In response to the Catholic church's synod's leanings, "The Sacred Page" hits the nail on the head!
Would the Real Pharisees Please Step Forward? The Debates on Marriage
"I posted on this issue already, and took the post down because it was not stated with enough precision. But upon further consideration, I believe my essential contribution was correct, and wish to restate it more accurately.
In the context of the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family, there has been an attempt by some to characterize the position of those who support current Church teaching and practice on divorce and remarriage as “Pharisaical,” while associating those who wish to accommodate some form of ecclesiastical blessing of second marriages within the Church with the evangelical mercy and love of Jesus.
This is extremely ironic, because in point of fact, it was the Pharisees who were very open to divorce and remarriage, but Jesus who opposed it.
Let’s review the relevant texts:
Matt. 19:1 Now when Jesus had finished these sayings, he went away from Galilee and entered the region of Judea beyond the Jordan; 2 and large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.
Matt. 19:3 And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” 4 He answered, “Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 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? 6 So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.” 7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?” 8 He said to them, “For your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. 9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for unchastity (Gk porneia), and marries another, commits adultery.”
Let’s discuss the background for this text. First of all, divorce and remarriage were legally and morally permissible in Pharisaic Judaism. There were differences among different schools of Pharisees concerning what were considered valid grounds for divorce, however. The school of Shammai held that one could only divorce his wife for a serious offense, whereas the school of Hillel held that one could divorce for virtually any reason. This is why the Pharisees come to Jesus and pose the question. It was a debate within their own school of thought, and they wanted to know what the impressive young rabbi from Nazareth taught on the subject.
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