On Line Bible Study - For the week July 20 - 26, 2009

Lesson 397

Jesus and Divorce ...
Mark 10: ¹Jesus then left that place and went into the region of Judea and across the Jordan. Again crowds of people came to him, and as was his custom, he taught them.
²Some Pharisees came and tested him by asking, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?" ³"What did Moses command you?" he replied.
⁴They said, "Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away." "It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied.
⁶"But at the beginning of creation God 'made them male and female.' ⁷'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, ⁸and the two will become one flesh. ^"So they are no longer two, but one. ⁹Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."
¹⁰When they were in the house again, the disciples asked Jesus about this. ¹¹He answered, "Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. ¹²And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery."

Divorce was not uncommon, either in the Jewish or the Roman worlds. Several points of interest:

• Jesus asks: What did Moses command you? Donahue and Harrington suggest that this was intentional on the part of Jesus. He forced the Pharisees to acknowledge that Moses did not "command" with regard to divorce, but permitted it. (Matthew reverses this: In Matthew 19 some Pharisees ask: Why did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce....? And Jesus is the one who says it was "permitted".) The reason this distinction between what is commanded and what is permitted is important is that it leaves the door open for Jesus to accuse the people of having "hardened hearts", thus making the allowance necessary. We have noted elsewhere that "hardness of heart" is a major theme in the scriptures.
  
• The Pharisees apparently are aware that Jesus does not agree with the law (or allowance) stated in Deuteronomy 24:1ff. Their question could only be a "test" if they were attempting to prove that Jesus was not a proponent of orthodoxy with regard to marriage and divorce.
• As recorded by St. Mark, Jesus leaves no exceptions for the permission of divorce. Compare this with Matthew 19 and I Corinthians 7:10-11.
• Later in the history of the Catholic Church marriage became a sacrament - a sign of Christ's presence among us. But long before it was a sacrament, Jesus seems to have held marriage in very high regard.
  

That divorce was not uncommon is also attested to in the relationship between Mary and Joseph; Joseph is not faulted for his inclination to divorce Mary for apparent infidelity. Jesus is questioned by his disciples about his views on divorce. In his mind (as portrayed by St. Mark) Jesus simply does not allow for the unity of marriage to be broken. Rather than depend on the text from Deuteronomy 24, he turns our attention to Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 - the first referring to the creation of male and female, and the second referring to unity that occurs when they come together. This, says Jesus, is God's original intent for men and women.

The Deuteronomy passage says a man can divorce his wife "if he finds something displeasing or indecent about her . . ." The Rabbis debated what displeasing and indecent meant exactly. The School of Shammai taught it referred to sexual misconduct on the woman's part. The School of Hillel taught that if a woman spoiled the supper, or if a man found another woman who was more beautiful - those were reasons enough to issue her a certificate of divorce.

Could it be that men had everything to lose with Jesus' understanding of what divorce was all about?