Note: This started as a comment, but I think the point is worth making in a post so I’m doing so here.
Commenter Hmm wrote:
Wilson’s original post concerned a man that was difficult to his wife in the home, but presented a different, benign face to the church. There was no evidence that anyone but her saw that he was a cruel, abusive man. If she took recourse to the elders, they could do nothing without a second witness. There was no one lawfully to back her up, or take her side. So he encouraged her to separate herself from him. Move quietly out, into her sister’s home. Not divorce. Not call a lawyer. Just separate.
In doing this she would of course be enlisting her family in her defense. And it would certainly raise questions in the church about why she did this, which might bring her husband under closer scrutiny. It might even drive him to a chargeable offense. But she is not enlisting women to her side, not dividing the church over the issue, not doing anything chargeable as gossip or slander.
The controversy is over whether there is Biblical warrant for a Christian woman to separate from such a man (who also claims to be Christian).
The bolded part is not true. The controversy is over Pastor Wilson’s astounding twisting of very clear verses in 1 Cor 7. Where the Apostle Paul says “Not I, but the Lord”, Wilson tells us Paul is just giving his own friendly advice. Where Paul urges wives not to separate from their husbands, pointing out that by remaining they might save their husband’s soul, Wilson says Paul is urging wives to leave their husbands in order to save their souls. See my original post, as well as the post from Bnonn that Wilson responded to.
I think Hmm is reading this all backwards. Hmm is assuming Wilson set out to explain how to handle a hard case, but simply mangled it beyond all comprehension. Twice. This is theoretically possible. It could be that Wilson is just really, really bad at explaining Scripture. If so, he needs to immediately find a new line of work. But I don’t think Wilson is incompetent. I think he set out to teach that all wives can separate from their husbands whenever they feel it is right and church elders need to leave them alone*. From there, he crafted both a tangled backstory and a wacky interpretation of Scripture to achieve this goal. But the backstory was always only a distraction, a magician’s misdirection. He wants us tangled up in the backstory he spun so we don’t notice how putrid his interpretation of 1 Cor 7 is. Note that a few hours** after I wrote my post criticizing his interpretation of 1 Cor 7, Wilson dropped a bombshell via a postscript (emphasis mine):
Postscript: In this fictional scenario, the elder board of the church this woman is leaving is complicit in the sin of the husband. When the Westminster Confession says that the church can be part of the remedy in prevent marriages from blowing up, I should add that I support a godly and judicious use of elder authority in such cases.
Why did he do this? It doesn’t address the problem at all. We could assume that this is Wilson just being really bad at his chosen profession. That is possible. But my hypothesis makes more sense. Wilson desperately wanted to change the subject back to the backstory. Note that his postscript doesn’t help anything. He already explained why such a wife should be allowed to leave without being “hassled” by her church elders. Wilson told us that Scripture commanded it, even if she is lying. If he believed that, why now change the backstory to make the elders villains in order to explain why they don’t have the right to judge her? Moreover, his sudden change of the backstory makes much of his original post absurd. Remember the bit about her not wanting her elders to take disciplinary action against her husband, because without the requisite witnesses it would be unjust? The postscript even contradicts Hmm’s summary of the original story:
Wilson’s original post concerned a man that was difficult to his wife in the home, but presented a different, benign face to the church. There was no evidence that anyone but her saw that he was a cruel, abusive man.
Don’t get stuck on the backstory. It doesn’t matter, and Wilson is free to change it on the fly as needed. Focus on what Wilson is teaching that Scripture says.
*Except for women in his church, who Wilson notes better be ready to explain themselves and face discipline if he thinks they don’t have a valid reason to leave.
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This is an example of why I dismiss all paint-by-the-numbers churches and congregations, those that house in former KMarts. The reason they exist is similar to the reasons Protestant denominations exists. Martin Luther did address actual corruptions, along with wanting a freestyle interpretation of the Bible (you get to decide what it’s saying, not Church hierarchy). In that case you don’t have to listen to your pastor at all. Still it’s natural for people look up to leaders for guidance. People shop churches until they find the “right fit” meaning they are forgiven all their past transgressions even without having to actually repent and pay restitution, but only to say “I’m sorry. I made a muhstake”. In that way, congregations operate on supply and demand, not based on solid, unchanging interpretations and God-given rules. “Pastors” of these churches have an incentive to abuse Scripture tenements in order to accommodate the sentiments of paying customers. The Catholic Church suffers from this as well, though returns to pre-Vatican II rites are a hopeful sign.
Another phony “Church”
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/08/12/pro-gay-church-plans-to-build-worship-spacebrewery-donate-profits-to-planned-parenthood.html
Can some one help me here? I don’t see the controversy of 1 Cor. 7, specifically 10-16. Verses 10,11 clearly are about when two Christian marry they should not divorce, and if they do divorce ( though the NASB uses the word “leave”, not divorce), they are to never remarry. Paul clearly states this is from the Lord when he says ” Not I, but the Lord.”
So it seems in hard cases, one spouse may leave, but never remarry. The text also seems to show that if they do divorce, that divorce is on valid by the law of the state, not in the eyes of the Lord. AM I wrong here?
On a side note, I choose to heed the them of the first 9 verses and stay unmarried. So far, so good.
@Rick
This isn’t what Wilson argued. He claimed that in 1 Cor 7:10 Paul was just giving friendly advice, and not telling them what God said they should do (even as a general rule):
He isn’t talking about making an exception in extreme cases*. His point was that church elders (himself excepted) have no right– ever– to discipline a wife who left her husband.
*This again is the misdirection of the backstory. If you aren’t paying close attention, you might mistake him for offering an exception in an extraordinary case. He furthered the misdirection in the postscript. But Wilson repeats that 1 Cor 7:10 is not binding on any woman (except for women in his congregation, where they will answer to him). He has never recanted this claim, even when responding to a post that pointed out the absurdity of it.
“Postscript: In this *fictional* scenario…”
<<>>
Wilson MADE UP this story? How many people, besides me, believed at first that he was responding to a REAL person? How many thought he was struggling to find a “pastoral” solution for a difficult situation?
He twisted the PRETEND FACTS to his liking, thereby making his position as attractive as possible, and STILL he can’t defend it?
This is astounding. Wilson used the old prog/feminist trick of creating a hypothetical and pretending it was real to argue his point, knowing that his readers would give him more leeway, and any potential critics would be handicapped by arguing on his own *fictitious* terms.
What kind of sick mind dreams up things like this? Well, besides divorce porn novelists…
His postscript is an indirect way of saying that his original post is no longer operative.
Wilson is being manipulated by the Father of Lies.
Inside the brackets I had written “record scratch”, but that must have looked too much like HTML and been stripped out.
@ Dalrock
I see. His explanation is so convoluted it’s difficult for me to follow. I don’t understand how he can interpret verse 10 as friendly counsel, not a command from the Lord.
On another note, does the command of Jesus in Matt. 18:16,17 have any bearing in the matters of marriage? It would seem that verse directs us to bring witnesses/evidence to the person in question, and if they don’t respond to that, the elders of the church ARE to get involved.
Rick,
Convoluting is what he is trying to do so that if you kind of like him, like him or lean toward what he teaches you would voluntarily agree with his twist and double twist.
@ Rick
The Greek text says ‘depart’ (Chorizo) and is not synonymous with the Greek Wording that the Gospels use for divorce (apoluo and apostasion for writ of divorce).
In other words, a wife should not separate from her husband at all. If she does, she must stay single or reconcile.
Divorce and remarriage are not permitted. This agrees with Jesus’ statements that there is no divorce period. Not even for adultery (the exception clause is false). There is evidence to support that the Greek text was altered in the majority of English translations:
https://lmf12.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/divorce_aug_2014.pdf
I discuss it more briefly here:
https://deepstrength.wordpress.com/2018/08/14/on-divorce-part-6/
The departure of the Reformers from RCC tradition of permanent marriage, which is also the true theology of marriage according to Jesus (“what God has put together let no man separate”), is a grave error.
Boy I can’t tell you how many couple I know where either one or both of them need to leave.
I certainly agree that remarriage violates scripture, but all these dead marriages with BOTH parties are broken and dysfunctional is just pathetic.
Out of the 16 couples in my overlapping circles, about a third of the husbands show any love towards their wives – in word or deed, and only one or two of the women seem to respect or submit to their husbands.
Our strident Red Pill analysis notwithstanding, most marriages are full of fakery and fuckery – and I’m not JUST going to blame the women. Some of these men aren’t checking of any boxes in the love and lead category, and without direction from a properly comported man, women aren’t going to do anything right.
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”Wilson’s original post concerned a man that was difficult to his wife in the home, but presented a different, benign face to the church. There was no evidence that anyone but her saw that he was a cruel, abusive man. If she took recourse to the elders, they could do nothing without a second witness. There was no one lawfully to back her up, or take her side. So he encouraged her to separate herself from him. Move quietly out, into her sister’s home. Not divorce. Not call a lawyer. Just separate.”
When Hmm originally wrote this, I my first thought was that some cases are complex. I still think that the word of God should be obeyed.
In this case, if the husband involved is a church man, then the elders don’t have any recourse because there is no other witness besides the wife, the husband is innocent until proven guilty, not ”guilty until proven innocent”.
So, can the (now hypothetical /fictional) church body, pastor or elder ask a few critical questions:
-What is the nature of the cruelty and abuse? Is he stopping her from working / curtailing her freedom of movement / preventing her from spending money? If so, why? Is she reckless with the household budget? Is she seeing friends that undermine and denigrate him?
During the dark time of my marriage, I would have been called an ”abusive husband”. I separated my finances from my wife completely – because she sent us bankrupt twice. I stopped attending social functions with a particular circle of friends – because they were rich and giving my wife envy issues. I stopped socializing with yet another circle of friends – because a pack of lesbians there would constantly wag their fingers at and lecture me. I have most recently thumbed my nose at an invitation to a wedding – because it’s same sex. My wife attended alone.
Abusive? Cruel? Well hey, I have standards and a moral center……
Do you think for one minute that Doug Wilson would encourage separation based on double secret abuse but wouldn’t allow for divorce or remarriage, that he wouldn’t dream up some adultery or abandonment or simply declare the husband an unbeliever?
Dalrock, A link that you posted on your site a while ago brought me to a less than appropriate website. It is a site that went dormant and was bought by someone else. At any rate, I assume you’d like to deactivate the link, so contact me, and I’ll let you know the name of the article.
P.S. It got flagged by covenant eyes and I just had to send an email explaining what happened to my accountability partner. Ha!
