Post by M.R. Hagerty on May 5, 2023 17:02:43 GMT -7
Matthew 5:21-48
21 "You have heard that the ancients were told, `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' and `Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.' 22 "But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ` You good-for-nothing,' shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, `You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
23 "Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering. 25 "Make friends quickly with your opponent at law while you are with him on the way, so that your opponent may not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you be thrown into prison. 26 "Truly I say to you, you will not come out of there until you have paid up the last cent.”
27 "You have heard that it was said, `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY'; 28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”
31 "It was said, `WHOEVER SENDS HIS WIFE AWAY, LET HIM GIVE HER A CERTIFICATE OF DIVORCE'; 32 but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
33 "Again, you have heard that the ancients were told, `YOU SHALL NOT MAKE FALSE VOWS, BUT SHALL FULFILL YOUR VOWS TO THE LORD.' 34 "But I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is the footstool of His feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is THE CITY OF THE GREAT KING. 36 "Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 "But let your statement be, `Yes, yes' or `No, no'; anything beyond these is of evil.”
38 "You have heard that it was said, `AN EYE FOR AN EYE, AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH.' 39 "But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. 40 "If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. 41 "Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two. 42 "Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you.”
43 "You have heard that it was said, `YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.' 44 "But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 "For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 "If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:21-48)
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Commentary
Matthew 5:21-24
21 " `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' . . . 22 and whoever says to his brother, ` You good-for-nothing,' . . and whoever says, `You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
We can get wrapped up too tightly in trying to analyze why merely calling a man a fool makes us as guilty as if we had committed murder. The courts of human government would never so prosecute. And in God’s eyes we would be reticent to conclude that telling a man he is good for nothing would count as seriously as murdering the man. But all such things are to be placed in the context of sin, and sin separates us from God. So a man who does not advance to murder is just as separated and worthy of judgment as the man who murders, therefore what is the point in talking about the degree of wrong?
So here it is not that the courts ought to be condemning men for calling others fools, but that the Supreme Court of God sees all the actions of men in sin as sin in His economy, hence we are worthy of condemnation. (Not a popular acknowledgment today.)
The primary takeaway from this lesson is that one cannot hide behind the safety of having at least not murdered. God looks at the thoughts and the motives of behavior and sees enough to condemn us when measured against His standards of righteousness. In this Jesus is not easing up on the Law, He is making it more rigorous than before. It was difficult to keep, now it is impossible if the thoughts are to be judged also.
23 ". . if you are presenting your offering . . and . . your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering . . first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.”
This is not the case of remembering that you have something against someone else, but that he or she has something against you. This would mean that he has complained to you about it, or others have made it known that so-and-so is upset with something you’ve done. Jesus here presents God’s view about what is preferred.
What is an offering? Is it something God needs and therefore is sanctified as inviolate? The purpose of man giving offerings is to either commemorate the goodness of God or to meet the demands regarding sin and forgiveness. It is done in order to say something to man rather than to fill some need in God. But to make offering for one sin while another one remains unresolved is not efficacious, neither is the case of offering something for a sin, but making no restitution to the one offended. God would rather see a brother restored through repentance and forgiveness than seeing the sacrifice on the altar.
And we see that this is not something completely new. Saul was told by Samuel that his disobedience was more important to God than making offerings to Him - ”to obey is better than sacrifice.” (I Samuel 15:22)
Matthew 5:25-28
25 "Make friends quickly with your opponent at law . .”
Ancient life included provisions similar to those today in which an injured person could sue us for damages. So the context here is established guilt on our part, not defense of ourselves as innocent. This is directed at the awareness of being guilty but preferring to take our chances in court; and perhaps if we are fortunate enough to hire a clever lawyer, we might get off. Yet as children of God, we are to recognize our guilt (the thing we normally try to hide), and seek reconciliation outside the legal means.
Now here the court is not the divine court, as above, but the earthly court, primarily because the agent handing us over happens to be our opponent. This is to say that we play a precarious game with misbehavior and the risks of being let off or not (and their consequences). But if we are guilty, the likelihood is greater that we will be found so and all our moves to avoid responsibility may very well end us up in jail.
