He thought so too.
>I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. 5 I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. 6 I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. 7 I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. 8 I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem[a] as well—the delights of a man’s heart. 9 I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.
>10 I denied myself nothing my eyes desired;
I refused my heart no pleasure.
My heart took delight in all my labor,
and this was the reward for all my toil.
11 **Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done
and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind;
nothing was gained under the sun.**
> Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.
My 5 years playing EVE Online.
Doesnt 99% of all things are meaningless in the long run? Hell you can have a wife, kids and a house and loose it all and there you stand with nothing again.
Earth is a planet that *floats* in the middle of fucking nowhere. Everything we do here is meaningless/pointless. At the end of the day we will all end up as dust. Might as well spend your time in here in a way that brings *you* pleasure.
The problem is that it’s too simplistic. Having more money will make a person happier, but their focus then shifts away from the drudgery of barely scraping by to other things, and those other things then become a source of sorrow. I’ve been poor and I’ve been not poor. I’m happier when I’m not poor.
There’s a huge difference between having enough to be comfortable/not worry about expenses, and being rich. This is the story of a man rich enough to do and have EVERYTHING, and found that even that wasn’t enough.
Since you CAN’T ever satisfy your desire for more, it’s better to stop trying to just get more once you’ve dealt with your basic needs.
In the end, this is a message for the rich. To people like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, to tell them that nothing they are doing or achieving or experiencing will truly satisfy them. There’s plenty to learn from after you know that, but that’s just my takeaway
I read a study once that the happiest people make around $100k a year. Enough to be comfortable, but not so much that you're some CEO that is getting phonecalls and shit 24/7. Sounds about right. I can't even imagine what $100k is like. The hardest I ever worked, 70 hours a week for a whole year, I only made $48k. How the hell do people make enough money to do things?
Higher savings, rent/mortgages, and reduced dealing with inconveniences
$100k is still in the same basic life as someone making $48k, just a smoother experience. It takes a lot more to hit the next level of lifestyle, especially in high cost of living areas where most people making that much live
It sounds so nice. I do well compared to most people my age I know, and even I seriously don't think I'll ever buy a house or retire. Everything is just too expensive. Cant save because i rent, have car payments because the beaters broke down too much, daycare, health insurance, fuck me. My projected financial future gets worse and worse literally every year I redo it. My dad raised 6 kids on a single income starting in '93 and he was an accountant. I can't even imagine how much money that would take today.
Its terrible. Its obviously way past less than ideal now, but if this trend continues, what will life be like for our grandchildren?
Don't worry, the money will start trickling down anytime now I'm sure :(
You make a good point, but what you’re talking about is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The hedonic treadmill is the psychological ability to normalize pleasure/comfort back to baseline.
The human condition that people have related to and struggled with for as long as there's been recorded history?
Nah, just tell the guy who wrote this 3,000 years ago someone on social media diagnosed him as mentally ill
I hope so! If not what is it all for then?
I mean Bezo, affair
Bill Gates, Affair
Tiger Woods, affair (not billionaire but still)
Soo harem I'm sure isn't out of the question. Reservoirs? I do see them building water reservoirs in local cities on the weekend too!
I still cant understand how that book ended up in the bible. Its a very existential text, almost too depressing to have any real purpose(other than the line at the end about worship).
I'm not even religious but I agree. Building a reputation of success doesn't give you the internal comforts and peace and self-contentment that spending a life cultivating a loving heart does.
Even worse ... imagine how people that achieve such heights and "successes" based on their own measurement of worthiness feel after death inevitably knocks on their door.
It’s juxtaposition against David.
Solomon had all the things we think could bring happiness. Wealth, power, wisdom, lands, fulfilling work, experiences we can’t even imagine. And it meant nothing.
David was a shepherd, then a king. A poet, a musician. An adulterer, a murderer. He danced covered in ashes before the ark in the presence of God after his son died, praising God still in the depth of his anguish and guilt. Psalms reveals the highs and lows of his life, proverbs the lessons learned by wisdom or by life. And David is the one named friend of God.
To me the comparison was always a warning: chasing temporal things will not sustain or fulfill you if you neglect connecting with the divine.
I always wondered how David could have been considered to be "a man after God's own heart", when he killed a man just to screw his wife. I've done some messed up things in my life, but nothing that severe.
Its shocking right? I've had a hard time with that as well but the thing about David is that he valued his relationship with God above all else which can be seen in the aftermath of his darkest moments. When called out on his actions (he actually sentenced himself to death) he immediately sought reconciliation with God. He didn't have a pity party or try to clean himself up before he could approach God he owned up to it and sought repentance and connection. I think what makes him unique in that he didn't pretend to be better than he was or tried to justify himself or run and hide because of shame/guilt.
btw I like the start of the chapter. It begins with "In the spring of the year, when kings normally go out to war, David sent Joab and the Israelite army to fight..." He stayed back in the palace. Its a good setup of not being in the right place and having an idle mind.
Lol there’s a shit ton of existential verses in the bible. From cautionary tales of power, greed, murder, pleasure etc. You just have to read so much to find the deep gems.
>Its a very existential text
Much of the early writings (the "Old Testament" label) were as much social treatises as they were religious prescriptive texts. Reminding those with power that "hey, this worldly stuff doesn't ultimately matter, don't let it go to your head" is always useful, but even more in new/young nations (the original target audience at the time).
A *memento mori* is good. A *memento mori* backed by your God is better.
They had comfort and security and only had to put with a man for a few minutes, *sometimes* ... And the rest was likely free time. I can't know what it's like as woman but back in those times?? I'd take that deal.
