Hard Saying on Divorce

“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”

Matthew 5:31-32

We now come to one of the most controversial sayings of Jesus. It is controversial not only for what it says, but also for what it doesn’t say. There are many different views on the issue of divorce ranging from no divorce under any circumstances to allowing for divorce for a variety of different reasons. In Jesus’ day there was one school of thought that said a man could divorce a woman for any and every reason including burning his food or him losing interest in her (school of Hillel)! The other school of thought was divorce was only permissible because of a serious transgression (school of Shammai).

This is a complicated issue, one which cannot be fully addressed in a brief article. I will highlight some comments, First, divorce is dealt with in four passages in the gospels (Matt 5:31-32, Matt 19:1-9, Mark 10:1-11, and Luke 16:18). Second, divorce was permitted by Moses in Deuteronomy 24:1-4. There Moses permits a man to divorce his wife if he finds “some indecency” in her. He further says, if this divorced woman gets remarried and her second husband dies, she cannot return to her first husband and remarry him. We know in Deuteronomy whatever “indecency” means; it must be something less than adultery because if a person was caught in adultery he was to be put to death. Third, there is debate over what Jesus mean by the word, “immorality” in Matthew 5:32 because there was another word that specifically meant adultery, but he uses the more general word that usually describes sexually immoral relations in general. Finally, there is discussion on the “exception” clause in Matthew because it is not mentioned in Mark and Luke.

Let me share a couple of thoughts. Whatever you think about divorce (or divorce and remarriage) we know that there is harmony between the gospels so we cannot pit one gospel against the other or say that one is right and the other is wrong. Also, we cannot say that Matthew added the idea, and it wasn’t original to Jesus for that would call into question the whole doctrine of inerrancy. Finally, we must not look for some esoteric, hidden meaning to Matthew’s account of Jesus because Jesus was the master teacher, and he was speaking clearly to a large audience who would have understood the plain meaning of his words. If he meant some obscure understanding, he would have said it.

Here is my understanding of Matthew’s gospel (5:31-32 and 19:1-9). It is God’s intention for marriage to be permanent and binding. It was never God’s intent for the relationship to be dissolved or for a couple to get divorced. God condescended to the sinfulness of people and permitted divorce to regulate what would have been even more grievous sin had he not. Jesus both lessens the consequences of adultery (the death penalty) while also making stricter when divorce is permissible (only for physical sexual immorality). In the act of sexual immorality, the “one-flesh” of marriage has been corrupted and the non-adulterous partner in this instance is permitted to divorce. This does not mean that one must get divorced in this situation but rather that it is allowable. In the time of the New Testament, it was assumed that a person who was divorced would be permitted to remarry and there is no reason to think this would not be assumed here as well. The Apostle Paul deals with one other circumstance regarding divorce for desertion of a believer by her unbelieving spouse, but space does not permit us to delve into that consideration. It must be understood that even with these “allowances,” divorce should be the extreme exception among believers and that most instances of divorce do not meet these criteria.