A Few Thoughts on Divorce from the Sermon on the Mount

Here is a brief follow up on the passage I mentioned last week. We didn’t have time to get to it in the sermon, so I wanted to offer a brief explanation for how it fits into the narrative and structure of the Sermon on the Mount. 

Here is a link to the sermon I preached on the passages directly before this one: https://lifepoint.be/sermons/20210131 

Here is the passage: Matthew 5:31-32

31 “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

This passage may appear random in the flow of the Sermon on the Mount. However, it’s important not to separate Jesus’ words here from the proceeding section speaking about the 7th commandment (“You shall not commit adultery”). Remember that the verses and section headings in our modern Bibles were not there when Matthew first put pen to paper (or papyrus?). So the separation of this section (vs. 31-32) from the previous (vs. 27-30) might seem more significant to us compared to what Matthew intended. 

Instead of writing a long exposé detailing Jesus’ entire theology of divorce, I want to just discuss the relevance of this teaching here to the overall theme of the Sermon on the Mount. Just like the surrounding passages, this section of the sermon is illustrating that Jesus requires more than mere performative righteousness from His people. He requires holistic righteousness in both our hearts and actions. 

Specifically, this teaching on divorce is an extension of Jesus’ elaboration on the ways one might commit adultery in their heart (vs. 28). Jesus references Deuteronomy 24:1-4, which was a passage the Pharisees were abusing for the sake of gratifying the sinful desires behind their façade of holiness. The idea of the passage was to protect the sanctity of marriage by making divorce a difficult process, something Jesus echos in this section of the Sermon. 

The passage in Deuteronomy, as well as Matthew 19:3-12, concur with Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount that God never intended for the marriage covenant to be broken. And if it is broken, there needs to be a specific reason why. Jesus says in Matthew 5 that “sexual immorality” (Greek: porneia, meaning specifically fornication) is an acceptable grounds for divorce, since the offending party has broken the conditions of the marital covenant. 

This is relevant to Jesus’ teaching about adultery here because He says that a divorced person who remarries “commits adultery.” Now, this is not the case for those people who were divorced after marital infidelity (since Jesus makes an exception for that situation). A divorce that results from “hardness of heart” (Matt 19:8) does not actually nullify the conditions of the marital covenant in God’s eyes; therefore, to divorce and remarry is to “commit adultery” since the previous marital covenant still stands. 

So, if a husband and wife get divorced because they “fell out of love” or they were experiencing “irreconcilable differences,” this doesn’t actually nullify their marriage in God’s eyes, since it is God who joined them together (Matthew 19:6). So to divorce and remarry is to transgress the original marital covenant, because their divorce was not valid. However, if someone has already divorced and remarried, they have entered into a new marital covenant, to which they must now be faithful. 

All this is to say that God loves marriage and hates divorce (Malachi 2:16). For the people of God, who are called to live lives of holistic righteousness, divorce is not something to be treated with flippancy and haste. Genuine righteousness always seeks reconciliation when wronged (Matthew 5:39), and is compelled to model God’s heart by valuing and protecting marriage at all costs. 

Unlike the Pharisees—who thought divorce was a license to get rid of their wives for any reason—Christians follow God’s original, good design for marriage (Genesis 1:27; 2:24) and practice true righteousness by displaying commitment, faithfulness, and love toward their spouses throughout their lives. 

Resources for further reading: 

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/divorce-and-remarriage/ (English)

https://evangile21.thegospelcoalition.org/article/e21-repond-peut-on-se-remarier-apres-un-divorce/ (French)