I do not disagree at all with the general direction of your comments and conclusions so far. I do however want to ask about one issue. In a lot of your writing you discuss the use of metaphors in Scripture and how many people get off track by taking metaphors literally (not the best word use, but I think you understand what I saying). Now I as read the OT passages about God giving Israel a writ of divorce and so on, I think this is metaphorical language. God is in a very real sense joined to Israel by a covenant and He can very well send them out on their own and abolish said covenant and be just in doing so. But this does not involve going to a judge or an elder and going through the actual physical process of asking for a divorce. So what I would like to ask is do you see any problems with taking the examples of God’s metaphorical divorce of Israel and applying them directly to the institution of human marriage and the process of divorce in those marriages?

Like I said, I don’t disagree with your main points or conclusions but based on what you said in the past about the use of metaphors I was just a little surprised here. This comment is late anyway and the next essay (#5) is already up. But if you get a chance I would be interested to know what your thinking is on this.

Thanks, I look forward to reading the rest of this series.

Brian

To divorce someone(an action)requires making a choice. Depending on the circumstances, that choice may or may not be sinful. To be divorced (passive) is a condition that has resulted from the sin of one or both parties involved. Divorce is inextricably linked to sin. But that doesn’t always mean that both parties are sinning when one of the two makes the choice to divorce.

God also calls us to be faithful to each other. Jesus had harsh words for people who divorced because they lusted after other lovers. He wants marriage to reflect the covenant relationship he has with his people–in fact, the cup of the new covenant at the last supper was like a marriage proposal.

As with the whole story the Bible tells–covenant broken by sin, covenant restored by Christ, covenant not yet fully grasped by believers–we still embody it imperfectly. Divorce is only one of the evidences of that.

To make sweeping commands against divorce and apply them to to every situation is like refusing to heal on the Sabbath–a form of legalism that doesn’t seek to minister to the whole person.

I’m not saying “you’re wrong, I’m right,” as some may take me, but rather offering a different understanding the Jer passage you cited.

For me, introducing the notion of “true Israel” isn’t necessary. I’ve understood Jer 3 – as best as I can reconstruct the context – as describing the treatment of the northern kingdom (Israel) and the southern kingdom (Judah). God did divorce Israel – sent her away at the hands of the Assyrians, whose foreign policy assured the demise and dispersion of the people; He did not divorce Judah – didn’t allow the Assyrians to conquer Judah but instead used the Babylonians, whose policies allowed for the Jews to remain an intact community even during their captivity of 70 years, and thus allowed for their return as a nation to Jerusalem under Ezra and Nehemiah.

History, if I understand it, seems to bear out the fact that God put an end to His marriage to idolatrous, unfaithful Israel but not to the (seemingly) equally unfaithful Judah. Another evidence of grace and God’s eternal purposes (since the lineage of Jesus is traced through Judah).

Of course, I could be wrong in all of this and would welcome any and all arguments against my understanding. I don’t claim to have the definitive answer to such interpretative matters.
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First of all, let me be extremely clear: I am not going to pronounce the rightness or wrongness of actual situations about which I know nothing. I listen to family tragedies every day that I work with students. I listen to husbands and wives going through terrible problems and situations in their relationships. I am will aware of the pain of divorce.

It is a tribute to what a bad writer I am that I have written four posts on this subject and you are asking me if I believe it is sinful to divorce a pedophile threatening one’s children. If that were an actual, factual situation, I would advise divorce asap.

Please note two of the last three paragraphs of the above post:

“Obviously, the fallenness and brokenness of marriage result in divorce, and God wants the moral distortion and outrage of divorce to be preserved, but at the same time, divorce is allowed. It is sometime justified. It is sometimes necessary. God himself understands it and identifies with it. Even commands it.

Whatever we might say about divorce and remarriage, we must remember that even in the law of God, Yahweh is surprisingly merciful and understanding. Divorce is bad, but there are worse things. Divorce was allowed and regulated. Divorce did not cause a person to lose their place in the community of Israel. There were consequences, but divorce was integrated into God’s gracious dealings with sinful persons in the old covenant.”

Consider the difference in the following two paragraphs:

“Divorce is God’s perfect plan for you. This is the complete fulfillment of God’s intention. It would be sinful NOT to divorce.”

“This is a tragic breakdown of a family. It is never God’s perfect plan for a marriage to end, but sometimes there is no other choice. There are considerations of safety and care for others in the home. This is a sinful, broken world where these events happen, but God is forgiving and kind to us when they occur.”

In the extreme situation of a threatening pedophile, I would take the second paragraph as the tone of my dealings with that person.

My understanding of sin is primarily fallenness and depravity. “Sinning” as in breaking a postive moral precept is not what we have here. I am not trying to assign blame, and I believe that a Biblical understanding of divorce accepts the sinful brokenness of the situation as a premise to any action.

Mercy and compassion are often responses to sin and evil. Mercy and compassion are never sinful, but they take place in sinful situations. As such they are redemptive, but are not perfect fulfillments of righteousness.

A policeman may kill a rapist. It is a merciful and just thing to do, but the fact that people must be killed is because the world is a broken, sinful place and all of us are involved.

I believe that the difference between divorce (always) being sinful and divorce being the result of sin is important.

If an action is sinful, then the person doing that action is sinning.

If a woman discovers that she is married to a pedophile and that he has committed adultery with a minor and that her children are in danger, is she sinning if she divorces him?

Is the action of doing that divorce sinful?

Another case – a woman who was in my small group. Her father told her that divorce is always sinful and even though she didn’t file (her husband left her for another woman), she was still involved in the sin. Is this woman in sin?

These are not “armchair theologians” (as I can be), these are real people that are hurt when the church tells them that all divorce is sin.

I’m not sure that I could say that sometimes God commands divorce, but it is always sinful. Certainly there is always sin involved in a divorce, but I’m not sure that you can say that it is the divorce that is sinful, only that sin triggered it.

God’s faithfulness to his covenant to Israel- the true Israel- transcends this “divorce” from national Israel.

It’s sinful. God doesn’t command sin. Divorce is a result of sin, if it’s a justifiable divorce, it’s not sin.

God does not, ultimately, divorce Israel,

Michael, Isaiah 50 says, “I had sent her away and given her a writ of divorce…”

Giving Israel a writ of divorce means that He divorced her.