Oddalenie żony czy rozwód? Język Biblii a dzisiejsze postrzeganie małżeństwa i jego rozpadu

There are many models of the marriage in the Bible: marriage as covenant (e.g. Malachi), one flesh (Genesis), passionate love (Song of Songs), sometimes also utility of the wife for his husband (Proverbs) and legal satisfaction of the sexual desire (1 Cor 7). No one of these models leaves place for divorce. Covenant, unity of flesh and love exclude it: we can imagine a rupture of such a marriage, but not a legal divorce. Two other models could be perhaps harmonized with divorcing, but the Bible neither proposes to divorce a bad wife, nor allows abstaining from the marital life for ascetic motives. Next, what is generally overlooked, the marriage as presented in the Bible can be also explained by a metaphor of a (mutual) property (cf. Exod 20.17; Song 2.16; 6.3; Tob 7.12; Mark 10.11-12; 1 Cor 7.2-4; Eph 5.21). This model also excludes divorce (cf. 1 Cor 7.1-5,11-12), but also helps to explain biblical texts on the failures of marriages. Deut 24.1 refers to sending back a recently acquired wife when she is unfit for marriage (the case of repugnance). Hosea and Matt 5.32; 19.9 considers marriage with a prostitute impossible, apparently because she cannot be an exclusive property of her husband (the case of prostitution, incorrectly called “divorce clause”). The term “divorce”, derived from the Roman law, does not fit to such situations, interpreting them from the modern viewpoint. In the biblical translations and in the books on the Bible we should avoid it. We should talk about sending away, about impossibility of marriage, or about a nullity of marriage instead.