Teachings on Marriage

Do Matthew 5 and 19 Provide Grounds for Divorce?

Isn't divorce allowed by the so-called "exception clauses" of Matthew 5:31-32 and 19:3-12?

This interpretation, although widely held in the modern church, must be a misunderstanding. Why? Because it is completely inconsistent with the local context in each case and with the global context of all other relevant scripture.

Reasons to Question the "Exception" Interpretation of Matthew 5 and 19

1) The context of Matthew 5 and 19 is one in which forgiveness is the example, forgiveness the standard (read all of Matthew 5, and Matthew 18 as well). Why would Jesus provide grounds for divorce in the midst of such exhortations to patient forgiveness?

2) Parallel gospel passages in Mark 10 and Luke 16:18 contain no such "exception" clause. A reading of these passages results in the clear understanding of Jesus' unequivocal prohibition of divorce under all circumstances.

3) Paul's exposition in I Cor 7 controverts this understanding. He indicates that the believer must not separate from even an unbelieving spouse willing to live with him.

4) The husband must love his wife "as Christ loved the church" - Eph 5:25. Wives are to be taught to love their husbands - Titus 2:4. I Corinthians 13 describes characteristics of love completely incompatible with divorce.

5) Allowing divorce and remarriage weakens the picture of salvation presented in Romans 7. In this picture, a person can ONLY be separated from the law through death. One is rescued from the law only through identification with the death of Christ. To allow separation of spouses via divorce rather than death is to picture escape from the law in our own way, e.g. to deny the necessity of the death of Christ.

6) To allow divorce is to abandon the biblical picture of eternal security. If we grant divorce, we are picturing the possibility of a separation between Christ and His church. That is, to allow divorce is to deny the faithfulness of the bridegroom.

7) If Matthew 5 and 19 were grounds for divorce, EVERY wife could divorce her husband because of what has gone on in his mind. According to Matthew 5:27,28 - "everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already"... We KNOW that it is not God's intention for all marriages to end in divorce.

8) If Matthew 5 & 19 are understood as exceptions, we must also implicitly read exceptions into the rest of scripture. For example:

Eph. 5 - "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it [unless she happens to commit adultery]...

I Cor. 13 - "Love is patient, love is kind, is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered [except for adultery], does not rejoice in unrighteousness [unless it offers an "escape clause"], but rejoices with the truth; bears all things [except adultery], believes all things, hopes all things, endures all [other] things. Love [almost] never fails;

Solomon 8:6 ...For love is as strong as death [but weaker than infidelity]....

9) Matthew 5 and 19 cannot be grounds for divorce because scripture, rightly divided, will never permit an action which in itself constitutes willful disobedience to other scripture.

While it is certainly proper to lay the major blame at the feet of the spouse who has committed adultery, God's commands to husbands and wives are not conditioned upon spousal compliance or obedience. That is, the injured spouse cannot escape condemnation for his/her own disobedience on the basis of the adulterous spouse's sin. Many examples follow:

* To initiate divorce is to deliberately enter into a state hated by God. Mal 2:16,17.

* What about marriage vows? To initiate divorce is to break promises made at the time of the marriage, promises based on Romans 7:1-3, I Cor 7:39, Matthew 19:6, etc., etc. Were these actual vows, or simple statements? If they were vows, they must be kept according to Matthew 5:33. If they were "Yea, Yea" statements, they must also be kept on the basis of Colossians 3:9. To initiate divorce makes one's marriage promise a lie.

* To initiate a divorce is to sin in violation of I Cor. 6:1-8 because it requires going to law before the unrighteous.

* To initiate divorce (put away, leave) is to sin in violation of I Cor 7:12-13: "12 But to the rest speak I, not the Lord: If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, LET HIM NOT PUT HER AWAY. 13 And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, LET HER NOT LEAVE HIM."

* Even were the guilty party an unbeliever, the spouse could not leave on the basis of I Peter 3:1 "Likewise, ye wives, BE IN SUBJECTION to your own husbands; that, EVEN if any are DISOBEDIENT to the word, they may be gained without the word by the conversation of the wives."

* Initiating divorce violates scriptural commandments to love our spouse: Titus 2:4 "That they may teach the young women to be sober, TO LOVE THEIR HUSBANDS, to love their children, 5 [To be] discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed."

Eph. 5:25 "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the Church and gave Himself up for her."

"Love one another AS I HAVE LOVED you" Jn. 13:34,35 15:12,17. This is a COMMANDMENT according to I Jn 3:32, II Jn 1:5.

How is it that God has loved us?

"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that WHILE WE WERE YET SINNERS, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if WHILE WE WERE ENEMIES, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life." Romans 5:8-10

* To initiate a divorce is prima-facie evidence that one is an unbeliever. Matthew 19:8 describes Moses' allowance of this as relative to "hardness of heart", e.g. unbelief. I Corinthians 7:10-16 indicates that the one who leaves is an unbeliever.

