Divorce

What Jesus says (and doesn't say)

Moreover, it is said, “Whoever divorces his wife must give her a [certificate of] repudiation.” But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except from a word of sexual impropriety, causes her to be adulterous, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. Matthew 5:31-32

Divorce is one of those topics that not only has many opinions, but can cause angst, anger, guilt, shame, confusion, and who knows what else. 

I do not want to cause any of those feelings with this post, but neither do I want to shy away from the clear-speak that Jesus conveys. Here is my understanding of this passage at the moment.

In Plain Sight is a subscriber supported publication. If you appreciate the content and insights of this Substack, please consider a paid subscription. Subscribers receive additional material at the end of most posts with more subscriber only material to come.

God’s Perfect Intention for Marriage

To fully understand what Jesus said in the Sermon about divorce, we need to be aware of other passages in the Gospels that also address this issue. The two main ones are Matthew 19:3-9 and Mark 10:2-12.

The Bible assumes that divorces happen and that there are legitimate reasons for divorce, but the divine intention is that marriages remain for life.

And Jesus affirms this intention: he quotes Genesis to affirm that God’s desire in creation was for a single union to last (Matthew 19:5 and Mark 10:6-8):

And he answered, Have you not read that the Creator made them male and female from the beginning? And he said, Because of this, a man shall leave his father and mother and join to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh, so no longer are they two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined, let not a man separate. Matthew 19:4-6.

Of course, our screwing up of God’s intention is the story of our world.

Marriages have ended from time immemorial in every culture.

Yet what Jesus said about the joining of a man and woman in marriage as God’s perfect intention holds no matter what, and provides the frame for what he says about divorce.

Divorce

First, Jesus never said that divorce is forbidden. 

He never spoke the command, “Do not divorce.”

Neither did he overturn the law of Moses. 

Jesus did not disavow the certificate of repudiation, he only explained it: Moses gave the command because of “your hard hearts” (Matthew 19:8//Mark 10:5).

But what Jesus did do was up the ante with respect to divorce. 

He explained divorce in light of the seventh commandment: “you shall not commit adultery,” which he had already addressed in light of the tenth commandment.

Like in our day, divorce was easy then.

All a man had to do if his wife did not please him (according to his own opinion!) was to give her a certificate of repudiation (i.e., divorce). Any marriage contract would be in force, and a dowry would need be returned, yet the divorce could be for any reason at all.

But Jesus said, “no, the only reason is sexual impropriety.”

He used the word porneia, which would entail a sexual act outside of the marriage (and there is nothing that forbid the woman from divorcing for the same thing).

Of course, if one partner had sexual relations outside of the marriage that would already be adultery.

By limiting divorce to sexual unfaithfulness, Jesus wiped away a myriad of justifications for divorce.

But neither did he say that divorce was required because of sexual unfaithfulness, only justified.

Remarriage

Second, Jesus did not forbid remarriage either. 

He never said, “don’t remarry.” 

What he did say is this: “If you divorce your wife you make her to be adulterous, and if you marry a divorced woman you commit adultery.”

Now we are getting to something very, very uncomfortable for many people.

How could Jesus say this?

Is it the woman’s fault that her husband divorced her for burning his toast?

Or that she left him because of a whole host of bad behavior and abuse?

How does the divorce cause her to be adulterous? And how does marrying a divorced woman constitute adultery?

Really, Jesus?

The Ten Commandments (again)

To get to the meaning of Jesus’s use of “adultery,” we need to consider again what I have put in other posts about the inability to “break” the Ten Commandments. 

The Ten Commandments express the unchangeable character of God in prohibitions (“You shall not …”). 

God’s holy character exists whether I like it or not.

I can either accept who God is or not.

If I “break” a commandment, I do not disparage God. Instead I am breaking myself again God’s character and I suffer the consequences of my violation. 

God does not judge me, I judge myself. 

With respect to divorce (and its connection to adultery in the seventh commandment) we can express the following: if I divorce, the consequences are well beyond the dissolution of the marriage bond for both me and my wife.

There are the children to consider and the extended family and even the village or town.

Sometimes the consequences of staying in an already broken marriage are even worse, so a situation may have “it’s worse if I stay” implications.

