Bible Study series: Matthew 19:1-12. Marriage is a covenant. His teaching on divorce is designed to protect women in an easy-divorce society. A quick summary of his healing ministry is included.
A warm welcome to this Bible study! I write to learn, so let’s learn together. I also translate to learn. The translations are mine, unless otherwise noted. If you would like to see many others, please click on this link:
In the next link to the original chapter, I comment more and offer the Greek text. At the bottom you will find a “Summary and Conclusion” section geared toward discipleship. Check it out!
In this post, links are provided for further study.
Let’s begin.
Scripture: Matthew 19:1-12
1 And so it happened that when Jesus finished those teachings, he went away from Galilee and went to the mountains of Judea beyond the Jordan River. 2 And large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.
3 Then some Pharisees approached him, testing him and saying, “It is permitted for a man to divorce his wife for every cause?” 4 In reply, he said, “Haven’t you read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’? [Gen. 1:27; 5:2] 5 And he said, ‘For this reason a man will leave father and mother and will join together with his wife, and they will be one flesh’? [Gen. 2:24] 6 So then they are no longer two, but instead one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no person separate.”
7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her?” 8 He said to them, “Moses, because of your hard heart, permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not like that. 9 I tell you that whoever divorces his wife except for sexual misconduct and marries another commits adultery. [And he who marries a woman who has been divorced commits adultery]”
10 His disciples said to him, “If the case of a man with his wife is like this, it is better not to marry.” 11 But he said to them, “Not everyone accepts this word, but to whom it has been given. 12 For there are eunuchs who are born that way from the mother’s womb. And there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by people, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. Let him who can accept this accept it.” (Matt. 19:1-12)
Comments:
It is imperative that you belong to a church and ask them about their divorce policy. I’m just a teacher with no pastoral oversight, but I merely teach what I believe the Scriptures tell us.
Let’s remember that Jesus’s teaching on divorce follows from his teaching on forgiveness (18:21-35).
Brief Overview of Divorce and Remarriage in New Testament
Jesus Teaches His Kingdom Citizens about Divorce
1-2:
So Jesus has been up in Galilee in the north, and then he went south to the mountains (or hills) of Judea, which is the province of Jerusalem, the capital. Yet he went to the east side of the Jordan River.
Jesus had a healing ministry, so large crowds followed him. Anyone who has seen a healing ministry up close knows that it is hard work. It is amazing to me that Jesus was tireless in “doing the stuff.”
“healed”: the verb means to “make whole, restore, heal, cure, care for.”
I like what commentator R. T. France says of biblical ethics and divorce:
The ethics of the kingdom of heaven, as we have seen them illustrated in 5:21-48, seek not primarily how evil may be contained and alleviated, but how the best may be discerned and followed. It would make a huge and beneficial difference to modern debates on divorce if this priority were observed, so that the focus fell not on what grounds for divorce may be permitted (as in the Pharisee’s question), but on how marriage may best be lived up to the Creator’s purpose for it. There will, no doubt, always be a need for trouble-shooting legislation and pastoral help when things have gone wrong, but it that is where our ethical discussion begins, the battle is lost before it is joined. Those who start from Deut. 24:1-4 will have as their basic presupposition that divorce is to be expected, the question being only how it is to be regulated. Those who start from Gen. 1-2 will see any separation of what God has joined together as always an evil; circumstances may prove it to be the lesser evil, but that can never make it less than an infringement of the primary purpose of God for marriage. (p. 714)
Perfect. Instead of beginning with Deut. 24:1-4 and looking to get away with as much as we can; let’s follow Jesus’s counsel and go back to God’s original intention in Gen. 1-2, which is maintaining a healthy marriage.