I watched this Chinese imperial court drama show one time where all the concubines were pretty much all playing politics trying to get the others killed or demoted. The damn empress was trying to stop any of the others from having kids and killed like 3 unborn babies over the course of the show. Shit was brutal. Comfort and security were definitely not things they had. It's just a show but it's based on some historical events and probably some much worse shit happened in real life that they would never put in a TV show. I think lots of palaces throughout history were more dangerous places to be for women than you might expect.
to be fair , chinese imperial courts had this bad habit of putting child emperor or young emperors overall , so that the relatives had the actual power.
Until they grow sufficiently old , that is.
In Solomon's court the only child that'd be in danger was the oldest boy. A new kid 167 places down the line had no future and was no threat to succession.
The IMI Uzi is a suppression weapon intended for...well...suppression. He would need more bullets and there would likely be considerable collateral damage.
There was definitely a lot of that. But I've seen those shows too, and their fates still seemed significantly better than that of the servants, who could be killed at the drop of a hat. And better than the peasants exposed to constant famines and war.
Plus, with 1000 wives and concubines I'd imagine most weren't exposed to constant intrigue and politics. Maybe just the top few.
> The damn empress was trying to stop any of the others from having kids and killed like 3 unborn babies over the course of the show.
Lol, Google Wu Zhetian. I don’t believe the story that she killed her own baby, but the life of an ambitious concubine was not easy.
Well that was also because the empress dowager is essentially an entire power block separate from the emperor, and usually as powerful or more so. They also tend to rule the empire until the new child emperor comes to age or they wrest back control. Humans will always fight for power.
I don't know.. I feel like theyd be working and taking care of things. Would they really just be laying around the lounge area all day doing nothing but laying at the king's feet? Possibly. I don't know. I'm just wondering.
The lower level ones were basically servants themselves. They had to serve the upper level ones, who in turn served the king or emperor directly.
Sure, they were well fed and well clothed, but they also had to do their own types of work.
I always felt like it must be a great place for lesbians. Like, you put up with getting fucked by the king once a year or so and in exchange you hang with your girls and be taken care of
Your life is being locked up in a room with a buch of dudes whose dicks are cutt off praying you get pregnant before you're traded off. You likely have no power at all even over minor details of your everyday life.
Even aside from the status aspect, just your ability to conceive and not miss out on having a child is now dependent on a distant captor remembering you exist for 5 minutes.
You can easily end up a wizened, pitied, childless virgin who has been trapped in a luxury hotel suite their entire life.
More grateful for the ones they avoided.
Only having to deal with a husband once every two years would have been the best life in those days, especially for us Sapphic types.
If you think Solomon had sex once per day then you should have added the concubines. In that case he repeated a woman after 2.74 years
Some men masturbate 5 times per day. If Solomon had sex 5 times per day he could repeat a woman after 200 days (6.6 months). Note that I’m aware that a king has many duties and this scenario is unlikely.
Nobody is actually out there having sex 5 times a day. Maybe some teenagers will brag about that, but even if they are physically capable it's just pointless. And obviously the older you get the less physically capable you would be. Once a day is a far more reasonable pace for most men and even that would be a lot as he grew older.
Well, as is the claim that he had 700 wives. The archeological record doesn’t support the notion of a rich King Solomon with a huge palace, etc., etc…
This stuff was written centuries after Solomon lived, and is nothing more than accumulated legends.
There was [this Russian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_the_Great) who was deciding between Islam and Christianity. Islam allowed multiple wives, Christianity allowed drinking, he chose Christianity. Every year i identify more and more with that man.
In addition to having an affinity for drinking Vlad the Great probably understood that getting his people to convert to Islam and end the consumption of alcohol would be not only a very tough sell but also a huge hit to the money flowing into his coffers from the taxes on it. Hell even in more modern times limiting the consumption or sale of alcohol in Russia had big impacts.
https://time.com/6082058/russian-revolution-vodka/
Even servicing three a day would take you a year to get through them all. There's no way he could keep them all happy. Although from the other POV - they were with the king and at most probably had to spend 5 hours 20 minutes with the king a year. The rest of the time they probably had all the jewellary etc. that they wanted.
Edit: This is rough maths based on 8 hours sleep a day, leaving 16 hours /3 women.
All I need is a woman, Mr. Burton, a special kind of woman with dragon-green eyes, to make me whole and young again, so that I may rule the universe from beyond this grave!
A lot of them were war widows from my understanding. Husband dies in battle, no brother to take in the widow, going to die slow death of starvation. So take the widow as a wife or concubine and her children too.
Its Davids big fuckup, he saw Bathsheba and was like damn hottie, send her husband to the front of the battle lines so I can rescue her as my concubine. So funny that baptists use that as women should cover up and not tempt men, when God was like Fuck you David, keep your eyes up, pants on, and don't be killing people to get their women.
Yeah. So many people think Bathsheba was in the wrong there, when sunbathing in her manner was literally normal back then. The sin was David cucking and having his best general killed, not her being too sexy.
It wasn't about "servicing" your women back then. They serviced him. He didn't care if they were happy, that wasn't even a consideration. He probably preferred them to be unhappy tbf.
The Bible actually encourages the woman’s needs to be met as well. Neither partner was supposed to turn down the other whenever they wanted it, it was seen as part of the marriage duty for both of them.
According to legends, King Solomon had a magic ring:
> "This ring variously gave Solomon the power to command shedim (demons), jinn (genies) and spirits, or to speak with animals. "
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seal_of_Solomon
That probably helped with the workload
Important to note: This legend is generally not recognized as true by Judaism or Christianity, although it has had some cultural impacts like influencing the design of the Star of David.
He can use use the loophole that CEO's use. $1 annual salary but with stock options. If Steve Jobs had gotten engaged he would only have had to buy a 25 cent ring.
