Divorce
You can also watch my two videos on divorce
– about 20 minutes each
In This Article:
Introduction
We come to a topic that I know sensitive and painful for many, but I feel that it is important to give clear biblical teaching on this subject. Many people (particularly women) have been given very strict, and I believe harsh advice to stay in a marriage which they should really leave. This advice has been based on a simple statement that divorce is a sin, and that the marriage vows were “for better or for worse” whatever the “worse” might be. I believe that this teaching is far too simple, and not nearly as biblical as some people think.
Part 1 - What does the Bible
teach about divorce?
Genesis 2:24 says, “A man shall leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This makes it very clear that God intended marriage to be between one man and one woman, for life. The word for “united” is a very strong word in Hebrew – equivalent with “weld” in English. You cannot separate two things that have been welded together without damaging both. The phrase “one flesh” gives the same meaning. Jesus makes this even stronger when he added to this verse “What God has joined, let no one put asunder.”
So, divorce was clearly never in God’s original plan of creation. That much is easy.
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But sin was not part of God's original plan either, and that is where the problem comes in. What does a person do when someone else's sin has made their marriage intolerable?
1. Explicit teaching about divorce.
Here is the startling truth:
There is no explicit teaching on the subject of divorce in the Bible.
There are very few passages in the Bible which mention divorce - actually only 17. The reason there are so few is that the law commanded that adulterers be stoned to death, so divorce didn’t come into it. And the passages that do talk about divorce are all what we call tangential. This means that every single one of the passages is actually talking about something else, and talking about divorce simply in passing or as an illustration.
We are going to look at all 17 to show how difficult it is to create any hard-and-fast rules on the subject.
The 17 passages :
Lev 21:7,14; 1 Chron 8:7-9; Ezek 44:21-23
These all take divorce as a fait accompli and make no comment on the rights and wrongs of it. The Ezekiel passage equates the divorced woman with the widow – indicating no particular stain on her character. The Leviticus passage forbids a priest to marry a divorced woman. This implies that it is acceptable for ordinary people to marry divorced women.
Lev 22:13; Num 30:8-10; Deut 24:1-4; Deut 22:19,29
These passages protect the rights of divorced women. They make no comment on the rights and wrongs of divorce, but don’t condemn the woman.
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Isaiah 50:1; Jeremiah 3:2-8
In these passages God himself engages in divorce - he divorces Israel. If God engaged in divorce, it makes it very difficult to put a blanket ban on divorce between human beings.
Malachi 2:10-16
This passage deserves particular mention. Firstly, it shows God’s abhorrence for men who break the marriage covenant. This is important and we will comment on this later. Second, this verse has often been quoted as saying “God hates divorce.” But that is a mis-translation, and you will not find a single modern translation that translates it that way. You will not find a verse anywhere in the Bible that says “God hates divorce.”
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Matthew 1:19
Joseph intended divorcing Mary, and the angel explained why he should not. But there is no condemnation of the concept that he might have.
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Matthew 5:31
This is the most important passage of all, and it is very important we interpret it correctly. Jesus says, “Anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” (Luke 6:18 is a parallel passage.)
Now, at face value, that looks nice and simple. But it’s not. Jesus is not here laying down a new law about divorce. His purpose in the second half of Matthew 5 is quite different. His purpose is to comdemn the Pharisees’ wrong interpretation of the law. He uses six examples – three where they were being too strict, and three where they were being too lenient.
On the subject of divorce, the Pharisees were being far too lenient. The famous Rabbi Hillel even went so far as to say that a man could divorce a wife simply if she burnt his food three times, or if she shouted at him loudly enough for the neighbours to hear! All the man had to do was say three times, “I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you.” Of course Hillel gave no example where a woman could divorce her husband. What Jesus is doing in this passage is objecting to that as far too liberal.
Now, we can’t take Matthew 5:31 and turn it into law, because that's not what Jesus was doing. And anyway, if we did that, we would have to take the verse immediately preceding this and turn it into law as well: “If a man looks lustfully at a woman, he has committed adultery,” (and should be stoned to death.) Now that would be a difficult law to apply - we would have to have sensors attached to men’s eyes to gauge how they were looking at women! And if we stoned all of those found guilty, there wouldn’t be many men left. Of course, it’s absurd to apply this literally.
