Original Meaning
Righteousness in the Face of Divorce (24:1–4)
FOLLOWING LONGSTANDING RABBINIC TRADITION and the question put to Jesus in Matthew 19:7,1 some argue that Deuteronomy 24:1b serves not just as a description of divorce procedures but as a ruling on the matter.2 But several factors raise doubts about this interpretation. (1) Based on ancient Near Eastern divorce laws, it should then have included financial stipulations to the divorce, particularly a statement of the husband’s obligations to repay the dowry or the conditions under which he would have been exempt.3
(2) Later use of a prior text is not determinative for the contextual meaning of the earlier text.4 In fact, Jesus disputed the Pharisees’ reading of the text. That Moses permitted divorce may simply mean that he left customary procedures in place; he was not making a (new) ruling on this matter.
(3) Although the first husband receives more attention, our text presents the two men in the woman’s life as parallel cases (vv. 1b, 3). The repetition of the last three lines in verses 1b and 3 suggests the preceding actions are equivalent, which means that if we interpret the second series conditionally, the first is neither a command nor permission.5
(4) The structural parallels between 21:10–14 and this text offer clues on how to interpret this text. Both texts contemplate situations in which a woman is vulnerable to abuse within a marital relationship, and both seek to protect the dignity of a woman who has been rejected by her husband. On this analogy, our text is not intended as a law on divorce but as a prohibition on remarriage,6 the primary concern being to protect wives from abuse by men, specifically a first husband. Moses does so by reiterating existing procedures for releasing wives from the bonds of marriage and insisting that when a husband divorces his wife, he relinquishes his authority over her. The text follows common diagnostic procedure, reflected in the five headings below.
The problem (v. 1a–c). The opening line suggests the marriage is off to a normal start. However, the grammar7 signals a complication: the woman did not find grace in the eyes of her husband. While most interpreters try to establish a flaw in the woman that provoked this response, the clause actually exposes a flaw in the man.8 Verse 1 describes a reciprocally disappointing situation: the woman is disappointed because of what she does not find in her husband—grace; the man is disappointed because of something he found in the woman. The text identifies her problem with a vague expression: “something indecent” (NIV).
Opinions on the meaning of this phrase range from “anything at all,”9 to adultery,10 to a physical defect.11 Literally, ʿerwat dābār means “nakedness of a thing.” The proximity of this statement to Deut. 23:14[15], the only other place where this phrase occurs, invites the reader to link these two texts. In the earlier passage ʿerwat dābār refers to unburied human excrement, which defiles the Israelite military camp. Obviously defecation is not an immoral act. Since ʿerwâ usually involves the genitals (Ex. 20:26; cf. 28:42), and since this is the woman’s problem, the expression is best interpreted as some menstrual irregularity (cf. Mark 5:25–34). The result is a constant state of impurity, curtailing many normal marital activities (cf. Lev. 12:2–8) and rendering her incapable of bearing children. The husband may have learned of her condition after he married her and sought to consummate the marriage. But instead of responding with compassion, he divorced her.
The customary response (v. 1b). Lacking the decency to stand by his wife, the husband initiates divorce procedures. The three-step process summarized in verse 1b was intended not only to free a husband from an undesirable marriage, but also to protect the well-being of his wife. The husband would first write for his wife a certificate of divorce,12 a document that officially severed the marital bond.13 Then, the husband would place the certificate in the hands of the woman. The certificate was vital for the woman, especially if the document relinquished the husband’s rights to her and her dowry and authorized her to return to her family of origin or to marry another man. From the man’s perspective, the record of the returned dowry would prevent the woman’s family from making further claims against him.14 Finally, the husband would expel the woman from his house.15
The complication (vv. 2–3). In describing the results of the divorce proceedings, Moses imagines two developments that could complicate the woman’s life. (1) A second husband’s disposition toward her may change to rejection. In divorcing her, the second husband follows the same procedures as the first, freeing her to return home to her family or to remarry. (2) Her second husband dies. As in most cultures, the death of a spouse frees a person to remarry. Since widows were economically vulnerable unless a woman was independently wealthy, it would have been in her best interest to remarry, especially if she did not have grown sons.
