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Would
you say that our society seems to be disintegrating?
I’m not a doomsayer, but I have eyes, and I see
what is happening around me, in my neighborhood,
at my children’s school, in the daily paper; and
it all seems to be pointing to a moral and spiritual
decline. Sadly, I believe our society is in a
process of disintegration, and many whom I respect
suggest it is because the institution of marriage
is disintegrating. After all, the fabric of society
is the family, and when families split apart,
that fabric begins to unravel. In Mark chapter
ten, where we resume our study this morning, Yeshua
our Master speaks to us of the sanctity of marriage,
and we need to really hear what He is saying.
Verse
1 Yeshua then left that place and went
into the region of Yehudah and across the Yarden.
Again crowds of people came to him, and as was
his custom, He taught them.
As we
continue in chapter ten of Mark’s narrative, we
see Yeshua leaving the Galilee, the region of
His earthly upbringing; a region, I might add,
which had enjoyed the greater share of His preaching
and teaching. What most of those living in the
Galilee could not have known (nor even His disciples
for that matter) was that this was to be His last
visit there before coming to Jerusalem and reaching
His goal.
Yeshua
comes into southern Israel, into Judea, and as
was typical, enormous crowds of people gravitated
to Him, eager to hear what the now-well-known,
influential rabbi had to say. Among the common
people Yeshua continued to be very popular, if
for no other reason than that He challenged the
smug piety and rigid demands of the Pharisees
and the theological compromise and corruption
of the Sadducees. His journeys also took Him east
of the Jordan River, to a region then known as
Perea.
One group
of people with whom Yeshua was decidedly unpopular
was the Pharisees. No doubt they felt that the
multitudes who followed Him were thumbing their
noses at them. The Pharisees were also unaccustomed
to open rebuke, much less from One who had not
come up through their ranks, nor attended any
of their Yeshivas. Yeshua posed a threat to the
political and religious influence of the Pharisees,
and their goal was to remove this obstacle, this
Stone, one way or another. It is important to
understand this ever-growing tension if we are
to appreciate the gravity of the question they
posed to him in verse 2.
Verse
2 Some P’rushim (Pharisees) came to Him,
testing Him by asking, "Is it lawful (in other
words, is it within the parameters of Torah) for
a man to divorce his wife?" Let me explain
why that seemingly legitimate question was, in
fact, hostile. In the first place the question
is moot. Both the Pharisees and Yeshua knew full
well that the Torah permitted divorce. Deuteronomy
chapter 24, which the P’rushim will shortly quote
allowed a man to divorce his wife if he “finds
some indecency” in her, mandating that in the
process he give her a certificate of divorce (for
her protection, lest she be reduced to prostitution,
as was often the case among the Canaanites). In
context, then, the Torah granted divorce on the
grounds of infidelity or gross sexual immorality.
But this
encounter between Yeshua and the Pharisees takes
place over 1,400 years later, and the issue of
divorce was still very controversial and divisive.
There was great debate over what the words ervat
davar ‘some indecency’ really meant. In other
words, how difficult should it be to obtain a
divorce?
The two
main rabbinical schools of the day, those of rabbis
Hillel and Shammai, differed stridently on this
point of Torah. Whereas the school of Rabbi Shammai
held that Moses’ intent was that “some indecency”
meant that sexual immorality was the only justifiable
grounds for divorce, the school of Hillel was
far more permissive, interpreting ‘some indecency’
to mean almost anything which displeased the husband.
Does she burn the toast? You can divorce her!
Is her coffee too weak? You can divorce her! Is
she not keeping up the house to your standards?
Does she nag? Is she not the svelte supermodel
you’re sure you married? You can divorce her!
I wonder
whether Rabbi Hillel also asked the men whether
they hung up their clothes and put their shoes
away or left dirty socks and underwear all over
the floor, whether they yelled at their wives,
or whether they themselves had put on a few pounds
and were not exactly the Charles Atlas or Arnold
Schwarzenegger the wife seems to recall marrying.
But why
stop there? Rabbi Akiva, in the second century
argued that “finding some indecency” could simply
mean the husband found a woman he liked better
than his wife! How lamentable that we should find
rabbis arguing for ease of divorce, while God,
speaking through the prophet Malachi, said, “The
Lord has been a witness against you and the wife
of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously,
though she is your wife and your companion by
covenant. But not one has done so who has a remnant
of the Spirit… Take heed, then, to your spirit,
and let no one deal treacherously with the wife
of your youth… ‘For I hate divorce,’ says the
Lord, the God of Israel, ‘and him who covers his
garments with wrong…’” (Malachi 2:14-16).