Dal,
When I wrote “The controversy is over whether there is Biblical warrant for a Christian woman to separate from such a man (who also claims to be Christian).” I was giving my view of some of the discussion in the meta to the original article. If a Christian woman is not to separate from her unbelieving husband, how can Wilson counsel her to leave a Christian one?
But yes, the bigger question is whether Paul is giving advice or a command from Christ (which is what the passage actually says). The idea that if a rule takes the form “don’t do x, but if you do, absolutely don’t do y”, there should be no discipline if the person does x is ludicrous. Wilson seems to think that if no penalty is specified, it’s just advice. You apparently have to be all the way down the slippery slope before we can try to stop you.
But the very command Paul is upholding: “believers may not divorce” (except…) doesn’t specify a penalty either. And the Old Testament structure for the law of divorce (as drawn out by Jesus in his teaching) takes exactly the same form as the 1 Cor/ passage at issue: “Don’t divorce. But if a man divorces his wife, he must give her a certificate of divorce.” [The Scripture that best spells this out is in Matthew 19:3-12]
The “do not divorce” part is exactly the law that the New Testament church would discipline for, but by Wilson’s logic, his church ought not, since there is no penalty given.
”wanting a freestyle interpretation of the Bible (you get to decide what it’s saying, not Church hierarchy)”
Scripture has inherent meaning. So its not whatever one decides what it means.
@DS
As I’ve written here and elsewhere, the work of the late Leslie McFall is very significant to the divorce/remarriage debate, especially his destruction of the “exception clause” of Mt 19:9 on textual critical grounds.
https://lmf12.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/divorce_aug_2014.pdf
And for those interested, he has also written extensively on headship.
https://lmf12.wordpress.com/good-order-in-the-church/
Read his articles on https://lmf12.wordpress.com/
About 16 or 17 years ago there was an article on Crosswalk dot com, the supposedly Christian web site, about a woman who separated from her husband of about 6 months. Seems the whole marriage thing was just overwhelming to her, and he was asking too much of her, even though they had no kids, had done the proper dating route, and I think he was a young pastor or something.
She wasn’t actually looking for a divorce, she just needed time to herself b/c you know how modern life is so much more challenging than what generations past endured. Of course he took the time to be introspective and learned how he could better serve his wife, so it was all good, and an important lesson was learned and shared w/ everyone else.
She wasn’t actually looking for a divorce, she just needed time to herself b/c you know how modern life is so much more challenging than what generations past endured. Of course he took the time to be introspective and learned how he could better serve his wife, so it was all good, and an important lesson was learned and shared w/ everyone else.
It’s probably a safe bet that these two are now divorced.
Sharkly said:
August 9, 2018 at 8:45 pm ~ Do You Smell That?
LOL Things are always unclear when Doug writes. Clarity is not the point for this false teacher. Ambiguity creates a world of grey where Doug’s flock need to personally get his interpretation of their situation to feel sure about what is right. He is making himself necessary, by making things confusing where God wrote clearly.
Dalrock says: *Except for women in his church, who Wilson notes better be ready to explain themselves and face discipline if he thinks they don’t have a valid reason to leave.
Doug Wilson is setting himself up as the head arbiter of everybody’s marriage in his cult. … Did I mention that is cultic? And apparently he has a bad track record concerning his inability to spot multiple real abusers, while labeling other innocent men as such.
@Sharkly
May God either bring him into repentance or barring that free the lost from his cult.
@Pedat Ebediyah
Many people fall short of good spouse evaluation. Historically why fathers and other family members are involved in vetting spouses as well assisting their child if they wish to find a good Husband or Wife.
That and the watering down or distortion of the Gospel in America. They don’t really know God. The same God who put Nadab and Abihu to death for Sacrilege.
Wedlock where man and wife become one flesh in the unitive act is holy as is its to be modelled after the relationship between Christ and his bride the Church.
People no longer no longer treat it has holy as they should.
@info: “People no longer no longer treat [marriage] has holy as they should.”
I consistently interpret Heb 13:4 “Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.” with a focus on the first part: marriage should be honored by all. That is, the institution of marriage should be upheld by the Church and its members.
That means the Church and Christians should do everything in their power to guard the marriage bond: first by respecting sexual boundaries (sex is to be only enjoyed in a one-flesh bond between husband and wife), second by respecting the covenantal nature of marriage (no divorce, no remarriage).
Now use this yardstick to measure the theology of many a pastor/teacher, and you can judge for yourself if they honor marriage or not.
And I might add to that, that to further honor marriage is for husbands and wives to honor the nature of the relationship between husband and wife as between Christ and His Church.
Thanks to Deep Strength for sharing with us the research of the late Dr. Leslie McFall. Here is a quote:
“The loss of the knowledge of this hierarchical headship in the church has permitted feminism to flourish throughout the Western part of Christ’s visible church. Male headship was replaced by male leadership; then male leadership was replaced with mutual submission. Now men and women are equal in all respects. Consequently, for the Holy Spirit to focus His attention on the male members is totally unacceptable in our politically correct churches. Even translations of the Bible are now altered to reflect this new equality of status and worth of all Christ’s disciples. How better to achieve this than by altering “brothers” to “brothers and sisters”? And how better to achieve this than by a scholarly footnote purporting to be based on sound,conservative-evangelical research, which shows that the term “brothers” had a “specialized use” in New Testament Greek, which, by coincidence, included females in its use. Is it providential that this new meaning was discovered just in time as the church passed through the Feminist Age?”
McFall, Leslie 2002. Review of: English Standard Version. p. 10-11.
@pariah
Why the distinction between Male headship and leadership?
@Paul
Indeed.
@info
I’m currently reading McFall’s unpublished book Good Order In The Church. The distinction he makes is that there are only three forms of headship, 1. God and Christ, 2. Christ and man, and 3. husband and wife. Leadership is not the same as headship because, for example, a father is a leader of his children, or the church elders are leaders for the congregation. A headship relationship is different to other kinds of relationships.
I’m only up to page 30 of his book. You can download a copy for free here: https://www.headcoveringmovement.com/christian-covering-media/dr-leslie-mcfall-1944-2015-good-order-in-the-church
McFall claiming that the Exception Clause in Matthew was altered by Erasmus is strange at best. Consider what the early Church Fathers said about the passage:
Clement of Alexandria (ca. 195)—“You shall not put away your wife except for the cause of fornication” (Roberts and Donaldson 1995, 2.379).
Tertullian (ca. 207): Jesus prohibits divorce “except for the cause of fornication” (Ibid. 4.45). Again, Christ “permits divorce when the marriage is spotted with unfaithfulness” (Ibid. 3.405). He allows “divorce for no cause, except one” (Ibid. 4.66).
Novatian (ca. 235): Christ “said that a wife must not be put away, except for the cause of adultery” (Ibid. 5.589).
Origen (ca. 245): The Savior does not at all permit “the dissolution of marriages for any other sin than fornication alone” (Ibid. 9:511).
Again it must be stressed that these men had access to Greek manuscripts that significantly predated Erasmus.
Jerome produced his Vulgate New Testament in the fourth century A.D. The Gospel accounts appeared in the year 383. Jerome used both Old Latin and Greek manuscripts. His translation was centuries before Erasmus. The Vulgate on Matthew 19:9 reads:
“And I say to you, that whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and he that shall marry her that is put away, committeth adultery.”
This should be sufficient to illustrate the fallacy of the Erasmus argument.
https://www.christiancourier.com/articles/1539-is-all-remarriage-after-divorce-condemned
@Damn Crackers
Leo Tolstoy – and I forget his reasoning wrote at length as to why ‘save for the cause of fornication’ not only made no sense in the context in which it was written but was in any event not in the original. I suppose he had his own masochistic reasons for that – I always feel somewhat sorry for the Countess Sonia (Mrs Tolstoy) but then that is what happens when you marry an Alpha male. I by-the-way have a letter from their daughter Sasha who became American and lived in the State of New York but is surely now deceased.
@Opus – Yeah, Tolstoy had his own hang ups regarding sexuality. He also thought everyone should be celibate so the end of the world would come.
He reminds me of a guilty early womanizer in his youth who became very guilty of his acts, like St. Augustine.
Burner Prime,
You let your hostility to specific types of churches overrule your senses. Almost every church today follows some variant of this, whatever their label. It is a widespread infection, not just one facing those you personally dislike.
You may or may not have a valid case against such churches, but this issue is not one of them since “they all do it” unfortunately. What is wrong with meeting in a former K-Mart anyway? Is a formal church building the only “true church”?
Deep Strength,
That is not what it says. They are never the ideal, but the hardness of heart remains and it can happen. You worship non-divorce as much as the Jewish leaders worshiped the Sabbath and therefore add burdens that were not intended.
Pedat Ebediyah,
So fix that. Don’t encourage marriage breakup. Many of those would have a radical change if both parties committed to it. Sometimes it would just be one, more often the wife in my experience and reading. Making a nasty bed doesn’t mean you should destroy the principle. The problem is that it is not just an issue for that marriage, it sends a message for others starting tough times.
How many wives today would be much happier and faithful in marriage if they didn’t have easy justification from things like this? My exwife thinks she was in such an intolerable position for so long, along the lines of what you wrote, but she was wrong. She was the one who decided she wanted intolerable, not the true situation. You would probably also have been one of the ones accusing me for not loving her enough when I did far more than anyone realized.
Spike,
I find it more compelling the argument where the understood penalty for adultery at the time was death. Since that would effectively end the marriage, then of course remarriage was allowed. As the also article states this was the position of the church for 400 years after Christ. If that is true, and I certainly don’t know if it is, then all the round and round over text interpretation, is specious. Regardless of what others in the church have stated, if the unchallenged view from the beginning was no divorce for any reason, then changing that ought to have a more compelling reason, than the wording of one verse. Again, I don’t know if that assertion is true, but if it is, then one ought to be very careful in dismissing it.
It’s important to know how God set up marriage so this type of stuff can be refuted. God created marriage so that’s the basis of what marriage is.
Much like two people of the same sex aren’t ever married…saying things like ‘intercourse only’ means marriage isn’t true marriage either.
”Wilson’s original post concerned a man that was difficult to his wife in the home, but presented a different, benign face to the church. There was no evidence that anyone but her saw that he was a cruel, abusive man.”
—————————————————————-
SO #justbelieveher…..
No thanks.
@tjcox53 – Hey…if we want to abolish divorce for any reason and institute capital punishment for adulterous wives, that trade-off would satisfy me.