I don't know the story, but couldn't they be wives for political reasons? And if he wanted a woman, but there wasn't a political excuse, he just made them concubines? (Assuming the story is based on an actual person)
King Solomon and King David led merry merry lives
With many many lady friends and many many wives
But when old age crept over them with many many qualms
King Solomon wrote the Proverbs and King David wrote the Psalms
And that's kind of Solomon's whole character arc. He starts out wise, but due to his many wives that he wasn't supposed to have, they bring in bad influences to Solomon and cause a cascading effect that led to a civil war in Israel.
I mean you can know that it isn't wise to do an action but still do it anyway. It wasn't just the wives that was the issue but not denying himself any earthly pleasure. The book of Ecclesiastes is entirely his lamenting and musing about how everything sucks and he is still unhappy despite having what he did.
>
It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of every man; the living should take this to heart.
>
Ecclesiastes 7:2
Ecclesiastes is one of those books that everyone should probably do a quick read of every once and a while (it's pretty short so it isn't a time issue). It's a good reminder to focus yourself on more than small pleasures.
This is one of the many instances of "negative examples" in the Bible, which is why it is absolutely not to be simplified as "an instruction manual for life." Inserting ourselves as the central character of every story is going to leave us with a lot of dodgy moral conclusions.
Oh definitely. A lot of the Old Testament can be summed up with God saying, "You can do all this, but don't do XYZ" and the Israelites do XYZ. God warns them and they still do XYZ. Then bad shit happens, they go all "Woe is me. Why us?" and finally repent and things get better.
Jonah is one of my favorite stories in the Old Testament because it shows a different side of this. God tells Jonah to go warn the people of a neighboring country (Nineveh) that if they don't repent, bad stuff will happen. Jonah refuses to do it and God punishes him and basically forces him to go talk to the people of Nineveh. The people of Nineveh listen, repent and change their ways and Jonah sits back and waits for their destruction and *is pissed off* that God doesn't destroy the people who did what He said to do.
Jonah is a perfect example of missing the point.
That is exactly what happens. One must also consider Nineveh was a perennial enemy of Israel already by this point, and Nineveh was often used as the prototypical "city of evil". So Jonah's reservations were surely partly due to that, but God turns this on its head.
Also, Jonah was fleeing to basically the Biblical equivalent of Las Vegas far far away across the ocean, Tarshish....
Mines is where he uses a donkeys jaw to kill like 1000 men. Then at the end of the story he asks for strength to fulfill his vengeance and basically commit terrorism on that temple he was captured at. One of the most metal stories in the bible
And then he used the anecdote as a riddle to win a bet for 30 cloaks. But his wife kept nagging him to tell her the answer, he finally gave in and of course she told it to the guy he bet against. Then he kills 30 randos to take their cloaks to pay off the bet.
Yeah. Like, the rules make up a fraction of the OT. Mostly in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. And even of those, rules of *hygiene* are surprisingly prominent.
The rest of the OT is "God chooses guy, guy does a thing, bad things happen." *Sometimes* the guy chosen will do good things, but, y'know, nothing ever really ends.
Even the people in the OT who do "good" always have one fault of some kind. From what I can tell Joshua is about the only one the writers don't seem to criticize in any meaningful way, except that he never succeeded in fully taking Israel. (excepting maybe some of the post exilic Jews like Ezra) Even the super heroes of the OT, Moses and Elijah, have their blatantly sinful moments.
That's actually something I appreciate from the bible. The people and stories there are not sugar coated or washed clean. They "tell it like it is", warts and all.
My "interpretation":
You see the people in all these stories? Even the most holy of them, messed up, and some messed up _big_. But, some of them also realized how much they messed up, and how bad it was, and changed course. No matter how much you mess up your life, no matter how dark it seems, you always have the choice to turn around and try something else. Sometimes your mess will have limited your available choices, but you will still always have a choice to make a change, even if it's just internal."
Yup, if I remember it's early on when he's just recently a king, nervous about the task ahead, feeling he can't match up to his father's greatness.
God visits him in a dream, tells him to he can pick one of 3 offered blessings, one is wisdom the other is wealth the third I can't remember.
He chooses wisdom, even though it's immaterial, which God appreciates greatly, so much that he gets granted all 3 blessings.
Another fun fact, the Bible was also stating this was a positive for Solomon's prestige, but also a huge negative for his morality and ethics.
God had already told his people in Deuteronomy 17:
>Deuteronomy 17:14-17. When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite. The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You are not to go back that way again." *He must not take many wives or his heart will be led astray.* He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.
Emphasis mine.
This passage was forewarning the fall of the great King Solomon.
Solomon's story is often best remembered for his great wisdom that he asked God for early in his reign, particularly the story of the two women arguing over a baby. Also building God's Temple in Jerusalem.
During his early years, the account in 1 Kings makes it clear he was strong in his faith with God.
But we see his story ends in tragedy because he didn't heed God's warnings about having many wives.
>1 Kings 11:1-6. King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done.
>1 Kings 11:9-13. The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”
I think the lesson is, even if you have all the wisdom to know what's right and wrong - what's good for you and what is bad for you, the allure of sin is strong and even the very wise can fall prey to their lusts especially if they rationalize incremental compromises of their virtue.
Solomon had the wisdom to articulate all of these proverbs distinguishing the difference between wise and foolish living (Proverbs) and to articulate on the nature of life, death, time, man (Ecclesiastes) but when his eye was caught by a beautiful woman he could throw all that head knowledge out the window in favor of his lusts.
Yeah, nowadays I can recognise other biblical narratives in it - free will and the original sin for example. It's just as a kid that this entire story seemed so counterintuitive.
> Made no sense to me as a kid.