Matthew 19:1-9; Mark 10:1-12
Here Jesus acknowledges that under Moses divorce was allowed, and also acknowledges that marital infidelity is grounds for divorce. Again, he emphasises God’s high standards, which ideally would not include divorce. As in Matthew 5, we must understand that his purpose here is not to lay down any laws, but to show the Pharisees how wrong their interpretation of Scripture was. Again, there is no possibility of making a law out of this.
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Corinthians 7:10-14
This is the only passage in all of Paul’s writings where he talks about divorce. His purpose in this passage is to address the unique problem of Christianity arriving in a heathen situation - he is not making any attempt to cover all the eventualities which might lead to divorce. This is the only passage where Paul makes the strange comments “I, not the Lord,” and “I say this as a concession, not as a command,” which creates real interpretive difficulties. Also, Paul suddenly gives an extra reason where divorce would be acceptable, namely that if an unbelieving husband or wife does not want to live with the believer, they could divorce. In other words this is an exceedingly difficult passage on which to build any kind of law.
In all of these passages there are many scenarios that are not commented on at all.
For example the Bible gives no guidance about what we should do in the case of physical violence, or the sexual abuse of children. This would have been dealt with simply in Bible times by execution, so divorce was never considered. But, as the Bible gives no guidelines, today’s society must make its own decisions on what to do about these things. Divorce and imprisonment are generally mandatory, and even the death sentence applies in some societies.
Conclusion
There are far too many interpretive problems related to the explicit passages on divorce to draw any firm conclusion, and certainly insufficient to create any law. Divorce is, in fact, a very minor topic in Scripture, and the passages that do talk about divorce give us no room to be dogmatic – especially where such dogmatism might bind someone into an abusive relationship.
2. The most important
topic in the Bible
I have said that divorce is a very minor topic in Scripture. I wonder what you would answer if I asked you, “What is the most important topic in the Bible?
The answer is: Covenant.
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Covenant is the central teaching of the Bible. The division of the Bible into Old Testament and New Testament indicates this - Testament means Covenant. The first great covenant is made with Noah, and is made with all mankind. The next two are made with Abraham and with Moses – both made with the people of Israel. The last and newest covenant was made by Jesus at the Last Supper on behalf of all mankind – “The new covenant in my blood.”
Covenant was such an important subject in Scripture that there are two words for it. The word “Diatheke” means a covenant between the greater and a lesser, and it is only dependent on the greater for it to be kept.
This could be symbolised by the sailor’s grip where the stronger will keep holding on, even when the other grows too weak. This is the covenant in Christ’s blood, and it gives me a great sense of security: Christ will never let me go. This is also the covenant that God made with his Israel, and particularly with the tribe of Judah.
Now the covenant with Israel was not totally unconditional – it was never absolute. God made clear time and again that he would never forsake them in their weakness, but that if they committed idolatry, they would be in great danger of losing the covenant. This is repeated many, many times in Scripture. And, of course, they did commit idolatry – time and again. Every time they did, God disciplined them. There is no exception to this rule. Usually it was with drought, plague, or military defeat. Generally, they would then repent, and God would take them back. This is the equivalent of a man taking back his wife after she has committed adultery. God did it again and again - the Old Testament is a book of amazing grace. But he warned them that if they kept at it, he would cut them off from the covenant. In the end, he did exactly that – he gave the 10 northern tribes a certificate of divorce (Jer 3:8). They lost the covenant and disappeared from the face of history. The only tribe left is the tribe of Judah, from which we get the word Jew.
This is the central story of the Old Testament.
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Now, if that is how God treated people who broke covenant with him, can we in all conscience ask someone whose husband or wife has broken the marriage covenant to behave differently? The breaking of covenant is always disciplined by God. To ask people to be “better” than God would be absurd, and actually wrong. They must put their partner under discipline, and if it goes on, they must divorce them. This is simply to behave the same way as God did throughout the Old Testament. And we must not think that Old Testament law has passed away – Jesus said, “Not one dot or comma will by any means disappear from the Law.”
The second word for covenant is “Suntheke.” This is a covenant made between two equals. It could be illustrated by the old monkey grip we used as children.It works only if both parties maintain the grip – if one lets go, the other cannot hold on.
The marriage covenant is a “Suntheke” covenant. It is like a tug-of-war. It requires the participation of both parties to be valid. And God expects both parties “to love and to cherish till death us do part.”The covenant is broken when one party fundamentally failed to love the other.
