And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she commits adultery.
All Commentaries on Mark 10:12 Go To Mark 10
John Chrysostom
AD 407
Vict. Ant., Cat. in Marc., and seeChrys. Hom. 62 : For being asked, whether it is lawful, he does not immediately reply, it is not lawful, lest they should raise an outcry, but He first wished them to answer Him as to the sentence of the law, that they by their answer might furnish Him with what it was right tosay.Wherefore it goes on: “And He answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you? "And afterwards, “And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. "They put forward indeed this that Moses had said either on account of the question of our Saviour, or wishing to excite against Him a multitude of men. For divorce was an indifferent thing among the Jews, and all practised it, as though it were permitted by the law.
Cat. in Marc. Oxon: Or else, it is said, “For the hardness of your hearts,” because it is possible fora soul purged from desires and from anger to bear the worst of women; but if those passions have a redoubled force over the mind, many evils will arise from hatred in marriage.
Thus then, He saves Moses, who had given the law, from their accusation, and turns the whole upon their head. But since what He had said was grievous to them, He at once brings back the discourse to the old law, saying, “But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female.”.
If however he had wished one wife to be put away and another to be brought in, He would have created several women. Nor did God only join one woman to one man, but He also bade a man quit his parents and cleave to his wife. Wherefore it goes on: “And he said, (that is, God, said by Adam) For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife. From the very mode of speech, shewing the impossibility of severing marriage, because He said, “He shall cleave. "It goes on: “And they twain shall be one flesh.”.
Being framed out of one root, they will join into one body. It goes on: “So then they are no more twain, but one flesh.”.
After this, bringing forward an awful argument, He said not, do not divide, but He concluded, “What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”.
But if two persons, whom God has joined together, are not to be separated; much more is it wrong to separate from Christ, the Church, which God has joined to Him.
Vict. Ant., e Cat. in Marc.: The Lord calls by the name of adultery cohabitation with her who is nota man’s wife; she is not, however, a wife, whom a man has taken to him, after quitting the first; and for this reason he commits adultery upon her, that is, upon the second, whom he brings in. And the same thing is true in the case of the woman; wherefore it goes on, “And if a woman shall put away her husband, and marry another, she committeth adultery”; for she cannot be joined to another as her own husband, if she leave him who is really her own husband. The law indeed forbade what was plainly adultery; but the Saviour forbids this, which was neither plain, nor known to all, though it was contrary to nature.
Vict. Ant. e Cat. in Marc.: There is no contrariety in Matthew’s relating that He spoke these words to the Pharisees, though Mark says that they were spoken to the disciples; for it ispossible that He may have spoken them to both.
