Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Matthew 19:9

"And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and he that marrieth her when she is put away committeth adultery." — Matthew 19:9 (ASV)

Jesus gives what is called his famous “exception clause” here. What is the meaning of porneia (NIV “marital unfaithfulness”; KJV “fornication”; GK 4518)? Some relate it to incest. Others have argued that it refers to premarital unchastity: if a man discovers his bride is not a virgin, he may divorce her. Still others hold that it means “adultery” here, no more and no less. Yet in Greek the normal word for adultery is moicheia (GK 3657). Matthew has already used moicheia and porneia in the same context (15:19), suggesting some distinction between the words.

It must be admitted that the word porneia itself is very broad. Occasionally it can refer to a specific kind of sexual sin, but only because the specific sexual sin belongs to the larger category of sexual immorality. Porneia covers the entire range of sexual sins and should not be restricted unless the context requires it.

Consequently, what Jesus seems to be saying is that divorce and remarriage always involve evil; but as Moses permitted it because of the hardness of human hearts, so also does he—but now on the sole grounds of porneia (sexual sin of any sort). Admittedly, Jesus would appear to be abrogating something of the Mosaic prescription; for whatever the general “something indecent” refers to in Dt 24:1, it can hardly refer to adultery, for which the prescribed punishment was death. But porneia includes adultery as a sexual sin, even if not restricted to it. Jesus’ judgments on the matter are therefore both lighter (no capital punishment for adultery) and heavier (the sole exception being some form of sexual sin) than Moses.

In some ways, Jesus is doing the same thing here as he did in the Sermon on the Mount (5:21–48). He points out the true direction in which the Old Testament points (19:4–8), even though formally it may be abrogating a Mosaic command. It should also be noted that because marriage is referred to in sexual terms in Ge 2:24, sexual promiscuity is therefore a de facto exception. It may not necessitate divorce; but permission for divorce and remarriage under such circumstances, far from being inconsistent with Jesus’ thought, is in perfect harmony with it.