Matthew 5:31,32

[Creatorshelp]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

 

[Enlightenedtruth]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Good question, to which there is no clear answer. I believe Matthew chapter 5 if about obeying God; for verse 31 & 32 I believe that is more about any "oath" taken before God. And read another way, the original husband "causes" the wife to commit adultery; which would indicate to me the original husband was the guilty party who would be held in Judgement for the divorce and the Sin resulting from it.

 

[WIP]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Maybe it comes down to who grants the divorce. The secular government or the Church. Just because something is legal does not necessarily make it right.

 

[Ezekiel]

In Matt 5 Jesus is speaking of the law He gave on Sinai. Teaching the Spirit of that law. That His followers do better then that law shows. Because of the grief, Moses wrote the divorce. Things like do not steal but give. Just something to think about. Jesus will never divorce you even if you leave him He will try to bring you back to Him and wail til you return back loving you forever. Some churches do this but Paul states, remove them from the church !

1 Tim 5
16 If any man or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not the church be charged; that it may relieve them that are widows indeed.
17 Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the word and doctrine.

 

[electedbyHim]

The Teaching of Jesus Part 1

but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the cause of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Mat_5:31-32)

Jesus affirms exactly what Moses taught in Deu_24:1-4 -that unjustified divorce inevitably leads to adultery. To the legalistic, self-righteous scribes and Pharisees Jesus was saying, “You consider yourselves to be great teachers and keepers of the law, but by allowing no-fault divorce you have caused a great blight of adultery to contaminate God's people. By lowering God's standards to meet your own, you have led many people into sin and judgment.”

The Pharisees interpreted Moses' instructions to mean, “If you find something distasteful about your wife, divorce her.” They saw the paperwork as the only issue. Jesus knew their warped interpretation and thus confronted them.

The error in their thinking is highlighted in Mat_5:27-30. They prided themselves on the fact that they did not commit adultery. But Jesus said, “I say to you, that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has commiteed adultery with her already in his heart” (Mat_5:28). In Mat_5:29-30 He showed them that no sacrifice is too great to maintain moral purity. Then in these present verses (Mat_5:31-32), He again indicts them for adultery because they were committing it by putting away their wives. The ease of divorce made it possible to avoid open adultery. Only a little paperwork was required to legalize their lust.

But Jesus confronted them with a proper interpretation of God's law. He said that every time a man without proper cause turned his wife loose to remarry, he forced her into adultery, which made him guilty also. In addition, the man who married the former wife and the woman who married the former husband were likewise guilty of adultery. The result was multiplied adultery! Jesus' whole point is that divorce leads to adultery.

Some interpreters maintain that apoluo (divorces), which has the basic meaning of let loose, or let go free, refers only to separation, broken engagement, or desertion. A common view of this passage is that Jesus is referring only to divorce during the betrothal period, such as that mentioned in Mat_1:18-19. But when used in the context of a man and wife, the common meaning of apoluo was always divorce-not merely separation or the breaking of an engagement (cf. Mat_19:3, Mat_19:7-9; Mar_10:2, Mar_10:4, Mar_10:11-12; Luk_16:18).

The term cannot refer only to a broken betrothal for several reasons. First, the background of the passage is Deu_24:1-22, which does not deal with broken betrothal but with broken marriage. To take the betrothal period as a limiting factor in a passage that deals strictly with marriage and divorce (based on its Old Testament roots) gives an illegitimate and nonhistorical restriction. If Christ has in mind the betrothal period He would then be adding something to the Old Testament standard, rather than commenting on and affirming it-which would have been out of step with His stated purpose for this section of the Sermon on the Mount (see Mat_5:17-18).

Second, the indissoluble union in a Hebrew marriage began at betrothal, not consummation, as illustrated by Joseph and Mary. He was her “husband” during the betrothal period. The Old Testament punishment of death for adultery was the same for both participants, and it applied whether the adultery was committed during betrothal or after consummation of the marriage. Prior to betrothal, a man and woman who committed fornication were only required to marry each other (Deu_22:28-29). In that cultural context betrothal was clearly an element of marriage.

