About the marriage and divorce issue in Matthew 19:9, Jesus was replying to the Jewish people. Does this mean that it does not apply to Christians but only Jews?<\/p>\n\t
You are missing an important implication. When laws were given to people there is an immediate audience and implied general audience. For instance, when the Ten Commandments were given they were given to the Israelites who left Egypt. “The LORD our God made a covenant with us at Horeb. The LORD did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, with all those of us alive here today<\/em>” (Deuteronomy 5:2-3). However, those commands were not limited to that generation only. “Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the judgments which the LORD your God has commanded me to teach you, that you might do them in the land where you are going over to possess it, so that you and your son and your grandson might fear the LORD your God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged<\/em>” (Deuteronomy 6:1-2).<\/p>\n The same is true of the New Testament. Most of the teachings of Jesus were to a Jewish audience, but they were to be passed on. “And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, ‘All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you<\/strong>; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age’<\/em>” (Matthew 28:18-20). Thus, while Paul wrote to the Corinthians about the problems in their congregation, those teachings still apply to us.<\/p>\n This line of argument has been around for many years as an attempt to avoid applying Jesus’ explanation of allowable divorce to be applied today. However, the approach leads the advocate to claim that all four of the gospel accounts do not apply to Christians, which is logically false. See<\/p>\n Question: About the marriage and divorce issue in Matthew 19:9, Jesus was replying to the Jewish people. Does this mean that it does not apply to Christians but only Jews? Answer: You are missing an important implication. When laws were given to people there is an immediate audience and implied general audience. For instance, when…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[167,799,268],"class_list":["post-47600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-divorce","tag-new-testament","tag-old-testament"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":53407,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/matthew-was-written-for-the-jews-so-the-law-on-marriage-and-divorce-only-applies-to-the-jews\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":0},"title":"Matthew was written for the Jews, so the law on marriage and divorce only applies to the Jews","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 4, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I was taught that you have to look at who's talking and who they are talking to. In Matthew 19, Jesus was talking to the Jews, and the Law of Moses was given to the Jews and not the Gentiles, even though Matthew is a New Testament book, so\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5790,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/justifying-divorce-and-remarriage-by-claiming-matthew-mark-luke-and-john-are-old-testament-books\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":1},"title":"Justifying Divorce and Remarriage by Claiming Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are Old Testament Books","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 8, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: What a tragedy! There are actually some members in the church that teach that Christians need to divorce their present mate because of having been previously involved in a divorce. Wow! This is an absolutely and pitifully deceptive teaching!\u00a0 And these sorts of doctrines need to be settled and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":67117,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-matthew-5-only-for-the-jews\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":2},"title":"Is Matthew 5 only for the Jews?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 20, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello, A friend of mine who is against divorce and remarriage says that Matthew 5 has a \"Jewish element,\" that is, the word \"council\" in Matthew 5:22, so it is a chapter only for Jews and not for Christians.\u00a0 What do you think about that? Thank you. Answer: This\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8571,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/were-only-the-jews-gods-chosen-people-in-the-old-testament\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":3},"title":"Were only the Jews God’s chosen people in the Old Testament?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 29, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Do you believe and teach that the house of Israel were all Jews? I mean that only the Jews were God's chosen people in the Old Testament. Thank you. Answer: The Israelites were chosen by God above all the other nations because of His love for their ancestors (i.e.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24402,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-do-we-cite-matthew-regarding-divorce-since-jesus-lived-under-the-old-law\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":4},"title":"Why do we cite Matthew regarding divorce since Jesus lived under the Old Law?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 29, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: As I understand Matthew 19:9 and Matthew 5:32 concerning divorce, Jesus is answering the Pharisees (Jews)\u00a0as they were tempting him on this question. His answer was the same as the law that they were under (except for fornication).\u00a0Such as in the case that Joseph thought Mary was in. Why\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2894,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/does-it-matter-who-files-for-the-divorce\/","url_meta":{"origin":47600,"position":5},"title":"Does it matter who files for the divorce?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 24, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: When you say that someone may divorce their spouse due to fornication, does it matter who actually files the papers? A woman I know moved out of her house, filed divorce papers, and then started dating another man. Her husband didn't know for sure if she was committing adultery\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47600\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n