God's requirement of the man is higher than for the wife, because the husband is the image of Jesus’ love for the church. So it is completely unthinkable that a man should break his marriage covenant, because he is then giving an image of Christ breaking covenant with his church. It is an abomination to God when a man breaks his marriage covenant. Now, obviously God does not like divorce, but he abhors someone who breaks covenant far, far more. And once the covenant is broken, there is no point in asking the other person to try to continue it. The partner has broken covenant; they have let go of the rope.
The lesser of two evils.
If you in a relationship where the other has fundamentally broken the covenant, you are faced with a choice between two evils - divorce, or staying in that relationship. Which do you choose? The fundamental principle of ethics is that when you are faced with two evils, and you have to make a choice, you always choose the lesser of the two evils. For example, if you were hiding some Jews in your basement during the Second World War, and the SS arrived at your door and demanded to know if you were hiding Jews, you would be faced with two evils: telling a lie, or betraying the Jews. Obviously, you would tell the lie.
But woe to the person who forces you to make that choice.
So, if you are faced with the choice of staying in an abusive,imprisoning marriage or getting a divorce, then choose the lesser of the two evils, and get divorced.
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What about my marriage vows?
Many feel bound by their marriage vows. I said “For better, for worse,” doesn’t that bind me whatever he has done? Ministers ought to make clear to couples before they get married that the vow means that I will stay with you through sickness and health, through hardship and old age, but it does not mean that I will stay with you if you break the covenant . Otherwise, we are in danger of making the marriage vows stronger than the teaching of the Old Testament. If one partner breaks the marriage covenant, the other partner is free.
Summary of the Biblical teaching.
1.
God’s original plan was for one man and one woman for life, and divorce was never part of that plan.
There is very little explicit teaching in the Bible on the subject of divorce. The few passages that do talk about divorce are tangential and difficult to interpret. And there are many situations (e.g. sexual abuse of a child) which are not addressed in Scripture. Therefore it is extremely difficult and dangerous to be dogmatic.
2.
Covenant is the most important subject in the Bible. A covenant is only valid as long as both parties keep it. Whenever one party breaks it, they are always to be disciplined, and the other party is free.
3.
Part 2 –Practical application.
Two errors
There are two errors that are commonly made in the whole area of divorce. On the one hand many people are far too lenient. The Pharisees in Jesus’ time were far too lenient. Today’s society is far too lenient – divorce is far too lightly entered into. Sadly, Christians have followed the world in this opting for divorce far too easily – simply because they can’t learn how to get on with someone else. This is simply not approved by God.
On the other hand, many people are far too strict. Some Christians or churches give a blanket ruling that divorced and re-marriage are never acceptable. We saw in Part 1 that we have no room from Scripture to be dogmatic about this, and it can be extremely cruel. And we cannot limit the reasons acceptable for divorce to one or two things, such as marital unfaithfulness (which Jesus seemed to give permission for) – there are many other cases, not addressed by Scripture, where divorce is advisable or even obligatory.
There was a sad case at a missionary conference. In the after-breakfast session, the truth came out that one of the men had been having an affair with one of the woman on his mission station. It was the first wife had heard about it. Would you believe, by lunchtime, some of the other missionary women were asking her if she had forgiven him yet. This is absurd and far too strict. He has broken covenant. It will take him months or longer to prove that he is truly repentant, and only then can she consider forgiveness and possible reconciliation.
When is a covenant fundamentally broken?
When I was a young man, my first car a Morris Minor. It had dial on the dashboard called an amp meter - a little indicator with a needle. As long as the needle was pointing into the green, you were fine. But if it started pointing into the red, you would need to get the car checked pretty quickly, or your battery would die and you would be stuck. Today we simply have a red light that comes on to warn us.
Imagine if we had an amp meter which could measure how marriage was doing!
The Marriage meter
Now, most of us, when we get married, have pretty idealistic ideas about how our marriage will be. We think it will look something like this – with the needle way over in the green all the time. Now and again you get two really saintly people who are both thoroughly unselfish and always consider the other better than themselves. In a word they live out Philippians 2:1-16 (the passage of Scripture that my wife inscribed on the inside of my wedding ring.)
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we were all like that!
But the truth is very few marriages are able to obtain that level of perfection. I’m afraid I fall far short of it.
Most reasonable marriages look like this – the needle about halfway into the green. He discovers she has faults, she discovers that he has faults, and, hopefully they both work on their faults. But the faults are not ultimately destructive. No one is being worn down by this marriage.
