Before discussing divorce in the Old or New Testament we need to clearly understand that women in both Testaments were considered chattels, that is property owned by men. Marriages in both Old and New Testaments were arranged by families and were an economic union rather than a Romeo and Juliet love match. Men could easily divorce their wives. Jesus called on men to not divorce their wives. He is specific in Matthew’s gospel 19: 5-9 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? 6 So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.” 7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command us to give a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her?” 8 He said to them, “It was because you were so hard-hearted that 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, and he who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
So, what was Jesus concerned about? Divorced women usually had no place to go and were subject to physical attack on the street and were vulnerable because they could not defend themselves and had no family structure to defend them. Being deprived of funds they had little access to clothing, shelter, or food. Jobs were not available to women in those times. Theoretically, when women were cast out of a marriage for whatever reason, their lives were at risk unless they could find a relative to take them in: a father, son, brother, uncle and so on. Although there are plenty of examples of men divorcing their wives there are no records of women divorcing their husbands. We can see in the Old Testament where marriages were important. There is a very famous match in the book of Ruth between Ruth, a Moabite and Boaz, a Judean. Inter-marriage between people of different races and cultures was frowned upon by the Judeans. This was the Judeans’ main beef with the Samaritans – the Samaritans intermarried with the Babylonians and were considered “mongrels.” Ruth’s marriage to Boaz had to be approved by the men at the gates of Bethlehem. When it was, it was then approved by the community. Boaz and Ruth were great grandparents of King David. In Jesus’ time, when a woman was divorced by a simple letter from her ex-husband, she often had no place to go. Dr. Brandon Scott, a distinguished member of the Jesus Seminar reflected that every time the word “widow” was used in the New Testament it reflected a divorced person and not a widow as we know it today. Remember the poor widow at the Temple who put all her money into the donation tube was most probably not a widow but a divorced woman (see Mark 12: 41–44). It must have been hard for a woman to be married in Jesus’ time where the husband had the power to dump you out on the street if you did not please him. So how do modern Christians follow the teachings of Jesus in today’s world when marriages do not work but there are all sorts of ways a divorced woman can support herself and children? When we look at the core of Jesus’ teaching it has as its main driving force the concept of Love. In the first century married men and women could have fallen in love and therefore the marriage most probably could have continued well. Look at Joseph and Mary’s relationship. It must have been pretty good as they produced at least 6 children that lived. What Jesus was worried about were wives who were dumped simply for their ex-husbands to find a “better squeeze.” If Jesus lived today, he would worry about the injustice done and not worry about ending unhappy relationships.
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AuthorI'm Rev. Dr. Pirie Mitchell and I live in Ontario, Canada. Archives
May 2023
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