– Sacred Scripture presents marriage as an indissoluble union between a man and a woman, with a view to achieving mutual complement:
Gen 2:24 : Therefore, a man leaves his father and mother to be united to his wife.
– Divorce was only allowed to Israel because of their “hardness of heart”:
Mt 19,8 : It is because of the hardness of your heart that Moses had tolerated the repudiation of women.
– Aiming to stop the abuses of polygamy, Moses codified the custom of repudiation by demanding the writing of a libel that the husband gave to his wife, making her free. Once the wife was repudiated, the husband could no longer take her:
Deut 24,1-4 : If a man, having chosen a woman, marries her, and comes to hate her.
– The precept on the repudiation libel does not apply if the cause of the divorce is adultery; in this case, the penalty provided for applies:
Leviticus 20:10 : If a man commits adultery with a married woman.
Deut 22,22s : If a man is found sleeping with a married woman, both must die.
Ez 16,38-42 : I will inflict punishment on adulteresses and criminals.
Ez 23,45ss : The righteous, however, will judge them, as is done with adulteresses.
Jn 8,5 : Moses commanded us in the Law to stone such women.
– Christ placed marriage in its ancient dignity, making it one and indissoluble:
Mt 5,31s : It was also said: Whoever rejects his wife, give her a letter of divorce.
Mt 19,3-12 : Is it permissible for a man to reject his wife for any reason?
Mk 10,2-12 : They asked him, to put him to the test, whether it was lawful for a man to divorce his wife.
1Cor 7,10s : I command those who are married (not I, but the Lord) that the woman does not separate from her husband.
– The quoted texts of Saint Matthew may present some difficulty:
1Cor 5,31s : It was also said: Whoever rejects his wife, give her a letter of divorce.
1Cor 19,3-12 : Is it permissible for a man to reject his wife for any reason?
– To solve it, there are two further explanations followed. The first, which comes to us from St. Jerome, translates the Greek word porneia as adultery, misconduct, or infidelity. Jesus would have admitted the repudiation of the wife in the case of infidelity, but without authorizing new marriages. Indeed, he soon adds, that if the man marries
with a divorced woman commits sin, just as every man sins who remarries before the death of his wife:
Mt 5:32 : Anyone who marries a rejected woman commits adultery.
Mt 19 :9 : Everyone who rejects his wife, except in the case of false marriage, and marries another, commits adultery.
– If we ask why Jesus mentions the case of adultery, we can say that, if Jesus had not indicated such an exception, he would have said that the husband, repudiating the unfaithful wife, exposes her to adultery. Why, that would be much to admire. Furthermore, it should be noted that the husband who caught his wife in adultery, according to the texts quoted from Leviticus and Deuteronomy, had to denounce her, and the punishment was usually the death penalty. The wife being dead, it is evident that, remarrying, the husband would not commit adultery. If, however, the unfaithful wife was not stoned, according to Jesus, neither the husband nor the wife would be allowed to remarry.
– We have yet another interpretation, which has achieved the approval of a large number of authoritative exegetes. The interpreters, analyzing the texts of Saint Matthew in the light of the terminology of the Jews contemporaries of Christ, concluded, after in-depth studies, that the Greek term porneia would correspond to the Hebrew word zenut , which designated not adultery but concubinage, that is, illicit union, false or null marriage:
Leviticus 18:7-18 : Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father, nor that of thy mother.
1Cor 5,1 : It is constantly heard that lust is committed among you.
– In this hypothesis, Jesus would condemn divorce in the case of true marriage and would allow definitive separation, with the possibility of contracting new marriages, in the case of null marriage or incestuous union.
