Deuteronomy 24:4
The former husband cannot take her again to wife: because she is defiled, and is become abominable before the Lord: lest thou cause thy land to sin, which the Lord thy God shall give thee to possess.
Open Deuteronomy 24:4 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- non poterit prior maritus recipere eam in uxorem : quia polluta est, et abominabilis facta est coram Domino : ne peccare facias terram tuam, quam Dominus Deus tuus tradiderit tibi possidendam.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- οὐ δυνήσεται ὁ ἀνὴρ ὁ πρότερος ἐξαποστείλας αὐτὴν ἐπαναστρέψας λαβεῖν αὐτὴν ἑαυτῷ γυναῖκα μετὰ τὸ μιανθῆναι αὐτήν, ὅτι βδέλυγμά ἐστιν ἐναντίον Κυρίου τοῦ θεοῦ σου· καὶ οὐ μιανεῖτε τὴν γῆν ἣν Κύριος ὁ θεός σου δίδωσίν σοι ἐν κλήρῳ.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- לֹא יוּכַ֣ל בַּעְלָ֣הּ הָרִאשׁ֣וֹן אֲשֶֽׁר שִׁ֠לְּחָהּ לָשׁ֨וּב לְקַחְתָּ֜הּ לִהְי֧וֹת ל֣וֹ לְאִשָּׁ֗ה אַחֲרֵי֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר הֻטַּמָּ֔אָה כִּֽי תוֹעֵבָ֥ה הִ֖וא לִפְנֵ֣י יְהוָ֑ה וְלֹ֤א תַחֲטִיא֙ אֶת הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁר֙ יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לְךָ֖ נַחֲלָֽה
Haydock's commentary
Defiled. This insinuates that the second marriage was a real adultery, (Calmet) and only tolerated by the law to prevent greater evils. (Haydock)
It might be said indeed that the woman was defiled, with regard to her former husband, who could not take her back without condemning his former proceeding (Calmet); as he would seem to have only lent her for some mean consideration. (Menochius)
Domitian took the privilege of a judge from a Roman knight, who had resumed his wife after he had divorced her for adultery. (Suetonius, viii.) But how then is the woman abominable before the Lord? Some say the thing itself is extremely dishonourable, as the Hebrew intimates, though the woman have done nothing but what the law allows. Grotius believes that the man might take back his wife, at any time, before she was married to another. But the Rabbins limit this privilege to three months after the date of separation. God forbids his priests to marry with those who had been divorced, as it is to be presumed that they have not been rejected by their former husbands without good reason, Leviticus xxi. 7. The man who cohabits with an adulteress, is deemed a fool; (Proverbs xviii. 22,) and some have believed, that it was necessary to put such away. But St. Paul advises a reconciliation, 1 Corinthians vii. 11.
To sin, or to incur the punishment due to it. (Calmet)
If the state connived at the transgression of the law, the judgments of God would fall upon the people.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Origen Origen's Commentary on Matthew, Chapter XVIII
After this we will discuss the saying of the Pharisees which they said to Jesus, “ Why then did Moses command to give a bill of divorcement and put her away? ” And with good reason we will bring forward for this purpose the passage from Deuteronomy concerning the bill of divorcement, which is as follows: “But if a man taketh a wife and cohabit with her, and it shall be, if she do not find favour in his sight because he hath found in her a thing unseemly,” etc., down to the words, “and ye shall not pollute the land which the Lord your God giveth you for an inheritance.” Now I inquire whether in these things according to this law, we are to seek nothing in it beyond the letter seeing that God has not given it, or whether to the Pharisees who quoted the saying, “Moses commanded to give a bill of divorcement and put her away,” it was of necessity said, “Moses, for your hardness of heart, suf …
Origen Origen's Commentary on Matthew, Chapter XX
Now there are those in whose case it has happened that the man dwells with them without having hated them, because they abide in the house of the last husband, who took to himself their synagogue as wife. But also in their case the latter husband dies, perhaps whenever the last enemy of Christ, death, is destroyed. But whichever of these things may happen, whether the former or the latter to the wife, the former husband, it says, who sent her away, will not he able to turn back and take her to be a wife to himself after she has been defiled, since “it is abomination,” it says, “before the Lord thy God.” But these things will not seem to be consistent with this, “If the fulness of the Gentiles be come in, all Israel shall be saved.” But consider if it can be said to this, that, if she shall be saved by her former husband returning and taking her to himself as wife, she will in any case be …
Origen Origen's Commentary on Matthew, Chapter XXI
But some one may inquire whether the human soul can be figuratively called a wife, and the angel who is set over her and is her ruler, with whom as her sovereign she holds conversation, can be called her husband; so that according to this each lawfully dwells along with the soul which is worthy of the guardianship of a divine angel; but sometimes after long sojourning and intercourse a cause may arise in the soul why she does not find favour in the eyes of the angel who is her lord and ruler, because that in it there is found an unseemly thing; and bonds may be written out, as such are written, and a bill of divorcement be written and put into the hands of her who is cast out, so that she may no longer be familiar with her former guardian, when she is cast out from his dwelling. …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Matthew V. 27, 28
He goes not on to what lies before Him, until He have well cleared out the former topics. For, lo, He shows us yet another kind of adultery. And what is this? There was an ancient law made,that he who hated his wife, for whatever kind of cause, should not be forbidden to cast her out, and to bring home another instead of her. The law however did not command him simply to do this, but after giving the woman a writing of divorcement, that it might not be in her power to return to him again; that so at least the figure of the marriage might remain.
St Jerome The Letters of St. Jerome, To Amandus
4. I have not been able quite to determine what it is that she means by the words “has found herself compelled” to marry again. What is this compulsion of which she speaks? Was she overborne by a crowd and ravished against her will? If so, why has she not, thus victimized, subsequently put away her ravisher? Let her read the books of Moses and she will find that if violence is offered to a betrothed virgin in a city and she does not cry out, she is punished as an adulteress: but if she is forced in the field, she is innocent of sin and her ravisher alone is amenable to the laws. …