And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
Ver. 5. And said, For this cause, &c.] Dixit, duxit, benedixit He ordered, he commaned, he blessed these three things are said by Moses to have been done by God in the institution, and for the honour of marriage; to the which still (saith Bifield on 1Pe 3:2) God beareth so great respect, as that he is pleased to bear with, cover, and not impute the many frailties, follies, vanities, weaknesses, and wickednesses that are found between man and wife.
For this cause shall a man leave father] viz., In regard of cohabitation, not of sustentation; Relinquet cubile patris et matris, as the Chaldee rightly interprets it, Genesis 2:24. And this was the first prophecy that was ever uttered in the world (saith Tertullian and Beda), venerable therefore for its antiquity; like as is also that first hexameter, made by Phemonoe, in the year of the world 2580 (1424 BC).
Συμφερετε πτερατ οιωνοι κηρον τε μελισσαι .
And shall cleave to his wife] Gr. Be glued to her, προσκολληθησεται. A table will often cleave in the whole wood, before it will part asunder where it is glued. A husband ought to be as firm to his wife as to himself. See Trapp on " Gen 2:24 "
And they twain shall be one flesh] This is point blank against polygamy, which yet Anabaptists would bring in again, and Turks allow of. They learned it of Lamech, qui primus unam costam in duas divisit, who was the first polygamist, saith Jerome, but had soon enough of it. So had Jacob, Elkanah, and other holy men of old, who lived and died in this sin of polygamy, and merely through mistake, as it is thought, of that text, Leviticus 18:16; "Thou shalt not take a wife to her sister, to vex her," i.e. Thou shalt not superinduce one wife to another. Now the Fathers took the word (sister) for one so by blood, which was spoken of a sister by nation, as those clauses (to vex her) and (during her life) do evince.