16 For I hate divorce," says Yahweh, the God of Israel, "and him who covers his garment with violence!" says Yahweh of Armies. "Therefore take heed to your spirit, that you don't deal treacherously.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Here again the Prophet exaggerates the crime which the priests regarded as nothing; for he says, that they sinned more grievously than if they had repudiated their wives. We indeed know that repudiation, properly speaking, had never been allowed by God; for though it was not punished under the law, yet it was not permitted. [1] It was the same as with a magistrate, who is constrained to bear many things which he does not approve; for we cannot so deal with mankind as to restrain all vices. It is indeed desirable, that no vice should be tolerated; but we must have a regard to what is possible. Hence Moses has specified no punishment, according to the heinousness of the crime, if one repudiated his wife; and yet it was never permitted. But if a comparison be made, Malachi says, that it is a lighter crime to dismiss a wife than to marry many wives. We hence learn how abominable polygamy is in the sight of God. I do not consider polygamy to be what the foolish Papists have made it, who call not those polygamists who have many wives at the same time, but those who marry another when the former one is dead. This is gross ignorance. Polygamy, properly so called, is when a person takes many wives, as it was commonly done in the East: and those nations, we know, have always been libidinous, and never observe the marriage vow. As then their lasciviousness was so great that they were like brute beasts, every one married several wives; and this abuse continues at this day among the Turks and the Persian and other nations. Here, however, where God compares polygamy with divorce, he says that polygamy is the worse and more detestable crime; for the husband impurely connects himself with another woman, and then, not only deals unfaithfully with his wife to whom he is bound, but also forcibly detains her: thus his crime is doubled. For if he replies and says that he keeps the wife to whom he is bound, he is yet an adulterer as to the second wife: thus he blends, as they say, holy with profane things; and then to adultery and lasciviousness he adds cruelty, for he holds under his authority a miserable woman, who would prefer death to such a condition; for we know what power jealousy has over women. And when any one introduces a harlot, how can a lawful wife bear such an indignity without being miserably tormented? This then is the reason why the Prophet now says, If thou hatest, dismiss; not that he grants indulgence to divorce, as we have said, but that he might by this circumstance enhance the crime; and hence he adds, For he covers by a cloak his violence. Some interpreters take violence here for spoil or prey, and think that the wife is thus called who is tyrannically compelled to remain with an adulterer, when yet she sees a harlot in her house, by whom she is driven from her conjugal bed: but this is too strained and too remote from the letter of the text. The Prophet here, I doubt not, shakes off from the Jews their false mask, because they thought that they could cover over their vice by retaining their first wives. "What else is this," he says, "but to cover by a cloak your violence, or at least to excuse it? for ye do not openly manifest it: but God is not deceived, nor can his eye be dazzled by such a disguise: though then your iniquity is covered by a cloak, it is not yet hid from God; nay, it is thus doubled, because ye exercise your cruelty at home; for it would be better for robbers to remain in the wood and there to kill strangers, than to entice guests to their houses and to kill them there and to plunder them under the pretext of hospitality. This is the way in which you act; for ye destroy the bond of marriage, and ye afterwards deceive your miserable wives, and yet ye force them by your tyranny to continue at your houses, and thus ye torment your miserable wives, who might have enjoyed their freedom, if divorce had been granted them." [2] He concludes again with these words, Watch over your spirit; that is, "Take heed; for this is an intolerable wickedness before God, however you may endeavor to extenuate its heinousness."
1 - This is not strictly correct, see Deuteronomy 24:2; and our Savior allows that Moses "suffered" the Israelites to put away their wives, though he says that is was for the hardness of their hearts. See Matthew 19:8. -- Ed.