The proscription (v. 4). Moses declares that if the woman’s second husband divorces her or he dies, the original husband may not change his mind and remarry his wife. While scholars have suggested a variety of reasons for denying him the right to remarry her,16 if ʿerwat dâbâr involves a physical rather than moral problem, the prohibition sought to protect the woman from further abuse from her first husband. The phrase “after she has been defiled” deflects moral accountability away from the woman either to an impersonal physical problem or to someone else.17
As in Deuteronomy 21:14, the issue is the degradation of the woman. The man has already degraded her, first by refusing to be gracious to a needy spouse ritually defiled through no fault of her own, and second, by publicizing her personal issue through the divorce proceedings. The preposition “after” suggests the defilement derives not from remarriage to her former husband but from previous events. Even if he regrets having divorced her earlier, she must be protected from further degradation by the man who had forfeited his right to her.
The rationale (v. 4b). Moses justifies prohibiting the remarriage of a woman to her first husband by declaring such an act “detestable” in Yahweh’s sight.18 Furthermore, remarriage to the first husband would bring sin on the land. The shift to second person reminds the people that they are responsible for maintaining covenantal standards of righteousness (cf. 16:20). If they allow a man to remarry his former wife after she has been married to another, they would bring guilt not only on themselves, but also on the land they have received from Yahweh.
Bridging Contexts
DIVORCE IN SCRIPTURE. SINCE verses 1–4 contain the only explicit instructions on divorce in the Torah, it is important to recognize what this text says and what it does not say. (1) It deals only with the case of divorce initiated by the husband. (2) It demonstrates that in Israel divorce belonged to the realm of internal family law rather than the public courts.20 (3) It identifies the motivation behind divorce in only the vaguest of terms: the husband has found ʿerwat dābār in his wife, which probably involves a physical rather than a moral problem. (4) The passage does not seek to regulate divorce per se, but the conduct of the husband after the divorce has occurred. Having humiliated his wife by forcing her to declare herself unclean, he may not reclaim her if she has remarried and then loses her second husband through divorce or death. (5) The legislation seeks to protect the woman by requiring the husband to produce a severance document as legal proof for the dissolution of the marriage. Without this document he could demand her back at any time, and if she would remarry he could accuse her of adultery.21 (6) While the text provides no moral or theological justification for divorce, it recognizes that divorce was tolerated in ancient Israel as a legal reality. But legal recognition and moral justification are two different issues.
Outside this text, evidence for Israel’s disposition toward divorce is sketchy. For humanitarian reasons, Exodus 21:10–11 and Deuteronomy 21:10–14 recognize that releasing a slave-wife or captive woman whom an Israelite warrior had married was preferable to a man refusing to fulfill his marital duties. Presumably as the lesser of two evils, in Genesis 21:8–14 God directed Abraham to send away his slave-wife Hagar. Apart from this episode Old Testament narratives provide few clues on whether or not Israelites adhered to the principles underlying marriage and divorce found here. They report husbands abandoning their wives temporarily (Judg. 14:19–15:8) and wives/concubines abandoning their husbands (Judg. 19), but they do not record a single instance of divorce initiated by a husband or wife until after the exile. According to Ezra 9–10, Ezra ordered the Jews of postexilic Jerusalem to divorce their pagan wives, because these marriages threatened the integrity of the “holy seed.”
The postexilic prophet Malachi had such marriages in mind when he condemned his male contemporaries for marrying “the daughters of a foreign god” (i.e., pagans; Mal. 2:11). But then he accused them of “breaking faith” (beged) against their wives for divorcing them (2:13–16). While the meaning of “I hate divorce” (v. 16) is clear, the underlying Hebrew is vague and could just as well be rendered “[he who] hates [and] divorces [his wife].”22 In the combination of śānēʾ (“to hate”) and ṣallaḥ (“to send away/divorce”), we hear echoes of Deuteronomy 24:1–4. Moses permitted divorce as a social reality, but he realized the potential for abuse, especially of women, inherent even in customs that had evolved in Israel. Malachi was more forthright, castigating the men of his time for their treacherous betrayal of their wives and citing the high divorce rate as evidence of the absence of fundamental piety and fear of Yahweh.
