For the LORD, the God of Israel, saith that he hateth putting away: for [one] covereth violence with his garment, saith the LORD of hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.
Ver. 16. For the Lord the God of Israel saith, that he hateth putting away] Heb. Put away: q.d. God hates that "Put her away, put her away," that is, so much in your mouths. For, because you are justly reproved for polygamy, for keeping two wives, you think to mend that fault by putting away your old ones, and plead you may do it by a law, licensing divorces. But the Lord would ye should know that he hates such practices; and the rather because you maliciously abuse his law, as a cloak of your wickedness. Divorce is a thing that God's soul hateth, unless it be in case of adultery, which breaks the marriage knot, and malicious perpetual desertion, 1 Corinthians 7:15. This last was the ease of that noble Italian convert, Galeacius Caracciolus, Marquis of Vico (as is to be seen in his Life, written by my muchhonoured brother, Mr Samuel Clark, in the second part of his Marrow of Ecclesiastical History, p. 101), who by the consent of Mr Calvin, Peter Martyr, and other learned divines, who met and seriously debated the case, sued out a divorce against his former wife, who had first maliciously deserted him, and had it legally by the magistrate at Geneva granted unto him; after which he married another, A.D. 1560. The civil law of the empire permitted divorce for divers other causes. And these Jews, for every light cause (if but a blemish in the body, or crookedness of manners), pretending to hate their wives, would write them a bill of divorce, and turn them off. Our Saviour deals against this, Matthew 5:19; see the notes there. This sin was also rife among both the Athenians (who were wont to put away their wives upon discontent, or hope of greater portions, &c.), and the Romans, whose Abscessionale, or writ of divorce, was this only, Res tuns tibi habeto; Take what is thine, and be gone. It is ordinary also among the Mahometans. But the Lord God of Israel saith here, that he hateth it; and it appeareth so by his practice to his spouse, the Church. See Jeremiah 3:1; John 13:1, and then say, that God's mercy is matchless; and that he takes not advantages against his revolting people, but follows them with his favour; no otherwise than as when a man goes from the sun, yet the sunbeams follow him, shine upon him, warm him, &e. Zanchy (and some others) reads the text thus, If thou hatest her, put her away, in that discourse of divorces, which he wrote upon the occasion of Andreas Pixzardus's divorce, as indeed agreeing best with the matter he undertook to defend. But in another book of his he utterly disliketh the doings of Luther, and some other Dutch divines, who advised Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, to marry, alteram, hoc est, adulteram, his former lawful wife being yet alive. Archbishop Grindall, by cunning practices of his adversaries, Leicester and others, lost Queen Elizabeth's favour, as if he favoured prophesyings, &c., but in truth, because he had condemned an unlawful marriage of Julio, an Italian physician, with another man's wife, while Leicester in vain opposed against his proceedings therein. Archbishop Abbots also led in disgrace for opposing Somerset's abhorred match with the Countess of Essex.
For one covereth violence with his garment] This text had been easy had not commentators (the Hebrew doctors especially) made it knotty. Rabbi David, in opening it, obscurior videtur, quam ipsa verba quae explicare conatur, seems to be more obscure than the words themselves which he undertaketh to open, saith Figueir, who also reciteth the expositions of several rabbins. Concerning which, I may say, as one did once, when being asked by another whether he should read such a comment upon Aristotle? answered, Yes; when Aristotle is understood, then read the comment. The plain sense is this: These wicked Jews pretended the law of God, as a cloak and cover of their sin, that it might be no sin to them. And though the Lord had protested to hate their divorces, yet they pleaded I know not what liberty permitted them by Moses; but this was but a political coverture of iniquity, Matthew 18:8,9. The like whereunto was the sin of Saul, 1 Samuel 15:10,23; of Jezebel, 1 Kings 21:13; of those Jews, John 19:7; of those libertines, 2Pe 2:1-3 James 2:8,9; of all heretics, that plead Scripture for their heresies; and some others impudently impious, who, lest they should seem to be mad without reason, abuse God's holy word to the defence of their unreasonable and irreligious practices. These men's judgments now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation sleepeth not, 2 Peter 2:3 .
Therefore take heed to your spirit] A repetition of the dehortation; of which see Malachi 3:16. Good things must be often inculcated, Philippians 3:1, one exhortation must peg in another, till they stick in our souls, as forked arrows in the flesh. Men do not use to lay ointments only upon their lame limbs, but rub them, and chafe them in; so here. Austin persuades the preacher so long to insist upon a necessary point till, by the gesture and countenance of the hearers, he perceiveth that they understand and relish it. Chrysostom, being asked by his people when he would stop preaching against swearing? answered, Never till you stop your swearing.