The Teaching of Jesus on Divorce

Jason Shirk

The Home • Sermon • Submitted 10 months ago • Presented 10 months ago

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Introduction

Tonight’s message is going to be more of a teaching message. I am going to place the emphasis on understanding what this passage means and teaches rather than application until the very end. To help us work through the text verse by verse, I have prepared the slides so you can see what I am saying as we go along. To begin with I want us to take a look at the background for this text from Matt 19.

Background

Matt 19:1-2 “And it came to pass, that when Jesus had finished these sayings, he departed from Galilee, and came into the coasts of Judaea beyond Jordan; And great multitudes followed him; and he healed them there.”

The area beyond Jordan is called Perea which you can see on your map. This region of Judea was where Herod Antipas ruled. If you remember the story of Herod Antipas and John the Baptist you will understand a little bit more about why the Pharisees asked about divorce here of all places.

Mark 6:16-18 “But when Herod heard thereof, he said, It is John, whom I beheaded: he is risen from the dead. For Herod himself had sent forth and laid hold upon John, and bound him in prison for Herodias’ sake, his brother Philip’s wife: for he had married her. For John had said unto Herod, It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother’s wife.”

John the Baptist had been arrested for preaching against the divorce and remarriage of Herod to his brother’s wife Herodias. He was married, but he lusted after his brother’s wife, who was also related to him, and he took his brother’s wife, his own relative, and married her. And that led to an encounter with John the Baptist. Herodias worked behind the scene to get Herod to kill John the Baptist so she had their daughter dance seductively before Herod in a pleasing way. He granted her one wish which she had been instructed to say that John’s head would be delivered on a silver platter. The Pharisees bring this question to Jesus because they are trying to trap him by his answer. Throughout the text they will try to trap him three different times by pitting him against some authority figure. Here the authority figure is Herod himself.

The Debate

In verse 3, the pharisees introduce the main point that is being discussed.

Matt 19:3 “The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?”

Those last three words were another trap. The Pharisees wanted to lure Jesus into contradicting what the most famous of Rabbis had taught. About 40 years prior to this a famous Rabbi by the name of Hillel had died. A debate had arisen during his lifetime about divorce between himself and the followers of Shammai. Shammai took a very strict stance toward divorce but Hillel took a very liberal stance on divorce. Hillel taught:

“For any reason, unload that woman”

Tradition had arisen because of one interpretation of a passage in Deuteronomy that we will look at in more detail later that taught that a man could divorce his wife for any reason that she displeased him.

burning your dinner

spinning around and revealing your ankles

Letting your hair down

speaking to a man

making a negative comment about your mother

They even believed it was required to divorce if she was infertile

You see how they are trying to trap Jesus into going against prevailing though of the day. Isn’t it surprising how similar the view of divorce was back then to what it is today. Nowadays, both men and women can divorce; but how often is it for petty reasons just like this. Something as simple as I just don’t love him anymore or we argue too much or we aren’t compatible.

Jesus’ Answer

Matt 19:4-6 “And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, 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.”

Jesus answers by challenging them with the word of God. The bible is intended to be our guide book for how we are to live our lives. It is one of the means if not the most prominent way that the Spirit speaks to us and shows us how to live today. Opinions on divorce do not dictate what we believe and practice; nor do our feelings. God has a right to tell us what He thinks and expects in our lives in this area.

Jesus begins by reminding them about how God intended things to be. This passage is parallel to what we looked at in Malachi 2 last week and reminds us how important God’s view of divorce is. God hates it. He remind us:

Marriage is the union of one man and one woman

The strength of that union is like glue

Husbands and wives become one flesh

Marriage is a work of God

If marriage and the one flesh union is a work of God, then men should not be so quick to intermeddle with it and tear it apart. The overall teaching of Jesus on divorce is that God never intended it to happen. This message is given three times in Matt 19, Mark 10:1-2, Luke 16:18. In most of these passages, the gospel writers do not even include the exception clause because the main thrust of Jesus message was that we shouldn’t get divorced. We cannot lose sight of that fact. That is why I preached Malachi 2 first. Because God didn’t intend for divorce, divorce doesn’t make Him happy and God hates unjust divorces.

The Pharisees Rebuttal

Matt 19:7 “They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away?”

The third trap that they tried to draw Jesus into is getting Him to disagree with the law of Moses. So where was this command of Moses?

Deut 24:1-4 “When a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that she find no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness in her: then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house. And when she is departed out of his house, she may go and be another man’s wife. And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement, and giveth it in her hand, and sendeth her out of his house; or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife; Her former husband, which sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after that she is defiled; for that is abomination before the Lord: and thou shalt not cause the land to sin, which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.”

So what does this verse actually say? I am not a Hebrew expert but my understanding of the Hebrew grammar and what others have pointed out to me is that the verb write is joined by a sequential conjunction making it another condition referring to the command. This the verse does not read “let him write her a bill of divorcement. This wording actually makes divorce a command which is what the Pharisees were actually making the case for, but if you understand what this verse is actually saying that become really problematic.

The actual wording here would be

“When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some uncleanness in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce.”

Here is why that change is so important. Moses was not making a command here to divorce your wife; rather, the first few statements are a description of what God knew would happen because as Jesus reveals of the hardness of their hearts. God was not commanded divorce, He was regulating it. The actual command is found later in the passage:

The actual command in this passage is that if someone divorces and his wife remarries and then divorces that husband, he cannot remarry his ex-wife.