3-6:
“Pharisees”: See this link to learn more about them:
Quick Reference to Jewish Groups in Gospels and Acts
This group, among others, was the Watchdogs of Theology and Behavior (David E. Garland, Luke: Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament [Zondervan, 2011], p. 243). The problem which Jesus had with them can be summed up in Eccl. 7:16: “Be not overly righteous.” He did not quote that verse, but to him they were much too enamored with the finer points of the law, while neglecting its spirit (Luke 11:37-52; Matt. 23:1-36). Instead, he quoted this verse from Hos. 6:6: “But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Matt. 9:13; 12:7). Overdoing righteousness, believe it or not, can damage one’s relationship with God and others.
However, Craig Keener notes in his commentary on this verse that the Pharisees were very loose about divorce, to the point of scandal. So righteousness was followed only when it suited them.
Now let’s move to the emotional topic of divorce.
Please note: Some of my comments are taken from my earlier ones at Matt. 5:31-32, but with some edits for this pericope (pronounced pu-RIH-koh-pea) or section of Scripture. You can click back there for different emphases.
Here in v. 3, the Pharisees use the phrase “every cause.” Where do they get it from?
The law of Moses has an ambiguous element in it.
When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house (Deut. 24:1, ESV)
That verse says that a man can write up a certificate of divorce and send his wife out of his house. Why? If he finds any cause of “indecency” in her. That’s the key word. Before Jesus lived, liberal interpreters (School of Hillel) said a man can divorce her for any cause (note those words). “Indecency” was stretched to include even bad food preparation. Strict interpreters (School of Shammai) said a man can divorce her only for sexual misconduct, because that is what “indecency” meant.
Jesus introduces the exception clause in divorce: except for the cause of sexual sin (porneia, pronounced pohr-nay-ah). (Mark 10:11-12 and Luke 16:18 do not have this exception).
To clarify further, the Pharisees asked him whether a man can divorce his wife for any cause. How would Jesus answer? He endorsed the Edenic model of one man and one woman, and they should stay together, because they made a covenant before God. He joined them together. The Pharisees replied by asking why Moses permitted the certificate of divorce. He said that Moses accommodated their hardness of heart, but at the beginning it was not so (vv. 7-8). Then Jesus revealed he was on the side of Shammai (up to a point)—divorce is allowed only for sexual misconduct, as he does here in vv. 3-6. However, Carson points out that Jesus was going his own way, siding with Mal. 2:16, which says, “I hate divorce.”
Verses 3-6 also answer the question of polygamy or bigamy. The Torah assumes (but does not command) that a man can have two or more wives (Exod. 21:10 and Deut. 21:15), but restrictions were placed on him, so that he better think twice before getting involved in polygamy. And it seems wherever polygamy is practiced, trouble brews. So the Bible shows by example not to get involved in it.
Now let’s discuss another issue regarding marriage.
Even in the (sad) context of divorce, these verses embody a great statement and affirmation of heterosexual and monogamous marriage, which is especially relevant to the world today, where it is trendy to see two women or two men “get married.” However, Jesus says that originally God’s plan for marriage was one man and one woman, and they alone can have a union that makes them one flesh. Two women cannot, nor can two men. The physical union between male and female touches the core of the soul, and two women and two men cannot have this. Yes, they can have a certain level of intimacy because they can sexually stimulate each other, either at the same time or by taking turns, but only a man and a woman can have penile-clitoral sex, which is the most intimate and, yes, most pleasurable. So there is a hierarchy of sexual relations, and this is at the top. Same-sex couples cannot match or achieve it. God ordained through natural processes that there should be this hierarchy.
This pleasure is God’s gift to humanity by virtue of how he anatomically made them. Why? He intends them to have children or to be fruitful and multiply (Gen. 1:28). Yes, it is true that sometimes a couple chooses not to have children, and God gave them freewill to go in this direction. But it may not be the best for them or humanity in general, and let’s trust they are listening to God and not to their own egoism, but for most couples God wants them to be fruitful and multiply.
And yes, it is true that sometimes a couple cannot have children because something has gone wrong with the reproductive side of things. We can pray for God’s healing, either supernaturally or by treatment. But if they cannot have them naturally even after prayer or treatment, then we should not let these extreme cases set biblical norms. As the saying goes: extreme cases make bad policy. The good news is that this couple can adopt and give a wonderful home to needy children.
