Would you date or marry a separated or divorced person?

Personally I find your opinion on this to be dumb. Jesus asked questions like that. This is a Christian forum. I an also interested in people's responses to tge question. My question is not disingenuous. Maybe you don't like 'preachy' people or questions. That's your problem. You are being preachy against being preachy. At least I am being consistent. Who is being argumentative? From my perspective you are...and derailing the thread.

Dumb?

Oh come on! Surely you can find something more descriptive than plain old dumb. You're a BDF veteran. Find the words to convey how you really feel. Dumb is just... so dumb.

I like daft. Ultra maroon. The ole driveway don't make it to the house.

Does God forgive sin completely?
Or is God like a man to you and a liar because He leaves a checkmark by your name if you divorced?


You either worship the God who is or one of your own making who doesn't forgive completely.

I'll let you choose.

Just because you can read scriptures doesn't mean that you understand what you read.

I see dome touchy people here. I asked in a singles forum if they'd married divorced person and if so under what circumstances, and you post about God forgiving sin.

if you think it is a sin to marry a divorced person? Do you think that single people should marry a divorce person because God will forgive their sin? Is that what you're saying? otherwise how do you get from the topic of my post to your response?

This is why I tried to point out that it's important, even crucial, to get to know the audience.

As I said before, a good number of people who post regularly here have been through separation, divorce, abandonment, or experienced the death of their spouse -- sometimes more than once, or more than one of those things on the list -- and are remarried themselves or are actively looking to remarry.

This is why you are getting these kinds of answers.

You wouldn't be surprised by this if you take the time to learn more about the population that hangs out here.

Ummm
Walks like a duck
Quacks like a duck
Looks like a duck
Talks like a duck
Swims like a duck....

And somehow you want people to think you are a lamb?

There's a million different topics to cover and discuss but YOU picked this one from a very specific viewpoint by the manner you asked the questions you asked.

And now you claim something else that you have no idea whether is true or not.

You currently have 2 outs and two strikes....bottom of the 9nth with a man on base....

What's the chance you are going to lose this game?

JohnDB and presidente going at it, head to head...

What am I doing sitting around? I should be selling tickets!

You mean acts like someone who is touchy and hypersensitive.

I asked a few question and quoted some, apparently unpopular scriptures.

Look at my OP. Here is the part I wrote, and the rest was scripture,

What was the manner I asked the questions? Did I sneer? Did I do a Skeletor laugh between my questions? Anything like that you would have had to have come from your imagination, because it's just words on a page.

"Shaka, when the walls fell." I don't know what you mean.

I am not playing your game.

I quoted scriptures on divorce and remarriage and you implied I don't believe God forgives people. What does that have to do with my post? I didn't know (or else recall) you were divorced before starting this thread. My post wasn't motivated by pointing out some sin you may be concerned about.

If a divorced man puts away his wife wrongly, and is forgiven, does that mean what Jesus said about His marrying another being adultery is no longer true, because He was forgiven for putting away His wife?

I suspect that those who recoil at the words of the Lord Jesus on this topic might be the ones who need to hear them the most.

I don't post here a lot. I don't know the demographics. The way to learn is by posting, I suppose.

If certain posters react very negatively to the teachings of Jesus and the apostles on this topic, what does that say about the posters? Might they not be the type that need to contemplate what these scriptures mean?

By all means, keep going if you feel such a need.

But until you learn about the people posting here, you shouldn't be surprised by the reactions you're getting.

Despite being called Singles, a good number of regulars in this part of the forum are already married or remarried.

I would truly encourage you to get to know the stories of the people who hang out here.

We know you don't post here much because it really, really shows.

You do realize this is another reason your dating thread, while a nice thought, went on to crash and burn, right?

As I said, many of the people who regularly answer Singles Forum posts are already married. Some were originally Singles regulars who married during their time here but never left because they are our friends. Some even married other CC members. Others who are married come here for the games and a bit of comic relief. Much of what you're trying to say doesn't apply to many of the people reading.

If you had taken the time to learn about the individuals here, you would understand these dynamics and it would enable you to better communicate with the audience you are apparently seeking.

You seem to keep wondering why the "singles" here aren't responding the way you anticipated or want, but you never realized that many here aren't even single, or are content being so.

This is why you're getting a wide mix of answers and not the homogeny it looks like you assumed.

People are cut from many, many different molds here, which is important to know when starting threads in this part of the forum.

The more assumptions made, the more fragmented the audience's answers will be, so you might want to expect that.

Well, do I jump in here or not?..

I've seen the following...

-Singles look at divorced people with contempt, and divorced people look at singles with envy... Single folks, don't be arrogant. You could make the same mistake.

- Married folk look at remarried folks with a mixture of contempt and envy. There are lots of unhappily married folks out there just toughing it out. I feel for you! You don't want to be another statistic. It's hard to sell the idea of marriage in the church when we do a worse job of it than the world does.

