What The New Testament Teaches About Divorce And Remarriage -- By: Andrew David Naselli
Journal: Detroit Baptist Seminary Journal
Volume: DBSJ 24:1 (NA 2019)
Article: What The New Testament Teaches About Divorce And Remarriage
Author: Andrew David Naselli
DBSJ 24 (2019) p. 3
What The New Testament Teaches About Divorce And Remarriage
Evangelicals hold three main views on divorce and remarriage (fig. 1).
Figure 1. Three Main Views on Divorce and Remarriage
View | Divorce | Remarriage after Divorce |
1. Never Initiate Divorce, Never Remarry | Never legitimate (to initiate) | Never legitimate (as long as one’s former spouse is still alive) |
2. Sometimes Divorce, Never Remarry | Sometimes legitimate (a) Only for sexual immorality or physical desertion (b) Also for other actions that break the marriage covenant like physical abuse | |
3. Sometimes Divorce, Sometimes Remarry | Legitimate when the divorce is legitimate |
DBSJ 24 (2019) p. 4
I should qualify figure 1 in three ways:
1. These are three main views. There are other variations.
2. When framing these three views on remarriage, I say “remarriage after divorce” (column 3 in fig. 1) because evangelical academics agree that one may remarry after one’s former spouse dies (Rom 7:2; 1 Cor 7:39). The debate is whether it is ever legitimate to remarry after divorce. According to views 1 and 2 in figure 1, only death can nullify a marriage covenant.
3. I could add a fourth view: Divorce is almost always legitimate, and remarriage after divorce is almost always legitimate. I am not including it because I am not aware of evangelical academics who support it, but (unfortunately, I think) it is the functional view of many professing evangelicals.
It may be helpful to highlight some proponents of the three views in figure 1:
View 1. The most influential evang...
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