The Divine Permission

Deuteronomy 24:1-4

When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some uncleanness in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house, when she has departed from his house, and goes and becomes another man's wife, if the latter husband detests her and writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies who took her as his wife, then her former husband who divorced her must not take her back to be his wife after she has been defiled; for that is an abomination before the LORD, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance.

not dissolve the new marriages and marry each other a second time. Men apparently were already divorcing their wives for "some uncleanness." We don't know when Moses began allowing such divorce, but that he had done so previous to the writing of Deuteronomy 24 is clear. Jesus, some 1,500 years later, told a group of Jewish leaders, "Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives" (Mt. 19:8).

The Historical Situation. At the time of Moses and throughout the Old Testament era, a man became the master of the woman he married. This was true in all the cultures of the time, even among the Israelites. A wife was a husband's possession in a manner similar to his property, his animals, and his slaves (Ex. 20:17). Jewish law did not permit a woman to initiate a divorce. She could remarry only if given a certificate of divorce. Any promise she made could be overruled by her husband (Num. 30:4-16). The husband could have his bride stoned if on the wedding night he discovered that she was not a virgin (Dt. 22:13-21). The society in Israel was definitely patriarchal like that of neighboring nations.

God, however, did not permit men unlimited power over their wives. They could not sell a wife into slavery, like neighboring nations could--not even if she were a war prisoner who had been made a secondary wife (Dt. 21:10-14). The children were commanded to honor the mother as well as the father (Ex. 20:12). A man could not humiliate his wife by marrying a sister as a rival (Lev. 18:18). The Lord gave these laws as a merciful provision for women in a male-dominated society. Through these regulations, God showed the men in Israel that their wives were to be viewed as people, not merely as property.

The Permission Given. Because of the hardness of men's hearts, Moses allowed divorce (Mt. 19:8). In the process, however, God provided guidelines. A man had to obtain a certificate of divorce and give it to the unwanted wife. When he did take such action, the divorce certificate would show that the woman had been legally released from marriage and that she was now free to marry another.

Moses permitted such action if a man found some uncleanness in his wife. The exact meaning of the expression "uncleanness" is not clear. It is a word that was almost always translated "nakedness" by the King James translators. An exception is when the word was used to describe an "unclean camp" in which human excrement had not been properly buried (Dt. 23:14). In some cases, as in Leviticus 18 and 20, the word was linked to specific instances of family sexual abuse. Given this usage, it's possible that if a man suspected his wife had been sexually molested by a family member prior to marriage, he could give her a certificate of divorce. Such an allowance might seem unmerciful. But keep in mind that this stipulation was granted because of "hardness of heart" circumstances. If a man could not deal with something that caused his wife to be despised in his eyes, the law allowed for her to be freed rather than to be subject to his contempt.

We know that Moses was not allowing divorce just in instances of adultery, because adultery was an offense punishable by death (Dt. 22:22). The "uncleanness," therefore, must have referred originally to conduct on the part of the wife that the husband deemed shameful or offensive, but not limited to physical adultery. We have no knowledge of how this was interpreted during Israel's early history.

At the time of Christ, Jewish rabbis disagreed about what Moses meant by the expression "some uncleanness." The followers of Rabbi Shammai limited this term to some kind of sexual impropriety (not necessarily adultery). The followers of Rabbi Hillel (the vast majority) gave it almost unlimited latitude--even making minor offenses like burning food a legitimate basis for divorce.

The Restriction Imposed. The focus of Deuteronomy 24:1-4 is the following restriction: Once the divorced pair had married new mates, they could never marry each other again. The reason for this restriction is difficult to determine. One widely accepted explanation is that it would make a husband think carefully before divorcing his wife and marrying another woman.

In summary, while we have no record of the occasion when God led Moses to make it possible for the men in Israel to divorce their wives, Jesus made it clear that it happened. He declared that God did this "because of the hardness of your hearts" (Mt. 19:8). Callous-hearted men would perpetrate greater evils against wives who were despised in their eyes if divorce were not an option. As noted earlier, God had already forbidden the sale of a wife into slavery. But a hard-hearted man in a male-dominated society could find many other ways to make life difficult for a wife he no longer wanted to support. He could vex her by marrying and lavishing all his attention on a second wife. He could burden her with too much work while openly resenting her continued presence.

I believe it was God's tender concern for women that led Him to permit divorce in Israel.

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