What does the Bible say about divorce and remarriage?

"First, He vindicates, according to the unstained light and tender goodness of God, the marriage relation. It is the most momentous step of human life, and the pillar of the social fabric."

"He asks what Moses commanded: they answer what Moses allowed; whereas our Lord shows how evidently it was in respect of their hard-heartedness he so wrote. In truth, the law made nothing perfect. Not the Gospel only, but the beginning of creation, bore its witness to the true thought of God, who made them male and female. How admirably the Lord applies, not only the fact of Gen. 1, but the words of Gen. 2:24! All other obligations of nature, even the filial, must give place ... and the new relationship from the first was abstractedly indissoluble. They were no longer two, but one flesh, even if not kindred in spirit. This was not merely Adam's language, but God's deed; and if He united, let not man put asunder."

"The law fell below the height of God's thought, but Christ did not: He fully maintained it. Verse 9 lifts the whole matter of marriage from the level of man and human expediency to the level of God and His action. It is a divine institution and not a human arrangement, and therefore is not to be tampered with by men. If God joins, man is not to put asunder."

"They raised a question regarding marriage and divorce, hoping to entrap Him. This they utterly failed to do for they were pitting themselves against Divine wisdom. A complete answer lay in referring them to what God had ordained at the beginning. Man was not to undo what God had done ... The answer was that it had been permitted because of the hardness of men's hearts. God knew that well, and hence He did not set the standard too high. The law set forth God's minimum requirement for life in this world."

"Only one thing can dissolve the tie according to God, and that is the virtual breaking of the bond by either of the parties."

"Moses had suffered a man to put away his wife for any cause, as we see in Deut. 24:1, 3; but the Lord maintained God's original ordinance that what God had joined together, man had no right to put asunder, therefore a man must not put away his wife except for fornication, when she herself had broken the bond."

"God's mind is clear from the first; adultery alone justifies divorce."

"In connection with the light of heaven on the lusts of the heart, the Lord adds His word on the permission of divorce in Deut. 24. It is here the woman protected against hard-hearted man. Positive sin in violation of the marriage tie alone calls for divorce. Men abused the licence beyond measure, as if the permission were a precept; and any vexation sufficed. But Jehovah hates putting away, as the last prophet testified to the Jews in their evil day."

"To the disciples (in the house, as only Mark here tells us) the Lord gives the stringent reply that, 'Whosoever shall put away his wife and marry another, committeth adultery against her; and if a woman put away her husband and marry another, she committeth adultery.' Here is the dark converse of sin in this relationship: no licence of man can consecrate the annulling that tie while in the flesh."

"The Lord meets the question, 'Is it lawful?' by appealing to the law. 'What did Moses command you?' In their reply they sought to turn aside the Lord's question by speaking, not of what Moses commanded, but of what Moses allowed. So doing they unwittingly exposed the hardness of their hearts."

"In the house the Lord further instructs His disciples as to the solemnity of annulling the marriage tie in order to indulge the desires of the flesh towards another woman. In God's sight this is to fall into the most degrading sin."

"It is well known that divorce was common among the Jews at that time, women were put away by their husbands for mere trifles as indeed the form of the question implies. 'Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth. For the Lord God of Israel, saith that He hates putting away' (Mal. 2:15-16)."

"Had these men ever entered into the finer feelings of the human soul in relation to the ordering of God for His creature they never could have quibbled about divorce. ... We ought to be greatly impressed by the beauty of God's order in marriage, and the way the Holy Spirit takes up this relationship between man and woman to illustrate the holy place of intimacy the Church is put into with the Lord Jesus Christ."

"Marriage was instituted at creation, for an exceptional case divorce was permitted by the law, but now in grace the woman is recovered from deep debasement to her honoured position in life as created by God. The awful departure from it in these last days is working dreadful havoc in society and causing suffering, sorrow and death."

"In verses 10 and 11 the Apostle enforces the instructions already laid down by the Lord. In verses 12 to 16 he gives further instructions in view of complications that often arise when the Gospel has reached one partner and the other is left unconverted ... If there be but a believing wife, God acknowledges the household as set apart for Him. The unbelieving partner may so hate the light that has come into the home that he will not stay there. But if he will stay there, and the children who do stay there — they enjoy the privileges that the light confers, it is to be hoped to their ultimate salvation."

"And this is the practical foundation of the Lord's new law of divorce. A tie which God has formed, once broken in the spirit of it, has no longer any value in His eyes. (Matt. 19:4, 9.)"