The only thing was that the Jews under Roman law could not grant capital punishment for anything. The stoning of the adulterous woman in John was probably a mob punishment.
@BillyS
Pedat Ebediyah,
Seriously, bro? I’m not gonna say shit about you and your situation unless I know you and the specifics of what you’re doing. And if I do criticize you I’m going to back it up with scripture, and whatever other supporting information I can that might point to some malignancy or defect in virtue or faith.
I’m the only single (divorced) person in the group of friends, and though it was a lifetime ago when I was married, my understanding of the gravity of the marriage covenant swallows up all these other couples combined. They bristle at my group and individual assessments of them and their shitty marriages. I wouldn’t marry any of these women – if they were single – and if I were a female I’d avoid most of the men too. These guys don’t love their wives or dwell with them according to knowledge. Like a lot of these so-called Christian men, they just want a lifetime pass on the pussy train. These cats, like most cats, ain’t pulling shit over my eyes. And the only reason these chicks married them is that they are Proctor and Gamble Directors, Ford Company Execs, and/or Magistrates and Judges. They got their trophy wives and husbands. These dudes, like a lot of men, want their wives to roll over in the middle of the night and let them bust their customary nut so they can roll over and go back to sleep, and the women take that shit because they chose security over freedom and love. This is, from what I see, is standard Christian behavior. It’s a sham.
So I’m not going to fix anything, bro. I’m not going to encourage anything but that both men and women stop with the fuckery. We in the Red Pill manosphere blame the women for every damn thing, and that’s just wrong. Just as we know that women in general tend to be unreliable moral agents, rebellious, poorly comported, immodest, vain, and just childish…there is a congress of men who are bitch-made, sissified, pussywhipped, dull, selfish, unloving, unaccountable, proud, and controlling. I don’t discriminate. Fuckery is fuckery.
Couples need fellowship. The somewhat stable couples KNOW which wife is getting cussed out, spit on, neglected, or abandoned, or which husband is being cucked, disrespected, cut off sexually, and nobody says shit. Nobody wants their marriage scrutinized so they are like, “we’ll keep you in our prayers”, and keep their heads down and under the radar.
Here is my recent response to one of the wives in group chat:
The circle of friends we (ya’ll) have is so fake and superficial it’s actually infuriating. The fact that no one has sat down and talked to the two of you, or at least to (hubby) is so fucked up that I would offend you if I told you how I really feel about it. No friend is going to sit around and watch his brother’s marriage dissolve without bearing that burden with them. Brother’s Keeper…my ass. All of your marriages suck. No one is doing any loving and no one is doing any respecting and submitting, which is why people keep their heads down hoping to stay under the radar. And your Pastor is a punk. All these Urban Pastors and their Mega-Churches want are congregations of high paid educated negroes who are “tithers”, and so they can brag about how progressive their congregations are. No wonder white people say ya’ll are r/selected. (I’m the exception though. LOL) I deliberately remain silent because I’m that crazy Red Pill brother and they don’t want to hear what I have to say no matter how nice I am about it.
So BillyS, I just watch and pray.
@Damn Crackers
I, mercifully, outgrew Tolstoy – his late novel Resurrection is so horridly Blue Pill. hint {spoiler alert] : marrying a prostitute (by way of penance) is crass stupidity and the worse sort of White-Knighting.
@DC : “McFall claiming that the Exception Clause in Matthew was altered by Erasmus is strange at best. Consider what the early Church Fathers said about the passage”
Consider this: did the early Church Fathers speak English? If not, where do the quotes originate from?
@DC
Look at https://biblehub.com/multi/matthew/19-9.htm
See the different Greek versions over there? See which ones do NOT have the ‘ei’?
Note that the RP Byzantine text is the most authoritative critical Majority Text edition.
And NA27 the most authoritative Alexandrian critical text edition.
I quote Leslie McFall:
“Erasmus flooded the European market with his five cheaper editions, all of which had his faulty, variant reading at Matthew 19:9. The fault was that he added an extra Greek word in Matthew 19:9 which completely altered Jesus’ teaching on divorce.”
“The original Greek text read: “not over fornication [which was punished by death],” so that Jesus condemned every known excuse to divorce a marriage that the rabbis could think of, besides fornication, because that particular sin had a death penalty punishment attached to it (Deut 22:22; Lev 20:10). The rabbis could not give ‘fornication’ as a grounds for divorce, because, they and Jesus, knew that God had decreed the death penalty for adultery and other sexual misdemeanours.”
“Erasmus turned Jesus’ teaching on its head, because his new Greek text read: “except for fornication.” This alteration had Jesus agreeing with Hillel and Shammai that fornication was a legitimate grounds for divorce in His Church. This was a humanist response to a social evil in Erasmus’s day. In his opinion, the death penalty was too harsh a punishment to inflict on the poorer classes, and since he believed that God sanctioned divorce as a divine institution in Deuteronomy 24:1-‐‑4, he assumed that a compassionate Jesus would allow divorce in the case of fornication, adultery, physical abuse, and intolerable desertion. ”
We often hear that God hates divorce (and he does). That being said, it is interesting that God divorced Israel for her spiritual adultery.
For those who maintain divorce is never allowed, why would God allow himself to divorce Israel for adultery, but tell us we cannot divorce for any reason, not even adultery?
Well perhaps because He is God.
Besides I think the terms adultery, prostitute and divorce were the terms God used to explain what was spiritually going wrong with Israel and Judah worshiping other gods to help us understand it better. Much like a wife rebelling from a husband by committing prostitution and adultery…that was what Israel and Judah were doing by worshiping other gods.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Jeremiah+3&version=NABRE
It would be like your wife saying how much she just loves to submit to Chad the pagan god of tingles over her lawful husband. In response the husband divorces…so the wife (before the days of state sanctioned provision) doesn’t have any protection or provision from the husband anymore.
So much like Israel worshiping Baal or whatever pagan god over the true God that led them out of Egypt…causes God to ‘divorce’ from Israel spiritually…and Israel didn’t have the spiritual provision and protection of God anymore because they chose Baal. It would be hard to explain this unless you had some idea what adultery, divorce, and prostitution is.
@ Earl
I got a pretty good laugh at the pagan god of tingles. That would be a good name for a rock band.
I always saw God’s divorce from Israel as His judgment to purge the idolaters to bring True Israel back to Him. But my theology on Israel is limited due to being steeped in dispensationalism my whole life.
I could see that too.
earl,
On Boxer’s site you once called oral sex “Sodomy” in a comment aimed in my general direction. I presume you consider that to be a Catholic interpretation of the matter. We’ll you’d better check in with your church. Apparently oral sex is now part of some new sacrament involving holy water too.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/report-pennsylvania-priests-abused-over-1-000-children-042935265.html
A priest raped a 7-year-old girl while visiting her in the hospital after she had her tonsils removed. Another priest forced a 9-year-old boy into having oral sex, then rinsed out the youngster’s mouth with holy water. One boy was forced to say confession to the priest who sexually abused him.
My wife is from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Apparently you are not familiar enough with the Catholic practices from her native diocese. LOL
Yeah that’s sodomy. Even when a priest does it…he commits sodomy. There was no changing to church teaching…there was sick men that got into the clergy. I hope these revelations defrock Wuerl and any other bishops/priests involved. They should be in jail too.
Do I need to go on about how the church also doesn’t endorse raping young girls too?
I’d suggest if you haven’t to read the report from Pennsylvania. This is going to be a huge event in the history of the church in America. Michael Voris has been doing an excellent job covering these scandals (and he’s got plenty of personal motivation…he has his own priest coming on to him story).
https://www.churchmilitant.com/
Pedat,
Not sure why they keep associating with you in that case, but watching and praying is all you can do.
I would hold both sides accountable for making things better, but I suspect the wife’s attitude is the main problem, even in their situation. You probably would be one of the ones wanting to stone me for not making my wife happy enough, since I am a fairly direct individual. I am sure you could pick on enough things to blame me for just wanting sex, even though that was nowhere near true.
Ongoing sex with a bitchy woman is not as compelling as some might think, whatever her looks (or not).
OKR,
Because they are legalistic about divorce.
It is far too easy today, but going to the “never and you must suffer even if you were wronged” is just as evil as chastising the Disciples for picking grains in the field to chew on during the Sabbath. Marriage was made for man, not man for marriage.
Earl,
I went to your link. With all that crap going on, I’d say it is high time to get out of that corrupt church.
2 Corinthians 6:17 Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you. 18 And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
Unfortunately I think that applies to almost every church today. The people there, including the leaders, are ashamed of God’s word. They do not build on the chief Cornerstone, but on the sand. They do not eat the Bread of life, which is the Word of God. They do not come through the Door, the Way, the Truth. They lean on their own emotions and uninformed understanding. When Christ comes He will scarce find faith on this earth. No one feels called to suffer like Christ their ensample.
1 Peter 2:21 For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps,
Everybody thinks if you’re suffering while a Christian, then you must have messed up, while the truth is quite the opposite. However nobody wants to suffer for Christ, for His word, for obeying His commands, they’d rather His Gospel be blasphemed, than that they should be anything but happy, and yet their selfishness does not bring them enduring joy, just death. They’re dead already. Disgusting corpses, decaying covered with sin upon sin. Touch not that unclean thing! Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord.
‘I’d say it is high time to get out of that corrupt church.’
It’s high time the corrupt clergy get out of the church. They obviously are not worthy of the title bishop or priest.
Every organization has its share of lousy members. The F.B.I. is generally a good organization. Some of its agents are shit. The Catholic Church is no different.
The lesson of this nonsense is the tendency of every organization to circle the wagons, to protect its own, rather than to pursue the ideals the organization was founded to further.
earl,
“Well perhaps because He is God.”
Well, you may believe God does things just because He can, but I think He does things for our good.
“So much like Israel worshiping Baal or whatever pagan god over the true God that led them out of Egypt…causes God to ‘divorce’ from Israel spiritually…and Israel didn’t have the spiritual provision and protection of God anymore because they chose Baal.”
Does it makes sense to you that God would divorce Israel for spiritual adultery (removing His provision and protection), but God would refuse to allow a husband today to divorce his wife for adultery (removing the husband’s provision and protection from her)?
It doesn’t to me. But, if one accepts the “exception clause” as a valid reason for divorce, I see God as consistent.
@ BillyS
So when God brought the Jews out of Persia and back to Israel did He Re-marry them?