The nation
of Israel was hotly divided between these competing
philosophies, embodied in the schools of the conservative,
biblical constructionist Shammai and the permissive,
socially liberal Hillel. And very little has changed
in these thousands of years. Divorce is still
a controversial issue, both in society at large,
and within the believing community. And it still
wreaks havoc in society and in the hearts of the
devastated children who must bear it. What is
to be done about divorce? How should it be regarded?
How easily should it be obtained? Given the inclinations
of a fallen human race, and the intentions of
our selfish hearts, it is not difficult to imagine
which of the two schools was the more popular.
As testimony
to our collective hard-heartedness, I submit for
your consideration the vast number of Akiva and
Hillel day schools to be found across the United
States, the Hillel foundations on U.S. college
campuses, and synagogues world-wide named after
either Hillel or Akiva. Meanwhile, has anyone
ever heard of “Congregation B’nai Shammai”?
So then,
if the Torah allowed for divorce, why were the
Pharisees asking Yeshua about it? There is clearly
an agenda on the Pharisees’ part, and the Greek
word employed here, peirazo, meaning to
tempt, to try or to put (someone)
to the test, bears out that this was by
no means an innocent question. Notice, too, that
the wording of their question calls for a ‘yes’
or a ‘no’, not an explanation. This “question”
was a trap, and nothing less.
So let’s
imagine for a moment that Yeshua answers ‘yes’
or ‘no’. If He answers, “No, it is not permissible
for a man to divorce his wife,” then they would
accuse Him of contradicting Moses, and brand Him
as repudiating the Torah. If He answers, “Yes,
divorce is permissible” then they would accuse
Him of promoting licentious behavior – hardly
fitting for a “teacher of righteousness”. Either
way, they figured, they had Him trapped with this
question. If He played into their hands, at the
very least He’d lose His massive following, and
possibly they could pin a rap on Him for advocating
the abrogation of the Torah, and call for His
execution. Or, as Rabbi Loren has pointed out,
by bringing up this controversial subject, they
might get Yeshua to comment on the Herod-Herodias
affair, and end up just like John the Baptist
– imprisoned and later beheaded.
In any
case, as was typical, they underestimated Him.
Actually, their failure to recognize Yeshua as
Messiah meant they missed the whole import of
the coming Kingdom of God! It’s not hard to pull
a fast one on Rabbi Glenn. I can be gullible at
times. I’ve been snookered into a few bogus arguments
in my time. Most of us are neither innocent as
doves, nor shrewd as serpents. The former could
get you in trouble with God, but the latter with
men. Yeshua wasn’t about to be taken in by their
disingenuousness. True to His excellent form,
He responds to their question with a question.
Verse
3 "What did Moses command you?" he replied.
Let me suggest that answering a question with
a question is often a good idea. It accomplishes
two things. First, if you are not especially agile
of mind, a question put back to the questioner
buys you some time to ponder the matter. You could
simply say, “Why do you ask?” Or, even better,
you could say, “What do you think?” Second,
by posing the right question back to the questioner,
you qualify that person. Are they asking because
they sincerely seek an answer and have thus far
failed to find one, or are they asking in order
to put you on the spot?
By answering
a suspect question with one of your own, one or
two good things will happen. At the very least
you will learn something about this person and
their thought processes. The bonus is that if
they claim not to know the answer, you will have
them on the hook for dishonesty later on if it
turns out they were just testing you.
It is
less crucial that we have an answer for every
question than that we take the time to get a read
on the questioner. I grieve over the wasted hours,
days, weeks, even years that well-meaning believers
have spent finding and then formulating answers
to questions put forward by phonies.
How can
you tell if a question is sincere or not? For
one thing, when you provide a reasonable answer
to their question, does the person interact with
your answer, or do they dismiss it with a wave
of the hand? If the question is sincere, and your
answer reasonable, the person should be satisfied,
and then it’s time to ask a question of your own,
so you can now direct the content of the conversation.
Yes, it is a little bit like chess. There is nothing
wrong with good strategy, provided you play the
game honestly.