The subject of divorce surfaces frequently in the Prophets, but primarily as a metaphor of the rupture in the relationship between Yahweh and Israel. Hosea develops the motif most dramatically. His marriage to Gomer and subsequent loss of her serve as a picture of Yahweh’s marriage with Israel. Because of the nation’s infidelity and adulteries in going after other gods, Yahweh stifles his compassion and divorces her (2:1–13[3–15]). However, he takes her back, and the marriage flourishes (2:16–25[14–23]). Apart from the sequence of marriage–divorce–remarriage, Hosea’s metaphorical picture differs fundamentally from the situation envisaged by Moses in Deuteronomy 24:1–5:
Feature | Literal Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage in Deuteronomy 24:1–4 | Metaphorical Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage in Hosea 1–3 |
Disposition of husband to the marriage | Despite having agreed to the marriage, when the time came to consummate it, he changed his mind. | Having promised to the ancestors to enter into covenant relationship with Israel, Yahweh sealed the covenant at Sinai. |
Condition of the wife | Physically flawed but morally innocent. | Physically fine but morally flawed. |
Disposition of the husband to the wife | Totally lacking in grace. | Lavish in his outpouring of grace before and after the marriage. |
Cause of the divorce | The husband’s hardness of heart. | The wife’s infidelity and adulterous conduct. |
Time of the divorce | Before the marriage was consummated. | Centuries after the marriage was sealed. |
Sequel to the divorce | Remarriage to another man. | No remarriage; reduced to status of slave on the auction block, but rescued by husband. |
Possibility of remarriage | Remarriage to original husband denied. | Remarriage to original husband confirmed. |
Yahweh’s questions in Jeremiah 3:1 exhibit the clearest echoes of Deuteronomy 24:1–4:
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 return to me?
Remarkably, in the utterances that follow Yahweh invites Israel and Judah back. As in the case of Hosea, the motif of marriage–divorce–remarriage serves as a rhetorical device to wake up the people to their own infidelities. At Sinai Yahweh had bound himself eternally to Israel in a covenant relationship, from which there would be no divorce. Many interpret his abandonment of the land and the exile of the people in 586 BC as evidence of a final divorce—the covenant has been revoked. However, Leviticus 26:44–45 and Deuteronomy 4:29–31 and 30:1–10 declare that the judgment could never be the last word. Even before the people were in the land, Moses anticipated a future rupture of Yahweh’s relationship with his people, but he also knew the promised blessings that were fundamental to the marriage contract would be suspended and replaced by divine wrath. But this marriage would not end in divorce. One day estranged husband and wife would be reconciled.
In Matthew 5:31–32 we observe a reflection of early rabbinic interpretation of Deuteronomy 24:1–2. According to the Mishnah the rabbinic schools of Shammai and Hillel offered narrow and broad interpretations respectively of Deuteronomy 24:1–4:
The school of Shammai say: A man may not divorce his wife unless he has found unchastity in her, for it is written, Because he hath found in her indecency in anything.
And the school of Hillel say: [He may divorce her] even if she spoiled a dish for him, for it is written, Because he hath found in her indecency in anything. R. Akiba says: Even if he found another fairer than she, for it is written, And it shall be if she find no favour in his eyes. . . . (Giṭṭin 9:10).23
Jesus’ interpretation follows the narrower view of Shammai. Indeed, he sets the bar even higher than Deuteronomy 24:1–4, transforming Moses’ iteration of a customary provision of a certificate of divorce into a virtual command and restricting legitimate cause for divorce to porneia (“marital unfaithfulness”; lit., “sexual immorality”; see also Matt. 19:8–9). Furthermore, he cautions men not to divorce their wives for any other reasons, for in so doing they become responsible for their wives’ subsequent adultery, which is what happens when men divorce innocent women and then the latter remarry.
Jesus offered this interpretation in the broader context of the Sermon on the Mount, which, like Yahweh’s revelation to Israel at Sinai, functions as a covenantal constitutional document governing his relationship with his followers. However, his utterances on divorce and remarriage in Matthew 19:3–9 (//Mark 10:2–12) represent his response to a challenge from the Pharisees. Here he reiterates what he had said earlier, but he also emphasizes that Moses’ statements on divorce reflect legally permissible procedures, necessitated by the hardness of human hearts.24 Moses’ instructions were intended to secure the well-being of women in the face of illegitimate divorce. Jesus declares that the provision itself represents a response to a culture that has departed from the divine ideal as reflected in the order of creation. Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 assume that God joins husband and wife together, and that no one may interfere with that union.