It ’s basically a good marriage.
There are marriages where the needle is only just into the green. This is not a good marriage. It’s hard going – possibly more so for one partner than the other. There’s not a lot of joy. There are a lot of issues that really should be addressed. It’s far from ideal. But at the end of the day, nobody is actually wearing out, or being abused. Partners can say in all honesty that the other loves them, though they wish it were more obvious. There is no ground for a divorce here. They need help, but not divorce.
Then there are marriages where the needle is way over in the red. Two extreme examples of this would be where the husband is physically beating up his wife, and/or sexually abusing the children. This is illegal – he should be put in prison. In Bible times he would simply have been put to death. Frankly, if she stays with him, she is fundamentally failing as a parent to protect her children. She might even be sinning in not divorcing him.
Far more often though, the needle is halfway across the red. I would put adultery in this category. (Adultery is the equivalent of the people of Israel committing idolatry.) The covenant is quite clearly and fundamentally broken. The covenant is gone, the other partner is free to decide what they want to do. This does not mean to say that the marriage is irreparable, but in my experience it is very rare that it can be put back together – especially if the affair has gone on a long time and involved a lot of lying. Trust is a fundamental foundation of marriage, and after a long period of lies, it is very difficult to re-establish.
But there is another category – the most difficult of all. This is the category where the needle is only just in the red, but it is always in the red. There is no adultery, and nobody is getting beaten up. You can destroy your marriage without ever lifting your hand, and, actually, without ever lifting your voice. In fact silence itself can be abusive. We sometimes say that silence is violence. Someone can destroy their husband or wife or children simply by ignoring them, by talking unkindly to them, by breaking them down, by talking badly about them. In a word, by giving them no love. Everyone in this marriage is slowly running down , wearing out. There is no point in staying in a marriage like that if it’s not going to change.
I remember going back to a town where I had once been a pastor, and having a meal with one of my previous congregation members. She had lost her husband since I saw her last, and I commented that she seemed to be doing quite well in spite of his death. She leaned towards me and quietly said, “I’m free at last.” And I thought to myself: Is it really glorifying to God to stay for years and years in a marriage that is basically a prison? Does God really expect that of us?
Ten cases where there is no point in trying to save a marriage.
If these were only my opinion, I would be quite hesitant in giving them to you. But most of them are listed in Frank Retief’s book on divorce, and I have great admiration for him.
1.
Abuse. Where there is physical abuse, charges must be laid and the person must get out of the marriage. Where there is constant verbal abuse, the marriage is not salvageable.
2.
No commitment. Commitment is the first foundation of any marriage. There is no point in one partner going on and on trying to save a marriage when the other is frankly not committed to it. You are not conducting a tug-of-war, you are just holding a rope.
3.
No trust. Trust is the second foundation of marriage, and after a long period of lies, it is very difficult to re-establish. Once you lose your integrity, you have lost a major part of yourself. Thomas Moore once said, “when a man takes a vow, he holds his life in his hands. If he lets it slip through his fingers, he must not look to find it again.”
4.
No Respect. Respect is the third foundation. Where one partner has lost the respect of another, again, it is extremely difficult to re-establish. These three foundations can be re-established, but only with major repentance and the work of God, and they will only be believable after a long period of time.
The three foundations for a marriage, without which the house cannot stand.
5.
No communication. We all tend to communicate badly, especially when we are defensive. But if one partner is basically refusing to communicate at all, there is no way to save the relationship.
6.
Continued causal behaviour. It may be possible to forgive adultery and loss of trust once, but once it happens a second and certainly a third time, it becomes virtually impossible.
7.
Opposition to your faith. It is not essential that your spouse shares your faith. But if they try to come between you and your God, you have to choose God. (Acts 5:29)
8.
Apostasy. If your spouse was once a Christian and has now actively turned against God, you are entitled to get out of that marriage. They have broken covenant with God and therefore with you as well.
9.
Intervening marriage. A couple gets divorced; one partner has remarried: it is absurd to suggest the second couple need to get a divorce the original couple must re-marry. It is also absurd and cruel to say that unmarried partner may never marry again.
10.
Personality disorder. This is a technical psychological term. People with this disorder, by definition, never take responsibility for their own actions. Everything is someone else’s fault. Therefore they will never change. They have a Jekyll and Hyde personality: they are able to be extremely charming and believable with outsiders, but extremely damaging to those close to them. If you are married to one of these people, you need to get out. They won’t change.
