Some men in the Bible had concubines in addition to one or more wives. The role of the concubine was to produce children if the man's wife was unable to do so, to have children to expand the family, and to take care of a man's sexual appetite, according to Christianity.com. While concubines had some rights under Hebrew law, they did not hold the same status as a wife. Concubines and polygamy were common during the "patriarchal period" of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but in later Biblical times most marriages were monogamous.
Concubines were typically Hebrew girls sold by their fathers, gentile captives, foreign slaves, or Canaanite women. Free Hebrew women without other means were also sometimes concubines. Some scholars refer to Hagar, Sarai's servant, as a concubine, and Genesis 25:6 implies that a woman named Keturah was Abraham's concubine, according to Christianity.com. King Saul had a concubine named Rizpah, while King David had 10 concubines, and King Solomon had 300 concubines and 700 wives.
Bible Ref interprets Genesis 2:22-24 as saying that "men are to separate from their parents and stick to their wives, becoming one flesh with them." This can be interpreted as God wanting marriage to be between a single man and a single woman. Christianity.com explains that God's allowance of concubines can be interpreted as him helping women who were unable to provide for themselves, saying "Concubinage was not part of God's dream, but because human life now involved sin, God made laws to protect vulnerable women from further oppression, knowing a sinful world would always include broken relationships between men and women."
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7qL7Up56eZpOkunCCkWttb29fmsOmvthmq7KolWK8p3nMmqmroZGcsm6ty6WmsJ2UYravedOhnGaamZe5pns%3D