exchanged without a bill of divorce, adultery must be acknowledged on both fides; they therefore have recourfe to a bill of divorcement, under which the woman was held to be legally put away, according to the law of Mofes and Ifrael (fee before p. .) and was free to marry whom he would; the bill of divorcement being looked upon as an abfolute and total diffolution of the marriage-bond. Our LORD is fhewing the contrary. First, On the footing of the indiffolubility of the contract, in the fight of GOD, by any human authority. Secondly, On the terms of the very law, to which the Pharifees referred him for their juftification; which being taken all together, proves no more than an implied permiffion of divorce for the hardness of their hearts; or, as we fay-a menfâ & toro propter fævitiam-" from bed and board by reafon "of cruelty:" and this was, that women might be releafed from the barbarity with which their cruel hufbands would have treated them, on conceiving fome diflike, had they been forced to have lived with them. But yet, as Mofes fhews, the bond of marriage ftill remained; fo that if a man married fuch a woman, he and the woman were both guilty of adultery, in the fight of GOD, notwithftanding the bill of divorcement. If this had not been the cafe, Mofes could not have called the marriage of the divorced woman a defilement -faying, Deut. xxiv. 4.-after she is defiled, Our SAVIOUR, therefore, doth not by His

I fay unto you, mean that He was enacting a new law, or laying down a rule that was oppofitę to, or inconfiftent with, the law of Mofes had He attempted this, he had fallen into the very fnare which the Pharifees had laid for Him. But-" I fay unto you" means. here, as in the inftances before related in His fermon upon the mount (fee before, p. 310: -313) as if He faid-"Your rabbies teach you "fo and fo, and in fo teaching you they "make void the law of GOD through their "traditions ;—but I, who am come to re"store the honour of Mofes's law, by reftoring its true fenfe and meaning-I-on the authority of that law, which you have partially quoted, without taking the "whole together-fay unto you, though, for "the hardness of your hearts, MOSES fuffered

66

you to put away your wives, and fufpended

any punishment which might have accrued "for fo doing, yet did he not, nor could he

thereby diffolve the marriage itself; fo "far from it, he terms the marriage of fuch "a divorced woman a defilement. Therefore "I fay unto you-whosoever putteth away "his wife, (except for the cause of fornica

tion-which is the only legal cause of divorce) and marrieth another-hereby tempting, and even provoking the divor"ced woman to marry another man—that "though the personal guilt follows the per

Mr. Salmon well obferves, that "the gospel is a covenant revealing grace, not commanding a new morality." Effay on Marriage, p. 134,

A a 4

p,

66

66

fonal act, with respect to her, so that if. 66 fhe, while her husband liveth, be married to "another man, fhe shall be called an adulterefs (fee Rom. vii. 2.) yet the guilt of this adultery will also be imputed to him who was the wilful occafion of it, by causing "her to commit it. And as to you, who, "for the purpose of exchanging your wives "with each other (a matter which the law of Mofes, in a part of the paffage which you "refer me to, but which you don't mention, was particularly made to guard against *) "have put away your wives--and to you "who marry fuch divorced women-and to you divorced women, who think yourselves at liberty to marry whom ye will, when ye are unjustly put away from your huf"bands-Mofes calls all this defilement, which "is but another term for adultery :-there"fore I fay unto you, as well as to those "who, contrary to the law above-mentioned, take back again the women they have once divorced, after they have been mar

66

"ried

*For this, faith Abarbinel on Deut. xxiv. 4. was to imitate the Egyptians, who changed their wives, and took them again into their houses, which was the occafion of great filthinefs; for, as Ifaac Arama gloffes, if this had not been prohibited, a gate had been opened unto vile men to make a trade of changing their wives, and thereby filled the land with whoredom.-See Patr. on Deut. xxiv. 4.

Though the bill of divorcement wrought as a fort of divorce a menfa & toro, and as a release from the vinculum externum, or outward bond-yet nothing but adultery or death could diffolve the vinculum internum, which was

created

.་

ried to others-however ye may have been taught to abuse the toleration of divorce on particular occafions-that all the cafes " which I have mentioned, touching men divorcing their wives and marrying others, thereby caufing their unjustly-divorced "wives to marry other men-of men marrying divorced women-and divorced women marrying other men-this is all contrary "to the law of marriage itself, as delivered "to and pronounced by ADAM, Gen. ii. 24.

66

as well as to the law of the feventh com"mandment, delivered to Mofes, and by him "delivered to the people at Mount Sinai. "In short, these are only several * methods of

created by the special command of GOD-they shall be one flesh. Therefore, when a divorced woman went away from her husband, and married another man, fhe committed an act of adultery in the eye of GoD: but this diffolved the first contract, and made her the wife of the fecond man; therefore, if this man put her away, the first husband, of whom he had been the doλeλujevn, (fee Luke xvi. 18.) could not take her again without committing adultery;for after her departure from him, under the bill of divorcement, he had become, by the hufband's own act and deed, and by her act of adultery, another man's property, otherwife fhe could not be supposed (ver. 2.) to become another man's wife. The law therefore of Deut. xxiv. 1, &c. was especially made to prevent fuch abominable traffic. See the preceding note.

*The reader may obferve, that, in this paraphrase, I have endeavoured to lay before him every interpretation of the paffage, which harmonizes with the meaning of the word -adultery—as it is used in the Hebrew fcripture; for it cannot be fuppofed that CHRIST, who is fpeaking of the law of Mofes, fhould call any thing adultery, but that which is fo by that law.

incurring

1

incurring the guilt of adultery; therefore "all the falvos which your confciences may "derive from your abufe of Mofes's permif"fion, with refpect to bills of divorcement,

66

however highly esteemed amongst men, are "abomination in the fight of GOD. Luke xvi. " 15."-Here CHRIST puts the Pharifees to filence, by the very law which they had partially quoted, with the hope of enfnaring Him, and making Him appear as an enemy to the law of Mofes. We do not read of any reply which they attempted to make: this would certainly not have been the case, had they understood him to have spoken against polygamy as adultery; the Pharisees could have defired nothing more to their purpose, of representing Him as an enemy to Mofes, as there was not a fingle paffage in the whole law of Mofes to have supported Him against them on that point. They were ready enough, on other occafions, to call upon him for his authority as to what he faid and did—See Matt. xxi. 23. Mark xi. 28.-but here they are totally filent: and this under the only fair opportunity they ever had, of convicting Him of a downright falfhood, as laying down that for law, which their law contradicted. It is therefore plain that they understood Him in no fuch fenfe. Neither did His own difciples understand Him to fpeak of any thing but divorce. They are faid, Mark x. 10, in the boufe to afk Him again of the fame matter; His anfwer was in fubftance the fame: the conclufion which the difciples draw from it is—