Mathew 5:32-?

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EmRose87

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How do I explain to a protestant what the phrase “except for unchastity,” means in the bible when talking about marriage. They always seem to think this means God is saying we can get divorced if someone commits adultery which of course seems silly obviously because if you wanted out you’d just have to commit adultery with evidence! :eek: I know that valid marriage are indissoluable, but how is this best explained :confused:?
 
Direct him to 1 Corinthians 7:10-11
But to them that are married, not I but the Lord commandeth, that the wife depart not from her husband. And if she depart, that she remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband. And let not the husband put away his wife.

However, the problem is that Protestants will interpret the Bible pretty much any way they like. I know I used to.

CCC 2384 Divorce is a grave offense against the natural law. It claims to break the contract, to which the spouses freely consented, to live with each other till death. Divorce does injury to the covenant of salvation, of which sacramental marriage is the sign. Contracting a new union, even if it is recognized by civil law, adds to the gravity of the rupture: the remarried spouse is then in a situation of public and permanent adultery: If a husband, separated from his wife, approaches another woman, he is an adulterer because he makes that woman commit adultery, and the woman who lives with him is an adulteress, because she has drawn another’s husband to herself.

Remind him that remarriage is not a justifiable option for any Christian.
 
Those who are living as if they are married but are not. They are exceptions since those in them are either fornicating or committing adultery.
 
I still don’t know how I can explain this particular excerpt.
 
How does he know that Jesus was referring to the New Covenant, and not the Old? There’s nothing in the NT after Jesus’ resurrection or Pentecost that suggests that adultery is a valid grounds for divorce - which is when many Protestants believe that the New Covenant had begun (this is one reason they use to justify setting Paul’s teachings against Jesus’).
 
In the footnotes of the JB.

The explanation seems to be that this text in Mt creates a special category for cases of infidelity in marriage since these require their own solution- but nowhere does he suggest what the solution is. This solution, which was not required at the time when full divorce was allowed, was destined to take shape in the Church and emerge as a ‘seperation’ of the parties that carried with it no permission to remarry, cf, 1 Co 7:11.
 
Matthew 5:32 But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; **and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. **

Jesus is saying is that there are reasons that would allow separation/divorce between a husband and wife, but that remarriage is not possible (while both spouses are alive).

There is a question as to the proper translation of the Greek word “porneia” (translated here as unchastity). You might like to read the following article.
scripturecatholic.xanga.com/702938378/10-porneia-and-the-exception-clause-of-matthew-199/
 
Matthew 5:32 But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity,** makes her an adulteress**; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
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How is it that a husband can make an adulteress of a wife ?
Matthew 5:32 But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
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Is this an exception because in this case the wife has been unchaste and made herself an adulteress?

Either way the wife is an adulteress.

and

Is that why
Matthew 5:32 But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and **whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. **
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Women depended on men for quality of life back then. Without provision from a man a woman faced a life on the margins of society. Since the children of a divorced woman would remain in their father’s household and the stigma of divorce not be attached to them, could it be that it was a common practice for men to increase the number of their offspring by means of divorced women?
 
Benadam said:
How is it that a husband can make an adulteress of a wife ?
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What it essentially is saying is that if the divorced wife remarries, she becomes an adulteress. The fact that she was divorced against her will does not serve as a legitimate excuse for remarriage. Remarriage makes her an adulteress (if her first husband is still living, of course).
Is this an exception because in this case the wife has been unchaste and made herself an adulteress?
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I don’t think so. If that were the case, Jesus would have said “except on the ground of adultery” and not “except on the ground of porneia”.

Here is the footnote in the RSVCE on Mt. 5:32:
unchastity: The Greek word here appears to refer to marriages which were not legally marriages, because they were either within the forbidden degrees of consanguinity (Lev 18:6-16) or contracted with a Gentile. The phrase *except on the ground of unchastity *does not occur in the parallel passage in Lk 16:18. See also Mt 19:9 (Mk 10:11-12), and especially 1 Cor 7:10-11, which shows that the prohibition is unconditional.​
 
Nita said:
Remarriage makes her an adulteress (if her first husband is still living, of course).