Third, it is clear that the Jews who heard Jesus use the term understood Him to mean divorce, because there was never any need to clarify what was meant. Deu_24:1-4, to which Jesus refers in Mat_5:31, had to do strictly with marriage and divorce, not betrothal, mere separation, or desertion. Jesus was not adding to or modifying what Moses had said, but simply clarifying it.

By divorcing his wife on grounds other than adultery, a husband makes his innocent former wife commit adultery if she remarries-as it is assumed she would. Further, as Jesus makes explicit in Mar_10:11-12, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; and if she herself divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery.” Jesus' statement that whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery (cf. Luk_16:18) completes the picture. A man or woman who has no right to divorce has no right to remarry. To do so initiates a whole chain of adultery, because remarriage after illegitimate divorce results in illegitimate and adulterous relationships for all parties involved.

When the detrimental effects on children, other relatives, and society in general are added, we see that few practices match divorce for destructiveness. It not only causes further sin but also confusion, resentment, hatred, bitterness, despair, conflict, and hardships of every sort.

In Mat_19:1-30 Jesus quotes God's declaration in Gen_2:24 that “For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and the two shall become one flesh” (Mat_19:5). “Consequently,” He goes on to say, “they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate” (Mat_19:6). The Pharisees' response, “Why then did Moses command to give her a certificate and divorce her?” (Mat_19:7) again betrayed their misinterpretation of Deu_24:1-4. Jesus had to explain, “Because of your hardness of heart, Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way” (Deu_24:8). God never “commanded” divorce but only “permitted” it as a concession to sinful, self-willed mankind. It is true that in Mar_10:5 Jesus speaks of Deu_24:1-4 as a commandment. But the teaching there is not a command to divorce but a command not to remarry the defiled person who has been divorced.

The condition except for unchastity is not a way out that God provides, but is the only grounds for divorce that He will recognize. Some say that this “exception clause” allows divorce for Jews only, and only in the case of the sin of consanguinity (marrying a near relative, a practice forbidden in Lev_18:1-30). This view is propounded by those who wish to believe that there are no biblical grounds at all for divorce by Christians. They point out that the exception clause appears only in Matthew and maintain that to interpret it otherwise would be to contradict or add to the law governing the sin of adultery.

Of course, God has only to say a thing once for it to be true, so the fact that the exception clause appears only in Matthew has no bearing on proper interpretation.



coninued below.

 

[electedbyHim]

The Teaching of Jesus Part 2
In fact, the exception clause would have been inappropriate in the contexts of Mar_10:1-52 and Luk_16:1-31. In Mat_5:1-48 and Mat_19:1-30 the clause is included to correct the Pharisees' misrepresentation of God's law regarding adultery. The exception clause in those passages amplifies Jesus' teaching on divorce in Mar_10:1-52 and Luk_16:1-31 -it does not contradict it.

Jesus gives no more approval for divorce than did Moses. The Old Testament ideal has not been changed. The permissions for divorce in the Old Testament economy were designed to meet the unique, practical problems of an imperfect, sinful people. God never condoned divorce, because what He joins together is not to be separated by man (Mat_19:6). Adultery, another reality that God never intended, is the only thing that can break the bond of marriage. In fact, under the Old Testament law, adultery would necessarily dissolve a marriage, because the guilty party was put to death (Lev_20:10).

Because Jesus specifically mentions divorce being permissible on the ground of adultery (Mat_5:32; Mat_19:9), and because He also specifically says that He did not come to contradict or annul the least part of the law (Mat_5:18-19), it seems evident that sometime during Israel's history divorce was allowed to take the place of execution as legitimate penalty for adultery. No Old Testament passage specifically authorizes divorce, but that does not mean God did not give specific revelation about it. Based on His own recognition and regulation of divorce, and His divorce of Israel and Judah (Jer_3:8), we can assume that divine instructions for divorce had been given orally or by written revelation not preserved in Scripture. God divorced Israel and Judah for spiritual adultery rather than put them to death. Also Joseph, a righteous man, was prepared to divorce Mary rather than stone her for her presumed adultery (Mat_1:19).

