
Bk. 15, st. 740, line 29; p. 369.
Parzival

Bruce Palmer Jr. photo
Sunil Dutt photo
Thomas S. Monson photo

“Several years ago my dear wife went to the hospital. She left a note behind for the children: "Dear children, do not let Daddy touch the microwave"—followed by a comma, "or the stove, or the dishwasher, or the dryer."”

Thomas S. Monson (1927–2018) president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

I'm embarrassed to add any more to that list.
Abundantly Blessed, Sunday Afternoon Session of the 178th Annual General Conference http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-851-38,00.html.

Clement Attlee photo

“A Tory minister can sleep in ten different women's beds in a week. A Labour minister gets it in the neck if he looks at his neighbour's wife over the garden fence.”

Clement Attlee (1883–1967) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Harold Wilson, Memoirs 1916-1964: The Making of a Prime Minister (Weidenfeld & Nicolson and Michael Joseph, London, 1986), p. 121.
Attributed

Bill Bryson photo
Robert Anton Wilson photo
Katie Hopkins photo

“I'm not sorry for stealing my husband from his wife.”

Katie Hopkins (1975) English media personality and newspaper columnist

Katie Hopkins: " I'm Not Sorry For Stealing My Husband From His Wife http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/08/06/katie-hopkins_n_3711079.html", at huffingtonpost.co.uk, posted: 06/08/20.
After admitting on The Apprentice That she had had an affair with Mark Cross who she knew was married, Hopkins clarified that she had no remorse for this, causing Cross to divorce his wife and eventually marrying him.

James Hudson Taylor photo

“It was no vain or unintelligent act when, knowing the land, its people and climate, I laid my dear wife and the darling children with myself on the altar for this service.”

James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) Missionary in China

(A.J. Broomhall. Hudson Taylor and China’s Open Century, Book Four: Survivors’ Pact. London: Hodder and Stoughton and Overseas Missionary Fellowship, 1984, 363).

Ali Gomaa photo

“Interviewer: what do you think about polygamy? Is this Egypt's method of family planning?
Ali Gum'a: This is a storm in a teacup. Our statistics show that cases of polygamy do not exceed two percent. That's one thing. Mistresses and adultery have become widespread throughout the world, beginning with the heads of state here and there – and I don't want to mention specific Western countries – and culminating with illegitimate children, who are recognized, due to the constraints of reality. I'd like to know if this is preferable to having a rate of two percent [polygamy] among marriages, according to the reliable official statistics? What is this? Are we supposed to allow adultery and ban marriages? In my opinion, this is preposterous.
[…]
Interviewer: In Judaism, a man is permitted to have four wives?
Ali Gum'a: Of course! Moses has four wives, and so did Abraham…
Interviewer: But today, it is not permitted.
Ali Gum'a: Today, yesterday…what's the difference? To this day, Judaism permits polygamy. The Hindus permit polygamy. The Buddhists permit polygamy. There is not a single religion on the face of the earth that bans polygamy, but all religions agree that women are not allowed to have more than one husband.
[…]
Ali Guma: …in Islam, Allah permits us – just like in all religions – to marry several wives, and have things done out in the open. For whose benefit is all this? For the benefit of the woman, because a woman who is taken as a mistress remains in the shadows, and loses all her rights. The man does not owe her anything. But since [Allah] permits marrying another wife, she gains respect, status, and rights.”

Ali Gomaa (1951) Egyptian imam

citation needed

Alexander Pope photo
Francis Escudero photo