That’s why i’m thinking that it was a given that a divorced woman is an adulteress, she would have to remarry to remain a viable member of the community. Is it possible that siince she would probably not be able to provide herself with food and shelter, that it is a given that she would remarry? Perhaps divorce put women in such needy circumstances their best hope was to find a man that wanted a second wife who otherwise couldn’t take another.
The Greek word here appears to refer to marriages which were not legally marriages, because they were either within the forbidden degrees of consanguinity (Lev 18:6-16) or contracted with a Gentile.
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Benadam said:
That’s why i’m thinking that it was a given that a divorced woman is an adulteress, she would have to remarry to remain a viable member of the community. Is it possible that siince she would probably not be able to provide herself with food and shelter, that it is a given that she would remarry? Perhaps divorce put women in such needy circumstances their best hope was to find a man that wanted a second wife who otherwise couldn’t take another.
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Considering how very difficult it was for a woman, on her own, to provide food and lodging for herself, I would guess it probably was the practice under the Old Covenant for a divorced woman to seek remarriage. The law forbade priests to marry a widow or a divorced woman (Lev. 21:7,13) but I’m not aware that it was forbidden to others. The problem might have been that there wouldn’t have been many prospects!!! - considering she had been divorced (found undesirable) by her husband.

Like some of the other Old Covenant practices mentioned in Matthew 5, ("you have heard it said…) Jesus is upgrading, so to speak, the law about marriage; introducing a higher level of love for it – a level more in conformity to God’s will.

I just think God’s love and mercy for the poor show through in so many of the laws in the Mosaic covenant. Just one example:
Lev 23:22 “And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field to its very border, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest; you shall leave them for the poor and for the stranger: I am the LORD your God.”
Brings to mind the story of Naomi and Ruth.
 
WCH said:
How do you know you’re right in your interpretation?
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Well, WCH, unless you’re going to proffer that you’re an infallible interpreter of Scripture–or that one even exists–you cannot tell anyone that his interpretation is incorrect, no?
 
PRmerger said:
Well, WCH, unless you’re going to proffer that you’re an infallible interpreter of Scripture–or that one even exists–you cannot tell anyone that his interpretation is incorrect, no?
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It’s a question; care to answer it?
 
WCH said:
It’s a question; care to answer it?
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Ah, WCH, you have returned, not chastened, but rather with the same adversarial spirit, eh?

I suggest you take a look at how some non-Catholic posters here are able to post with elegance, eloquence and charity. One classy example of this is JonNC.

At any rate, we know that our interpretation, at least as it pertains to Matthew 5:32, is the correct one because

-the same Church that discerned for you that Matt 5:32 is* theopneustos* has told you what it means; thus, if it’s correct in telling you that it is God’s word, then it’s correct in telling you what it means.

Additionally, we know that the Church teaches correctly through a spiral argument:
-On the first level we argue to the reliability of the Bible insofar as it is history. From that we conclude that an infallible Church was founded. And then we take the word of that infallible Church that the Bible is inspired. This is not a circular argument because the final conclusion (the Bible is inspired) is not simply a restatement of its initial finding (the Bible is historically reliable), and its initial finding (the Bible is historically reliable) is in no way based on the final conclusion (the Bible is inspired). What we have demonstrated is that without the existence of the Church, we could never know whether the Bible is inspired." source And that when she declares something to be, it is. Spiral, not circular.

Now, my question for you, WCH:

How can you, in your paradigm of “I can interpret Scripture as the Holy Spirit directs me to” tell anyone else that his interpretation is incorrect? What if that person responds, “Yes, my interpretation directly contradicts yours, but I read that verse and the HS told me it means " and, thus, I’m using the same paradigm as you.”
 
Mathew uses the word “Unlawful” in 19:9.