Why did God allow divorce to replace the death penalty? The answer may be that Israel had so completely immersed herself in immorality that there was not sufficient desire for righteousness left in the people to carry out executions for that offense. Ultimately, God in His mercy chose Himself not to enforce the death penalty. That is consistent with the divine nature revealed in Jesus, who challenged the Pharisees who were about to stone a woman for adultery and then forgave her Himself (Joh_8:7). Apart from the death penalty, divorce became the divine alternative, tolerated only because of the hardness of the human heart, as Jesus states in Mat_19:8.

Divorce was never commanded, even for adultery. Otherwise God would have given His notice of divorce to Israel and Judah long before He did. A legitimate bill of divorce was allowable for adultery, but it was never commanded or required. It was a last resort-to be used only when unrepentant immorality had exhausted the patience of the innocent spouse, and the guilty one would not be restored.

If God permitted divorce rather than death as a merciful concession to man's sinfulness, why would He not also permit remarriage, since remarriage would be perfectly allowable under the original law of death for the adulterer? After all, the purpose of divorce was to show mercy to the guilty party, not to sentence the innocent party to a life of loneliness and misery.

Unchastity (porneia) refers to any illicit sexual intercourse, whether or not either of the parties is married. It was a broad term that included adultery, as other texts using a form of porneia indicate (“immorally,” 1Co_10:8; “immorality,” Rev_2:14; cf. 1Co_5:1). Because Mat_5:31-32 focuses on marriage and divorce, the primary unchastity involved here would be adultery. But porneia also included incest, prostitution, homosexuality, and bestiality-all of the sexual acts for which the Old Testament demanded the death penalty (Lev_20:10-14). In other words, any of those corrupt and perverted sexual activities was a permissible ground for divorce.

Jesus does not advocate divorce in such cases, much less demand it. He simply says that divorce and remarriage on any other grounds always leads to adultery. As God, Jesus hates divorce (Mal_2:16), but by implication He acknowledges that there are times when it does not result in adultery. The innocent party who has made every effort to maintain the marriage is free to remarry if his or her spouse insists on continued adultery or divorce.

Jesus sets the record straight that God still hates divorce and that His ideal is still monogamous, life-long marriage. But as a concession to sin and as a gracious provision for those who are innocent of defiling the marriage, He allows divorce on the single ground of unchastity.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul adds one more legitimate ground for divorce and subsequent remarriage. “But to the rest I say, not the Lord, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, let him not send her away. And a woman who has an unbelieving husband, and he consents to live with her, let her not send her husband away” (1Co_7:12-13). After giving the reason for that instruction, he adds, “Yet if the unbelieving one leaves, let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace” (1Co_7:15). The Greek word translated “leave” (chorizo) was often used for divorce. Thus if an unbelieving spouse deserts or divorces a believer, the believer is no longer bound and is free to remarry. (For further study on this passage, see the author's commentary First Corinthians [Chicago: Moody, 1984], pp. 164-68.)

 

[journeymanisnothing]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Our Lord excepted adultery when He said,

For the hardness of your heart he (Moses) wrote you this precept.

The marriage between a man and woman is sacred. It's symbolizes our oneness with God,

This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Eph.5:32 KJV

from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. Mk.10:5-8 KJV

A woman wasn't obligated to be married to another man, but since most women worked inside as homemakers who raised children she might feel compelled to remarry.

The point is they were using divorce for foolish reasons because they were adulterers themselves.

 

[Tenchi]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Here's a good way to gain a full sense of what Christ said and meant: Look at the parallel Gospel accounts of what Jesus said.

Matthew 5:31-32
31 “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’
32 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 19:3-9
3 And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?”
4 He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female,
5 and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?
6 So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?”
8 He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

Mark 10:2-12
2 And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”
3 He answered them, “What did Moses command you?”
4 They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.”
5 And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment.
6 But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’
7 ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife,
8 and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh.
9 What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
10 And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter.
11 And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her,
12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

Luke 16:18
18 “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.