@Paul – Even without the ei, the me (not) alone can still give the context of “except” or “exclude” –
“whoever divorces his wife not (mé) [for] immorality (porneia) and marries another, commits adultery”
Likewise, how did Erasmus go back over 1000 years to change the Greek speaking Church Father’s minds, including John Chrysostom, 4th Century Greek Church Hierarch who wrote in a sermon on Matthew: “Whosoever shall put away his wife except it be for fornication, and marry another, committeth adultery.”
Sorry folks, I think the anti-Christ of Biblical divorce exegesis here, Instone-Brewer, answers McFall’s claims here. Interestingly, he accepts some of what McFall has to say:
http://divorceremarriage.blogspot.com/2009/06/is-there-really-exception-in-greek-of.html
@Earl – What do you think of Chateau Heartiste’s solution to the Catholic sex scandal?
“The Catholic Church child abuse problem is a homosexual problem (most of the victims are young boys). The Catholic Church needs to drop the clerisy celibacy requirement. It’s been corrupted and used as a cover by hordes of homosexuals to infiltrate the institution and turn it into their gaypedo playground. All it would take to clean out the sphincter splitting sewage are a few happily sexed Chads of the Cloth giving no quarter to the degenerates.
The pro-clergy celibacy argument goes that celibate men don’t share their loyalties between God and Woman/Family. (Cynically, the church instituted the celibacy requirement to prevent inheritances from leaving Church coffers). The celibacy rule wasn’t instituted until 1,000 years after the Catholic Church was established. It can and should be reconsidered in light of modern realities.”
Pedat Ebediyah says: We in the Red Pill manosphere blame the women for every damn thing, and that’s just wrong.
There is a good bit of sense to it sometimes though. Wives are commanded to submit to their husbands before the husband is commanded to love his wife “according to understanding”, in every instance.
1 Peter 3
Ephesians 5
Colossians 3
And in Titus 2 the younger women are told to love and to submit to their husbands, while the young men are not specifically told to love their wives, but are instead told to be sober minded.
There is a divine order to the wife’s commanded submission first, before the Husband is told to love. If things go wrong from the first moment you often never have the chance to be a leader. How would my kids behave If my wife wasn’t teaching them to be rebellious? I’ll never know. I was never allowed to discipline them like I wanted to. I was told she would call the police if I spanked them, when they were young. It took a lot of Christian counseling before she would let me do a little bit of spanking, too little and too late. She also demonstrates her own rebellion to authority in front of them every moment of every day. So can I blame my wife for my kids behavior? I think I can to some degree. I have no idea how the kids would behave if I’d been allowed to be the kind of father I wanted to be for them. She by threat of police/divorce/stealing the kids, has got her way almost entirely. And since she has had all the control, made the decisions, and Etc. she can bear the blame. The same thing goes for almost every aspect of my marriage. Within a month my wife went from vowing to obey me, to screaming in my face that if things weren’t her way, our marriage was over. So, she took control, and I’ll be damned if I give a shit that you don’t want me to hold her accountable for her usurpation and unwise decisions. Call it “blame” so what? It is due, since she rebelled before I even had a chance to ever lead anything. Everybody likes to say well you should have done this or you should have done that, but at the end of the day, I tried my best to live for Christ according to His word, and I have suffered greatly for it. Should I be blaming God? Should I blame myself for my bad choice? I already do. Am I unloving? I try not to be, but loving a rebellious sinner who is on the broad road to hell, doesn’t always resemble a Hallmark movie. It looks like the love of Hosea. Unless the wife has first done her part well, you’ll never know what could have been. And to blame the husband, when he never even had a chance to lead, is just adding to his suffering. If women can’t be blamed for the things they destroy, that is pretty Blue Pill. Sure men can be selfish, sure men can give up, but some are loving and never get the chance to have a decent relationship. Like Hosea the prophet, who was chosen to love his wife like God, and got nothing but unfaithfulness and contempt in return. I hope you don’t intend to insult Hosea, should you meet him in heaven. Was the blame not rightly entirely on her? An evil wife can destroy and pollute her own marriage and home, entirely by herself, even if she has a God selected lover, loving like God Himself, as Hosea clearly demonstrated.
Only semi-OT: a guy who’s at least purple-pill makes a dialectical (so doomed) appeal to women to shut down the Friend Zone for men they know:
https://thefederalist.com/2017/04/04/men-women-can-never-just-friends/
An excerpt (so copyright fears N/A):
“Americans need to raise our sagging birth rates. One of the best ways we can do so is by reversing the trend of Americans waiting longer to get married. So, apart from tearing down America’s institutions of higher education, which tend to slow down the recitation of wedding vows, how do we do that? It’s quite simple. We tear down the Friend Zone.
Every year, countless young men find themselves trapped in the Friend Zone, a prison where women place any man they deem worthy of their time but not their hearts, men they’d love to have dinner with but, for whatever reason, don’t want to kiss goodnight.
Being caught in the Friend Zone is an inarguable drag on fertility rates, as a man who spends several years pledging his heart to a woman who will never have his children is also a man who most likely won’t procreate with anyone else during that time of incarceration. Free him to find a woman who actually wants to marry him, however, and he’ll have several more years to sire children who will laugh, create, sing, fill the world with love and, most importantly, pay into Social Security.
Quite simply, for the sake of our future, the Friend Zone must be destroyed. For the Friend Zone to be destroyed, women must accept the following truths: you don’t have any guy friends and, in fact, you can’t have any guy friends.
If He’s Spending Time Alone With You, He Wants a Date
There’s Only One Thing You Can Give His Man Friends Can’t
Consider your best guy friend. Are you attracted to him? Does he fill you with the biological desire to repopulate the earth? If not, then do your “friend” a solid and let him go. Call him up and tell him, “It’s not my fault that your facial symmetry grosses out my ovaries, but it was my fault that I got your hopes up by putting you in the Friend Zone. As restitution, please accept the phone numbers of five girls I know who find you attractive. Stop wasting your time with me and go hang out with a girl who might one day bear your children.”
So get brave. Get married.
Do this now. Don’t hesitate, thinking that you don’t want to lose him as a friend. The truth is, you’ve never had him as one.
Conversely, if you find your guy friend attractive, and if you see him as a man of character and heart, then call him right now and tell him that he was placed in the Friend Zone due to a clerical error. Say to him, “You make me laugh and would be a great husband and father. Clearly, you need to be on the express track to the Marriage Zone.”
@ Rick
Yes.
Hosea 2
15 I will give her her vineyards from there,
And the Valley of Achor as a door of hope;
She shall sing there,
As in the days of her youth,
As in the day when she came up from the land of Egypt.
16 “And it shall be, in that day,”
Says the Lord,
“That you will call Me ‘My Husband,’
And no longer call Me ‘My Master,’
17 For I will take from her mouth the names of the Baals,
And they shall be remembered by their name no more.
Luke
Only semi-OT: a guy who’s at least purple-pill makes a dialectical (so doomed) appeal to women to shut down the Friend Zone for men they know:
It is not possible to negotiate desire. This appeal is therefore doomed to fail.
Worse still, it is the classic beta-orbiter “nice guy” approach that women despise.
He needs a pair of The Glasses to see clearly, although his eyes will hurt at first.
@OKRickety and BillyS
If you’re going to take the illustration of God’s marriage and divorce from Israel so literally–and as an eternal example of marriage–then I can’t wait to hear your expositions about how it is cool for you to marry a whore AND her whore sister…because God did.
Also cool for you to do because God did: Drown your sinful neighbors. Raze a city of sinners. Spread pestilence among unbelievers. Poison the waters of a nation. Slay fraudulent givers. Ride in on a white horse with a sword and a tattoo on your thigh that says “King of kings and Lord of lords!”
Or maybe you just haven’t thought about it very much and instead are prooftexting to satisfy your own desires.
Luke quotes some man
Being caught in the Friend Zone is an inarguable drag on fertility rates, as a man who spends several years pledging his heart to a woman who will never have his children is also a man who most likely won’t procreate with anyone else during that time of incarceration. Free him to find a woman who actually wants to marry him,
No, this is absolutely wrong. The man in the Friend Zone needs to free himself and regain his self-respect. Expecting a woman to do a man’s job is just dumb. Glasses. This man needs glasses. I bet he doesn’t even lift…
Agreed with the criticisms, but they miss the essential aspects (aside from dialectic being an inferior approach to appealing to women, compared to rhetoric).
IMO, those are:
1) women rarely accept fault,
and
2) they never voluntarily give up an advantage without (at least if they perceive it so) gaining a greater one.
Women are very predominantly at best amoral. In a society where they are not overtly in charge, and there is reliable sanctioning for behaving amorally, many of them can behave morally. A society where there is little reward for moral behavior for women, and much reward for its opposite, well, you get our current bastardy, birth, and women-filed frivorce rates.
@DC: “how did Erasmus go back over 1000 years to change the Greek speaking Church Father’s minds”
Did you check yet what these Church Fathers said in the original language? And did you check Leslie McFall on his extensive treatment of the translation of “me epi” versus “ei me epi” and its variants? And did you check that ‘ei’ was most likely not in the original autographs? The Textus Receptus is wrong here (sorry KJV-onlyists!)
The concensus is that for the first 1500 years or so, the Church almost universally condemned remarriage after divorce (e.g. http://whatismarriagetonywpiano.weebly.com/teaching-of-the-church-for-1500-years-about—divorce-and-remarriage.html)
Heck, if it was not for the discussion around Mt 19:9, there would hardly be any doubt.
And as for an appeal to Moses (Deut 24); strictly speaking it does not regulate divorce, it describes a complex condition in which a wife could not return to her former husband.
Note also that appeal to Moses was EXACTLY what the Pharisees did questioning Jesus that no one should divorce.
@OKRickety: “For those who maintain divorce is never allowed, why would God allow himself to divorce Israel for adultery, but tell us we cannot divorce for any reason, not even adultery?”
1. I argue that remarriage after divorce is never allowed
2. Divorce is not allowed, but sometimes has happened. If so, stay single or reconciliate.
3. It is clear that the NT gives new rules concerning marriage
4. The explanation of the OT has its own difficulties
To be fair, this is also one of the passages that I find difficult to interpret against the clearer instructions of the NT. That said, you can also refer to Ezra 10, where Israelites were forced to divorce their wives because of illegal marriages. It is difficult to extract moral guidance from such cases.
Back to the interpretation of Jer 3. Please read the full chapter.
Jer 3:1 is apparently difficult to translate; is it a question or a command?