“. . the last penny” This merely emphasizes that our cleverness will not relieve our paying our full debt before the law and we will find that it would have been better to be honest and to have sued for peace. It focuses attention on our being pro-active about our responsibilities as citizens To avoid the very mistakes that would land us in court, we ought to be all the more circumspect.
27 "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY; . .28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”
This is framed from the view of men looking at women, but it applies to both sexes looking at the other (or even their own) with lust.
We have to bear in mind that Jesus as Creator is fully aware that it is He who created human sexual response. Yet we find Him proscribing it with rigorous conditions. This is not because He made a mistake in the Creation, but that man has abused the gift of God and where abuse persists, correction and even abrogation are necessary.
So we find Jesus laying down a more rigorous obedience to the Law than the Pharisees ever dreamed. It is not enough to be pure in deed, but people must be pure in their thought. To do so would actually exceed the practice of the Pharisees which Jesus had already taught was necessary if one wished to approach by works. This is not about the initial tempting thought (we are all fallen and impure thoughts are going to arise within us.) It is about entertaining such thoughts. It is not that such thoughts appear, but that they remain.
Temptation is going to bring the thought into consciousness; it is not sin when it does. But to dwell and indulge the thought, to let it possess us, this is where sin is conceived. So the notice of a beautiful woman or handsome man is an event. The lingering thought of being with them moves the initial thought to lust. We are not responsible for the first (except to avoid situations known for their temptations) but we are wholly responsible for the second.
Now this is of course not limited to adultery, but applies to fornication (illicit sex between the unmarried) and to all other forms of lust in which we indulge the desire to have something forbidden or that steals our heart away from God.
Matthew 5:29-32
29 "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”
Many have tried to resolve the difficulty of these verses by explaining that Jesus never intended anyone to cut off parts of their body, that He was just talking in hyperbole. But it is more the case that the eye and the hand do not actually cause us to sin, so there would be no occasion to literally do what He says. That is not the same as saying He never intended it literally. If it were to be discovered that our eye or hand caused us to sin, separating them from us would be the proper step to preserving us against judgment.
‘Stumble’ is an interesting word and is used in this sense uniquely in the NT. To sin is to stumble, as on a path. The stumbling takes our eyes off the goal ahead of us and retards our progress in that we must now pick ourselves up, or even nurture our wounds before continuing. In the NT the stumbling can also picture the case of quitting the path altogether, and looking for easier ones.
As it happens, sin occurs in the human heart. So to follow Jesus’ command, we must excise our selfish, corrupted heart. In doing so we must come to the only Physician who knows how, and He will not only take away the old heart but is ready with a new one, one that desires righteousness, and desires the practice and effecting of love.
32 . . " . . but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
Very hard words in modern times, where divorce is accommodated as one of society’s frequently applied remedies for our mistakes. This is covered again in Matthew 19. The verse quoted here is Deut 24:1-3. This will come up later in reference to why Jesus’ new teaching is right if Moses permitted divorce. Here Jesus conveys the heart of God, how He sees the marriage bond and how serious it is when it is broken.
First, there is an exception – that of unchastity. Interestingly, the other Gospels leave this qualification out. But the rule of interpretation is that the harder verses interpret the weaker. More information is considered harder than less information, in that it is more complete and has more stipulation, therefore it rules the more vague. To make the shortened versions rule the interpretation would be to actually eliminate information, which is never the intent of biblical interpretation.
The word is ’porneia’ from which we get our word pornography. (This is one case where the NASB has chosen a weaker, vaguer word when much stronger words were available.) Porneia can be translated as adultery, fornication, homosexuality, lesbianism, intercourse with animals, sexual intercourse with close relatives, and sexual intercourse with a divorced man or woman. So it is basically any form of illicit sexual activity. Whether this is something that occurred prior to marriage or is committed while in the state of marriage, the act serves as a basis for dissolving the marriage if the offended party wishes it. But it does not forestall the offended partner from forgiving his wife or husband and remaining married.
