Clearly relevant, though, is Deuteronomy 25:5, which provides that the brother of a deceased man must marry his dead brother’s wife, in what has become known as a Levirate marriage. (The word comes from the Latin levir, which means “brother-in-law.”) The verses that follow in Deuteronomy underscore the importance of this obligation, and don’t contain an exception if the surviving brother happens already to be married. So some Levirate marriages have the effect of not only permitting polygamy but actually requiring it. (Most Jews today do not follow this practice, but until the founding of the
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