The choice is ours; the brokenness remains.

An Example

The preeminent example in the New Testament is the Samaritan woman in John chapter 4. She came to Jacob’s well at noon—the hottest part of day—instead of early. Why? She had most likely been shunned by the women of Sychar. She had been married four times and was living with a fifth (not a rare occurrence even today).

She remarried because she needed protection and provision.

There were no government benefits for a single woman with or without children.

The initial divorce (one or more husbands could have died, but all of them would be unlikely), initiated her remarriage and all of the consequences to follow of her tragic life.

While we don’t know her specific circumstances, we see all around us today the consequences of broken families due to divorce:

the pain of the divorce itself,

the economic consequences of the divorce,

the resentments and bitterness that often result, especially when one party remarries,

the devastation and scars for children,

the difficult process of blending families in remarriage, often with unspoken feelings of favoritism,

the uneasy bonds with former in-laws when the bonds had been close (“I’ve lost close friends”),

the loss of friends who take one side or the other,

the changed looks of those in social situations, unfortunately including church congregations, and so many others besides,

and the feeling that “I don’t fit anywhere anymore.”

I have witnessed many of these and lost friends when I tried to stay neutral.

Whatever reason the divorce has happened, the ideal of the divine marital bond is broken and the consequences follow.

Justified or not, the seventh commandment has been broken.

It is not in the plan of God for marriages to dissolve.

Abuse

Some may ask, well what about abuse? Jesus did not address abuse, but an abusive spouse has broken the marriage covenant: the vows to love and care for the spouse are broken.

The woman at the well may have left one of her husbands for that very reason. If so, she made the choice she had to make for her survival.

Adultery explained:

Except for porniea, Jesus speaks to the aftermath of the divorce, not the cause.

“Adultery” has occurred simply because the original marriage bond has been abrogated and replaced.

Jesus does not judge or speak with anger or condemnation, but sadness. 

Jesus does not condemn; he only speaks the truth of the broken situation.

Jesus does not use the word adultery to disparage anyone, but to stress the consequences of dissolving a marriage. He condemns no one with his use of that term.

The Woman caught in adultery

In John 11 we read a story that brings some threads of this topic together even in the case of porneia.

Some Jewish leaders brought a woman to Jesus “caught in the act of adultery.” He first dispelled the crowd eager to stone her: “Let the sinless one among you cast the first stone upon her.”

They all left.

But then he asked the woman, “where are they? No one condemns you?”

Rembrandt, The Woman Taken in Adultery

“No one, Lord,” she replied.

Then Jesus with the most remarkable and loving words said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and from now on no longer sin.”

Jesus did not downplay the reality or seriousness of the situation. Adultery happened.

Yet nothing is beyond God to forgive.

Nor beyond God’s power to help us forgive.

Restoration

Just to reiterate, Jesus affirmed that marriage is to be the faithful, life-long union of a man and a woman, but he never forbad divorce or remarriage. He only said that divorce and remarriage is effectively adultery because the marriage bond was broken—with its very real consequences.

Despite the tragedy of divorce, Jesus himself offered (and offers) forgiveness no matter the sin we enter into—and marital dissolution or unfaithfulness are part of his forgiveness. To the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11) he said, “neither do I condemn you, go and sin no longer.” And to the Samaritan woman he showed himself as the Messiah, and she went excitedly to Sychar and proclaimed, “Come see a man who told me everything I ever did!”

Jesus offered grace and love and salvation to both of these broken woman.

He can do the same for every one of us.

**All comments are welcome.**

---

---

Invitation to “Critics of the Bible”: In September and October I will be teaching an on-line class via Zoom “Critics of the Bible.” If you are interested here is the link to sign up. I’d love to have you.

Here is the course description:

“It is almost axiomatic that people trust the Bible when scholars trust the Bible. In the last few centuries, famous critics of the Bible, such as Voltaire and Spinoza, have used their formidable intellects to influence other scholars to ridicule divine inspiration. As a result, Scripture generally has no standing within the university to serve publicly as a legitimate source of truth. Doubt has been injected into Western Civilization such that whole nations have unmoored themselves from biblically revealed truth. In this course students will be given the opportunity to learn how to defend the authority of Scripture and stand firm in God's Word.”