2 - The interpretation given of the first clause of this verse is according to the Septuagint and the Targum, and has been adopted by Cyril, Jerome, Theodoret, Drusius, Grotius, Dathius, and others. Our version is derived from Jun. and Trem., and Piscator, and has been followed by Marckius, Lowth, Scott, Adam Clarke, Newcome, and Henderson. The second clause has been variously interpreted both by the ancients and the moderns. The Septuagint make "violence," or wrong, the nominative to "cover," and the Targum the accusative. "Iniquity shall cover his garment," is the version of Jerome. "For he covers violence as with his garments," has been the version of others; which corresponds with the Targum, as the former does with the Septuagint. The most natural construction of the first part is no doubt what our version exhibits; the meaning of the second is less obvious: but they seem connected. What seems to be said is, -- that God hates the divorcer, and him also who maltreats his wife without divorcing her. Then we may give this literal rendering, -- For he hates the divorcer, (or him who puts away,) Saith Jehovah, the God of Israel; And the coverer of outrage on his own garment, Saith Jehovah of hosts. To speak of God here in the third person is in accordance with the preceding verses. "His own garment," according to Venema, Dathius, and Henderson, is a figurative designation of a wife. See Ruth 3:9; Ezekiel 16:8. The condemning of divorce is more suitable to this place, than any reference to its permission; because in the previous part the allusion is evidently made to the first institution of marriage, and not to any posterior modification. -- Ed.
He hateth putting away - o He had allowed it "for the hardness of their hearts," yet only in the one case of some extreme bodily foulness discovered upon marriage, and which the woman, knowing the law, concealed at her own peril. Not subsequent illness or any consequences of it, however loathsome (as leprosy), were a ground of divorce, but only this concealed foulness, which the husband "found" upon marriage. The capricious tyrannical divorce, God saith, "He hateth:" a word Naturally used only as to sin, and so stamping such divorce as sin.
One covereth violence with his garment - o or, "and violence covereth his garment," or, it might be, in the same sense, "he covereth his garment with violence" , so that it cannot be hid, nor washed away, nor removed, but envelopes him and his garment; and that, to his shame and punishment.
It was, as it were, an outer garment of violence, as Asaph says Psalm 73:6, "violence covereth them as a garment;" or David Psalm 109:18, "he clothed himself with cursing as with a garment." It was like a garment with "fretting leprosy," unclean and making unclean, to be burned with fire. Leviticus 13:47-58. Contrariwise, the redeemed saints had Revelation 7:14 "washed their robes and made them white in the Blood of the Lamb." Having declared God's hatred of this their doing, he sums up in the same words, but more briefly; "and this being so, ye shall take heed to your spirit, and not deal treacherously."
For the Lord - hateth putting away - He abominates all such divorces, and him that makes them.
Covereth violence with his garment - And he also notes those who frame idle excuses to cover the violence they have done to the wives of their youth, by putting them away, and taking others in their place, whom they now happen to like better, when their own wives have been worn down in domestic services.
For the LORD, the God of Israel, saith that he (b) hateth putting away: for [one] covereth (c) violence with his garment, saith the LORD of hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.
(b) Not that he allows divorce, but of two faults he shows which is the less.
(c) He thinks it sufficient to keep his wife still, even though he takes others, and so as it were covers his fault.
For the Lord the God of Israel saith, that he hateth putting away,.... The divorcing of wives; for though this was suffered because of the hardness of their hearts, it was not approved of by the Lord; nor was it from the beginning; and it was disagreeable, and even hateful to him, Matthew 19:8 in the margin of some Bibles the words are rendered, "if he hate her, put her away"; and so the Targum,
"but if thou hatest her, put her away;''
to which agree the Vulgate Latin, Septuagint, and Arabic versions; and this sense made mention of in both Talmuds, and is thought to be agreeable to the law in Deuteronomy 24:3 though the law there speaks of a fact that might be, and not of what ought to be; wherefore the former sense is best; and this other seems to have been at first calculated to favour the practice of the Jews, who put away their wives through hatred to them. The Jews were very much inclined to divorce their wives upon very trivial occasions; if they did not dress their food well, were not of good behaviour, or not so modest as became the daughters of Israel; if they did not find favour with their husbands; and, especially, if they had entertained a hatred of them: so says R. Judah (k),
"if he hate her, let him put her away:''
but this is by some of them restrained to a second wife; for of the first they say,
"it is not proper to be hasty to put away a first wife; but a second, if he hates her, let him put her away (l)''
and R. Eleazer says (m), whoever divorces his first wife, even the altar sheds tears for him, referring to the words in Malachi 2:13 and divorces of this kind they only reckon lawful among the Israelites, and found it upon this passage; for so they make God to speak after this manner (n),
"in Israel I have granted divorces; among the nations of the world I have not granted divorces. R. Chananiah, in the name of R. Phinehas, observes, that in every other section it is written, "the Lord of hosts"; but here it is written, "the God of Israel", to teach thee that the holy blessed God does not put his name to divorces (or allow them) but in Israel only. R. Chayah Rabba says, the Gentiles have no divorces.''