Now what about not dividing or splitting what God has joined together? Don’t go near a marriage and seduce one of the partners to commit adultery. And married partner, don’t you dare allow yourself to be seduced.
Matt. 5:28 and Adultery in the Heart
For v. 6, Osborne writes: “Jesus draws the natural conclusion from the Genesis quotes. By centering only on the Deut 24 passage, the Pharisees have missed the true teaching of the Torah. The purpose of creation is the God-given union of ‘male and female.’”
7-9:
First, let me say that v. 9 has a dispute about manuscripts. The clause in brackets don’t appear in some manuscripts. I don’t want to discuss this complicated issue here, but I include the clause because I like a fuller biblical text.
In v. 7, the Pharisees use the verb “command,” but Moses did not command divorce; he permitted it.
“Thus in Matthew (in contrast to Mark), the Pharisees even exploit Moses’ concession as a command …. Jesus, by contrast, uses Scripture differently (cf. 12:7), here probably seeking to protect an innocent Jewish wife from her husband wrongfully divorcing her … Other Jewish teachers also recognized that by making divorce more difficult they would protect the woman ….” (Keener, pp. 465-66).
Osborne on v. 8: “The ‘indecency’ clause of Deut 24:1 is the key; divorce is always the result of a series of sins that a couple commits against each other. It is effected by going against God’s will time after time. It is better of two terrible options—continuing acts of ‘indecency’ against each other, or breaking the marriage vow. The fact is that divorce had attained epidemic proportions in the first century (as today!), and Jesus had to address the serious problem.”
Moving on to another observation, I like how Jesus restricted the law of Moses, when it was sloppily, loosely interpreted. He issued a reinterpretation of the text on the basis of the original Edenic model. We need to read Deut. 24:1 and his comments in vv. 7-9 in the light of their hard hearts.
We saw in my comments on Deut. 24:1 in vv. 3-6, which says that Moses allowed a certificate of dismissal in order to divorce, that the issue was divorce for all causes or any cause, which Jesus restricted to sexual immorality or sexual misconduct. He restricted it because easy divorce for “every cause” harmed the woman and marriage itself. Now let’s imagine a woman who was recently divorced for any cause. Her husband did not like the way she prepared the food. It is easy to imagine quarrels about silly things. Now she is divorced and goes back to her father’s house, a social embarrassment. On the way home, a man hears about the divorce. He sees her walking back to her father’s house with her bride price. Legally the man could send his first wife out of the house with a certificate of dismissal and marry the second woman who was recently divorced.
Apparently, in Jesus’s eyes, marriage had become much too cheap and sordid. He intended to put a stop to it. Siding with more with Shammai (up to a point), Jesus was tightening things up in order to help the woman who was unjustly turned out of her first husband’s house. In an easy divorce society, which Hillel’s views promoted, marrying and remarrying could potentially become a wife-swapping scheme, in pursuit of the latest and most attractive woman. “I like her! I’m bored with my wife now. She’s old! I know what I’ll do! I’ll write up a certificate of divorce on flimsy grounds, tell my current wife to go home, and marry this new woman who strikes my fancy!” Abandonment in a context of frivolous divorce permits remarriage.
Jesus’s goal is to protect women, not impose kingdom oppression on them, since Jewish law allowed only the man to initiate the divorce and thereby possibly victimize the woman.
Please see this link, where I discuss Matt. 5:31-32 and where I bring Paul’s counsel into the discussion (1 Cor. 7:15).
Brief Overview of Divorce and Remarriage in New Testament
Here is an illustration of the marriage covenant, which Jesus teaches in vv. 3-6:
This illustration shows that God oversees the marriage covenant between a man and a woman. God ordains the covenant, as Jesus said, referring to the original couple in vv. 3-6. So marriage is not limited to two persons (man and woman) but between three persons (God, man, and woman). However, if a man divorces his wife for an unbiblical reason, this does not mean that he necessarily breaks his standing in the New Covenant, but he does break his covenant with his wife, a covenant that God set up. So divorce, even for a biblical reason, must be done with utmost caution and with the kingdom community’s guidance or pastoral guidance.