The ideals expressed by Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:8–16 are equally high. He virtually excludes legitimate divorce for Christians, declaring that wives should not leave their husbands (v. 10) and husbands should not send their wives away (i.e., divorce them; v. 12). But if a woman abandons her husband, she is not to remarry but to continue to seek reconciliation with him (v. 11). The only context in which a Christian might consider divorce is when one of the parties in the marriage is converted to faith in Christ. Even then the believer may not initiate divorce, for it is hoped that through his/her piety the unbelieving spouse might come to faith (vv. 13–14). But if the unbeliever seeks divorce, the believer may acquiesce, in which case he/she is free to remarry.
Contemporary Significance
MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE FOR Christians. According to research into marital patterns in the United States, the divorce rate among professing Christians in some parts of the country is actually higher than among the population as a whole.25 What can Deuteronomy 24:1–4 teach us that would help us recover a biblical view of marriage and divorce? Here are a few suggestions.
(1) Stable marriages do not just happen; they take effort and must be built on solid foundations. Deuteronomy 24:5 teaches that when people marry, outside responsibilities and distractions should be reduced to a minimum. While a two-week honeymoon offers hope for a good start to the marriage, it is insufficient to prepare for a life of married bliss.
(2) Because the health of a community depends on the health of marriages, support for newlyweds should be a communal matter. This would mean not only offering communal assistance for getting the marriage off the ground, but also discouraging newlyweds from taking on responsibilities in the church for a specified period—Moses suggests a year.
(3) Because no partners in a marriage are perfect, the health of the marriage requires spouses to be extremely and persistently gracious in responding to the other person’s faults. What stressed people need is grace in the eyes of the Lord and in the eyes of their spouses.
(4) Because of the propensity for men to run roughshod over their wives, the church needs to establish specific principles and procedures to ensure that within the context of divorce and remarriage, the welfare of women is protected.
(5) Divorce never happens without violation of the divine ideal and without sin. Divorce arises from hard hearts and represents a final declaration of failure in the most fundamental of human institutions. The culture of divorce in the West offers Christians an extraordinary opportunity to be countercultural. To the extent that in these matters we have behaved like the world, we must repent or face the prospect of God’s wrath.26 To the extent that we model biblical ideals of marriage, we declare to the world the kind of relationship they may enjoy with God through Jesus Christ, the self-sacrificing head and husband of the church.
Original Meaning
Righteousness in the Face of a Call to Arms (24:5)
THOUGH VERSE 5 SEEMS more at home with earlier war texts, its placement here and its principal concern suggest it belongs to the complex of “family instructions.” This text assumes a man has taken a wife but only recently. The concern here is securing the health of any newly established household. A man who has just taken his bride is exempt from military duty (cf. 20:7) and from all outside responsibilities. The awkward clause “have any other duty laid on him” refers to duties that might be imposed on him for the good of the community. He must invest his energies in establishing solid economic and social foundations for his household. Indeed, the exemptions are to apply for one full year.19
The verse ends with a remarkable rationale: husbands of new brides are exempt from all communal obligations so they may devote themselves to the happiness of their wives. With keen pastoral insight Moses has painted a picture of marriage that contrasts sharply with that portrayed in verses 1–4. Whereas the two husbands had caused their wife extreme stress, a husband is to pursue righteousness by bringing joy to his wife.
Bridging Contexts
DIVORCE IN SCRIPTURE. SINCE verses 1–4 contain the only explicit instructions on divorce in the Torah, it is important to recognize what this text says and what it does not say. (1) It deals only with the case of divorce initiated by the husband. (2) It demonstrates that in Israel divorce belonged to the realm of internal family law rather than the public courts.20 (3) It identifies the motivation behind divorce in only the vaguest of terms: the husband has found ʿerwat dābār in his wife, which probably involves a physical rather than a moral problem. (4) The passage does not seek to regulate divorce per se, but the conduct of the husband after the divorce has occurred. Having humiliated his wife by forcing her to declare herself unclean, he may not reclaim her if she has remarried and then loses her second husband through divorce or death. (5) The legislation seeks to protect the woman by requiring the husband to produce a severance document as legal proof for the dissolution of the marriage. Without this document he could demand her back at any time, and if she would remarry he could accuse her of adultery.21 (6) While the text provides no moral or theological justification for divorce, it recognizes that divorce was tolerated in ancient Israel as a legal reality. But legal recognition and moral justification are two different issues.