But some of them have better understanding of these words, and more truly give the sense of them thus, as R. Jochanan does, who interprets them,
"the putting away of the wife is hateful (o);''
it is so to God, and ought not to be done by men but in case of adultery, as our Lord has taught, Matthew 5:32 and which was the doctrine of the school of Shammai in Christ's time, who taught,
"that no man should divorce his wife, unless he found in her filthiness;''
i.e. that she was guilty of adultery; though this Maimonides restrains to the first wife, as before: but the house of Hillell, who lived in the same time, was of a different mind, and taught that
"if she burnt his food;''
either over dressed or over salted it, according to Deuteronomy 24:1. R. Akiba says, if he found another more beautiful than her, according to Deuteronomy 24:1, he might divorce her (p); of the form of a divorce; see Gill on Matthew 5:31. Those interpreters among Christians that go this way do not look upon this as an approbation of divorce, on account of hatred; but that so to do is better than to retain them with hatred of them, seeing it was connived at, or than to take other wives with them.
For one covereth violence with his garment, or "on his garment",
saith the Lord of hosts; as he that puts away his wife does her an open injury, which though he may cover, pretending the law, which connives at divorces; yet the violence done to his wife is as manifest as the garment upon his back: though those who think the former words are an instruction to put away wives, when hated, consider this as a reason why they should do so; because, by retaining them, and yet hating them, and taking other wives to them, is doing them a real injury, whatever cover or pretence may be used; because, if dismissed, they might be loved by, and married to, other men. Aben Ezra seems to have hit the sense of these words, when he makes this to be the object of God's hatred, as well as the former; his note is,
"the Lord hateth him that putteth away his wife that is pure, and he hates him that covereth; or God sees his violence which is done in secret.''
Mr. Pocock proposes a conjecture, which is very ingenious and probable, that as the words will bear the construction Aben Ezra gives, that God hates putting away, and hates that one should put violence upon or over his garment; by "garment" he thinks may be meant a man's lawful wife, which is as a garment to him; and by "violence" a second wife, or other wives, taken to the injury, hurt, and vexation of the former; and the covering, or superinducing violence over the garment, is marrying an unlawful wife, over or with, or above his lawful one: and the sense is, that as God hates divorce, so he hates polygamy:
therefore take heed to your spirit, that you deal not treacherously; See Gill on Malachi 2:15.
(k) T. Bab. Gittin, fol. 90. 2. (l) Maimon. Hilchot Gerushin, c. 10, 21, 22. (m) T. Bab. Gittin, ib. (n) T. Hieros. Kiddushin, c. 1. fol. 58. 3. (o) T. Bab. Gittin, ut supra. (p) Misn. Gittin, c. 9. sect. 10.
putting away--that is, divorce.
for one covereth violence with . . . garment--MAURER translates, "And (Jehovah hateth him who) covereth his garment (that is, his wife, in Arabic idiom; compare Genesis 20:16, 'He is to thee a covering of thy eyes'; the husband was so to the wife, and the wife to the husband; also Deuteronomy 22:30; Ruth 3:9; Ezekiel 16:8) with injury." The Hebrew favors "garment," being accusative of the thing covered. Compare with English Version, Psalm 73:6, "violence covereth them as a garment." Their "violence" is the putting away of their wives; the "garment" with which they try to cover it is the plea of Moses' permission (Deuteronomy 24:1; compare Matthew 19:6-9).
Putting away - Divorce, such as these petulant Jews used to make way for some new wives, which God hates as much as putting away.
*More commentary available at chapter level.