-THE PEREAN MINISTRY

-Jesus Teaches Concerning Divorce

-Matthew 19:3-9, Mark 10:2-9

-Once again, the Pharisees came to Jesus “tempting him” (KJV), “testing Him” (NASB).

            -“They had found fault with him for violating the law (2:24); and transgressing the tradition

             of the elders (7:5); had referred his power to Beelzebub (3:22); and had demanded a sign

             from heaven (8:11; Matt. 12:38).  But now they seek to entangle him in existing

             controversies, which, they thought, would be impossible to answer without displeasing

             one or another of the Jewish parties” (Dorris, pg 226).

-Notice the Pharisees’ question:  “Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?”

 (vs 3, KJV, emp. add.).  The NASB words it in this manner:  “Is it lawful for a man to divorce

 his wife for any cause at all?” (emp. add.).

            -“There were two current opinions among the leaders at this time.  The school of Hillel

             taught that a man might divorce his wife for any reason, for any slight offense, or merely

             for his dislike of her person or manners; they based their opinions on Deut. 24:1, which says,

             ‘If she find no favor in his eyes,’ then he may ‘write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in

             her hand, and send her out of his house.’  The opposite school of Shammai allowed divorce

             only for adultery; this school based its decision on the same scripture (Deut. 24:1) which

             says, ‘Because he hath found some unseemly thing in her,’ which they interpreted as the

             sin of adultery” (Boles, Matthew, pg 385).

            -Surely, the Pharisees thought that they had entrapped Jesus.  Either way He answered He

             would be at odds with one of the groups on the issue.

-Jesus’ response bypassed both schools of thought and went directly to the word of God and His

 law of marriage.

            -Notice Jesus’ initial words in Matthew’s account, “Have ye not read?...”  Rather than trying

             to find a solution in the schools of thought attributed to mankind, they should have searched

             for the answer in God’s word - the overall answer being in the book of Genesis.

            -“...For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they

             twain shall be one flesh?  Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh.  What therefore

             God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (Matthew 19:5-6).  This law of marriage

             was established by God in the beginning and has stood ever since.

                        -The design and institution of marriage is universal.  It supersedes any specific covenant 

                         and includes and applies to all people.  This is a part of the marriage-divorce-remarriage

                         discussion that either gets missed or is under-emphasized far too often.

                        -“In regards to verse 6, H. Leo Boles (in his commentary on Matthew) observed, “Any

                         violation of the union of this pair is fundamentally wrong and contrary to God’s original

                         purpose” (pg 386).  “Marriages indeed may fail for reasons of human sin; but there can

                         never be any way to make the failures a good thing, nor change the ideal of marriage as

                         God intended and purposed from the beginning of creation” (Coffman, Mark, pg 202).

                        -“Our Lord, in this, also showed consummate wisdom. He answered the question, not

                         from Hillel or Shammai, their teachers, but from Moses, and thus defeated their malice.

                         (Barnes).

-Seeing that they had been unsuccessful in trapping Jesus with their initial inquiry, they

 attempted to put Him at odds with Moses - “...Why did Moses then command to give a writing

 of divorcement, and to put her away?” (vs 7).

            -Notice a very significant difference in the wording of this question and Jesus’ response.  The

             Jewish leaders asked, “Why did Moses then command...?” but Jesus stated, Moses...suffered

             (KJV), permitted (NASB, NIV)...”  Moses did not command divorce; instead, he permitted

             it.   

                        -“...[I]nstead of suffering the husband to divorce his wife in a passion, he required him, in

                         order that he might take time to consider the matter, and thus make it probable that

                         divorces would be less frequent, to give her a writing; to sit down deliberately to look at

                         the matter, and probably, also, to bring the case before some scribe or learned man, to

                         write a divorce in the legal form. Thus doing, there might be an opportunity for the

                         matter to be reconciled, and the man to be persuaded not to divorce his wife” (Barnes).

                        -This allowance was due to the hardness of the people’s hearts.  I certainly do not pretend

                         to know the fullness of that which was included in such a statement.  It seems that

                         Matthew Henry evaluated the situation correctly when he wrote, “Moses complained of

                         the people of Israel in his time, that their hearts were hardened (Deut 9:6; 31:27),

                         hardened against God; this is here meant of their being hardened against their relations;

                         they were generally violent and outrageous, which way soever they took, both in their

                         appetites and in their passions; and therefore if they had not been allowed to put away

                         their wives, when they had conceived a dislike of them, they would have used them

                         cruelly, would have beaten and abused them, and perhaps have murdered them...and

                         therefore were allowed to put them away.”  McGarvey and Pendleton states, “As a

                         choice of two evils God therefore temporarily modified the law out of compassion for

                         the women” (pg 540).

            -Jesus clearly indicates that such conditions were not within the intentions and perfect will

             of God - “...but from the beginning it was not so” (vs 8).

                        -“The Mosaic law was not intended as a code of perpetual obligation, but was

                         preparatory to something better and higher, when the people were able to bear it” (Dorris,

                        pg 227).

-In Matthew 19:9, we find the doctrine of Christ under which we are bound and by which we are

 to live.  “Emphasis should be laid here on the word "I." This was the opinion of Jesus-this he

 proclaimed to be the law of his kingdom this the command of God ever afterward” (Barnes). 

            -Jesus straightforwardly states that the only time a person has a Divine allowance for

             re-marriage is in the case of fornication (sexual sin) committed by the spouse.  Such

             fornication must be the reason for the putting away at that time.  In any other scenario,

             there is no allowance for re-marriage.

                        -“This is the law of God; and by the same law, all marriages which take place after

                         divorce, where adultery is not the cause of divorce, are adulterous” (Barnes).

-The difficulty is not in understanding the words of Jesus.  Due to the conditions found

 in our society, the difficulties arise when applying these words. 

            -The law of God is easy to understand.  Problems arise only from the complications that set

             in when men sin, giving rise to all kinds of fantastic situations” (Coffman, Matthew, pg 291).