In all of these accounts only in the first one from Matthew 5 does Jesus say that the man who divorces his wife causes her to commit adultery. Did Matthew perhaps recount Christ's words inaccurately? This is suggested by the fact that only in the one account does Jesus say what he does about the divorced wife.

I would, though, not want to cast doubt on the veracity of the Gospel accounts. Perhaps it is that Matthew was entirely accurate in his recounting of Christ's words, which is what I would expect if his writing of his Gospel was superintended by the Holy Spirit, who guided Matthew's mind as he wrote, prompting him to pen what he did.

I think a better explanation of Christ's words in Matthew's account ought to emphasize two things:

- the God-ordained nature of marriage and its resulting sanctity.

Whether or not humans do, God takes marriage very seriously, in His word even making it a reflection of the relationship of Christ to his Bride, the Church (Ephesians 5:22-33). At the very first marriage in Eden, Adam was united to Eve, the two of them becoming "one flesh." This union of Man and Woman, Jesus said, must never be broken apart by anyone (Genesis 2:21-24; Matthew 19:6). Marriage, therefore, is a deeply sacred thing, however lightly humans may have come to think of it.

- that it is the man's selfish, sinful decision to divorce his wife that makes her an adulterer should she remarry, not unfairness on God's part.

Part of what makes sin so awful is that it always sends out "ripples" of effect that negatively affect others. Consider how Adam's sin in Eden has damaged us all; consider how Achan's sin destroyed his entire family; consider how "a little leaven" in a church "leavens the whole lump" (Romans 5:12-14; Joshua 7:23-26; 1 Corinthians 5:6).

A husband's betrayal of his marriage vow not only breaks apart what God has commanded that no person should divide, but puts his spouse in the unavoidable circumstance, should she remarry, of being an adulterer. This result is a sort of "law," like the Law of Gravity, or the Law of Entropy, or the Laws governing Motion. We don't complain that, when a boy jumps from a branch high up on a tree and falls to the ground and breaks his leg, God has been unfair. It's just how God made physical reality to work; and if the boy ignores God's law, unhappy consequences result for him and for those who must take him to the hospital and care for him afterward. So, too, if a person refuses to regularly invest energy in the upkeep of their home: it spirals downward into messy disorder. We don't blame God, though, for the mess a person makes of their home by not keeping it clean and neat. We don't charge God with unfairness when our carelessness produces chaos for ourselves and others. Entropy is just the way God has made things to be and when we ignore the Law of Entropy and our home turns into a pigsty, troubling ourselves and others in the home, we have only ourselves to blame.

So, too, in regards to God's law concerning the sin of divorce: If you divorce your spouse, you make your spouse an adulterer, should your spouse remarry. Like the Law of Gravity, this is just the way God has made things to work. And so, when a person invokes this consequence in divorcing their spouse, it is not God who should be blamed or called unfair. All blame for putting one's spouse in the place of a potential unwilling adulterer attaches only to the one who has divorced one's spouse. The boy leaping from a high tree-branch should not have done so; the homeowner should not have been careless about upkeep of their home; and the person divorcing their spouse should not have done so. The consequences of their bad choices that affect others isn't unfairness on God's part.

 

[DavidT]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

She is not guilty of adultery, if her husband divorces her for other reasons than "fornication" outside the marriage.

In Old Testament times, men divorced their wives for many different reasons. Jesus is simply showing doing that is not justified, except for the reason of "fornication" (i.e., adultery, fornication outside the marriage).

 

[WIP]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Something to consider is that it is extremely rare, maybe not impossible, but extremely rare that both parties are not somehow partially responsible. Yes, it is common for one of them to claim they did nothing to promote the situation but after careful self examination they could most likely discover that they also contributed to the demise of the relationship in some way.

