quote:
Wasn't Jesus asserting a high standard, one that people could not live up to, as a rhetorical device?
The Pharisees had two distinct approaches to halacha. Hillel (progressive) and Shammai (conservative) led great schools in Jerusalem in the generation before Jesus began his ministry.
Hillel said a man could divorce his wife for any reason, even if she burnt his dinner. Shammai said a man could only divorce his wife for adultery. Their interpretations of Deuteronomy 24 supposedly. The only different idea, depending on whether we are reading Matthew or Mark and Luke, and consistent between the three is the idea that remarriage constitutes adultery. Matthew addresses it twice. (Matthew 5:31-32 and 19:1-11). The one in chapter 19 is closer to the Mark version than chapter 5. There the author makes the same male and female argument.
As I was corrected, the writer of Mark didn't even provide adultery as an option. Neither does the book of Luke. This author only gives one line to the issue.
16:18
Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery, and the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
Even divorce for the reason of adultery doesn't make sense given the laws in Deuteronomy. If a woman commits adultery she and the man she slept with are to be put to death (Deuteronomy 22:22). No need for divorce. So Deuteronomy 24 wouldn't be talking about adultery as grounds for divorce.
The idea that remarriage after a legal divorce is adultery isn't supported in the OT. Marriage was a legal contract that could be ended by the death of one party, breach of contract, or mutual agreement. Divorce is the legal means to end the marriage contract.
Even God divorced Israel. (Jeremiah 3:8)
A Jewish marriage could only be absolved by a Jewish Divorce. IOW, a Greek divorce was not recognized by Jewish Law.
It's possible that the conclusion in Mark 10: 10-12 deals with releasing a woman without a paper of divorcement as the Greeks allowed.
I think the author of Matthew was alluding to that situation. Remember that earlier in the chapter Jesus said he didn't come to change what was written in the law.
Matthew 5:31
It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement:
There's a difference between just letting one's wife go (as the Greeks could) and legally divorcing her.
So in Matthew 5:32 we have Jesus stating that just letting one's wife go (as the Greeks did) causes her to commit adultery. If she is not legally divorced, then yes she she would be committing adultery.
Since the writer of Mark shows some Greek tendencies, this may be the point of the issue. Unfortunately the argument that since they were made male and female there should be no divorce is not a reasonable argument.
I do think Jesus was trying to get the people to stop frivolous divorces for the sake of a better deal. It wasn't fair to the women or good for the children.
Of course saying that there is no good reason for a divorce is also unreasonable.
Marriage and divorce are both man made.
Scripture is like Newton’s third law of motionfor every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
In other words, for every biblical directive that exists, there is another scriptural mandate challenging it.
-- Carlene Cross in The Bible and Newton’s Third Law of Motion
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