But beyond the exception, we have the hardest words of the teaching. They apply more to remarriage after divorce than to the act of divorce itself. For a husband to simply divorce his wife because she no longer pleases him, actually occasions the likelihood that she will commit adultery. This is because she will inevitably remarry and when that occurs, her bond to the first husband is still considered valid (since the grounds for divorce were not met), hence she is committing adultery, not so much for being married again, but for having relations with someone else. And the man who divorces his wife is in the same condition if he remarries.
But the sin extends further. The man who marries the divorced woman will join her in her act of adultery as will the woman who marries the husband who divorced his first wife. So the adultery spreads fourfold from but one act of divorce based on mere discontent.
The import of this becomes clearer in I Corinthians - if they divorce they are to remain single, or else be reconciled to each other (7:11). However, one condition will undo this restriction for the party that waits – the remarriage of the partners. This is because a new union makes reconciliation of the first union biblically impossible, as described below from Deuteronomy.
But we need a word about the legalism involved here. We cannot assuage the harshness of the command, but we are not to use these verses to make those who have divorced and remarried in fear of their souls, or worse, try to undo the subsequent remarriages and restore what was lost.
In the end, sin is sin and our response is to confess it as sin. But what action we take in terms of remedy or restoration depends on how far things have gone. We must observe the prohibitions in Moses: “4 then her former husband who sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled; for that is an abomination before the LORD, “ (Deut 24:4)
Jesus does not discuss the problem of abuse that could make necessary a divorce for protection’s sake. In I Corinthians, Paul deals with the case of the unbelieving husband who is content to live with the believing spouse. She is not to divorce or consider her marriage illegitimate because the man is not a believer (I Cor 7:15).
Some argue that ill-treatment by a believing partner who is oblivious or uncaring about their sin is the same as acting as an unbeliever, and further that such behavior hardly qualifies as desiring to live with the spouse in anything resembling marriage. As such, the wife might think herself free to leave according to the biblical terms of I Corinthians, in that her husband’s behavior is not conducive to remaining as man and wife.
The problem with this approach and interpretation is that it ignores the restorative resource we have in God. Choosing abandonment by making hasty assessments of our spouses can be easily abused and divorce can become rampant among Christians at the very moment when God desires to show Himself stronger than the world.
21 "You have heard that the ancients were told, `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' and `Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.' 22 "But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ` You good-for-nothing,' shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, `You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
23 "Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering. 25 "Make friends quickly with your opponent at law while you are with him on the way, so that your opponent may not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you be thrown into prison. 26 "Truly I say to you, you will not come out of there until you have paid up the last cent.”
27 "You have heard that it was said, `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY'; 28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”
31 "It was said, `WHOEVER SENDS HIS WIFE AWAY, LET HIM GIVE HER A CERTIFICATE OF DIVORCE'; 32 but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
33 "Again, you have heard that the ancients were told, `YOU SHALL NOT MAKE FALSE VOWS, BUT SHALL FULFILL YOUR VOWS TO THE LORD.' 34 "But I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is the footstool of His feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is THE CITY OF THE GREAT KING. 36 "Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 "But let your statement be, `Yes, yes' or `No, no'; anything beyond these is of evil.”
38 "You have heard that it was said, `AN EYE FOR AN EYE, AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH.' 39 "But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. 40 "If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. 41 "Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two. 42 "Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you.”
43 "You have heard that it was said, `YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.' 44 "But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 "For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 "If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:21-48)
_____________________________________________________________
Commentary
Matthew 5:21-24
21 " `YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' . . . 22 and whoever says to his brother, ` You good-for-nothing,' . . and whoever says, `You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
We can get wrapped up too tightly in trying to analyze why merely calling a man a fool makes us as guilty as if we had committed murder. The courts of human government would never so prosecute. And in God’s eyes we would be reticent to conclude that telling a man he is good for nothing would count as seriously as murdering the man. But all such things are to be placed in the context of sin, and sin separates us from God. So a man who does not advance to murder is just as separated and worthy of judgment as the man who murders, therefore what is the point in talking about the degree of wrong?
So here it is not that the courts ought to be condemning men for calling others fools, but that the Supreme Court of God sees all the actions of men in sin as sin in His economy, hence we are worthy of condemnation. (Not a popular acknowledgment today.)