What to do when you discover your spouse is having an affair
The best book I know on this subject is James Dobson's “Love must be Tough.” Dobson says that if you find out your partner has been committing adultery, you get a locksmith to come and changed the locks on your house. Then you take your spouse's belongings and put them in suitcases in the garage, and when they come home and find their key does not fit in the lock, you talk to them through the letterbox in the door and say: “I have discovered that you are committing adultery. I will not be shared. I will not even share the house with you. You have broken the covenant, and as far as I’m concerned it is over. If we are to meet again, it will be in the counselor’s room and I’m not sure if we can put this back together."
Now, in some countries, it is not legal to physically shut someone out of the house. But the principle is the same. They must be faced with a choice: "Repent, get out of your other relationship, or lose your marriage. I will not be shared – that is non-negotiable."
Often, the wronged partner's first reaction is to blame themselves. Some misguided people will tell them that they must go back and be more loving in order to win their spouse back. This is cruel and unbiblical advice. It may be true that you have been less loving in the marriage then you could have been, and that must be dealt with in the counselling room. But it must not come into the discussion about your spouse’s adultery, and their need to make a choice before any discussions take place.
Of course, all of this extremely difficult when you are falling apart emotionally. Get all the help you can from other people, but when your spouse meets with you they must find you firm, in control and without a trace of pleading.
You will notice on the cover of James Dobson’s book the words: “New hope for families in crisis.” The aim of his approach is to restore relationships. Actually, this is the only way to restore it – pleading and bargaining will never do so. When a partner sees that you keep tolerating the situation, and allow them to walk all over you, they will simply carry on. Children are the same. The only way to restoration is for the partner to be faced with a clear-cut choice: Come to full repentance and change your ways, or lose your marriage.
You have to be prepared to lose your marriage in order to save it.
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That’s the deal. Some people are not willing to do that. I know of one woman who divorced her husband for multiple adulteries, and afterwards said she wished she hadn’t, because the loneliness was intolerable. That’s your choice. You can continue in the relationship if you want to. I wouldn’t, but I wouldn't criticise you if you did.
But I am convinced that the only way to full restoration is to make quite clear to the partner that you will not live in the broken-covenant relationship.
Is remarriage after divorce permissible?
I have already made clear that biblically, once one partner has broken the covenant, the other is free. But as a marriage officer, there were always certain things I looked for before I would agree to perform a second marriage:
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I believe there should be a period of 12 months after the divorce has been finalised in which the person did not get involved with anyone else. There are three reasons for this. Firstly, it makes very clear that you were not hurrying from one marriage into the next, and it keeps your name and your witness good in the community. Secondly, it is wise. You are far too bruised and confused by the process that led to the divorce to be able to make a wise decision. You need at least a year to settle, otherwise you are liable to make a bad choice. Thirdly, a year gives your ex-spouse a chance to put their lives right. God is a God of great grace – he has forgiven us so much, we must not be too quick to close the door on the possibility of remarriage. But where there has been serious sin and misbehaviour, you will not know for at least a year if that other person has truly changed. For example, if they are an alcoholic, you need to see that they have joined AA and had been sober for a year for you to believe change is real. But if, after a year, there is no clear evidence of change, you are totally free to remarry and will have a free conscience about it.
Then I look for evidence that every effort was made to save the marriage. Doctor Phil always said, “You must earn your divorce.”
I also look for evidence that the spouse who now wants to remarry has made a real effort to live close to God.
Of course, for me as a marriage officer, I can only be sure of these things if I know the person reasonably well. This more-or-less means that they must be in my church. But I have sometimes been willing to take the word of another pastor about these things.
Conclusion
It may be that you were the guilty party. God is able to forgive and restore. If you want to do the work of full repentance (which always involves reparation) and change of lifestyle, God might give you back your original marriage or, if that is not possible, even allow you to marry again.
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Or, if you were the wronged party, God wants to see that it is in your heart to forgive and to restore that relationship if possible. If that is not possible, he does not want you to sit for ever feeling guilty and feeling that your life is second-best. Of course, divorce was not part of God’s original plan for your life, but God is a God of Plan B. Whatever has gone wrong in your life, God is able to work all things for good and make a new plan for you.
We have a God of amazing Grace.