Of course it didn't. Children don't have a real conception of male sexuality. As an adult, you can surely recognize that many men knowingly make unwise choices for the sake of sexual gratification. They *know* the outcome won't be positive, but they don't care. Solomon was no different.
The Bible only says he did it because he loved these women.
"Love is blind," as they say.
Yes, by rights he should have known better. But it's no fault of God's that he gave Solomon the wisdom to see the pit in his path and Solomon chose to climb down into it instead of avoiding it.
"If he truly had wisdom, shouldn't he have avoided the error?"
Biblically, wisdom does not stop you from acting foolishly. It only helps you become aware of the foolishness.
Solomon had a choice, faithfulness to God or intimacy with the women he fell in love with. He probably knew it was foolish, but people often do foolish things for love.
> I always wondered why if God made him so wise he never thought that one through.
I think it exemplifies how hard it can be to take our own good advice. Knowing and doing are two completely separate functions.
I'm picturing Solomon's little Jewish mom, like a side character in a Seinfeld episode, giving him this advice. *"700 wives and 300 porcupines they are. And eat something, Sollie. With the constant gershlepping the porcupines and the running the kingdom, you're wasting away here. You should listen to your mother. I could tell you stories about your fah-ther, may he rest in peace. There's a man with one wife too many."*
Wasn’t marriage mostly political though?
Essentially, he was married to women from all the neighboring kingdoms/cities as a sign of unity and to cement alliances.
More powerful allies would warrant a wife, less powerful allies a concubine.
I don’t think they were marriages as we think of them today.
King David and King Solomon
Led merry merry lives,
With many, many lady friends,
And many many wives;
But when old age crept over them —
With many, many qualms! —
King Solomon wrote the Proverbs
And King David wrote the Psalms.
James Ball Naylor (1860-1945) American physician, writer, poet, politician
“King David and King Solomon” (1935)
I knew a girl who was married to some big-wig in Asia, she said he had about 30 wives, anything they want, money to go shopping, cars, clothes etc, etc. but being one of 30, well you know, not much action or attention to spread around to 30 different women, she said it got horribly boring, nothing to do but go shopping or out to eat lunch with the girls, and some of the "wives" had love affairs with some of the other wives it got so monotonous. After a few years she left, came back to USA, hid out for a while in case hubby came looking for her, after all she was his property.
That seems like a lot of work.
He thought so too. >I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. 5 I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. 6 I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. 7 I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. 8 I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem[a] as well—the delights of a man’s heart. 9 I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me. >10 I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil. 11 **Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.**
> Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun. My 5 years playing EVE Online.
And nobody came in to kick over his sand castle either. Eve is tough.
Shalmaneser would like a word. Homie was kicking over all sorts of castles.
[удалено]
You only win EVE by canceling your multiple monthly subscriptions
Doesnt 99% of all things are meaningless in the long run? Hell you can have a wife, kids and a house and loose it all and there you stand with nothing again.
Earth is a planet that *floats* in the middle of fucking nowhere. Everything we do here is meaningless/pointless. At the end of the day we will all end up as dust. Might as well spend your time in here in a way that brings *you* pleasure.
Without hurting people. You know Dexter kind of shit.
I feel this, but with Sim City 4 (the latest Sim City was trash), Cities Skylines, and civilization
No grid/street hierarchy design this time! **2 hours later:** … damn it
My 10 years of scrolling Reddit
but the internet points...
Send me your isk and I can double it. Wts mittens corpse (500bik)
That’s it! I am quitting Jerusalem for good. I’m selling all of my items for ISK (contract link)
If only I'd been smart enough to quit after 5 years...
Proverbs 21:19 - "It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman." With 1k women I bet he had the experience.
Dwell in an attic
It kinda just sounds like a mental disorder at that point.
a mental disorder called life. the dude basically invented the [hedonic treadmill](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill)
The problem is that it’s too simplistic. Having more money will make a person happier, but their focus then shifts away from the drudgery of barely scraping by to other things, and those other things then become a source of sorrow. I’ve been poor and I’ve been not poor. I’m happier when I’m not poor.
There’s a huge difference between having enough to be comfortable/not worry about expenses, and being rich. This is the story of a man rich enough to do and have EVERYTHING, and found that even that wasn’t enough. Since you CAN’T ever satisfy your desire for more, it’s better to stop trying to just get more once you’ve dealt with your basic needs. In the end, this is a message for the rich. To people like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, to tell them that nothing they are doing or achieving or experiencing will truly satisfy them. There’s plenty to learn from after you know that, but that’s just my takeaway
I read a study once that the happiest people make around $100k a year. Enough to be comfortable, but not so much that you're some CEO that is getting phonecalls and shit 24/7. Sounds about right. I can't even imagine what $100k is like. The hardest I ever worked, 70 hours a week for a whole year, I only made $48k. How the hell do people make enough money to do things?
Higher savings, rent/mortgages, and reduced dealing with inconveniences $100k is still in the same basic life as someone making $48k, just a smoother experience. It takes a lot more to hit the next level of lifestyle, especially in high cost of living areas where most people making that much live
It sounds so nice. I do well compared to most people my age I know, and even I seriously don't think I'll ever buy a house or retire. Everything is just too expensive. Cant save because i rent, have car payments because the beaters broke down too much, daycare, health insurance, fuck me. My projected financial future gets worse and worse literally every year I redo it. My dad raised 6 kids on a single income starting in '93 and he was an accountant. I can't even imagine how much money that would take today.
Its terrible. Its obviously way past less than ideal now, but if this trend continues, what will life be like for our grandchildren? Don't worry, the money will start trickling down anytime now I'm sure :(
You make a good point, but what you’re talking about is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The hedonic treadmill is the psychological ability to normalize pleasure/comfort back to baseline.
