The overseer therefore must be without reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, sensible, modest, hospitable, good at teaching;
The only true exposition, therefore, is that of Chrysostom, that in a bishop he expressly condemns polygamy, (50) which at that time the Jews almost reckoned to be lawful. This corruption was borrowed by them partly from sinful imitation of the Fathers, (for they who read that Abraham, Jacob, David, and others of the same class, were married to more wives than one at the same time, thought that it was lawful for them also to do the same) and partly from neighboring nations; for the inhabitants of the East never observed that conscientiousness and fidelity in marriage which was proper. However that might be, polygamy was exceedingly prevalent among them; (51) and therefore with great propriety does Paul enjoin that a bishop should be free from this stain. 