Read Mark 10:1–12, as well as Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24. What trap was hiding under the Pharisees’ question about divorce, and what lessons did Jesus teach in His response?
In this passage, the Pharisees ask Jesus if it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife. Among the Pharisees, divorce was considered lawful. The question was on what grounds. The School of Shammai was arguably more restrictive—only for childlessness, material neglect, emotional neglect, or marital unfaithfulness. The School of Hillel was much more lenient, allowing divorce for almost any reason, though their process of granting the divorce was more complex, helping to slow things down.
So, it may seem a bit odd that they ask Jesus the blanket question if divorce is acceptable at all. Hiding under this question was a plot to get Jesus in trouble with Herod Antipas, the ruler of the region to the east of the Jordan, where Jesus was now. Antipas had divorced his wife and married Herodias, his brother’s wife. Herod had beheaded John the Baptist because of his rebuke regarding this illicit relationship (see Matt. 14:1–12).
Jesus parries their question with His own, asking the Pharisees what Moses commanded on the matter. The passage the Pharisees reference in reply is Deuteronomy 24:1–4, which describes a particular case of remarriage after divorce. The Israelites in Moses’ day were already practicing divorce. The case law described in Deuteronomy 24 was meant to provide protections for the woman. But in Jesus’ day, this was twisted by the School of Hillel to make it easier to get a divorce for almost any reason. Thus, the law that was meant to protect the woman was being used to make it easy to thrust her aside.
Instead of debating the case law in Deuteronomy 24, Jesus refers back to God’s original ideal for marriage in Genesis 1 and 2. He notes that in the beginning God made a man and a woman (Gen. 1:27), two individuals. He then combines this truth with Genesis 2:24, which says that a man leaves his parents and is joined to his wife, and the two become one flesh. This concept of unity becomes the basis of Jesus’ affirmation of the marriage bond. What God has joined, people should not separate.
What can your congregation do to strengthen the marriages among you? How do you help those whose marriages have already fallen apart?
Supplemental EGW Notes
When the Pharisees afterward questioned Him concerning the lawfulness of divorce, Jesus pointed His hearers back to the marriage institution as ordained at creation. “Because of the hardness of your hearts,” He said, Moses “suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.” Matthew 19:8. He referred them to the blessed days of Eden, when God pronounced all things “very good.” Then marriage and the Sabbath had their origin, twin institutions for the glory of God in the benefit of humanity. Then, as the Creator joined the hands of the holy pair in wedlock, saying, A man shall “leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one” (Genesis 2:24), He enunciated the law of marriage for all the children of Adam to the close of time. That which the eternal Father Himself had pronounced good was the law of highest blessing and development for man.—Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, p. 63.
Jesus came to our world to rectify mistakes and to restore the moral image of God in man. Wrong sentiments in regard to marriage had found a place in the minds of the teachers of Israel. They were making of none effect the sacred institution of marriage. Man was becoming so hardhearted that he would for the most trivial excuse separate from his wife, or, if he chose, he would separate her from the children and send her away. This was considered a great disgrace and was often accompanied by the most acute suffering on the part of the discarded one.
Christ came to correct these evils, and His first miracle was wrought on the occasion of the marriage. Thus He announced to the world that marriage when kept pure and undefiled is a sacred institution.—The Adventist Home, p. 341.
God Himself gave Adam a companion. He provided “an help meet for him”—a helper corresponding to him—one who was fitted to be his companion, and who could be one with him in love and sympathy. Eve was created from a rib taken from the side of Adam, signifying that she was not to control him as the head, nor to be trampled under his feet as an inferior, but to stand by his side as an equal, to be loved and protected by him. A part of man, bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh, she was his second self, showing the close union and the affectionate attachment that should exist in this relation. . . .
God celebrated the first marriage. Thus the institution has for its originator the Creator of the universe. “Marriage is honorable” (Hebrews 13:4); it was one of the first gifts of God to man, and it is one of the two institutions that, after the Fall, Adam brought with him beyond the gates of Paradise. When the divine principles are recognized and obeyed in this relation, marriage is a blessing; it guards the purity and happiness of the race, it provides for man’s social needs, it elevates the physical, the intellectual, and the moral nature.—Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 46.
The above quotations are taken from Ellen G. White Notes for the Sabbath School Lessons, published by Pacific Press Publishing Association. Used by permission.