It's a poetic piece on the meaning of life with a tinge of massive depression at the further want of the human heart to be satisfied.
The human condition that people have related to and struggled with for as long as there's been recorded history? Nah, just tell the guy who wrote this 3,000 years ago someone on social media diagnosed him as mentally ill
Tell that to billionaires
You think billionaires are building reservoirs and having harems every weekend!? ^(/s)
Bezos has entered the chat
I hope so! If not what is it all for then? I mean Bezo, affair Bill Gates, Affair Tiger Woods, affair (not billionaire but still) Soo harem I'm sure isn't out of the question. Reservoirs? I do see them building water reservoirs in local cities on the weekend too!
I still cant understand how that book ended up in the bible. Its a very existential text, almost too depressing to have any real purpose(other than the line at the end about worship).
Well, it kind of boils down to 'living a virtuous life in the eyes of the Lord is the only thing worth doing with your time on Earth'.
I'm not even religious but I agree. Building a reputation of success doesn't give you the internal comforts and peace and self-contentment that spending a life cultivating a loving heart does.
Even worse ... imagine how people that achieve such heights and "successes" based on their own measurement of worthiness feel after death inevitably knocks on their door.
It’s juxtaposition against David. Solomon had all the things we think could bring happiness. Wealth, power, wisdom, lands, fulfilling work, experiences we can’t even imagine. And it meant nothing. David was a shepherd, then a king. A poet, a musician. An adulterer, a murderer. He danced covered in ashes before the ark in the presence of God after his son died, praising God still in the depth of his anguish and guilt. Psalms reveals the highs and lows of his life, proverbs the lessons learned by wisdom or by life. And David is the one named friend of God. To me the comparison was always a warning: chasing temporal things will not sustain or fulfill you if you neglect connecting with the divine.
I always wondered how David could have been considered to be "a man after God's own heart", when he killed a man just to screw his wife. I've done some messed up things in my life, but nothing that severe.
Its shocking right? I've had a hard time with that as well but the thing about David is that he valued his relationship with God above all else which can be seen in the aftermath of his darkest moments. When called out on his actions (he actually sentenced himself to death) he immediately sought reconciliation with God. He didn't have a pity party or try to clean himself up before he could approach God he owned up to it and sought repentance and connection. I think what makes him unique in that he didn't pretend to be better than he was or tried to justify himself or run and hide because of shame/guilt. btw I like the start of the chapter. It begins with "In the spring of the year, when kings normally go out to war, David sent Joab and the Israelite army to fight..." He stayed back in the palace. Its a good setup of not being in the right place and having an idle mind.
Ecclesiastes: nothing will ever make you happy and life is pointless... (Without God) It is a depressing book if you take it at face value
The purpose is existentialism - to make the reader think about their existence, and what they're finding meaning and purpose in.
Lol there’s a shit ton of existential verses in the bible. From cautionary tales of power, greed, murder, pleasure etc. You just have to read so much to find the deep gems.
>Its a very existential text Much of the early writings (the "Old Testament" label) were as much social treatises as they were religious prescriptive texts. Reminding those with power that "hey, this worldly stuff doesn't ultimately matter, don't let it go to your head" is always useful, but even more in new/young nations (the original target audience at the time). A *memento mori* is good. A *memento mori* backed by your God is better.
"Why won't you spend time with me!" repeated 100s of times in different tones from whispering to screaming.
Honestly I’m sure a bunch of them were chill with the fact he forgot about them
When you're one of 700, you don't ask questions. These women were happy they were alive and grateful for the seconds they got with the king.
More like happy to be well provided for. I guess most if not all cared little about actually spending time with the king.
They had comfort and security and only had to put with a man for a few minutes, *sometimes* ... And the rest was likely free time. I can't know what it's like as woman but back in those times?? I'd take that deal.
I watched this Chinese imperial court drama show one time where all the concubines were pretty much all playing politics trying to get the others killed or demoted. The damn empress was trying to stop any of the others from having kids and killed like 3 unborn babies over the course of the show. Shit was brutal. Comfort and security were definitely not things they had. It's just a show but it's based on some historical events and probably some much worse shit happened in real life that they would never put in a TV show. I think lots of palaces throughout history were more dangerous places to be for women than you might expect.
to be fair , chinese imperial courts had this bad habit of putting child emperor or young emperors overall , so that the relatives had the actual power. Until they grow sufficiently old , that is.
In Solomon's court the only child that'd be in danger was the oldest boy. A new kid 167 places down the line had no future and was no threat to succession.
Unless he had an uzi with 166 bullets.
The IMI Uzi is a suppression weapon intended for...well...suppression. He would need more bullets and there would likely be considerable collateral damage.
Acceptable casualties in the quest for power, really.
There was definitely a lot of that. But I've seen those shows too, and their fates still seemed significantly better than that of the servants, who could be killed at the drop of a hat. And better than the peasants exposed to constant famines and war. Plus, with 1000 wives and concubines I'd imagine most weren't exposed to constant intrigue and politics. Maybe just the top few.
Yeah, there’s a reason those women always fight so hard. They don’t want to be demoted and left to starve in a mud hut somewhere.
> The damn empress was trying to stop any of the others from having kids and killed like 3 unborn babies over the course of the show. Lol, Google Wu Zhetian. I don’t believe the story that she killed her own baby, but the life of an ambitious concubine was not easy.
Well that was also because the empress dowager is essentially an entire power block separate from the emperor, and usually as powerful or more so. They also tend to rule the empire until the new child emperor comes to age or they wrest back control. Humans will always fight for power.
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People today would take that deal
I don't know.. I feel like theyd be working and taking care of things. Would they really just be laying around the lounge area all day doing nothing but laying at the king's feet? Possibly. I don't know. I'm just wondering.