The primary takeaway from this lesson is that one cannot hide behind the safety of having at least not murdered. God looks at the thoughts and the motives of behavior and sees enough to condemn us when measured against His standards of righteousness. In this Jesus is not easing up on the Law, He is making it more rigorous than before. It was difficult to keep, now it is impossible if the thoughts are to be judged also.
23 ". . if you are presenting your offering . . and . . your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering . . first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.”
This is not the case of remembering that you have something against someone else, but that he or she has something against you. This would mean that he has complained to you about it, or others have made it known that so-and-so is upset with something you’ve done. Jesus here presents God’s view about what is preferred.
What is an offering? Is it something God needs and therefore is sanctified as inviolate? The purpose of man giving offerings is to either commemorate the goodness of God or to meet the demands regarding sin and forgiveness. It is done in order to say something to man rather than to fill some need in God. But to make offering for one sin while another one remains unresolved is not efficacious, neither is the case of offering something for a sin, but making no restitution to the one offended. God would rather see a brother restored through repentance and forgiveness than seeing the sacrifice on the altar.
And we see that this is not something completely new. Saul was told by Samuel that his disobedience was more important to God than making offerings to Him - ”to obey is better than sacrifice.” (I Samuel 15:22)
Matthew 5:25-28
25 "Make friends quickly with your opponent at law . .”
Ancient life included provisions similar to those today in which an injured person could sue us for damages. So the context here is established guilt on our part, not defense of ourselves as innocent. This is directed at the awareness of being guilty but preferring to take our chances in court; and perhaps if we are fortunate enough to hire a clever lawyer, we might get off. Yet as children of God, we are to recognize our guilt (the thing we normally try to hide), and seek reconciliation outside the legal means.
Now here the court is not the divine court, as above, but the earthly court, primarily because the agent handing us over happens to be our opponent. This is to say that we play a precarious game with misbehavior and the risks of being let off or not (and their consequences). But if we are guilty, the likelihood is greater that we will be found so and all our moves to avoid responsibility may very well end us up in jail.
“. . the last penny” This merely emphasizes that our cleverness will not relieve our paying our full debt before the law and we will find that it would have been better to be honest and to have sued for peace. It focuses attention on our being pro-active about our responsibilities as citizens To avoid the very mistakes that would land us in court, we ought to be all the more circumspect.
27 "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY; . .28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”
This is framed from the view of men looking at women, but it applies to both sexes looking at the other (or even their own) with lust.
We have to bear in mind that Jesus as Creator is fully aware that it is He who created human sexual response. Yet we find Him proscribing it with rigorous conditions. This is not because He made a mistake in the Creation, but that man has abused the gift of God and where abuse persists, correction and even abrogation are necessary.
So we find Jesus laying down a more rigorous obedience to the Law than the Pharisees ever dreamed. It is not enough to be pure in deed, but people must be pure in their thought. To do so would actually exceed the practice of the Pharisees which Jesus had already taught was necessary if one wished to approach by works. This is not about the initial tempting thought (we are all fallen and impure thoughts are going to arise within us.) It is about entertaining such thoughts. It is not that such thoughts appear, but that they remain.
Temptation is going to bring the thought into consciousness; it is not sin when it does. But to dwell and indulge the thought, to let it possess us, this is where sin is conceived. So the notice of a beautiful woman or handsome man is an event. The lingering thought of being with them moves the initial thought to lust. We are not responsible for the first (except to avoid situations known for their temptations) but we are wholly responsible for the second.
Now this is of course not limited to adultery, but applies to fornication (illicit sex between the unmarried) and to all other forms of lust in which we indulge the desire to have something forbidden or that steals our heart away from God.
Matthew 5:29-32
29 "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”
Many have tried to resolve the difficulty of these verses by explaining that Jesus never intended anyone to cut off parts of their body, that He was just talking in hyperbole. But it is more the case that the eye and the hand do not actually cause us to sin, so there would be no occasion to literally do what He says. That is not the same as saying He never intended it literally. If it were to be discovered that our eye or hand caused us to sin, separating them from us would be the proper step to preserving us against judgment.
