Summary: Perhaps no words by Jesus have been interpreted so literally and so misinterpreted so painfully than those from this passage. There's no question Jesus said what he did about divorce and remarriage - but who was he speaking to, what was he telling them and what does it mean for us today?
C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) died over 60 years ago. Born in Ireland and educated in England, he lost his mother at an early age. He served in World War I, turned to atheism for answers, spent his life in academia and was ultimately, as he put it in the title of his autobiography, Surprised by Joy. His return to Christianity led to a stream of Christian books that continue to challenge, inspire and convert many skeptics to this day.
Toward the end of his sojourn on earth, he met the love of his life, Joy Davidman (1915-1960), an American admirer who sought him out. Their love story was capped with her heroic struggle against cancer, and after her death in 1960, Lewis wrote one of his greatest works, a slim volume titled A Grief Observed, which was so personal he published it under a pseudonym. His friends, observing first-hand his struggles with grief, gave him copies of the book, hoping it would provide him with comfort.
The one jarring note in this love story was the struggle Lewis and Davidman had in getting married during the latter's battle with cancer. Davidman, you see, was a divorcee, and many clergy - some of them Lewis' close personal friends - refused to perform the marriage ceremony because of Jesus' words regarding divorce and remarriage. At last, however, the couple found a sympathetic clergyman and the two were married before Joy's death.
Perhaps no words by Jesus have been interpreted so literally and so misinterpreted so painfully. Women who flee brutal domestic violence are nevertheless told they cannot remarry and must remain single parents, necessitating working two or three jobs. Some Christians who remarry discover they are not welcome in the church they loved. Others attend church but do so as second-class citizens, unable to become full members or to take part in certain aspects of the life of the church. Some feel driven away from Christianity entirely.
There's no question Jesus said what he said about divorce and remarriage - but who was he speaking to, what was he telling them and what does it mean for us today?
Today's passage from the Gospel of Mark includes two seemingly unconnected incidents, one involving a question about divorce, and the other in which parents bring children to Jesus for him to bless. What do they have in common? Perhaps both address vulnerable populations - women and children - who in that day had fewer legal protections than men.
In this first part, some Pharisees asked Jesus, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?" According to Mark, they asked the question to test Jesus - in other words, to trap him. Those asking the question weren't interested in the issue of divorce so much as how they could spin any answer Jesus might give to make him look bad.
By the way, the questioners were Pharisees, and to some Pharisees are automatically the bad guys. Not so. Some Pharisees in Jerusalem who lived close to the center of money and power may have had bad motivations, but for the most part, the Pharisees were keepers of the Word who served the ordinary believers as rabbis in the synagogues and looked after the spiritual needs of their flocks.
As Jesus sometimes did to forestall a trap, he answered their question with a question: "What did Moses command you?" Their response gets to the heart of this matter - a matter of misinterpretation! They said, "Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her."
"Moses" was a term used to refer to the Torah, the first five books of our Bible, Genesis through Deuteronomy. There are, starting with the Ten Commandments, 612 laws in those books of the Bible. Some, like the aforementioned 10, are foundational. Some expand on the 10. And some are what are known as case law - written to address specific cases, and not necessarily every instance.
So, what was Moses addressing in that statement? In Deuteronomy it says: "Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her, so he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house; she then leaves his house and goes off to become another man's wife."1
That sounds pretty straightforward, doesn't it? It's all cut and dried. Please the man or get out. Good work if you can get it. And indeed, there are some men who would use this law to become tyrants in their homes, with a biblical warrant for their actions. But the devil, as is true so often, is in the details.
First of all, there's that word "objectionable." Robert Alter's Bible translation reads: "... he finds in her some shamefully expressed thing." The New Jewish Publication Society Translation says "... he finds something obnoxious" about his spouse. Duane L. Christensen, whose translation of this passage appears in his Word Biblical Commentary, reads: "because he finds in her 'a naked thing.'"2
What seems to be implied is public, lewd activity, not some question of whether dinner is served at 5:05 instead of 5:00 o'clock sharp. The Deuteronomy passage is an item of case law designed to address a specific problem, and not meant to be used universally or literally for all marriages. And the text assumes that it is normal and natural for the woman to remarry.
Jesus knew the scriptures better than they did, and he knew they were quoting this so far out of context that they might as well be operating from another religion's book altogether.
Let me say it again: the passage assumes that the wife will marry another. She is not barred from further marriage. Moreover, there are additional words in this passage that directly address abuse by men: "Then suppose the second man dislikes her, writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house (or the second man who married her dies); her first husband, who sent her away, is not permitted to take her again to be his wife after she has been defiled; for that would be abhorrent to the LORD, and you shall not bring guilt on the land that the LORD your God is giving you as a possession."3
In other words, men cannot divorce and remarry their spouses as a way of swapping wives - nor as a way of draft dodging. What? Let's read the next verse: "When a man is newly married, he shall not go out with the army or be charged with any related duty. He shall be free at home one year, to be happy with the wife whom he has married."4
In other words, you don't marry a woman, get a year free from military service, swap wives so you get another year's exemption and then remarry your first spouse so that you get yet another free pass (and perhaps by this time the war is over anyway).
The fact is, though divorce was never a desirable outcome, it happens. Just as there is no mention of a wedding service in the Hebrew scriptures, though certainly weddings took place, next to nothing is said about how to go about divorces either. This is because in the cases of both weddings and divorces, Jewish society already knew how to do both.
Since women were in a vulnerable position in first-century Judea, Jesus created a case law of his own: Stop abusing women by misusing Deuteronomy; instead, care for your spouse.
We're probably all familiar with the second part of this passage. People bring children for Jesus to bless, and when the disciples try to send them away, he responds by inviting the children to approach. He concludes his lesson by saying, "Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it."
There is so much to say about this passage, but today I want to emphasize just one thing. Children were a particularly vulnerable population at this time, susceptible to early death and of little monetary value until they were old enough to work in the fields or in the family craft. When Jesus says we need to become like a little child, he is suggesting we ought to stop having such a high opinion of ourselves, thinking we're God's gift to humanity, and to stop acting like dictators. Our value comes from God's eyes. And fortunately, God's eyes are the eyes of love.
Jesus himself is a model of how this should be done. When Jesus met the Samaritan woman at the well, divorced five times and living with her current companion, he saw her as someone who could hold up her end of a complex dialog, an outcast who had the potential to evangelize her whole village.
No one should go into marriage thinking "At the first sign of trouble I'm bailing." However, there are abusers and users, tyrants and the damned who want to drag others into their damnation. And most of all, if we believe in death and resurrection, then the death of divorce should lead to hope and new life.
Rather than using these verses as case law composed by Jesus to combat the misuse of a case law from the Hebrew scriptures, how much better is it to offer grace, hope and love to the vulnerable in our midst. That's what I call gospel. That's what I call Good News.