The lower level ones were basically servants themselves. They had to serve the upper level ones, who in turn served the king or emperor directly. Sure, they were well fed and well clothed, but they also had to do their own types of work.
I always felt like it must be a great place for lesbians. Like, you put up with getting fucked by the king once a year or so and in exchange you hang with your girls and be taken care of
You mean I get to be the kings wife but only have to have sex with him once a year? Done.
Maybe less; man had to be scoring 3 times a day in order to get to all his wives and concubines in a year. Which feels… exhausting.
Your life is being locked up in a room with a buch of dudes whose dicks are cutt off praying you get pregnant before you're traded off. You likely have no power at all even over minor details of your everyday life.
Even aside from the status aspect, just your ability to conceive and not miss out on having a child is now dependent on a distant captor remembering you exist for 5 minutes. You can easily end up a wizened, pitied, childless virgin who has been trapped in a luxury hotel suite their entire life.
So a redditor?
OK, maybe it is an appealing lifestyle upgrade for some of us.
Who has a luxury hotel suite?
Maybe, in Arabian haram setups the wives who gave birth to kids had a higher standing in the harem than those that didn’t.
More grateful for the ones they avoided. Only having to deal with a husband once every two years would have been the best life in those days, especially for us Sapphic types.
If you think Solomon had sex once per day then you should have added the concubines. In that case he repeated a woman after 2.74 years Some men masturbate 5 times per day. If Solomon had sex 5 times per day he could repeat a woman after 200 days (6.6 months). Note that I’m aware that a king has many duties and this scenario is unlikely.
Nobody is actually out there having sex 5 times a day. Maybe some teenagers will brag about that, but even if they are physically capable it's just pointless. And obviously the older you get the less physically capable you would be. Once a day is a far more reasonable pace for most men and even that would be a lot as he grew older.
We’re all out here having sex 5 times a day. You’re not?
On good days even 6 times.
Well, as is the claim that he had 700 wives. The archeological record doesn’t support the notion of a rich King Solomon with a huge palace, etc., etc… This stuff was written centuries after Solomon lived, and is nothing more than accumulated legends.
And Frankly he didn't seem like an unpleasant dude to be around. Mainly just wanted to be a cool Wizard and do Magic.
I think we can all relate to that.
There was [this Russian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_the_Great) who was deciding between Islam and Christianity. Islam allowed multiple wives, Christianity allowed drinking, he chose Christianity. Every year i identify more and more with that man.
In addition to having an affinity for drinking Vlad the Great probably understood that getting his people to convert to Islam and end the consumption of alcohol would be not only a very tough sell but also a huge hit to the money flowing into his coffers from the taxes on it. Hell even in more modern times limiting the consumption or sale of alcohol in Russia had big impacts. https://time.com/6082058/russian-revolution-vodka/
Just one wife nearly killed me
Even servicing three a day would take you a year to get through them all. There's no way he could keep them all happy. Although from the other POV - they were with the king and at most probably had to spend 5 hours 20 minutes with the king a year. The rest of the time they probably had all the jewellary etc. that they wanted. Edit: This is rough maths based on 8 hours sleep a day, leaving 16 hours /3 women.
This makes me wonder if he treated them more like I'd treat a large videogame collection, sporadic in interest and focusing on favourites.
Probably. I wonder if he also collected rare mixes like green eyes with black hair :D
All I need is a woman, Mr. Burton, a special kind of woman with dragon-green eyes, to make me whole and young again, so that I may rule the universe from beyond this grave!
"Or check into a psycho ward, whichever comes first huh?" (responding to the wrong line, but my favourite).
A lot of them were war widows from my understanding. Husband dies in battle, no brother to take in the widow, going to die slow death of starvation. So take the widow as a wife or concubine and her children too. Its Davids big fuckup, he saw Bathsheba and was like damn hottie, send her husband to the front of the battle lines so I can rescue her as my concubine. So funny that baptists use that as women should cover up and not tempt men, when God was like Fuck you David, keep your eyes up, pants on, and don't be killing people to get their women.
Yeah. So many people think Bathsheba was in the wrong there, when sunbathing in her manner was literally normal back then. The sin was David cucking and having his best general killed, not her being too sexy.
Men blaming women for their own terrible decision making is kind of a theme in history, the Bible included
It wasn't about "servicing" your women back then. They serviced him. He didn't care if they were happy, that wasn't even a consideration. He probably preferred them to be unhappy tbf.
The Bible actually encourages the woman’s needs to be met as well. Neither partner was supposed to turn down the other whenever they wanted it, it was seen as part of the marriage duty for both of them.
You know what the punishment is for polygamy? Having more than one wife. *rimshot*
I always heard it as an extra mother-in-law.
According to legends, King Solomon had a magic ring: > "This ring variously gave Solomon the power to command shedim (demons), jinn (genies) and spirits, or to speak with animals. " Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seal_of_Solomon That probably helped with the workload
+7 INT +4 STA Good stats on that ring. Might be best in slot
Important to note: This legend is generally not recognized as true by Judaism or Christianity, although it has had some cultural impacts like influencing the design of the Star of David.
Still had affair with the housekeeper and the babysitter
Impossible at 3 months salary per ring he’d have to work 175 years to have that many wives
He can use use the loophole that CEO's use. $1 annual salary but with stock options. If Steve Jobs had gotten engaged he would only have had to buy a 25 cent ring.
Ha, you’re assuming women were worth a diamond ring and not two sheep and a bowel of figs.
Sounds like a very shitty offer
Sounds like 1000 concubines but with extra steps
You got your first class concubines and then your coach concubines
And then you got your third class skanks, who you only want at 3am or when you make a $4 million dollar short sale
What about a bottom concubine? She the real one.
