THE CATACOMBS
You are here: Home
> Catacombs > Articles
On translating "put
away" as "divorced"
In the ISV's rendering of
Matthew 5:32, I am curious about the words translated in this verse as all
forms of the word 'divorce'. Is it the word sometimes known as simply 'put
away' without a certificate of divorce, or what we laypeople may think of as
completely divorced (legally and scripturally)?
In a word,
"No." The term of art used in Matthew 5:32 was a Greek word employed in
that language as the Hebrew equivalent to the word for divorce. The text
of the ISV for Matthew 5:31-32 reads:
31“It
was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife must give her a written notice
of divorce.’ 32But I say to you, any man who
divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, causes her to commit
adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
Note that
the citation in verse 31 is a direct quote from Deuteronomy 24:1,3. Verse
31 affirms the necessity of issuing a certificate of divorce, an action
which by definition requires the divorcing be based on grounds listed in
the Torah, though we note in other NT passages that Jesus reminded his
hearers that this was permitted because people's hearts were hard.
In verse 32
Jesus makes the prescription even more restrictive by saying that any
putting away (with or without what you're calling being "completely
divorced (legally and scripturally)" outside of the cause (logos,
the "matter") of fornication causes her to commit adultery. The man who
marries such a woman, says verse 32, then commits adultery. Personally, I
side with John Piper (see below) that the word fornication is a reference
to pre-marital (but post-engagement) fornication, and should be viewed
from the context of Joseph's decision to put away his wife (same word used
in Matthew 5:32) righteously during their engagement period on the
(supposed) grounds of fornication. As Piper says:
I suppose
there will always be disagreement about the meaning of the “exception
clause” in Matthew 19:9 (“Whoever divorces his wife, except for
sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery”).
I have argued elsewhere
that it refers to fornication during betrothal and means that “divorce”
during betrothal would be permissible if one of the partners had
committed fornication against the other.
Hence the paraphrase of Matthew 19:9 would be, “Whoever divorces his
wife and marries another, commits adultery—and I am excluding here
the matter of fornication during engagement, as in the case of what
Joseph thought Mary had done, and was thus about to divorce her.”
It is significant that only Matthew has the exception clause (“except
for fornication,” 5:32; 19:9) and only Matthew records Joseph’s
intention to “divorce” (apolusai) Mary justly (dikaios)
during their betrothal.
One advantage of this interpretation is that the words of Jesus in
Matthew 19:9 are in complete harmony with his words in Mark 10:11-12
where there is no exception mentioned (“Whoever divorces his wife and
marries another commits adultery against her, and if she divorces her
husband and marries another, she commits adultery”). And they are in
harmony with Luke 16:18 where there is no exception mentioned (“Everyone
who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who
marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery”).
Click here for the URL to this essay. At any rate, it seems to me that
the plain meaning of what Jesus commanded for his disciples rejected
what Moses commanded (see Mark 10:5) or permitted (see Matthew 19:8)
in the passage cited from Deuteronomy 24. His was a higher standard.
My deep heart's desire is to be true to the scriptures and the heart and
mind of God in all matters, including this one, avoiding both intense
legality and liberal dismissal of Biblical truth.
It is my
(Dr. Welty's) sad experience in dealing with single parents (I taught for
a number of years in the Single Parents Fellowship of Chuck Swindoll's
First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton) that what some call "intense
legality" is merely a disavowal of following the NT prescriptions so they
can have their own way in the matter and "liberal dismissal" is
all-too-often an attempt to walk around the implications of the text. Most
of the people I met were looking for someone to legitimize their
separations, which were usually (not always) based on a sense of not
having been honored enough in the marriage. Given what you've said above,
we do have better hopes of you, though.
I am not by any
means seeking to involve any of your staff in any proof-texting effort or
theological debate. I am simply very interested in your expert knowledge and
opinions on this verse's interpretation, and possibly related others if you
have the time and/or staff availability.
Uh, okay. We don't have a
large staff, but you may do well to visit
John Piper's web page on the subject, and read what's written there.
Some of these essays are 20 years old. Others were posted in late 2007.
They're all useful. Perhaps it might be best to sum up here by citing
Piper's comment that:
The world
we live in needs to see a church that is so satisfied in Christ that its
marriages are not abandoned for something as amorphous as “emotional
neglect.” The deepest meaning of marriage is to display the
covenant-keeping faithfulness of Christ and his church (Ephesians 5:25).
And Christ will never divorce his wife and take another.
In the long haul of life,
Piper's last comment in the quote above reminds us of the real standard
for God's people. Too many evange-lites today are looking for the quickest
reason why they don't have to obey the high standards of the Christ. I,
for one, decline to be one of these folks, especially in light of the
passage in Revelation 3 where, concerning a church leader like to these,
Jesus once rebuked the pastor with the warning words, "I will vomit you
out of my mouth."
William Welty, Ph.D.
The ISV Foundation
|
