Waters’ First Affirmative:
“The Scriptures teach that all divorced persons may marry today with God's approval.”
By divorce(d) I mean, “The legal ending of a marriage.”
By “may marry” I mean the divorced person, being “loosed” and no longer
“bound,” has God’s approval to have a spouse, which is accomplished by
marriage.
1. That divorce ends a marriage is fundamental.
God’s ideal is that a man and his wife not “put asunder” but be faithful till death. Unfortunately, because we are human, and humans make mistakes, breakups became common. Thus, God gave a directive telling men how to end a marriage (Deut24:1-4). God was not pleased with a mere “departing” or separation. He required that the man give the woman WRITTEN proof that she was free from him. As best as I can figure, because men were allowed to have more than one wife the divorce law was actually intended to benefit the woman. The men who were determined to be rid of a woman were to follow the multi-part directive (Deut24:1-2) to end the marriage God’s way (Mark10:3). Without the required certificate, a man's actions of sending his wife out of the house (“shalach,” the corresponding word Jesus used was “apoluo”) would be nothing but a “putting away,” which God hates (Mal 2:16). The certificate enabled the woman to “go be another man’s wife” rather than be cast out on the street, destitute and likely to have no choice but to resort to prostitution.
Secular laws incorporate the idea that divorce ends a marriage. The law of our land reflects Moses’ teachings that require a certificate to be presented before a divorce is legal. Even “legal separations” are not considered a divorce that allows the parties to marry. “Unlawful” marriages, such as incest (“fornication”) are condemned (Mark6:18; 1Cor 5:1).
God confirmed the definition of divorce, contained in the law itself, and expressed that divorce ends a marriage, with the record of his own divorce of Israel (Jer3:8). When we look at Paul’s teachings we will tie a comment he made with the facts of Jeremiah 3:8 and discuss the necessary conclusion.
2. Jesus’ teachings do not contradict the idea that divorce ends a marriage, freeing the divorced to marry.
Jesus did not break his promise (Matt5:17) and teach that divorced persons commit adultery when they marry, but rather that a woman who is “put away” (which is what the text says), but NOT LEGALLY divorced, does indeed commit adultery when she marries another. Jesus was condemning an evil Jewish practice that is tantamount to “forbidding to marry” (it kept women from having a real marriage, as do many religionists today), which Paul classified as “doctrines of devils.”
The “exception clause” is found only in Matthew. Many seem to think that if you read this passage you know everything you need to know on the subject under study. But the fact that it is found nowhere else indicates it does not add anything of great import to what the parallel texts say, as would obviously be the case if Jesus were indeed giving a new law, contrary to Moses’, that stated that a divorced woman is not free unless SHE initiates the divorce for adultery. My opponent applies the phrase to men also. But men living in Jesus' day were allowed to have more than one wife. Thus, when Jesus said the man that does the putting away “committeth adultery against her” he obviously was not referring to sex WITH someone in a new marriage. The man could marry another whether properly divorced or not and it would not be “sexual” adultery.
Here is my paraphrase of the teaching of Jesus, incorporating parallel texts, followed by my comments and supporting versions:
“If you send away (“apoluo”) your wife, except in the case where it is done because of fornication (such as incest, which would be an illegal marriage), and you marry another, you commit adultery against her. Also, the man who marries her commits adultery because she does not have the required divorce papers to free her to marry legally.” (See: George Lamsa's Translation, New Jerusalem New Testament, New American with Apocrypha, Holman Christian Standard, Wuest Translation.)
3. Jewish men were putting away but not divorcing.
The dowry was brought to the husband from the bride’s father.1 The deal was that the man would return the dowry if he divorced the woman. This would assure that if he divorced her she would not be immediately destitute. With this change in custom, the Jewish men had a motive to “put away but not divorce.” This practice, though more evil than divorce, was “suffered”; i.e., there was nothing done about it. And why would God put in place a HUMAN magistrate to judge the husband’s actions and punish him for putting away? After all, it is common for couples to separate but get back together. Would it make sense to punish the man for not giving the bill of divorce, in view of the fact that giving it would doom any possibility of reconciliation, especially if the woman married another (Deut24:4)? Nevertheless, the man's “treacherous” actions were something he will have to account for when he meets God (Mal2:16).
When I asked Howard for a passage in which Jesus condemned the sin of putting away but not divorcing, if he did not do it in Matthew 19:9, etc., he could not provide a single passage. He was forced to deny, contrary to common knowledge, that such a sin ever existed or exists.2
4. Paul’s teachings harmonize with the idea that divorce ends a marriage and frees the divorced to marry.
The gist of Paul’s teaching to the Corinthians (and us) is to HELP those
who need help with fornication, a problem noted in chapter 6. In chapter
7, Paul follows up by presenting his answers to questions from Christians
regarding marriage. In the following passages Paul gives no hint that
there must be some specific “cause” or “reason” for a divorce in order for
it to do what divorce does:
a) he explains the need for a man and a woman to have a spouse “to avoid
fornication” (1Cor7:1,2);
b) he speaks of the “unmarried” (which includes all the divorced) and says
“let them marry” (8,9); and
c) he says those “loosed from a wife” (divorced) do not sin if they marry
(27-28).
Paul confirmed that divorce ends a marriage when he said the divorced wife of God (Jer3:8) (“those who know the law") "should be married to another,” and Christ was then confirmed as that husband or bridegroom (Rom7:1,4; Rev18:23). Why would God give us this teaching if he did not intend for all to see that a divorced person may marry another? If it is sin for a man today to marry a divorced woman then it was sin for Jesus to take Israel as his bride, which is the church.
Paul says to leave those who have divorced to God’s judgment (1Cor7:17-24).
Not only have I proved that divorce ends a marriage, but I have also proved that the divorced may marry another with God’s approval.
Sources:
Web search for: JewishVirtualLibrary;
rabbis-among-4-charged-fbi-divorce=sting; Jewishwomaninchains.
Robert Waters