NIV: If a man divorces his wife and she leaves him and marries another man, should he return to her again? Would not the land be completely defiled? But you have lived as a prostitute with many lovers– would you now return to me?” declares the LORD.
KJV: They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man’s, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the LORD.
But look at the later verses
v8 (NIV) I gave faithless Israel her certificate of divorce and sent her away because of all her adulteries. Yet I saw that her unfaithful sister Judah had no fear; she also went out and committed adultery.
12 Go, proclaim this message toward the north: “‘Return, faithless Israel,’ declares the LORD, ‘I will frown on you no longer, for I am faithful,’ declares the LORD, ‘I will not be angry forever.
RETURN! This in spite of Deut 24!
14 Return, faithless people,” declares the LORD, “for I am your husband. I will choose you–one from a town and two from a clan–and bring you to Zion.
RETURN! Why?
BECAUSE the LORD *IS* her husband!
Tell me, how can the LORD be her husband if he divorced Israel?
Furthermore it should be clear this is an analogy; there has never been an actual certificate of divorce. And marriage to a nation is clearly a spiritual concept. Therefore we should not read too much into the analogy.
Am I the only one who has heard the following theory about the Matthew 19:9 exception?
Matthew was a Gospel written firstly to Jews. Jews who believed people to be legally married during their betrothal period. Thus when Joseph was betrothed to Mary he was going to divorce her when he discovered she was pregnant. Also recorded in only Matthew.
Matthew 1:19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.
So the exception for “fornication”(sex before marriage) was actually a way to divorce out of a betrothal, or guard against premarital virginity fraud, like an annulment.
Matthew 19:9 9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
Because a married woman can no longer commit fornication, once she has consummated her marriage.
Anybody else hear that? Or have any thoughts on that?
@Sharkly – Yes, that Jewish betrothal argument was popular among “never divorced” crowd.
@Paul – I am not going to look up the original Greek of every Church father I listed. Suffice it to say, I trust they’re Greek is better than yours and mine. McFall is probably correct in the addition of his words, but he still doesn’t have a good explanation of the interpretation of many of the Church fathers in their reading of the exception clause.
I racked my head over Jesus’s words on divorce because it seemed so illogical. Jesus, among other things, can’t be illogical in his preaching. So to say divorce and remarriage are never allowed never made sense to me or how Jesus could say he never changed the law one iota, including Jewish marriage/divorce laws. And, you can never tell me that an annulment isn’t really just Catholic divorce. Remember, the early Church also thought celibacy in marriage was a model too.
The revelation from Instone-Brewer and others that Jesus was arguing what was basically a new “no-fault” divorce interpretation created by the Pharisees makes more sense in context when you read his words and St. Paul’s on divorce. Roman divorces were also no-fault for the most part for most of the period when they were preaching.
We’re just going to go back and forth with this argument. Let’s just say we’ll all find out in the end.
To take back your wife, after she has defiled herself with another man, is morally disgusting. It is an abhorrence to Jehovah, like homosexuality and idolatry. God has not changed his mind about that.
@DC
My point is that the words of the church fathers are translated; you don’t know if the translators took the same approach as many modern translations of Mt 19:9, which STILL use the ‘ei me epi’ construct to translate as ‘except’, whereas we now KNOW the ‘ei’ is not in there, and ‘me epi’ should be better translated as ‘not for’.
My impression from what I’ve read from the church fathers from other sources than the book you quote, as that they almost universally rejected remarriage after divorce.
@DC
And as for David IB, has reasoning, that the church somehow lost the Jewish interpretation in the first/second century, and that David himself has now rediscovered, is totally unbelievable.
He treats marriage as nothing more as a contract, and is able to let texts say the direct opposite of what a plain reading would tell you.
I don’t buy it.
@Daniel “To take back your wife, after she has defiled herself with another man, is morally disgusting.”
According to….?
@Paul – You’re right. The Church fathers all saw remarriage after divorce as adulterous. You were married to your spouse as long as they live, divorced or not. I thought you were arguing that there was no divorce in this time. To them you could put away your wife, but you couldn’t remarry until her death.
All my life I wondered what kind of God wouldn’t allow for remarriage if one’s spouse was a murderer, adulterer, abandons you, etc. It’s punishing the victim. You can say that those are God’s words, so shut up. Still, Instone-Brewer was the first person to put the full context of the Jewish divorce debate in Jesus’s time in front of us. Like McFall, sometimes we moderns have more information about things then our religious forefathers.
@Daniel – The Shepard of Hermas was a popular writing from 1st or 2nd Century AD that was almost included in the Bible said you must take back your adulterous wife:
[29]:4 I say to him, “Sir, permit me to ask thee a few more questions” “Say on,” saith he. “Sir,” say I, “if a man who has a wife that is faithful in the Lord detect her in adultery, doth the husband sin in living with her?”
1[29]:5 “So long as he is ignorant,” saith he, “he sinneth not; but if the husband know of her sin, and the wife repent not, but continue in her fornication, and her husband live with her, he makes himself responsible for her sin and an accomplice in her adultery.”
1[29]:6 “What then, Sir,” say I, “shall the husband do, if the wife continue in this case?” “Let him divorce her,” saith he, “and let the husband abide alone: but if after divorcing his wife he shall marry another, he likewise committeth adultery.”
1[29]:7 “If then, Sir,” say I, “after the wife is divorced, she repent and desire to return to her own husband, shall she not be received?”
1[29]:8 “Certainly,” saith he, “if the husband receiveth her not, he sinneth and bringeth great sin upon himself; nay, one who hath sinned and repented must be received, yet not often; for there is but one repentance for the servants of God. For the sake of her repentance therefore the husband ought not to marry. This is the manner of acting enjoined on husband and wife.
According to most men. That is a simple statement. It is just another reason I will not be getting married. I couldn’t stomach taking back an adulterous woman and calling her my wife.
Cool, please do that purging before telling the rest of us to join.
My above comment in relation to this quote.
Sounds like cuckoldry to me. Sorry, not buying it.
I do not take it nearly as literally as you suggest (strawman?) but suppose it (allegory?) could have relevance. My own belief is primarily based on my understanding of the “exception clauses” found in Matthew. I am quite aware of the claims about Erasmus, McFall’s studies, and Instone-Brewer’s studies. However, it seems quite possible that their work is questionable, done to satisfy their own desires.
Outside of the Roman Catholic church (who deny divorce but allow annulments) and, I suppose, the Orthodox churches, what denominations/groups deny divorce absolutely?
@Paul – I didn’t mean for you to shut up, I was referring to me and my ideas.
It’s funny but in truth the ‘never divorce’ crowd has been more fundamental in my no marriage argument than even the most ardent feminist who would want to enslave me by force.
@OKRickety – From reading the Orthodox policy on remarriage, I learned that they do allow it but they aren’t too happy about it.
“The Orthodox Church recognizes the sanctity of marriage and sees it as a life-long commitment. However, there are certain circumstances in which it becomes evident that there is no love or commitment in a relationship.
While the Church stands opposed to divorce, the Church, in its concern for the salvation of its people, does permit divorced individuals to marry a second and even a third time.
The Order of the Second or Third Marriage is somewhat different than that celebrated as a first marriage and it bears a penitential character. Second or third marriages are performed by “economy”—that is, out of concern for the spiritual well being of the parties involved and as an exception to the rule, so to speak.”
https://oca.org/questions/sacramentmarriage/divorce-and-remarriage
Paul,
Perhaps that’s true, but let’s take this one question at a time. The first question is whether divorce is allowed for any reason. The second is whether remarriage is allowed after divorce.
If divorce is never allowed, then the second question has no relevance. Do those church fathers allow divorce?
When St. Paul spoke about separation in Corinthians, it was the same as divorce. Also, see the post above from the Shepard of Hermas. If divorce (separation) occurred, there was to be no remarriage in case of reconciliation.
Never mind the disease aspect of this whole mess. If your wife cheats, divorces you and then suddenly repents 10 years later and you have to reconcile with her or be sent to hell, then you must also sleep with her upon request or likewise sin, thus if she has a sexually transmitted disease you will most likely get the disease too.
And she can keep cheating on you, what is there to stop her? Doing the same thing over and over again, you cannot determine if she has truly repented and must believe her each time she ends up doing another gent. At what point does it become obvious that it is a sham? The first, second, third adultery?
Sorry, it’s a shit show, one I will have no part in. Keep arguing semantics though as the culture dies around you.
@feministhater – Also, I don’t think the early Church fathers had information like this:
CHEATING ONCE MAKES YOU 300 PERCENT MORE LIKELY TO CHEAT IN YOUR NEXT RELATIONSHIP
Authored by Psychology Professor Kayla Knopp, the study surveyed 1,294 targeted participants, communicating with them periodically over five years. It found that, of the participants who had at least two romantic relationships in that time, those who reported cheating in the first relationship were three times more likely to do the same in the subsequent relationship. Furthermore, those who reported suspecting their partner of cheating in the first relationship were four times more likely to suspect the same of their next partner.
Here’s an example where there was no divorce, but David knew what he had to do.
@FH : “the ‘never divorce’ crowd has been more fundamental in my no marriage argument than even the most ardent feminist who would want to enslave me by force.”
You’re in good company
Mt 19:10The disciples said to him, “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry.”
1 Co 7:28b But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this.
@Paul – I am sure that a lot of the problems and controversies about divorce and remarriage was why the institution of annulment was created. It was a way to say that the marriage never happened. It was merely fornication for a time. You can then ask for forgiveness and remarry.
@OK: “Do those church fathers allow divorce?”
Some even prescribed it in some cases, but their understanding was different from what legal divorce means in our court systems today. Their insistence on forbidding remarriage was based on the understanding that “divorce” is not able to terminate the marriage bond, only death is.
@OKRickety
It is not a strawman argument if you base your argument for what a man is allowed on what God has done, as if every man was a god.
As was mine. I really liked that one passage because it was the one that seemed to have an exception clause for a sinful situation which I found disgusting. I didn’t like the other NT verses on divorce as much because none of them had the exception clause. So what I used to do was read the other passages “in the light of” the one passage in Matthew 19, i.e., I assumed that the exception clause was the ruling passage and all the others (Mark 10, Luke 16, 1 Corinthians 7) were subordinate to Matthew 19.
That was wrong. The better way to do it is read the one passage (Matthew 19) in the light of the other passages (Mark 10, Luke 16, 1 Cor. 7) because they all agree. When I do, what I find is that it makes sense if I take the meaning of Matthew 19 as one may not divorce unless it is discovered there was previously unknown fornication before the marriage, e.g., a man discovers that he has not married a virgin when she had maintained that she was. Therefore, in such a case, the divorce is merely a declaration that the marriage was never properly formed. When I read it that way, every verse is in harmony. I believe the RCC has the basic doctrine right even if their application of it is risible.
