Matthew 19:4-6

Matthew 19:4-6. He answered, Have ye not read, &c. It is thought by some that the chief design of the Pharisees in putting the fore-mentioned question to our Lord, was to make him contradict Moses. If so, they were much disappointed, for, instead of contradicting him, he confutes them by the very words of Moses. He who made them at the beginning When the human race began to exist; made them male and female Greek, αρσεν και θηλυ , which Dr. Campbell renders, a male and a female. He finds fault with our version as inaccurate and irrelative to our Lord’s argument, and thinks our translators “could not have rendered the clause differently if the original expression had been αρρενας και θηλειας εποιεσεν αυτους . Yet it is manifest, that the sense would have been different. All that this declaration would have implied is, that when God created mankind, he made people of both sexes. But what argument could have been drawn from this principle, to show that the tie of marriage was indissoluble? Or how could the conclusion annexed have been supported? For this cause shall a man leave father and mother. Besides, it was surely unnecessary to recur to the history of the creation to convince those Pharisees of what all the world knew, that the human race was composed of men and women, and consequently of two sexes. The weight of the argument, therefore,” he says, “must lie in this circumstance, that God created at first no more than a single pair, one of each sex, whom he united in the bond of marriage, and, in so doing, exhibited a standard of that union to all generations. The very words, and these two, show that it is implied in the historian’s declaration, that they were two, one male and one female, and no more. But this is by no means implied in the common version. It lets us know, indeed, that they were two sexes, but gives us no hint that these were but two persons.” And said By the mouth of Adam, who uttered these words, For this cause On account of his engaging in the married state; shall a man leave father and mother When those dear relations of parental and filial tenderness shall take place, and shall cleave to his wife With an affection more strong and steady than he feels even for those from whom, under God, he has derived his being: and they twain shall be one flesh That is, “shall constitute only one person, in respect of the unity of their inclinations and interests, and of the mutual power which they have over each other’s bodies, 1Co 6:16 ; 1 Corinthians 7:4; and as long as they continue faithful to this law, they must remain undivided till death separates them.” Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh

“From the original institution of marriage, therefore, in paradise, and from the great law thereof, declared by God himself on that occasion, it evidently appears that it is the strongest and tenderest of all friendships, a friendship supported by the divine sanction and approbation, a friendship therefore which ought to be indissoluble till death.” What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder By unreasonable divorces. Husbands and wives, being joined together by the ordinance of God, must not be put asunder by any ordinance of man: but the bond of marriage must be esteemed sacred, and incapable of being dissolved by any thing which does not make them cease to be one flesh, by making that of the one common to some third person, that is, by one of the parties committing adultery: for as, by forming at first only one man and one woman, God condemned polygamy, so, by making them one flesh, he condemned divorce.