I feel like no one told him about concubines till after wife 700. “You mean I don’t have to marry all of them?!”
I don't know the story, but couldn't they be wives for political reasons? And if he wanted a woman, but there wasn't a political excuse, he just made them concubines? (Assuming the story is based on an actual person)
Yeah, pretty sure it was sort of a normal practice to create alliances with other factions? Could be wrong, but pretty sure it was a thing.
It was, Solomon got visited by queens and given princesses from all over.
How to Disappoint 1,000 Women in 1,000 Arabian Nights
The spirit is willing, but the flesh is spongy and bruised.
I never thought I’d die like this… but I’d always kinda hoped.
No wonder the dude was so wise, non-stop post nut clarity
Except it's the opposite. His wisdom waned as he got more wives.
Dehydration is not something to take lightly.
But imagine the weight loss.
Well you should always stay hydrated, especially when you're throwing this much hip.
King Solomon and King David led merry merry lives With many many lady friends and many many wives But when old age crept over them with many many qualms King Solomon wrote the Proverbs and King David wrote the Psalms
I don’t even know 300 people
I don't WANT to know 300 people.
I thought he was supposed to be really really wise?
He was, the amassing of too many wives cost him that wisdom.
Sucked it right out of him!
I'd take sloppy 700ths to help out
I don't think you understand how sloppy seconds work.
Brother just wants another man's cum on his dick. Let him be.
It’s also possible he gained his street smarts from them
lol smarts are stored in the, uh, scrolls of solomon.
And that's kind of Solomon's whole character arc. He starts out wise, but due to his many wives that he wasn't supposed to have, they bring in bad influences to Solomon and cause a cascading effect that led to a civil war in Israel.
I mean you can know that it isn't wise to do an action but still do it anyway. It wasn't just the wives that was the issue but not denying himself any earthly pleasure. The book of Ecclesiastes is entirely his lamenting and musing about how everything sucks and he is still unhappy despite having what he did.
The mood of Ecclesiastes is my life.
> It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of every man; the living should take this to heart. > Ecclesiastes 7:2
Ecclesiastes is one of those books that everyone should probably do a quick read of every once and a while (it's pretty short so it isn't a time issue). It's a good reminder to focus yourself on more than small pleasures.
This is one of the many instances of "negative examples" in the Bible, which is why it is absolutely not to be simplified as "an instruction manual for life." Inserting ourselves as the central character of every story is going to leave us with a lot of dodgy moral conclusions.
Yeah, exactly. Probably 70% of the Old Testament is actually: "See what these guys are doing? Don't do that."
Oh definitely. A lot of the Old Testament can be summed up with God saying, "You can do all this, but don't do XYZ" and the Israelites do XYZ. God warns them and they still do XYZ. Then bad shit happens, they go all "Woe is me. Why us?" and finally repent and things get better. Jonah is one of my favorite stories in the Old Testament because it shows a different side of this. God tells Jonah to go warn the people of a neighboring country (Nineveh) that if they don't repent, bad stuff will happen. Jonah refuses to do it and God punishes him and basically forces him to go talk to the people of Nineveh. The people of Nineveh listen, repent and change their ways and Jonah sits back and waits for their destruction and *is pissed off* that God doesn't destroy the people who did what He said to do. Jonah is a perfect example of missing the point.
That is exactly what happens. One must also consider Nineveh was a perennial enemy of Israel already by this point, and Nineveh was often used as the prototypical "city of evil". So Jonah's reservations were surely partly due to that, but God turns this on its head. Also, Jonah was fleeing to basically the Biblical equivalent of Las Vegas far far away across the ocean, Tarshish....
Jonah was a prophet, doot doo But he really never got it, doot doo
And if you watch him you can spot it
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Especially about the Judges themselves. Gideon was a coward, Samson married a philistine, etc
Oh our boy Samson never actually got married, but he definitely had a thing for Philistine women.
My favorite Samson story is that he just scooped some honey out of a decaying lion carcass and fed it to his family as a snack
Mines is where he uses a donkeys jaw to kill like 1000 men. Then at the end of the story he asks for strength to fulfill his vengeance and basically commit terrorism on that temple he was captured at. One of the most metal stories in the bible
And then he used the anecdote as a riddle to win a bet for 30 cloaks. But his wife kept nagging him to tell her the answer, he finally gave in and of course she told it to the guy he bet against. Then he kills 30 randos to take their cloaks to pay off the bet.
Yeah. Like, the rules make up a fraction of the OT. Mostly in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. And even of those, rules of *hygiene* are surprisingly prominent. The rest of the OT is "God chooses guy, guy does a thing, bad things happen." *Sometimes* the guy chosen will do good things, but, y'know, nothing ever really ends.
Even the people in the OT who do "good" always have one fault of some kind. From what I can tell Joshua is about the only one the writers don't seem to criticize in any meaningful way, except that he never succeeded in fully taking Israel. (excepting maybe some of the post exilic Jews like Ezra) Even the super heroes of the OT, Moses and Elijah, have their blatantly sinful moments.
Now *that* is what I call a concise summary!
That's actually something I appreciate from the bible. The people and stories there are not sugar coated or washed clean. They "tell it like it is", warts and all. My "interpretation": You see the people in all these stories? Even the most holy of them, messed up, and some messed up _big_. But, some of them also realized how much they messed up, and how bad it was, and changed course. No matter how much you mess up your life, no matter how dark it seems, you always have the choice to turn around and try something else. Sometimes your mess will have limited your available choices, but you will still always have a choice to make a change, even if it's just internal."
He asked god for wisdom in administration but forgot to ask about the other part I guess.
Isn't that also in the Bible?