‘Stumble’ is an interesting word and is used in this sense uniquely in the NT. To sin is to stumble, as on a path. The stumbling takes our eyes off the goal ahead of us and retards our progress in that we must now pick ourselves up, or even nurture our wounds before continuing. In the NT the stumbling can also picture the case of quitting the path altogether, and looking for easier ones.
As it happens, sin occurs in the human heart. So to follow Jesus’ command, we must excise our selfish, corrupted heart. In doing so we must come to the only Physician who knows how, and He will not only take away the old heart but is ready with a new one, one that desires righteousness, and desires the practice and effecting of love.
32 . . " . . but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
Very hard words in modern times, where divorce is accommodated as one of society’s frequently applied remedies for our mistakes. This is covered again in Matthew 19. The verse quoted here is Deut 24:1-3. This will come up later in reference to why Jesus’ new teaching is right if Moses permitted divorce. Here Jesus conveys the heart of God, how He sees the marriage bond and how serious it is when it is broken.
First, there is an exception – that of unchastity. Interestingly, the other Gospels leave this qualification out. But the rule of interpretation is that the harder verses interpret the weaker. More information is considered harder than less information, in that it is more complete and has more stipulation, therefore it rules the more vague. To make the shortened versions rule the interpretation would be to actually eliminate information, which is never the intent of biblical interpretation.
The word is ’porneia’ from which we get our word pornography. (This is one case where the NASB has chosen a weaker, vaguer word when much stronger words were available.) Porneia can be translated as adultery, fornication, homosexuality, lesbianism, intercourse with animals, sexual intercourse with close relatives, and sexual intercourse with a divorced man or woman. So it is basically any form of illicit sexual activity. Whether this is something that occurred prior to marriage or is committed while in the state of marriage, the act serves as a basis for dissolving the marriage if the offended party wishes it. But it does not forestall the offended partner from forgiving his wife or husband and remaining married.
But beyond the exception, we have the hardest words of the teaching. They apply more to remarriage after divorce than to the act of divorce itself. For a husband to simply divorce his wife because she no longer pleases him, actually occasions the likelihood that she will commit adultery. This is because she will inevitably remarry and when that occurs, her bond to the first husband is still considered valid (since the grounds for divorce were not met), hence she is committing adultery, not so much for being married again, but for having relations with someone else. And the man who divorces his wife is in the same condition if he remarries.
But the sin extends further. The man who marries the divorced woman will join her in her act of adultery as will the woman who marries the husband who divorced his first wife. So the adultery spreads fourfold from but one act of divorce based on mere discontent.
The import of this becomes clearer in I Corinthians - if they divorce they are to remain single, or else be reconciled to each other (7:11). However, one condition will undo this restriction for the party that waits – the remarriage of the partners. This is because a new union makes reconciliation of the first union biblically impossible, as described below from Deuteronomy.
But we need a word about the legalism involved here. We cannot assuage the harshness of the command, but we are not to use these verses to make those who have divorced and remarried in fear of their souls, or worse, try to undo the subsequent remarriages and restore what was lost.
In the end, sin is sin and our response is to confess it as sin. But what action we take in terms of remedy or restoration depends on how far things have gone. We must observe the prohibitions in Moses: “4 then her former husband who sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled; for that is an abomination before the LORD, “ (Deut 24:4)
Jesus does not discuss the problem of abuse that could make necessary a divorce for protection’s sake. In I Corinthians, Paul deals with the case of the unbelieving husband who is content to live with the believing spouse. She is not to divorce or consider her marriage illegitimate because the man is not a believer (I Cor 7:15).
Some argue that ill-treatment by a believing partner who is oblivious or uncaring about their sin is the same as acting as an unbeliever, and further that such behavior hardly qualifies as desiring to live with the spouse in anything resembling marriage. As such, the wife might think herself free to leave according to the biblical terms of I Corinthians, in that her husband’s behavior is not conducive to remaining as man and wife.
The problem with this approach and interpretation is that it ignores the restorative resource we have in God. Choosing abandonment by making hasty assessments of our spouses can be easily abused and divorce can become rampant among Christians at the very moment when God desires to show Himself stronger than the world.