Outside this text, evidence for Israel’s disposition toward divorce is sketchy. For humanitarian reasons, Exodus 21:10–11 and Deuteronomy 21:10–14 recognize that releasing a slave-wife or captive woman whom an Israelite warrior had married was preferable to a man refusing to fulfill his marital duties. Presumably as the lesser of two evils, in Genesis 21:8–14 God directed Abraham to send away his slave-wife Hagar. Apart from this episode Old Testament narratives provide few clues on whether or not Israelites adhered to the principles underlying marriage and divorce found here. They report husbands abandoning their wives temporarily (Judg. 14:19–15:8) and wives/concubines abandoning their husbands (Judg. 19), but they do not record a single instance of divorce initiated by a husband or wife until after the exile. According to Ezra 9–10, Ezra ordered the Jews of postexilic Jerusalem to divorce their pagan wives, because these marriages threatened the integrity of the “holy seed.”
The postexilic prophet Malachi had such marriages in mind when he condemned his male contemporaries for marrying “the daughters of a foreign god” (i.e., pagans; Mal. 2:11). But then he accused them of “breaking faith” (beged) against their wives for divorcing them (2:13–16). While the meaning of “I hate divorce” (v. 16) is clear, the underlying Hebrew is vague and could just as well be rendered “[he who] hates [and] divorces [his wife].”22 In the combination of śānēʾ (“to hate”) and ṣallaḥ (“to send away/divorce”), we hear echoes of Deuteronomy 24:1–4. Moses permitted divorce as a social reality, but he realized the potential for abuse, especially of women, inherent even in customs that had evolved in Israel. Malachi was more forthright, castigating the men of his time for their treacherous betrayal of their wives and citing the high divorce rate as evidence of the absence of fundamental piety and fear of Yahweh.
The subject of divorce surfaces frequently in the Prophets, but primarily as a metaphor of the rupture in the relationship between Yahweh and Israel. Hosea develops the motif most dramatically. His marriage to Gomer and subsequent loss of her serve as a picture of Yahweh’s marriage with Israel. Because of the nation’s infidelity and adulteries in going after other gods, Yahweh stifles his compassion and divorces her (2:1–13[3–15]). However, he takes her back, and the marriage flourishes (2:16–25[14–23]). Apart from the sequence of marriage–divorce–remarriage, Hosea’s metaphorical picture differs fundamentally from the situation envisaged by Moses in Deuteronomy 24:1–5:
Feature | Literal Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage in Deuteronomy 24:1–4 | Metaphorical Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage in Hosea 1–3 |
Disposition of husband to the marriage | Despite having agreed to the marriage, when the time came to consummate it, he changed his mind. | Having promised to the ancestors to enter into covenant relationship with Israel, Yahweh sealed the covenant at Sinai. |
Condition of the wife | Physically flawed but morally innocent. | Physically fine but morally flawed. |
Disposition of the husband to the wife | Totally lacking in grace. | Lavish in his outpouring of grace before and after the marriage. |
Cause of the divorce | The husband’s hardness of heart. | The wife’s infidelity and adulterous conduct. |
Time of the divorce | Before the marriage was consummated. | Centuries after the marriage was sealed. |
Sequel to the divorce | Remarriage to another man. | No remarriage; reduced to status of slave on the auction block, but rescued by husband. |
Possibility of remarriage | Remarriage to original husband denied. | Remarriage to original husband confirmed. |
Yahweh’s questions in Jeremiah 3:1 exhibit the clearest echoes of Deuteronomy 24:1–4:
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 return to me?
Remarkably, in the utterances that follow Yahweh invites Israel and Judah back. As in the case of Hosea, the motif of marriage–divorce–remarriage serves as a rhetorical device to wake up the people to their own infidelities. At Sinai Yahweh had bound himself eternally to Israel in a covenant relationship, from which there would be no divorce. Many interpret his abandonment of the land and the exile of the people in 586 BC as evidence of a final divorce—the covenant has been revoked. However, Leviticus 26:44–45 and Deuteronomy 4:29–31 and 30:1–10 declare that the judgment could never be the last word. Even before the people were in the land, Moses anticipated a future rupture of Yahweh’s relationship with his people, but he also knew the promised blessings that were fundamental to the marriage contract would be suspended and replaced by divine wrath. But this marriage would not end in divorce. One day estranged husband and wife would be reconciled.