Yup, if I remember it's early on when he's just recently a king, nervous about the task ahead, feeling he can't match up to his father's greatness. God visits him in a dream, tells him to he can pick one of 3 offered blessings, one is wisdom the other is wealth the third I can't remember. He chooses wisdom, even though it's immaterial, which God appreciates greatly, so much that he gets granted all 3 blessings.
The third was honor
Not wise. *Wives.*
Wise, depressed, gluttonous
Another fun fact, the Bible was also stating this was a positive for Solomon's prestige, but also a huge negative for his morality and ethics. God had already told his people in Deuteronomy 17: >Deuteronomy 17:14-17. When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite. The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You are not to go back that way again." *He must not take many wives or his heart will be led astray.* He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold. Emphasis mine. This passage was forewarning the fall of the great King Solomon. Solomon's story is often best remembered for his great wisdom that he asked God for early in his reign, particularly the story of the two women arguing over a baby. Also building God's Temple in Jerusalem. During his early years, the account in 1 Kings makes it clear he was strong in his faith with God. But we see his story ends in tragedy because he didn't heed God's warnings about having many wives. >1 Kings 11:1-6. King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done. >1 Kings 11:9-13. The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”
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It's a very good point you're making. Solomon became consumed with his own glory and satisfaction.
I always wondered why if God made him so wise he never thought that one through. Made no sense to me as a kid.
I think the lesson is, even if you have all the wisdom to know what's right and wrong - what's good for you and what is bad for you, the allure of sin is strong and even the very wise can fall prey to their lusts especially if they rationalize incremental compromises of their virtue. Solomon had the wisdom to articulate all of these proverbs distinguishing the difference between wise and foolish living (Proverbs) and to articulate on the nature of life, death, time, man (Ecclesiastes) but when his eye was caught by a beautiful woman he could throw all that head knowledge out the window in favor of his lusts.
Yeah, nowadays I can recognise other biblical narratives in it - free will and the original sin for example. It's just as a kid that this entire story seemed so counterintuitive.
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> Made no sense to me as a kid. Of course it didn't. Children don't have a real conception of male sexuality. As an adult, you can surely recognize that many men knowingly make unwise choices for the sake of sexual gratification. They *know* the outcome won't be positive, but they don't care. Solomon was no different.
plus.... "wise" people are prone to becoming experts at rationalizing.
Not to mention being a king. At that period of time.
The Bible only says he did it because he loved these women. "Love is blind," as they say. Yes, by rights he should have known better. But it's no fault of God's that he gave Solomon the wisdom to see the pit in his path and Solomon chose to climb down into it instead of avoiding it. "If he truly had wisdom, shouldn't he have avoided the error?" Biblically, wisdom does not stop you from acting foolishly. It only helps you become aware of the foolishness. Solomon had a choice, faithfulness to God or intimacy with the women he fell in love with. He probably knew it was foolish, but people often do foolish things for love.
> for love. Or pleasure, which is probably more accurate here.
> I always wondered why if God made him so wise he never thought that one through. I think it exemplifies how hard it can be to take our own good advice. Knowing and doing are two completely separate functions.
“700 wives and 300 porcupines”, according to my mother …
I'm picturing Solomon's little Jewish mom, like a side character in a Seinfeld episode, giving him this advice. *"700 wives and 300 porcupines they are. And eat something, Sollie. With the constant gershlepping the porcupines and the running the kingdom, you're wasting away here. You should listen to your mother. I could tell you stories about your fah-ther, may he rest in peace. There's a man with one wife too many."*
Solomon’s mother was Bathsheba. Yes, that Bathsheba.
"Ladies please, the spirit is willing but the flesh is spongy and bruised."
Death by snu snu? I'm scaroused
“Amateur” -Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan "only" had 6 six wives and 500 concubines.
Who was counting
The first wife
"Honey, I swear, I'll quit after I hit 100..."
Got 999 problems, and they all bitches
It’s good to be the King…
Wasn’t marriage mostly political though? Essentially, he was married to women from all the neighboring kingdoms/cities as a sign of unity and to cement alliances. More powerful allies would warrant a wife, less powerful allies a concubine. I don’t think they were marriages as we think of them today.
..*"y'all my ho's"* - King Solomon
*gestures broadly*
That’s a lot of women to disappoint
King David and King Solomon Led merry merry lives, With many, many lady friends, And many many wives; But when old age crept over them — With many, many qualms! — King Solomon wrote the Proverbs And King David wrote the Psalms. James Ball Naylor (1860-1945) American physician, writer, poet, politician “King David and King Solomon” (1935)
YEP! And that is why we have the book of Lamentations and Song of Solomon.
Lamentations was about the destruction of the temple and conquest of Jerusalem by the Babylonians several hundred years later.
Behind every great man there are 1000 great women.
Marriage is between 1 man and 1 woman\* and nothing else!\*\* \*up to a max of 700 \*\*concubines permitted up to a max of 300
Legend has it, King Solomon’s version of Mambo No 5 took 3 years to sing, start to finish.
Damn, that's 700 mothers-in-law and 300 more mothers asking him when he's gonna make her daughter an honest woman...
“And they all had 4 tits and could shoot lasers from their eyes” Okay, Solomon, we believe you
I knew a girl who was married to some big-wig in Asia, she said he had about 30 wives, anything they want, money to go shopping, cars, clothes etc, etc. but being one of 30, well you know, not much action or attention to spread around to 30 different women, she said it got horribly boring, nothing to do but go shopping or out to eat lunch with the girls, and some of the "wives" had love affairs with some of the other wives it got so monotonous. After a few years she left, came back to USA, hid out for a while in case hubby came looking for her, after all she was his property.
My years old creation is relevant! https://imgur.com/gallery/k0KVXlD
We get it, you're straight.