Commenting on the passages Mark x. 3-9 and Matt. xix. 4-8 he makes this just observation:
"It is clear from the Old Testament quotation that the breach of the marriage does not so much consist in the marrying again as in the separation by man of those whom God hath joined together: consequently the sin is as much committed when man ordains a separation from bed and board as when a new marriage is sanctioned."[2]
The basis on which Christ makes the exception is nothing less than the destructive character of the act of adultery. Divorce was but the legal declaration of an accomplished fact; the marriage bond had already been dissolved by the act of infidelity, the sentence of a human tribunal did but certify the fact.
It has been objected to this view that an
