Why Men Lose Sexual Interest in Marriage, and Why the Bible Never Condemned Polygyny
- Rob Kowalski
- Jan 14
- 3 min read
Many Christian men quietly struggle with a question they’re afraid to ask out loud:
“Why did my desire fade… even though I still love my wife?”
They’re told it’s selfishness. Immaturity. Lack of discipline. Or worse, secret sin.
But psychology offers another explanation, one the church rarely engages with.
It’s called habituation.
What Psychology Says About Sexual Habituation
Psychologist Orion Taraban, author of The Value of Others, explains habituation as the natural decline in sexual excitement that occurs with prolonged familiarity.
The brain responds powerfully to novelty. Over time, repeated exposure to the same stimulus produces diminishing neurological response.
This is why:
Sexual passion fades in long-term relationships
Desire feels easier outside of marriage than inside it
Entire industries exist to recreate novelty: role play, costumes, “spicing things up”
In other words, the problem is not rare or pathological. It’s universal.
Yet Christianity often treats this reality as moral failure rather than biological design.
The Question Christians Avoid Asking
What if this isn’t brokenness?
What if male desire for variety is purposeful, not perverse?
The Bible begins with a command that modern churches rarely connect to sexuality:
“Be fruitful and multiply.”
If human reproduction depended on men being perpetually satisfied with one woman, expansion would be drastically limited.
Women can bear roughly one child per year. Men can father many.
The male drive for novelty, pursuit, and expansion is not random. It aligns with reproduction, legacy, and generational growth.
Why Polygyny Makes Sense Biblically (Even If It’s Uncomfortable)
Here’s a fact many Christians have never been taught:
👉 The Bible never condemns polygyny as sin.
Not once.
Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, and others all had multiple wives.God rebuked these men for injustice, disobedience, or neglect, not for plural marriage itself.
When Scripture regulates polygyny, it assumes its legitimacy.
That alone should force an honest question:
If polygyny were inherently sinful, why did God regulate it instead of forbidding it?
What the Church Got Wrong
When polygyny was culturally outlawed, something else happened:
Men didn’t become more faithful. They became more secretive.
Repressed male desire doesn’t disappear, it finds unbiblical outlets:
Pornography
Emotional affairs
Cheating
Double lives filled with shame
Modern Christianity didn’t eliminate male nature. It just removed legitimate frameworks for understanding and disciplining it.
Polygyny vs Adultery: The Distinction the Church Lost
Biblically:
Adultery is betrayal
Polygyny is responsibility
One destroys families. The other historically built them.
A man taking additional wives in Scripture was expected to:
Provide materially
Protect physically
Lead spiritually
Care emotionally
That’s not indulgence. That’s leadership under heavier weight.
What This Means for Christian Men Today
If you’ve felt torn between:
Wanting to honor God
Wanting sexual purity
And feeling desire that won’t shut off
You’re not alone. And you’re not broken.
You may simply have a polygynous disposition that’s been misunderstood, misdiagnosed, and morally shamed instead of biblically stewarded.
A Better Path Forward
The solution is not:
White-knuckle monogamy
Suppression
Pretending desire disappears with prayer
The solution is alignment.
Understanding how God created men, not how modern culture wishes we were created.
Next Steps
For Men
If this article put language to something you’ve felt for years, you belong around other men who are dealing honestly with these questions.
Man of Options exists to help men:
Understand biblical masculinity
Live sexually disciplined lives
Explore marriage, leadership, and legacy without shame or secrecy
➡️ Learn more at ManOfOptions.com Start your free 7-day trial today.
For Women
If you’re a woman who wants clarity instead of slogans, support instead of fear, and biblical truth presented with care and honesty, my wife Sanne leads a Telegram community called:
Faithful Femininity
A place for women navigating marriage, singleness, and biblical family design with wisdom and peace.
➡️ Apply here
Final Thought
Men were never designed to suppress their nature. They were designed to master it.
When we stop confusing tradition with Scripture, we don’t lose morality. We recover truth.
Comments