I say to you whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) and marries another commits adultery." (Matthew 19:9)

The NAB uses the same word, “Unlawful” as well. Other translations use the phrase “except for sexual immorality” and “except for unchastity”. Mark 10 and Luke 16 prohibit divorce without qualification. Matthew was probably writing to a specific group of people who’s communities engaged in incest and marriage between brothers and sisters. This type of marriage is “Unlawful” and can easily be described as “sexual immorality.”

Marriage cannot ever be disolved because it is a mirror of the bonds of love within the Trinity. Matrimony mirrors the love between God the Father and God the Son in the way that love produces the Holy Spirit. God the Father and God the Son are totally committed to each other in an inseperable bond, totally vulnerable to each other, each offering himself totally to the other. This is what marriage is modeled after. And the way in which the love between God the Father and God the Son produces the holy Spriit is the way in which love between husband and wife in a totally committed and self-sacrificing relationship produce a child.

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the model for husband, wife and children. God created the bond between husband and wife that way. He designed us that way on purpose. And he told us that explicitly.

Then God said: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground.” God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:26-27)

Man and women… Male and female… Created in “Our” image, the image of the Trinity. This message was so important that God put it in the 27th verse of a book with over 35,000 verses.

The bond of unity between the first and second persons of the Trinity can never be broken. The bonds of matrimony, being modeled after the Trinity, also can never be broken. And Jesus tells us that as well.

***Some Pharisees approached him, and tested him, saying, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause whatever?” He said in reply, "Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ *and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate." (Matthew 19:3-6)

…for any reason whatever?

And Jesus’ reference to the way it was “From the beginning” is a Rabinnical teaching technique whereby the teacher touches briefly but forcefully upon uses a phrase from the Old Testament to drive home a point. His reference to the phrase “From the beginning” would have been immediately recognizable to the Pharisess as a reference to the very first lines of Genesis… In the Beginning. But the Pharisess don’t get it and so he does it again, hits them over the head with it hard…

***He said to them, "Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning *it was not so. (Matthew 19:8)

BANG! Like whacking them with a hammer. Jesus reminds the Pharisees that God created man and woman in “Our” image, in the image of the Trinity from the very beginning of time.

When taken as a whole (which we must always do) the force of the Biblical message is that there are no loopholes. Matrimony was designed by God as a mirror of trinitarian love and it can never be disolved. The fact that it was permitted in the OT was because “Of the hardness of your hearts”, your inability to forgive.

Then again, Jesus has plenty to say about forgiveness, especially in the Lord’s Prayer.

-Tim-
 
PRmerger said:
Ah, WCH, you have returned, not chastened, but rather with the same adversarial spirit, eh?

I suggest you take a look at how some non-Catholic posters here are able to post with elegance, eloquence and charity. One classy example of this is JonNC.

At any rate, we know that our interpretation, at least as it pertains to Matthew 5:32, is the correct one because

-the same Church that discerned for you that Matt 5:32 is* theopneustos* has told you what it means; thus, if it’s correct in telling you that it is God’s word, then it’s correct in telling you what it means.

Additionally, we know that the Church teaches correctly through a spiral argument:
-On the first level we argue to the reliability of the Bible insofar as it is history. From that we conclude that an infallible Church was founded. And then we take the word of that infallible Church that the Bible is inspired. This is not a circular argument because the final conclusion (the Bible is inspired) is not simply a restatement of its initial finding (the Bible is historically reliable), and its initial finding (the Bible is historically reliable) is in no way based on the final conclusion (the Bible is inspired). What we have demonstrated is that without the existence of the Church, we could never know whether the Bible is inspired." source And that when she declares something to be, it is. Spiral, not circular.

Now, my question for you, WCH:

How can you, in your paradigm of “I can interpret Scripture as the Holy Spirit directs me to” tell anyone else that his interpretation is incorrect? What if that person responds, “Yes, my interpretation directly contradicts yours, but I read that verse and the HS told me it means " and, thus, I’m using the same paradigm as you.”
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So you’ve memorized an argument. Congratulations.

How do you know it’s right?

Are you infallible?
 
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