@Cane Caldo – So what you’re saying is that 95% of American first marriages are eligible for annulment since they’re wives aren’t virgins. I’m ok with that.
Paul,
My original question here was addressed to “those who maintain divorce is never allowed”. I am not certain where you stand on that question. What is your answer? Note: I’m asking about the Biblical position on divorce, not the position of the state. And I’m not asking about remarriage after divorce (you are the one that moved to that question). That is a different, although commonly related, question.
I am amused that you questioned the statements of the Church Fathers about divorce provided by DC, but apparently accept the statements of the Church Fathers about remarriage in your link, when I highly doubt that you have read them “in the original language”.
@Damn Crackers
Our situation is complicated by the fact that most men marry women knowing they are not virgins, nor do those men maintain the expectation that their wives be virgins at marriage.
“Eligible for annulment” isn’t correct (regardless of RCC actual practices). An annulment is recognition that a marriage never occurred. Every unformed marriage should be annulled, technically speaking. Having said that: I do fear that something like 95% of American marriages don’t actually exist.
Thinking about this stuff makes my insides curdle. Thinking about this stuff while knowing that our spiritual leaders deny it makes the curdles boil.
Rick,
Given that Gabriel told Mary that Jesus would sit on “David’s Throne”, God clearly did not totally cut off all contact with all of Israel.
I would have to spend a fair bit of time digging into it, as I have not done so, but I even find the statements in Romans about the restoration of Israel to Jesus to indicate He is not completely done with them. God made too many prophesies that were unconditional that still remain to be fulfilled.
Note that in Malachi, when He chastised them for not tithing and giving properly (which applied to Israel, not the Church contrary to how some teachers use it today) indicated His ongoing connection with them.
Oscar seems to have directly answered it a bit more directly than my focus on principles, though both have merit.
Cane,
f you’re going to take the illustration of God’s marriage and divorce from Israel so literally–and as an eternal example of marriage–then I can’t wait to hear your expositions about how it is cool for you to marry a whore AND her whore sister…because God did.
I am not sure which case you are referring to here. I don’t recall Hosea being told to do that. Though God does refer to Isreal and Judah as “sisters” in some contexts, so perhaps that is it. They were not in reality, but God chose to apply that aspect.
God said He will guard us under His feathers and His wings, but that doesn’t mean He is a big chicken. I just take things seriously.
Also cool for you to do because God did: Drown your sinful neighbors. Raze a city of sinners. Spread pestilence among unbelievers. Poison the waters of a nation. Slay fraudulent givers. Ride in on a white horse with a sword and a tattoo on your thigh that says “King of kings and Lord of lords!”
Believing that the “mighty men” mentioned at the start of Genesis and in Caanan were connected to angelic corruption of the human line, the cleansing makes perfect sense. It is not a command to the Church today. Though we are to be just that ruthless in our spiritual warfare against the forces of darkness, so I see no conflict there.
Or maybe you just haven’t thought about it very much and instead are prooftexting to satisfy your own desires.
Nope. I am seeking to be consistent. I may be wrong on points, but the Scripture must convince me of the error, not some other handwaving.
I don’t expect to convince you or others who disagree, I just make the points. God is consistent, even if we don’t always like it or if we sometimes cannot completely grasp all things. That does not mean we should stop seeking to understand.
Are you against holding forth the Scriptures as supreme? I don’t recall you being RCC or Orthodox (I think it was Episcopal), so you lack the faithful church hierarchy to fall back on instead. What is the authority?
(Probably easier to discuss this in person though, as a thorough argument here requires more depth to cover and is too dialectic for this format.)
====
This brings me back to what I realized a few weeks ago: I know of no place where I can sit with other men and truly seek to understand the Scriptures, allowing some disagreement without killing relationships. Most men’s groups are filled with blue pill men repeating advice like the posts Dalrocks opposes. It is hard to even discuss things since most are obnoxious in their views.
I could strongly disagree on doctrine in a group, but could still fellowship with most, even if I disagreed, yet that kind of forum is not available when spiritual discussion are part of the mix.
Daniel,
David forceably took back Michal (Saul’s daughter) from the one Saul gave her to. I can’t believe she and that man were celibate the entire time.
“She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce. Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore.”
Jeremiah 3:8
Cane Caldo,
I find the grouping of 1 Cor. 7 with Mark 10 and Luke 16 to be peculiar, because, although they all relate to divorce, they are greatly different in substance.
Are you saying that the divorce of an unbeliever and an unbeliever-turned-believer is unacceptable? That is not my understanding of 1 Cor. 7:12ff.
I have yet to understand why Matt. 5:32 “but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for [the] reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.[NASB]” is often left out of discussions on this topic. It clearly contains the issue of divorce and has an “exception” clause.
Cane,
This is the core issue. Very few, if any, wrestle with the issues involved and instead fall back on trite phrases and things that would cause a pile of additional issues if implemented. Accepting the modern divorce mill system is another major part of the problem, since it encourages more of the exact problem churches actively ignore.
Do the “never divorce” crowd think that someone in a second (or later) marriage should end that and return to the first spouse? Would this apply even if the marriage had lasted multiple times longer than the first marriage?
SirHamster,
But they were one when they were initially “married” so trying to apply things too tightly there is idiotic. Thanks for the reply though. It does give the context I was not thinking of.
OKR,
They would probably say that the separation in that case would have to remain single forever, even though they did not have to keep the unbeliever from leaving (which was impossible as indicated by the context).
They are modern day Pharisees who react to the modern immorality by going beyond what little is written and completely ignore the overarching principles.
Anything Jesus discussed about divorce was in the context where a woman didn’t control things and could not abandon her husband. Stretching them to apply to every case forever is not correct. The principle of marriage is that it should be between a man and a woman for life, but God clearly makes provisions for man’s weaknesses, even in the NT (see I John 1:9 for an overarching example).
Jesus’ words only talked about a man divorcing his wife. While I signed the paperwork (or I would likely be in jail), I did not divorce my wife. Thus it is not the exact same situation. I do wish we had a lot more clarity on all possible situations in the Scriptures, but we don’t and must use the brains God gave us to properly apply His principles.
Based on the prohibition of taking back a previously divorced wife in the OT (Deut 24) because that is destestable, I’d say there is no “should”.
No take backs. The existing marriage is the existing marriage, and adding a second divorce doesn’t nullify the first divorce or improve things.
I’d even say that a husband wiilling to take her back because her 2nd husband died shouldn’t; it’s not just about her, but the example set to the community.
So do they have to divorce that spouse instead and just remain single? Otherwise they are continually committing adultery according to what some write here.
Dig farther into the consequences of a thought and the difficulty remains.
@OKRickety
I haven’t left it out. The “reason of unchastity” is the discovery that a man who was told he married a virgin discovers that he was deceived and she was not a virgin before their marriage. Therefore he was falsely married to her, and a false marriage is no marriage at all. Therefore, legally, he divorces her so that the rest of society knows they are not in fact married and that the wedding was a deceptive affair. This understanding brings all the texts which touch upon divorce into harmony; not to mention the treatment of sin in general.
@BillyS
This is stupid; so stupid it is exactly what feminists say when they are reminded that the Bible says women are not to teach men. And it is so stupid that it is the exact opposite of what the Pharisees were actually guilty; which is piling on rule after rule and ignoring the principle.
The principle of Christian marriage is that it is one man, one woman, forever, and that sexual activity is only permissible within that one man one woman together forever paradigm. The plain, clear reading of the NT doctrine of divorce is: Don’t do it. If you do it anyways, you are not to be married to another. A few things keep a marriage from being properly formed. One is if a man is falsely married to a non-virgin.
Another is if a non-believer married to another non-believer becomes a Christian, and is therefore reborn a new creation–a new person and in a real way therefore not the same person who married. Nevertheless, if the non-believer is content to stay, then for the sake of the children and for the sake of the Gospel[1] the new person in the marriage should stay. But if the unbeliever leaves, let the unbeliever go.
None of the above is pharisaical. It is a plain reading of short texts which are easy enough to be understood by children.
[1] So non-believers don’t see the Gospel as a disordered and home-wrecking theology, which it is not.
Cane,
I did not divorce my wife, she divorced me. I would likely be in jail if I had not signed the paperwork, so is that what I should have done instead? Yet you apply your interpretation to both sides, the one doing it and the one hit by it. Tell me how that is consistent with God’s character, holding the innocent in bondage because of the guilty.
We need to take all God’s principles in mind, especially when specific instructions were not given. Jesus covered one specific case, a man divorcing his wife, not every possible variant.
Note too that God also divorced Israel, though that may be why Cane does not want to take that too straightfowardly, since it would negate part of the “you are doomed to stay single if your wife leaves you” idea. Though Paul’s writing on that has still not been addressed by the never divorce camp.
I know of no Biblical reason for “have to divorce”. Since it is shameful for her to go back, and women need provision, and the man knew it marrying her, the marriage should be left alone, even if not ideal. There were wedding vows made before witnesses, and those should be honored.
Note that the OT example from Deut 24 deals with a case where a man married a divorced woman. If it were necessary for such marriages to be broken up, the OT law would have instructions for that.
I am satisfied with my chain of thought. Do you find problems with it?
“Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. … Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t let it trouble you–although if you can gain your freedom, do so.”
It is consistent with the character of God’s children to submit to their Father’s will, even when it personally costs them. Jesus innocently died on a cross. Christian slaves did not choose to be slaves, but that was their lot.
No, it doesn’t bring short term benefits, but every price you pay for the sake of God’s kingdom yields a heavenly reward completely worth the cost.
Call it gaming the system – worry less about one’s rights as a Christian; instead look for how to convert one’s suffering and injustice into advancement of God’s kingdom – because God is just, and injustice yields good interest.
Cane,
“Are you saying that the divorce of an unbeliever and an unbeliever-turned-believer is unacceptable? That is not my understanding of 1 Cor. 7:12ff.”
I’m still interested in your answer to this question.
Sir Hamster…you are on point…sir.
Taking your lumps and not shirking one’s comeuppance is part of being not only a man, but a godly man.
We all know that bitches be cray. Nothing to be mad about or hate them for – even when they did us wrong.
Too late to be mad.
God never intended for man to separate what He joined together….so while your ex was certainly not thinking about God and rather looked to the state to separate you…it is still possible in the eyes of God you are married.
