‘But Jesus said to them, “He wrote you this commandment because of your hardness of heart. But from the beginning of creation he made them male and female. For this reason shall a man leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh, so that they are no more two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let not man separate.” '
Jesus reply was that they were misinterpreting Deuteronomy 24. He was the only one who considered it in its context, and He pointed out that it was a provision made because of men's hardness of heart in divorcing their wives. God's primary will and intention, He pointed out, was that once a man and woman had come together as one through sexual union they should be seen as inseparable because they had become uniquely one. In evidence of this He quoted Genesis 1:27; Genesis 2:24-25. Thus He was declaring that divorce was not God's will and intention at all, but was to be seen as what it was, something that resulted from man's hardness of heart. He was not contending that Moses was wrong. Indeed both He and the Pharisees saw Genesis 1:2 and Deuteronomy 24:1-4 as the work of Moses and therefore as containing his teaching. He was contending that the Scribes had interpreted these verses wrongly
‘Because of your hardness of heart.' It was because man was sinful and hardened his heart against God's will and did divorce what he saw as an unsatisfactory wife that God spoke of a certificate of divorce in Deuteronomy 24:1. But it was never His strict intention that it be seen as permissive. It arose because unfortunately men disobeyed His commandments and did put their wives away, something which could leave the wives in a parlous position as it might be questioned whether they were divorced or not. Deuteronomy 24 was thus simply safeguarding any woman to whom it happened (against the will of God) from false accusations. Divorce is therefore a sign of the division between God and man, for it reveals hardness of heart. The word for ‘hardness of heart' is restricted to Jewish and Christian literature. It signified an attitude developed against God.
‘From the beginning of the creation he made them male and female.' The reason for this is stated. It is that originally man and woman were made as one. There was no thought that they would ever separate, for they were seen as indissolubly linked, and such a thought was therefore not God's intention. That is why when a man marries a woman he leaves behind his father and mother, and that household of which he was firmly and very much a part, and forms a new household, joined to his wife as one flesh as Adam was to Eve. The tie of marriage is therefore to be seen as stronger and deeper than the tie of blood, which is itself indissoluble. The thought was not that a man no longer had any regard for his wider family. It was that his regard for his wife should become the priority.
‘They shall become one flesh.' That is, will be joined by as close a union as it is possible to have, united in their flesh by an unbreakable spiritual bond.
‘What therefore God has joined together let not man separate.' To seek divorce therefore is to seek to separate what God has joined together. It is not therefore something that a man should desire or permit. It is totally banned. We should not understate this argument. It is declaring that God has so instituted the union of a man and woman in a marriage relationship that there is a genuine, if invisible, way in which they become one, so that to engage in sexual relations with any other actually breaks a genuine, if unidentifiable, unity. It is not just a play on words. It is a genuine reality.
Mark is here bringing out God's absolute purpose under the Kingly Rule of God as revealed in the words of Jesus. For this reason he does not bring out the exception mentioned in Matthew 19:9, ‘except it be for fornication' (compare Matthew 5:32), for that exception arose because by illicit sexual union the guilty parties have themselves caused the sinful separation. But it was never God's intention, and could only therefor be seen as an aberration. This brings out quite clearly that sexual union is seen by God as binding and total (compare 1 Corinthians 6:16). His purpose was that man should be both monogamous and faithful. And His purpose in this was so that they might ‘go forth and multiply'. Anything that does not result in that intention is not marriage, for true marriage is a family forming relationship, not an exclusive bond between two self-centred people who think only of each other (although we must recognise the difference between intention and unintended and undesired consequences)
The stress on this faithfulness was so strong in the Law that an adulterer and an adulteress were to be put to death (Leviticus 20:10), and the result would be that the husband or wife would be freed from the marriage tie because of the death of the one who had broken the tie. This was the absolute position. But once the law on instant death had ceased to be put into practise through mercy or force of circumstances, the presumption was made that presumably he or she could be seen as ‘dead', and treated as such. Thus the exemption.
So Jesus was laying out the difference between God's will and purpose on the one hand, something on which there could be no concession (compare Malachi 2:14-16 which emphasises this), and sinful man's behaviour on the other for which provision had to be made for the sake of the innocent party. Without the position laid down in Deuteronomy a woman could have been left in an impossible position because of a man's hard-heartedness. This was the situation that Moses was commanded to alleviate. But it was never God's intention that it be treated as a norm, nor did it mean that He had given permission for divorce, for most decidedly He had not.
The startling nature of this declaration should be recognised. Indeed it even startled His disciples. For it established a whole new situation with regard to marriage, and indicated a purpose in marriage that was God ordained and God demanded, and was different from how all men saw it. Jesus was thus changing the whole view on the subject in a way that could only be seen as possible under the Kingly Rule of God. Only those who subscribed to the Sermon on the Mount could be expected to live in this way, as that Sermon itself made clear (Matthew 5:27-32).
Jesus thus turned a Pharisaic discussion on divorce into statement of the purpose of marriage, and thereby revealed that a new way of approaching life had begun under the Kingly Rule of God, a way that set aside the old weaknesses and excuses. A way that demanded a commitment to positive love and cooperation, sealed by marital faithfulness. It was one way in which the true people of God would stand out from all others, a foundation stone of the new Kingly Rule. As Paul will later point out, one of the most important responsibilities of Christian women was to bear and bring up children as Christian men and women. Thereby they experienced and worked out their salvation (1 Timothy 2:15).