If, on
the other hand, the question was asked by someone
with a hostile agenda, someone more interested
in trapping you in a statement than in obtaining
an answer, they will not interact with your answer.
They will either dismiss it, or quickly fire off
another question at you. Sometimes a person’s
body language speaks louder than their voice.
Watch their posture. Are their arms crossed in
front of their chest and are they scowling? Are
their hands on their hips and their toe tapping?
Do they have a smirk on their face that communicates,
“I’ve got you now!”?
I realize
I’m giving away some of my evangelism workshop
material, but this is an important principle,
and I think everyone should take it to heart.
Are you listening? Yeshua never gave a
straight answer to a crooked question and neither
should you!
And so
Yeshua asks them, "What did Moses command you?”
Masterfully, Yeshua brings them back to the Torah.
First of all, this puts them on the hook for having
asked the question, since they end up citing the
passage in Deuteronomy. It proved to the entire
crowd their pretense. They knew the answer to
their own question!
And here
it is, in verse four:
Verse
4 They said, "Moses permitted a man to
write a certificate of divorce and send her away."
There you have it! So if they already knew,
why ask? Yeshua’s strategy was brilliant. Their
hypocrisy was now transparent to the crowd. But
beyond that, in bringing it back to the Torah,
Yeshua takes the opportunity to clarify the Law.
As long as they asked, why should not the world’s
foremost authority on Torah comment on Torah?
In doing so, He also takes the opportunity to
uphold its authority. Far from contradicting the
Torah, Yeshua frequently pointed men back to it.
And now he humors them. Now that the crowd is
on to their ruse, Yeshua deigns to give an answer
anyway; an answer the entire crowd would benefit
from hearing. An answer you and I need to hear,
as well.
Verses
5-9 It was because your hearts were hard
that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied.
"But at the beginning of creation God made them
male and female. For this reason a man will leave
his father and mother and be united to his wife,
and the two will become one flesh. So they are
no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has
joined together, let man not separate. "Hey,
don’t blame me… you asked! Yeshua tells them that
the only reason God made a provision for divorce
in the Torah was as a concession - because of
our sinful, hard hearts. Divorce is evidence of
selfishness and hard-heartedness. It may be on
the part of one spouse or both, but regardless,
divorce represents failure, and it represents
a breach of God’s stated will.
Yeshua
appeals to the Creation to make His case. He points
us to God’s original intent. Man and woman were
made for each other from the beginning of creation
… If God intended a man and a woman to be
joined together as husband and wife and become
one flesh, how dare we break up that union! We
hear these words and the accompanying vows at
almost every wedding. For many it’s the only time
they’ll actually hear the Scriptures read aloud,
given the secularism that permeates our culture.
Most of the time those words aren’t taken very
seriously – not even by believers, apparently,
since the divorce rate among confessing Christians
is nearly the same as that of the world.
Why did
God allow for divorce? I suggest it was in order
to put limits on it, so that we might think twice
before destroying people’s lives on account of
our selfishness. By the time of the Exodus and
the giving of the Torah mankind had become so
corrupted that it was unrealistic to think that
divorce was simply going to be eliminated. God
made a concession, but only so that things might
not get any worse. A man was required, not merely
to utter a three-fold “I divorce thee, I divorce
thee, I divorce thee,” but must write out a certificate
of divorce. That required effort and thought,
and afforded time to “chill”.
God permitted
slavery in the Torah as well, but precisely to
put limitations on it so that we would remember
that every human being is created in His image.
God did not forbid polygamy in the Torah, but
also set parameters so that women would not so
easily be treated like property, nor children
be treated with cruel favoritism. All of these
things: slavery, polygamy and divorce, are the
result of our own selfishness and hard-heartedness.
Eventually God’s revelation, through the Brit
Chadashah, the New Covenant, included prohibitions
on some of these things, and in it we find women
given higher place and protection than had ever
been known.
Isn’t
it wonderful, though, the way God designed the
sexes differently? I’m glad I’m a man, and I’m
thankful to God for my lovely and captivating
wife. Look, I like hanging out with guys and arguing
sports and motorcycles and such, but after a while
- it’s enough already. I like the differences
between the genders. God meant for a husband and
wife to enjoy each other. We are different. We
look different to the eye, and that’s God-intended.
We think differently, and that’s God’s design,
too. Of all that He created, God said, “Tov” (good).