Bottom line: Marriage is a covenant not only between the man and the woman, but between God, the man, and the woman. Involve God in your marriage. If you do not, then sin may enter and destroy the covenant, and civilly legal divorce may ensue.
The above triangle says that the closer the couple draws near to God, going upward, the closer they draw towards each other.
Go to church, get counseling, and pray! Divorce—breaking the three-person covenant—is the last resort!
Also see: Matthew 5 (scroll down to vv. 31-32), where the topic of divorce is also taught.
How to Forgive Adultery and Fornication
10-12:
The disciples draw the reasonable (but incomplete) conclusion because easy-divorcism ruled back then in many quarters, so why get married if divorce is restricted to sexual misconduct? However, they miss the point of the blessing of the creation of marriage back in Genesis (vv. 4-6).
Next, Jesus mentions three classes of eunuchs, which in one category seems to be celibacy. Believe it or not, the implied better path is to get married and have children.
(1). Eunuchs were born this way, presumably without sexual organs or malfunctioning ones;
(2). Eunuchs who were made this way by people, presumably to watch the harem in royal courts;
(3). “Eunuchs” who gave up sex or lived the celibate life for the kingdom of heaven, much as Jesus and Paul were doing and Paul recommended, with reservations (1 Cor. 7:7-9). The verb “it is given” is in the passive, so some scholars (Turner) say this the divine passive or an understatement of God working behind the scenes, giving power to be celibate.
Nevertheless, it is better to marry than to burn with passion (1 Cor. 7:9).
In a Jewish context, it would be impossible for Jesus to advocate self-mutilation, because it would engender horror to the Jews of his day. It was against God’s law of nature. Therefore, Jesus simply means celibacy, like the Essenes, a group not mentioned in the Bible, though they lived during Jesus’ times, but who favored celibacy.
As noted, Jesus is affirming heterosexual marriage. The above three categories are rare and outside the mainstream of kingdom life. And Jesus already taught how God viewed marriage in vv. 4-6. God ordained the institution. No man should split up in a frivolous divorce what God has joined together.
As for “born a eunuch” = homosexuality, France is again on target:
Most references to homosexual behavior in the ancient world are to what we now call bisexuality, the choice of some who are capable of heterosexual intercourse to find sexual fulfillment also (or instead) with member of their own sex. Such a choice could hardly be described as being “born a eunuch,” and the idea of an innate and irreversible homosexual orientation belongs to modern Western psychology rather than to the world in which Jesus lived (p. 725).
As for making oneself a eunuch, it is not to be understood literally. It means to renounce marriage (New International Version) or not marry. This category represents those who have voluntarily chosen celibacy. “Their choice is not ascribed to disinclination but to their perception of God’s will for them: the “kingship of heaven” means God’s sovereign authority, and it is obedience to that authority that they have been prepared to stand apart from normal expectation of marriage and fatherhood” (France, p. 725).
Jesus Teaches His Disciples about Eunuchs
“kingdom of heaven”:
5 The Kingdom of God: Already Here, But Not Yet Fully
Bible Basics about the Kingdom of God
Questions and Answers about Kingdom of God
Basic Definition of Kingdom of God
1 Introducing the Kingdom of God (begin a ten-part series)
GrowApp for Matt. 19:1-12
1. If you were abandoned by an unjust divorce, how did you recover? How has God redeemed your life?
2. If you divorced your spouse for an unbiblical reason and now regret it by repenting and reconciliation is no longer possible, how has God redeemed your life?
3. Have you witnessed someone going through divorce? How did you pray and minister to him or her?
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14. Similarities among John’s Gospel and the Synoptic Gospels
1. The Historical Reliability of the Gospels: Introduction to Series
SOURCES AND MORE
To see the bibliography, please click on this link and scroll down to the bottom. You will also find a “Summary and Conclusion” for discipleship.
Dr. Jim's Essential Bible Teaching 