In Matthew 5:31–32 we observe a reflection of early rabbinic interpretation of Deuteronomy 24:1–2. According to the Mishnah the rabbinic schools of Shammai and Hillel offered narrow and broad interpretations respectively of Deuteronomy 24:1–4:
The school of Shammai say: A man may not divorce his wife unless he has found unchastity in her, for it is written, Because he hath found in her indecency in anything.
And the school of Hillel say: [He may divorce her] even if she spoiled a dish for him, for it is written, Because he hath found in her indecency in anything. R. Akiba says: Even if he found another fairer than she, for it is written, And it shall be if she find no favour in his eyes. . . . (Giṭṭin 9:10).23
Jesus’ interpretation follows the narrower view of Shammai. Indeed, he sets the bar even higher than Deuteronomy 24:1–4, transforming Moses’ iteration of a customary provision of a certificate of divorce into a virtual command and restricting legitimate cause for divorce to porneia (“marital unfaithfulness”; lit., “sexual immorality”; see also Matt. 19:8–9). Furthermore, he cautions men not to divorce their wives for any other reasons, for in so doing they become responsible for their wives’ subsequent adultery, which is what happens when men divorce innocent women and then the latter remarry.
Jesus offered this interpretation in the broader context of the Sermon on the Mount, which, like Yahweh’s revelation to Israel at Sinai, functions as a covenantal constitutional document governing his relationship with his followers. However, his utterances on divorce and remarriage in Matthew 19:3–9 (//Mark 10:2–12) represent his response to a challenge from the Pharisees. Here he reiterates what he had said earlier, but he also emphasizes that Moses’ statements on divorce reflect legally permissible procedures, necessitated by the hardness of human hearts.24 Moses’ instructions were intended to secure the well-being of women in the face of illegitimate divorce. Jesus declares that the provision itself represents a response to a culture that has departed from the divine ideal as reflected in the order of creation. Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 assume that God joins husband and wife together, and that no one may interfere with that union.
The ideals expressed by Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:8–16 are equally high. He virtually excludes legitimate divorce for Christians, declaring that wives should not leave their husbands (v. 10) and husbands should not send their wives away (i.e., divorce them; v. 12). But if a woman abandons her husband, she is not to remarry but to continue to seek reconciliation with him (v. 11). The only context in which a Christian might consider divorce is when one of the parties in the marriage is converted to faith in Christ. Even then the believer may not initiate divorce, for it is hoped that through his/her piety the unbelieving spouse might come to faith (vv. 13–14). But if the unbeliever seeks divorce, the believer may acquiesce, in which case he/she is free to remarry.
Contemporary Significance
MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE FOR Christians. According to research into marital patterns in the United States, the divorce rate among professing Christians in some parts of the country is actually higher than among the population as a whole.25 What can Deuteronomy 24:1–4 teach us that would help us recover a biblical view of marriage and divorce? Here are a few suggestions.
(1) Stable marriages do not just happen; they take effort and must be built on solid foundations. Deuteronomy 24:5 teaches that when people marry, outside responsibilities and distractions should be reduced to a minimum. While a two-week honeymoon offers hope for a good start to the marriage, it is insufficient to prepare for a life of married bliss.
(2) Because the health of a community depends on the health of marriages, support for newlyweds should be a communal matter. This would mean not only offering communal assistance for getting the marriage off the ground, but also discouraging newlyweds from taking on responsibilities in the church for a specified period—Moses suggests a year.
(3) Because no partners in a marriage are perfect, the health of the marriage requires spouses to be extremely and persistently gracious in responding to the other person’s faults. What stressed people need is grace in the eyes of the Lord and in the eyes of their spouses.
(4) Because of the propensity for men to run roughshod over their wives, the church needs to establish specific principles and procedures to ensure that within the context of divorce and remarriage, the welfare of women is protected.
(5) Divorce never happens without violation of the divine ideal and without sin. Divorce arises from hard hearts and represents a final declaration of failure in the most fundamental of human institutions. The culture of divorce in the West offers Christians an extraordinary opportunity to be countercultural. To the extent that in these matters we have behaved like the world, we must repent or face the prospect of God’s wrath.26 To the extent that we model biblical ideals of marriage, we declare to the world the kind of relationship they may enjoy with God through Jesus Christ, the self-sacrificing head and husband of the church.