What Jesus really said about divorce
[Edited for clarity/accuracy]
Often the church treats divorcees as second class christians. This is a short article a friend put me onto, which i think brings a lot of healing to divorced christians. I'd never heard this interpretation of Jesus before.
Essentially, he says that in the gospel passages about remarriage = adultery the word we often think of as "divorce" is in fact NOT the Greek for divorce, but the word for "putting away" or "desertion". (It is in fact rendered "putting away" in many translations). So that Jesus actually said "anyone who ABANDONS their spouse (and doesn't grant a divorce) is forcing them to commit adultery if they remarry."
I don't like the way he writes, or the use of the KJV (ug), but the content itself is worth reading. The article is here: http://home.earthlink.net/~truth/sec8-4-2Marriage.html
I bumped into another book,
I bumped into another book, which I haven't read but looks good.
Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Literary Context
by David Instone-Brewer
One Amazon reviewer gives a summary:
Perhaps best to see how the author treats the subject is to read his conclusion (which comes after a CAREFUL reading of Paul and Jesus in their original contexts):
"The message of the NT is that divorce is allowed but should be avoided whenever possible. Divorce is allowed only on the grounds of broken marriage vows [including lack of love, food, or proper material care], and the decisions to divorce can be made only by the injured party. A believer should never break the marriage vows, and should try to forgive a repentant partner who has done so. If divorce does happen, remarriage is permitted. All this would be obvious to a 1st-century Jew, but the meaning of the text was obscured at a very early date due to ignorance about Jewish background after 70 C.E. Modern Church practice can be easily adapted to this insight because our marriage services still preserve the four biblical grounds for divorce in the marriage vows.
The Church should now be humble and admit that a great mistake has been made. Too many generations of husbands and wives have been forced to remain with their abusing or neglectful partners and have not been allowed to divorce even after suffering repeated unfaithfulness. The Church should not continue in a false teaching because Church tradition should not be regarded as superior to the teaching of Jesus and Paul" p.314
I should add that the author has a high view of Scripture, he is a scholar reading the text, and not a man trying to justify divorce. Furthermore, this book is recommended reading in conservative seminaries, so one should not look at this as a liberal attempt to undermine marriage. This book is Biblical (though none will agree with all of its interpretations) and accessible.
from here
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0802849431/ref=pd_sim_b_4/002-0701382-7899242?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=283155
Thanks
I think this is a good topic. It's very difficult to talk about because of all the emotions around what we've been taught and what we have experienced.
Thanks for bringing this up, Jonathan. I may have more to say about this another day.
he also wrote a book
he also wrote a book (published 2002)
I feel like I want to add lots of disclaimers, divorce is an uncomfortable topic, and i don't want to appear to be "promoting" divorce as such. Divorce hurts a lot.