The one exception, the one “lo tov” (not
good) was man’s being alone. The blessedness of
marriage, and I’m convinced it’s God’s way of
working with us, is that it requires us to sublimate
our own wishes and desires, and begin to think
about somebody else’s well-being first. That’s
why marriage is an essential part of making men
out of boys. Two people with potentially rivaling
interests and aspirations willingly subject them
in favor of a new partnership. For those of us
men who are followers of Yeshua, it gives us the
opportunity to learn about His character as we
protect and provide for our wives, and see to
their needs before our own, just as Messiah
loved us and gave Himself for us.
I have
often wondered, sometimes aloud, how all these
guys who I know aren’t rich, are still able to
afford some of these expensive “toys” (like shiny
new Harleys). To be sure, some were wise and frugal
and saved their money for a long time. Others
did it by financing themselves to the hilt, which
is never a good idea. And others – their expensive
“toys” are the symbols of broken marriages, broken
hearts and devastated children. That’s a price
none of us should be willing to pay.
The purpose
of marriage is to take two uniquely constituted
people, and to blend their lives together so that
they become one. That one-ness is sacred, so much
so that man is commanded to LEAVE HIS FATHER
AND MOTHER AND BE UNITED TO HIS WIFE. That
means there is a new priority. As important as
it is to honor your father and your mother, according
to God’s will, your wife comes before your mother
and father. You leave father and mother when you
are married. Your children will one day leave
you when they get married (don’t get weepy just
yet – you still have to survive their teenage
years). The marriage relationship is the highest
human relationship you will ever know, and is
thus to be cherished, nurtured and protected from
every threat, within or without.
Michigan
has “no-fault” divorce laws. Don’t fall for that.
There is most definitely fault. A successful marriage
is not one in which there is never disagreement
or quarreling. A successful marriage is not one
without problems. It is, to be sure, a process.
A wedding is for a day. Marriage is for a lifetime.
A successful marriage is one in which problems
are worked out, where your mutual commitment to
God is such that even when things get dicey, the
seriousness with which you take your vows keeps
you there, in your marriage, until you can work
things through. A successful marriage is one where
there is a willingness to work things through
however much it may hurt, and whatever fears we
may need to face and sins confess. Marriage is
God-ordained, and His word says so. God has also
communicated through His word His contempt for
divorce. Divorce is, therefore, defiance against
God. Yeshua concludes His reply to the Pharisees
with this warning: Therefore what God has joined
together, let man not separate."
Verses
10-12 When they were in the house again,
the disciples asked Jesus about this. He answered,
"Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another
woman commits adultery against her. And if she
divorces her husband and marries another man,
she commits adultery."It is a hard teaching,
and Yeshua’s disciples, at least some of whom
we know were married, pursue the matter further,
privately. Is there any justifiable basis for
divorce?
What I
find significant here is the matter of initiation.
The word for “divorce” is translated “to send
out”. Yeshua tells them that it matters not whether
it is the husband or the wife, but that whoever
initiates the divorce and then remarries
commits adultery. There is no reason at all why
an abandoned husband or wife should feel guilt.
God knows each of our hearts, and the circumstances
that resulted in the decimation of a marriage.
Now here
is the Grace. Those who love Yeshua, whose spouses
have divorced them, are not to think they bear
guilt on that account, particularly if they tried
to keep the marriage together. Secondly, if
any man is in Messiah, he is a new creature, the
old things passed away, behold, new things have
come (2 Corinthians 5:17). God will forgive
those who confess to Him their sins, including
the sin of divorce.
But we
are warned in the strongest possible terms that
divorce runs counter to the will of God, and that,
apart from infidelity, there is no biblical grounds
for divorce. Even then, it is expected that an
effort should be made for repentance and reconciliation.
God is able to soften hard hearts – even the hearts
of some of those Pharisees were later softened!
Forgiveness and restoration of marriage is possible,
and is absolutely to be preferred.
Prayer:
May You, who created us male and female and created
the estate of marriage, surround our marriages
with Your protection, and grant us humility and
steadfastness of character, so that we may love
our spouses as Messiah loved the Holy Congregation
and gave Himself for her. Help us, Lord, to embrace
Yeshua’s words, even those that may be difficult,
and to face our sins, turn from them, and serve
you wholeheartedly. Amen.
Rabbi
Glenn
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