In my case, when my ex-wife told me that she wanted to separate, I felt dumbfounded and blindsided. It caught me totally by surprise. After a few months separation, during which time I had learned of her infidelity, we tried again but five years later I learned once again that she was fooling around with other men. Yes, I meant that to be plural both times. Now I did file for divorce the second time but as time went on and after I cooled off a bit, I began to examine our relationship with my 20-20 hindsight and learned that as blindsided as I felt, I was not without partial blame for our relationship going south. It takes work, respect, compassion, and love on the part of both involved to keep the relationship alive and thriving and we both failed to accomplish that.

 

[follower]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Because the Creator Says So. He is much much much more correct, always right, and very strict never bending Torah. He is much stricter, and He is Judge, and that is His Right so to be.
Is it not even more strict as Jesus says, a man is guilty of adultery even if he does not ever do anything !?
(if he just LOOKS at a woman with the guilt in his heart, never even acting on it that man is guilty of adultery as Jesus Says)

 

[Josef]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

Hey All,
This is a great question. Let's first look at some facts about marriage.

Marriage, according to God's Word, (through Moses) is the ordained union between a man and a woman. God. (Genesis 2:18-25)
The marriage vows, a.k.a. the marriage covenant, is supposed to be a mirror-image of Christ’s relationship with His bride, the church. (Ephesians 5:25-29).
This is why marriage is considered a sacred institution, and not to be entered into lightly.
Marriage is honorable; and it's bed is undefiled. (Hebrews 13:4).
(Follow up: Honorable - moral, righteous, decent.
Undefiled - pure.)
Now, for the negative, people sometimes break their promises, making the union no longer honorable.

The answer to your question is here in how Matthew wrote the "understanding" of the Law, vs. how Moses actually wrote/worded the Law, and how Jesus removes the "loophole."
Let's look:

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

The Law:
Deuteronomy 24:1-2 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.

Man’s sin nature created loopholes in Moses’s law. The loophole was created from the phrase,

"because he hath found some uncleanness in her:"

So if they could find their wife in an unclean state, that was grounds for divorce. What was considered unclean was not just sexual immorality sin. Some did not involve sin at all. For example, giving birth, or having a skin disease, like dandruff, or even pimples, was also considered to be an unclean state for women. Another was menstruation. So these unclean states were used by men as a "legally acceptable" cause for divorce.
Jesus corrects this back to the original meaning of the law. (" . . . saving for the cause of fornication . . . ") The forced adultery comes from the fact that the original couple, though having a letter of divorcement, are not legally divorced according to the Law given to Moses.

Keep walking everybody.
May God bless,
Taz

 

[Vinny37]

why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason?
Its not her doing or fault.

[Why would the woman be guilty of adultery, including her new husband, if her original husband divorces her for the wrong reason? It’s not her doing or fault.]

To some extent πορνεια makes it simple, a sin permitting sinless divorce (covenant annulment)—the Matthean Exception. Then both parties have no residual obligation and may marry any available consenting person. In short, the marriage bridge between them was sadly destroyed by sin, and not required to be rebuilt.

But in Jesus’ setting, divorce for any other reason was still valid but since based on invalid reason, sinful, leaving a residual obligation to reunite or remain single. Thus both parties were living outside an obligatory covenant obligation to unity, so even the innocent party (here the former wife) was per force adulterous (ie at variance with the ought, the obligation): “causes her to become an adulteress” (NIV). At least that’s one suggestion as to why even the innocent woman becomes adulterous, namely that whether she marries another or remains unmarried, she is excluded from her obligation of marital unity, howbeit by the sin of the man in sinfully divorcing her. The man is also an adultery, ie in breach of his covenant obligation.

D A Carson (Matthew (EBC), 2010:382) preferred the idea that an unspecified assumption is that wrongly divorced wives probably had to find and marry someone else, therefore forced by economics to commit adultery by going against their obligation to remain single or remarry the spouse they were wrongly divorced from. By marrying another, they might in fact commit πορνεια, the sin of sexual union against the residual obligation to the previous spouse.

It’s a big issue.