10) Because it is not possible to initiate divorce without commiting sin, it is therefore also not possible to counsel divorce.

Is There an Alternative Interpretation of Matthew 5 and 19?

What do these passages really mean, and why are they in the bible?

Matthew 5:31,32 "It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement; 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."

Is Jesus here giving us grounds for divorce? Or is does He have some other agenda?

Consider the context of Matthew 5. Jesus is in the midst of an extended discourse in which he is demolishing conventional wisdom while clearly stating His own authoritative interpretation of scripture. Again and again He quotes the old testament, including selected entries from the ten commandments. Again and again He says "BUT I SAY TO YOU", followed by a TIGHTENING of the rules, the CORRECTION of a misunderstanding.

For example, Jesus shows that hatred is tantamount to murder and that lust is tantamount to adultery.

In fact, Jesus closes chapter 5 with the statement "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect." This is inconsistent with a view that would see these passages as introducing grounds for divorce.

It is more likely that the language of Matthew 5:32, "saving for the cause of fornication", is NOT an exception allowing divorce, but rather a LOGICAL exception to the CHARGE of CAUSING a spouse to commit adultery.

In other words, the exception simply recognizes the situation in which a spouse was ALREADY committing adultery. If she had not already been committing adultery, divorce would be sinful EVEN THOUGH APPARENTLY ALLOWED BY MOSES because it would CAUSE subsequent adultery in the manner described by Paul in I Cor. 7:1-5.

I believe that the discourses in both Matthew 5 and 19 are to TIGHTEN the rules of marriage, to return marriage to the way God intended it to be from the beginning. Both passages emphasize that the truth of God's holiness is MORE STRINGENT than previously acknowledged, as DEMONSTRATED in the Lord Jesus.

In Matthew 19 (where we are explicitly told that the Pharisees were testing Jesus), Jesus appeals to the original intention of God that marriage be an inseparable unity. This was His answer to their request for "legal grounds for divorce".

The Pharisees pressed the matter by citing Moses. Jesus responds that that former state of affairs evidenced their own unbelief and that God did not intend it to be that way.

To help you to see how this passage can be understood to be in concert with the rest of scripture, rather than in conflict, consider this paraphrase of Matthew 19 verses 3-12:

Pharisees: "(Thinking, Let's trip Him up...)" Pharisees: "Can a man get out of his marriage FOR ANY OLD REASON?" Jesus: "Can't you read? GOD made man and wife ONE. That was THE PLAN from day one. DON'T SPLIT UP GOD'S HANDIWORK." Pharisees: "(NOW He's trapped... We'll show Him who can read!...)" Pharisees: "Then why did Moses allow divorce FOR FORNICATION?" Jesus: "You were hard-hearted, so Moses allowed divorce FOR FORNICATION." Jesus: "But from the beginning, divorce WASN'T allowed FOR FORNICATION, and now that you know, you can't use that old excuse anymore." Jesus: "And not only can't you divorce her FOR FORNICATION, I SAY TO YOU, if you now divorce her for ANY OTHER REASON, and remarry, YOU'RE guilty of FORNICATION TOO!" Disciples: "Jesus, that's just too hard... we'd better stay single!" Jesus: "You aren't all cut out for the single life, but maybe some of you should live that way..."

Although the rules governing marriage are now clearer and stricter, the picture of forgiveness in Christ is also more complete. Perhaps this is why we discover, in John 8, that adultery is no longer a capital crime?

To summarize, in Matthew 5 and 19 Christ is actually CORRECTING a gross over-application of Moses' divorce concession while ABOLISHING the single remaining Old Testament ground for divorce.

On what basis is this possible? With the advent of Christ, the world now has a complete revelation of both the severity and the full mercy of God, as well as of the true symbolism of marriage. These truths demand full and complete forgiveness and reconcilliation of anyone who would identify with Christ.

For additional support of this view, consider the disciples' reaction (Mt 19:10). They thought Jesus' instruction an impossible standard to live up to. If He had been offering grounds for divorce, why would the disciples have reacted so strongly?

Why Would God Make These Passages So Deliberately Difficult to Understand?

God in His sovreignty brings trial and testing into our lives to prove our devotion and obedience to Him. Furthermore, He has written the bible in such a way as to be deliberately difficult to understand, thus eliminating those unwilling to follow Him with their whole heart:

Deut 8:1 "All the commandments which I command thee this day shall ye observe to do, that ye may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers. 2 And thou shalt remember all the way which the LORD thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, [and] to prove thee, to know what [was] in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. 3 And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every [word] that proceedeth out of the mouth LORD doth man live."

II Pet 3:16 "As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction."

The obscure statements of scripture must be governed by the preponderance of clear statements. Let us not behave like little children who, intent on a pre-determined course of disobedience, tirelessly seek a pretext, no matter how slim, for disobeying our parents - "But mommy said I could have a cookie"!