Here is a second reason why it is important to understand that this verse is not a command to divorce. The meaning of the word uncleaness in this verse is very broad. The word literally means nakedness, shame, indecency. This is how it is used throughout the book of Deuteronomy. Could it mean adultery? Sure it could except that the punishment for adultery given just a few chapters back was death. You can’t divorce someone who is dead. This leaves it open to it basic meaning of shame. So if this is a command, you can divorce you wife for all the reason’s that Hillel listed. Hillel was not totally off base, he just took a wrong interpretation of the meaning of this passage.

Jesus’ Clarification

Matt 19:8-9 “He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so. And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.”

These are the key verses to our message today. Jesus says that Moses suffered or allowed you to divorce. Why? because of the hardness of your hearts. A culture of divorce had already become custom in the world by this time. And so God regulated the practice, but Jesus brings clarification about what God’s intent is.

Jesus affirms that anyone who divorces for an illegitimate reason and marries again commits adultery. I add that word illegitimate because Jesus here gives us our first exception to the rule. He says except it be for fornication. But what does that mean? I want to spend some time doing a word study here because it is important.

This isn’t the only time Jesus gave this exception either:

Matt 5:32 “But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery.” Sermon on the mount. Jesus had a habit of teaching this truth with the exception clause.

There are two interpretations to this passage that are prevalent in churches today.

1. One group says divorce and remarriage are permissible if one of the parties has committed adultery.

2. The second group says that divorce is never acceptable and remarriage is never an option once you have been divorced.

Men I respect are on both sides of this debate, but I am going to teach you what I believe this passage means and try to prove my understanding. Let me just state, I believe this passage teaches that you can get remarried if you divorce because of adultery.

1. The other group believes that this passage cannot be referring to us today for a couple reasons. They believe that this passage is only found in Matthew which was written primarily to the Jews; so there must be a specific Jewish reason this was written.

2. They believe the word fornication can only mean sexual sin before marriage.

So they would say that fornication in this sense can only require divorce because Jews had a special practice of betrothal before marriage. If one member of the betrothed couple committed sexual sin before marriage the betrothal could be cut off, but this would require a divorce. This is true and it is what we see in the story of Joseph and Mary when Joseph wanted to put her away privately. He wanted to secretly divorce her.

However, fornication does not just mean sex before marriage; so this interpretation is not necessary to make sense of the passage.

fornication- πορνεια porneia

Fornication included homosexuality, betaility, incest, today pornography; but as we will see it also included adultery. Fornication is a general word for any sexual sin while adultery is a specific word for sexual sin inside of marriage.

To prove this let’s look at two passages in the NT where this same word is used.

1 Cor 5:1 “It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.”

This passage includes incest between atleast one married partner which would be adultery in our terminology and yet the bible uses the word fornication. Another passage if we are reasonable also would seem to indicate that adultery is included in fornication.

1 Cor 10:8 “Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand.”

This passage is a reference to Numbers 25:9 which talks about the Jewish men going a whoring. God kills on that day between 23-24,000 people. You possibly could argue that these were all single people, but the argument is unlikely with that many men being involved.

Conclusion

Jesus disciples ask for clarification privately afterwards and conclude that if you can’t get divorced for any reason, you should probably just stay single. Jesus agrees that singleness is good, but not everyone has the gift or can receive this. Divorce and remarriage is a very serious issue. Because of that we should not jump into marriage lightly. I think of the words from the musical “Fiddler on the Roof”

Matchmaker, Matchmaker

You know that I’m

Still very young.

Please take your time.

Up to this minute,

I misunderstood

that I could get stuck for good.

~Bock/ Harnick

So let’s clarify Jesus’ position on divorce in this passage. Marriage is important and divorce is only allowed because of the sinfulness of men’s hearts. If a man or woman divorces for legitimate reason’s like adultery and others we will look at next week, they can get married. Where there is grounds for divorce there is always grounds for remarriage. Just because God is merciful and doesn’t kill the adulterer doesn’t mean the innocent party should be penalized. But where there are illegitimate reasons for divorce, remarriage becomes adultery before God.

In saying all this, I want to leave you with one challenge. Many marriages have faced this issue of unfaithfulness in marriage. While this is a legitimate reason for divorce, you are not commanded to divorce nor do you have to divorce even for this. Just like sex does not automatically constitute a marriage Ex 22:16-17 “And if a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife. If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins.” Adultery does not automatically break a marriage. In Mal 2 she is still called the wife of his covenant.

i recently told the story of Phil and Priscilla. Phil dabbled in pornography for years until it became an addiction. He hid it from his spouse, lived a good life, worked in ministries. Eventually, he needed more so he committed adultery with a woman at a massage parlor. God convicted him of his sin and he reached out to a friend to confess and get advice. That friend pushed him to go to his wife. His sin hurt that marriage. She couldn’t trust him, she didn’t want to touch him, she made him sleep in a separate room, but God put it in his heart to get counseling to overcome his sin and God put it on her heart to stay married to him. After years, God eventually restored their marriage to a beautiful thing. Divorce doesn’t always have to be the option. God can fix even that if we give him a chance.

Now understand, I am not saying you must stay with that partner, but God is also not saying you must divorce that partner. God values marriage.

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