1 Corinthians 7:15 - Exposition

If the unbelieving depart. The sense of the word rendered "depart" is rather "wishes to be separated." Is not under bondage ; literally, has not been enslaved . Our Lord assumes one cause alone—unfaithfulness—as adequate for the disruption of the marriage tie; but he was not contemplating, as St. Paul is, the case of mixed marriages. To peace; rather, in peace. Peace is to be the sphere in which the calling comes, and in which it issues. Milton, in his 'Tetrachordon,' quotes Maimonides to the effect that "divorce was permitted by Moses to preserve peace in marriage and quiet in the family." Similarly, a voluntary separation might be the only possible means of preserving moral peace where the union was between souls separated from each other by so vast a gulf as those of a pagan and a Christian.