BS Earl. I can live with my circumstances, and I will almost certainly stay single the rest of my life, but commanding that as a Biblical requirement is not accurate.
SirHamster,
You didn’t address about what should be done if a man has already remarried.
I do agree with you that divorce is never commanded. But it does happen and we need to think through the implications of what to do when that comes. Paul’s exception does not directly require singleness forever, so why do you not accept that?
Thanks, Pedat.
@BillyS
Thought it was obvious when I argued a man is not supposed to divorce the re-marriage. He should remain in that marriage and not divorce again. Keep the wedding vows he has made.
Not accept what? I was only discussing specific points I quoted and responded to.
@OKRickety
I did answer it. Above I wrote:
This doesn’t work either. If the marriage is false, it is void. Therefore there is no need for a divorce. Why is there a need for everyone here to play ‘capt save a hoe’?
Sexual immorality can happen inside a marriage just as easily as outside, especially for women. This is a green light for immoral women to take advantage of the situation. The marriage laws are bad enough, trying to burden men with having to keep adulterous wives, slippery slop gents. You all keep on doing what you’re doing though, harmony and all that..
Did God join you and your wife?
Women who pretended to be virgins and then were found out not to be were stoned to death in front of their father’s house. No divorce was required.
Never thought I would see the day when cuckoldry was promoted but there we go. An adulterous wife sleeps with other men, she can have children with other men. Stating that the innocent husband must remain married to her and thus take care of any children that she produces is condoning cuckoldry. Try as you might to escape this but you can’t.
Nobody is saying he has to stay married to her…however if God joined them together and he divorces her he doesn’t have justification to remarry until she dies.
Then you guys should be blessing the #metoo movement. You should be embracing the feminist Marriage 2.0 model as it allows Christian husbands to physically feel their comeuppance in jail.
It isn’t stupid, it’s logically consistent. The plain reading of the text is that divorce is not allowed but for unchastity; which includes adultery. Being unchaste isn’t just before marriage, it’s during marriage too, are you seriously suggesting married couples are free to be unchaste during marriage?
This only makes sense if the wife has not committed adultery, if she has done so already, the exception makes sense. A husband cannot make an adulterous wife commit adultery. It’s logically inconsistent…..
To extrapolate your point further, the argument means that every married Christian is free to commit absolutely any sin they want, and their Christian spouse is obligated to remain married to them regardless. Count me out of that arrangement.
I said: “Because a married woman can no longer commit fornication, once she has consummated her marriage.”
feministhater said: Sounds like cuckoldry to me. Sorry, not buying it.
I thought it would be self explanatory that what was fornication before marriage, becomes adultery, a capital offense, after the marriage has been consummated.
Taking back a wife sexually, who has become the wife of another, is a form of incest. Because you and her were one flesh, you are as close of relatives as you can be. So you are no longer able to marry her a second time, because the second time around you are close relatives, in God’s eyes, due to your previous union. I’m not making that up.
If your wife has divorced you, and has committed adultery, I don’t see that God want’s you to be unequally yoked back again with an unbeliever. If you have been loosed, don’t go back into that bondage unequally yoked. Do not be deceived, adulterers have no inheritance in the Kingdom of God, King David was under a sacrificial system, and he made sacrifice for his sin, and God took his illegitimate son too. But, don’t count on Christ being slain a second time for our rebellion. We are not under the old law, we are under a far simpler rule of grace, however God still wants sexual purity in our “temples of the Holy Spirit”. It isn’t too much for Him to ask of us.
1 Corinthians 6:15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid.
Cane,
Sorry. I missed that as it followed “BillyS,…”. It is not clear to me what you believe, and I don’t wish to make further effort. If there was any possibility I might change to your position, that window has now closed. Thanks.
@OK
The discussion on divorce and remarriage is difficult in the details, but it isn’t when you look at the bigger picture. Let’s assume we’re talking about what a never before married modern day christian man in a society where legal divorce is permitted, adultery is not a crime, women have effectively bargained a power position over men in marriage, is to do,
1, don’t marry. it’s the better option if you can control your sexual desire, else…
2. marry and have lots of sex with your wife. If you marry don’t divorce. That requires first faithfulness from both partners, and determination to follow Christ, prayer, and God’s grace, as well as some healthy submission on the wife part.
3, if divorce did happen, don’t remarry until your spouse has died
What this shows is that if you decide to marry you better make sure you marry a reliable virgin submissive christian wife. It’s shame the devil has tricked many into sinful lifestyles to the point it has become almost mission impossible to find such a wife in these societies.
of course reconciliation after divorce should be the first thing to strife for
I think most of you can probably better understand after the discussions in this thread why (proven) adultery was punishable by death in the OT. As death terminates the marriage bond, it effectively answers a lot of what-if situations. And it shows why sexual boundaries should be upheld in society.
@feministhater
Correct. That’s what an annulment is: a declaration that the marriage is void. It didn’t happen.
The need for a divorce is necessary wherever marriage has been a legally recognized arrangement with various benefits and obligations. People who heard that John and Suzy married need to know that John and Suzy are not married and that there are no obligations or benefits between them.
It also makes clear that something was done which should not have been done: Suzy should not have tried to marry under false pretenses. An annulment tells us a marriage didn’t happen. It doesn’t tell us that someone tried to get marriage by deception. If we didn’t have something like a writ of divorce to warn other men away from Suzy the lying harlot, we’d have to invent it.
That’s even more stupid than BillyS’ implication that I’m a pharisee because I agree with the plain reading of the texts in harmony with one another. More below in my response to OKRickety.
@OKRickety
That is almost exactly how the apostles responded (Matt. 19:10 The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.”) so you’re in good company. Me too. That is why I said contemplating this stuff makes my insides curdle and the fact that our spiritual leaders don’t talk about it makes the curdles boil. That’s also why I said that you were prooftexting the Scriptures to get the answer you desire. Because you were and you didn’t want to hear that marriage really is a lifelong obligation; even if you separate and even if the person to whom you are married really is a vile sinner.
As far as the truth of your extrapolation, I suppose it depends on your idea of “free to commit absolutely any sin they want”. Is a man free to murder if he has a good enough plan to get away with it? Of course not. The authorities ought to catch the guy, punish him, and make an example of him. This is where my “curdles boil”: Our leaders let people–predominantly women–get away with murder![1] They even tell them they are right to do so!
We can’t get away from the unfairness of sin. That’s why sin is so awful. A man kills another man and yet the first man lives unless a third man does something about that. What the third man can’t do is bring the second man back from the dead except if he be Jesus Christ. Sin and its consequences can never be made right in this life. The wages of sin really is death.
Even if we were to move back to the laws of the OT with polygyny and putting away and all that stuff, the problem of the unfairness caused by sin is not addressed. Christ is king of women too, and they did not have those options. That’s not to say that we ought to make the mistake of trying to equalize everything, but to demonstrate that God is aware that we are sinful people amid other sinful people and so often find ourselves in grossly unfair circumstances; yet we are to be content with our minds set on Christ, and the eternal prize.
[1]Here I am talking about divorce, but they absolve women of actual murder (abortion) as well.
@OKRickety, Feministhater & BillyS
Let’s look at it from your perspective that it’s acceptable for a Christian to divorce an adulterer and then remarry. We all agree that adultery is awful and destructive and disgusting…all that stuff. What your mixed-up interpretation adds is that you are ultimately fine with the adultery as long as you are legally allowed to have sex with somebody else later. That’s it. That’s all you get from it in our modern age. The courts will still favor her when it comes to kids and money and your whole life. What you’re fighting for is an interpretation of Scripture that allows you to put yourself back at the same risk while you get your willy wet. And don’t forget that only lasts as long as the new trick wants, as well. Otherwise you’re just a marital-rapist. That’s your big comeuppance for the former wife’s adultery…
Nah, that’s pure bunk. This ‘interpretation’ has been pretty standard for hundreds, even thousands of years..The adultery has already been committed. You refuse to see that the exception of ‘unchastity’ therefore applies.
Calling things ‘stupid’ that obviously put a thorn in your interpretation is a cowards way out. It was you who stated that unchastity only applies to a woman who lied about being a virgin on marriage. I merely pointed out that unchastity covers those in marriage and those outside of it. This is not ‘stupid’ it is logical. If we take you at your word then unchastity is an impossibility for those in marriage hence the question. If you admit that people in marriage can also be unchaste then the exception applies to them as well. You cannot have it both ways.
I’m sorry, you’re being logically inconsistent.
One does not seek to place themselves in grossly unfair circumstances. You outline marriage as a grossly unfair contract and therefore it should not be entered into by any sane man. You’re worried about marriage rates, yes? You’re worried that the reward isn’t worth the risk, yes? You’re worried about male headship within marriage? Well then, go ahead and make more unrealistic demands of men, that’s sure to work..
Once again, you cannot have it both ways. If an annulment voids a marriage, the contract is never seen to have taken place. Therefore, divorce is not required as divorce is the break-up of a contract, not the voiding of it. Divorce only applies to those marriages that are valid. This would obviously not include marriages that took place based on an obvious lie, i.e lying about virginity.
Furthermore, you’re getting stuck in legalese that simply wasn’t the case when Jesus or Paul spoke about marriage. The marriage license did not exist, the state wasn’t nearly so involved, no family court judges, no child support models, no alimony, none of that existed. Divorce was merely a piece of parchment handed to the woman to end the marriage.
@Feministhater
You haven’t tried to understand my argument so I won’t waste my time.
One thought – Christ seems to have regarded moichea and porneia as distinct sins. He lists them separately. If moichea was just a subspecies of porneia he would have only listed porneia.
@Bruce – Would he? I used to consider that too. Most commentators believe adultery is included fornication, not the other way around. So fornication includes things just than adultery.
Quick question for those who hold divorce and remarriage are never allowed. Are you all Catholic or did you come to this from the reading of the NT? Just curious…
BTW, you may look at the Greek Orthodox policy on divorce and remarriage I posted above. It may be something all Christian churches should look into as a solution.
DC,
I am Anglican (like Cane I think). I came to this conclusion on my own – I never had an Anglican Bishop teach me one way or the other and I never asked them.
I believe the EO understanding is the same as the Catholics however they allow people to live in a state of adultery (as a pastoral concession) by living in a state of constant penance over the fact that they are coming adultery – I do not agree with this either.
BTW, an “annulment” is properly speaking a “declaration of nullity”, that is, a legal verdict by canon law experts that marriage is did not take place. It is not an infallible judgement and is only give moral e.g. actionable certitude not absolute certitude. This is in Catholic theology, I don’t know if there are Protestant churches that use annulment. Just added for clarity based on an argument above.
@ Damn Crackers
Yes, the problem of pedophile priests was caused by the Catholic Church’s un-Biblical requirement for clergymen to remain celibate, but there’s nothing “modern” about the problem. The celibacy requirement provided cover for predatory homosexuals for centuries, and will continue to do so for as long as the Catholic Church maintains it.
Whatever you think of it, requirements for priestly celibacy date back to at least AD 300-ish.
Bruce,
I think almost all Greek scholars agree that moichea (adultery) is included in porneia (fornication, sexual immorality, unchasteness). Put another way, porneia is a grouping of sins, and moichea is a specific sin that is part of porneia. That is, these are not “distinct sins”.
By the way, porneia is not “fornication” as it is defined today (sex outside of marriage), but many sins of sexual infidelity (as I understand it, specifically those involving intercourse, including bestiality, homosexuality, and, yes, adultery).
If Jesus had meant to say “except for adultery”, don’t you think He would have used moichea instead of porneia? He clearly knew both words. He used two different words in two different places to express different concepts.
Bruce,
But the Anglicans didn’t continue that requirement when they separated from the Roman Catholic church, did they?
Says the man who called the argument of others ‘stupid’.
You chose the word chastity. Chastity includes being unfaithful in marriage, it isn’t merely being a non-virgin and lying about it to get married. Thus the exception applies when a spouse commits adultery.
If you applied this to any other contractual arrangement, people would rightly scoff at the absurdity. Imagine your business partner making off with all the money from loans taken to start the business and leaving you to pay it off…. then coming back 20 years later after all the money is gone and you’ve paid the debt off, only to ask you once again to start another venture with him… yeah, didn’t think so, buddy. Oh, but he’s reformed now and has repented.. oh, what’s that you say? You would expect him to pay back you back and some extra for pain and suffering and not merely accept his repentance at face value, my, my, hypocritical stance…
Sorry, that should be unchastity includes being unfaithful in marriage…
@ Bruce
Requirements of priestly celibacy violate the Apostle Paul’s requirements for Church leaders spelled out in his letters to Timothy and Titus. That’s what matters most. That priestly celibacy has provided cover for predatory homosexuals for centuries also matters.
@ Oscar and OKRickey,
My only intention was to disagree with the date given for priestly celibacy (1000 years after the Catholic Church was founded).
@ BillyS
How’d that work out for David and Michal?
OKRickety
“If Jesus had meant to say “except for adultery”, don’t you think He would have used moichea instead of porneia? He clearly knew both words. He used two different words in two different places to express different concepts.”
Yes, I guess that’s my point. He distinguished between adultery and porneia e.g. his list of sins in Matthew 15:19. So it seems the two sins were different in Matthew/Mark/Jesus’ usage. Or else listing porneia would cover adultery – why distinguish between the two if one covers the other.
It has been suggested that porneia in Matt 19:9 referred to the practice of concubinage and the point was to distinguish between concubinage and Christian marriage – a wife cannot be put away.
I agree with Cane, the gospels/epistles should be harmonized, Mark, Luke and Paul do not give the so called exception and from what I can tell this was the understanding of the early Church fathers.
I don’t believe the EO allows shacking up; you are talking about a re-marriage as a state of adultery?
Also it is argued that the divorce for adultery view would mean Jesus took the same position (or more relaxed) as Rabbi Shammai which isn’t what the disciples reaction to Jesus’ teaching suggests. Jesus always called to a higher standard.
Scott is free to correct. I believe in EO you can be divorced and remarried up to three times. Since marriage is one of the seven sacraments it cannot be undone any more than someone can be unbaptized. So the allowance of up to two divorces and three marriages is a “pastoral” concession e.g. it is supposed to be “merciful”. This is what liberal/progressive Catholics are trying to change these days.
So the 2nd and 3rd marriage are supposed to be lived in a constant state of penance for the sin. If I am wrong then I’m sorry to the EO for the mistake.
Celibacy is the reason for pedophilia & homosexuality?
C’mon Oscar…that’s certainly not reasonable. What if I told you things like lust are the reason…remember those things called ‘sin’. Just because a person isn’t married doesn’t mean they still don’t commit sexual sins.
If celibacy was the reason for child/teen diddlers….how come we keeps seeing married (usually female) teachers in public schools doing the same thing?
What is the Anglican view of dealing with this? Attempt to unwind/rewind to original marriage, or simply separate?
@Bruce – “Also it is argued that the divorce for adultery view would mean Jesus took the same position (or more relaxed) as Rabbi Shammai which isn’t what the disciples reaction to Jesus’ teaching suggests.”
No, the Rabbi Shammai definition of divorce was that one could get divorced for “any reason”; this was the position that Jesus was arguing against.
For a long period of time, there was a solution for men who could not be chaste but could not remarry – concubines and whores. Brothels were found in most towns before and after the medieval period. The crackdown on concubines was only cracked down on in the late medieval period. There were more prostitutes than Cardinals in the Vatican during the time of Luther.
Was it sinful? Yup. But, remember the words of St. Augustine via St. Thomas Aquinas –
“…those who are in authority, rightly tolerate certain evils, lest certain goods be lost, or certain greater evils be incurred: thus Augustine says (De Ordine ii.4): “If you do away with harlots, the world will be convulsed with lust.” (ST II-II, q. 10, a. 11)
@ Earl
No, Earl. That’s not what I wrote. Please don’t play the straw man game. It’s tedious, boring, and irritating. I expect better from you.
What I wrote is that the Catholic Church’s un-Biblical requirement for priestly celibacy provided cover for homosexual predators. It always has, it still does, and it will continue to do so for as long as it exists.
Do you deny that some homosexual predators choose the priesthood precisely because it provides them with cover and victims?
I’m sorry. The “any cause” position was argued by Rabbi Hillel.
I deny what that has to do with the requirement of celibacy.
C’mon Oscar you knew exactly where you were going with the celibacy argument otherwise you wouldn’t have brought it up.
@DC : “Are you all Catholic or did you come to this from the reading of the NT?”
Just reading the NT. Then the church fathers. And Luther. Then the books. Then the internet discussions. Then the different translations. Then the Greek. More discussions. A lot of prayer. I actually had interaction with Leslie McFall before his untimely death (he was no RC). It’s a pity he was not able to finish his E-Book on divorce and remarriage. And I still consider that I do not have a full understanding.
But even given my limited understanding, it’s clear for everyone what the intention should be: marriage till death do us part. The discussions are either typically about very complex situations, or people just want to justify their own bad choices by finding someone who agrees with them.
@ earl
It has everything to do with the un-Biblical celibacy requirement. It gives the homosexual predator a built-in reason (cover) for why he’s not married. Do you deny that is true?
Now you’re playing the mind-reading game. Seriously, man, I expect that from a few others here, but coming from you, it’s disappointing. I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Bruce,
Why list both? Perhaps to make certain that adultery is not conveniently forgotten to be part of the group? Having seen confusion by some about the use of both words in both Matt. 5:32 and Matt. 19:9, I thought that might be why you made the statement.
Porneia referring to concubinage? That seems to be a minority view espoused by a Roman Catholic. I am amazed at the efforts that have been made to suppose that this word means something other than a group of sexual sins involving physical, sexual intercourse.
I do…otherwise you could make that assumption about all unmarried gents. Are we all covering some homo predication in your mind?
You are trying to paint the celibacy requirement as the reason why the homosexual predator is in the priesthood. It’s not. They specifically went in there with the intent of destroying the church from within.
And I might add it always feels wrong to me when I encounter remarried divorced people. And I mean that literally; somehow in my inner self I feel that it is not right, even though my ratio and my emotions would in some instances wish it was allowed for people to remarry.
@earl: “why the homosexual predator is in the priesthood. It’s not. They specifically went in there with the intent of destroying the church from within.”
That’s bollocks.
BTW…it’s not unBiblical either…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clerical_celibacy_(Catholic_Church)
What the homo’s problem is they aren’t chaste like Christ.
No, it’s not.
https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/news-episcopal-sodomy-communist-homosexual-infiltrators
@ earl
That’s a complete non-sequitur, the type of which I’m accustomed to observing in feminists, but again, is disappointing coming from you. It does not follow that, because homosexual predators seek some kind of cover, that it’s therefore true that all men who are unmarried are homosexual predators.
Do homosexual predators normally seek out positions that provide them with cover and opportunity?
It’s interesting to contrast the attitudes of some here towards child molestation claims based on boy vs. girl victims.
“Half-a-BILLION dollars was awarded to the ‘victims’ of this Nassar guy. I didn’t follow the case closely, but recall reading that many of his ‘victims’ returned to him scores of times, to be molested and raped, over and over again. Obviously, all of them were powerless to refuse to see him (after the first molestation) or to find any alternate avenue to end their repeated rapes. Apparently Mr. Nasser was so dominating, so terrifying, that these females couldn’t help but return to him, again and again. Hm.
Sorry, I’ve seen how fifteen or sixteen y.o. females behave in the U.S. I do not doubt that Nasser did what he was accused of. What I doubt is the expressed helplessness of these many ‘victims’, particularly when followed-up by 500 million dollars in payment for their ‘completely ruined lives’. Sounds more like whore-payoffs to me. Smells like Sisterhood.”
https://dalrock.wordpress.com/2018/05/30/hysteria-grips-man-up-headquarters/#comment-274214
@ Sirhamster,
“What is the Anglican view of dealing with this? Attempt to unwind/rewind to original marriage, or simply separate?”
I honestly do not know – I have seen an example of a divorced and remarried Anglican Bishop.
OKRickey,
I guess the word porneia doesn’t really occur many times in the NT. In John Chapter 8, some of the disciples (who I think left Jesus) suggest that the meaning is associated with bastardy – they are verbally sparring with Jesus and imply that he is a bastard (by a Samaritan??). I don’t know if this implies a definition of “concubinage” or “pre-marital sex.”
‘Do homosexual predators normally seek out positions that provide them with cover and opportunity?’
Do heterosexual ones seek out positions like that too for those reasons?
I wouldn’t be butting heads against you on this if you didn’t mention the ‘celibacy’ part. As if that had anything to do with this.
@ earl
Yes. That’s why some of them go after single moms.
I answered your question, even though you evaded mine. Now, please answer my question. Do homosexual predators normally seek out positions that provide them with cover and opportunity?