- There are folks in the church now that are in their third, maybe even fourth marriages. Folks have tried to do things the right way and for whatever reason, they just can't.. At least they tried to do things the right way. They didn't live together or just have the occasional hookups.

- I know the verses mentioned at the start of this thread don't mention this specifically, but there are folks in the church that had multiple partners before they married "their one true love!" ... But somehow that doesn't count I guess?

- I'm pretty sure adultery isn't the only sin we will be judged for. I could be wrong about that. I will let others argue that out.

My statement is not eloquent, it's just me rambling about...

I'm not touchy...so don't touch me. And I KNOW Jesus's words well....obviously better than you. Because you don't know the difference between "putting away" a wife and divorcing a wife. And when I see you winding up to attack the biblically illiterate and downtrodden. People using the scriptures like a weapon to beat the other people with...I tend to get angry.

How many wives could a Jewish man have?
What was the punishment called for by Moses for an adulterous wife?

What was the LAW in the Old Testament concerning divorce?

What happened in Ezra with the foreign wives?

You claim to know scriptures....but you really don't seem to know how to put them together well. And how and why is God different from the Old Testament vx the Jesus in the New Testament?

Hint: God never changes and Jesus always saves. Gospel means literally "Good News"....not new condemnation and new rules for measuring how people fail.

ἀπολύσῃ Take a deep breath. Try to be aware of yourself and self-assess. Are you being aggressive, and maybe a bit obnoxious? Do you know what you are talking about?

Look at the translation I used in the OP. I can see that there is a distinction between the words translated 'divorce' and 'put away' in the OP. I was looking for a translation that used modern language (without the -eth) endings that preserved the distinction between those two words to allow for discussion of that topic. The King James 2000 Bible is not widely used, but I finally found it on the second page of translations of the verse to capture that distinction. So I am aware of the use of the worlds. Even witha Bible translation that captures this distinction, you still seemed 'triggered.'

I am also aware of some damaging false teachings going around that make much of the use of the words there. He tried to argue that a woman who was 'put away' was not legally divorced. Does that fit Matthew 19? Clearly not.

A while back, a website promoted the teaching that Jesus was merely opposing divorce without a certificate. That's sophistry, which can be debunked by looking at the English translations of the passage that use different English words for the Greek words. I've seen this erroneous teaching repeated on discussion forums.

If a man just kicked his wife out of the house and sent her away, he 'puts her away', but that wasn't the legal way it happened. And that is not the topic of debate in Matthew 24. Now, this website was promoting the idea that 'put away' really means 'put away without a certificate' and that Jesus was just saying if you expel your wife without giving her a certificate of divorce and marry someone else, you commit adultery. But that does not fit the actual conversation, the scriptures they were discussing.

The Pharisees asked Jesus if it was legal to put away a wife for any cause. There were two main groups of Pharisees, the Hillel school and the Shammai school. Hillel had taught a man could divorce his wife if she displeased him, even if she had burnt the bread. Shammai taught a man may divorce his wife if she did something indecent. Was the 'any cause' idea of Hillel right or not? The Pharisees ask if a man could divorce his wife for any cause. Jesus referred back to Genesis, two shall be one flesh. What God has joined together, He argued, let not man separate.

The Pharisees refer to Deuteronomy 24, and ask why Moses allowed putting away(/sending away) a wife with a certificate. It is clear from the Pharisees' question, from the phrases used in the New Testament, and from Deuteronomy that a woman put away with a certificate is indeed put away.

In Matthew 19:9 Jesus says,
7 They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away?
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.

Notice Moses 'suffered you to put away your wives'. How did he allow that? With certificate in hand, or without a certificate? WITH a certificate of divorce. That was the putting away the Pharisees talked about. It is what our Lord was referring to, and His response continues into verse 9.

Clearly "WHOSOEVER shall put away his wife" certainly INCLUDES those who do so with a certificate. Since that is the very topic in question based on verse 8, there should be no question at all. The issue of putting away a wife without a certificate is not mentioned.

The Pharisees did not recognize putting away a wife without a certificate as legitimate.

As mentioned above, Greek has two words associated with divorce. One has to do with the legal aspect of it. Another word, ἀπολύσῃ (apolysē) can be used for 'send away', but is also used for sending away as a word for divorce. I have found an example of the word being used that way outside of the New Testament during that era.

You may notice that many Bible scholars who know Greek do not make much of the two different words used for divorce in Matthew 19 and other passage. It may just because the distinction from the words doesn't create some doctrine that allows for free divorce and remarriage, and since it isn't relevant to such an idea, that teacher does not bring up the distinction.

I don't have good access to documents with Koine Greek apart from the New Testament, but I was able to find this.

1. 
   
   I'll include a translation with a bit more commentary after the phrase translated 'Jewish laws'from the Greek above.
   
   "10. But some time afterward, when Salome happened to quarrel with Costobarus, she sent him a bill of divorce, and dissolved her marriage with him. (16) Though this was not according to the Jewish laws. For with us it is lawful for an husband to do so: but a wife," from http://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/ant-15.html
   

In the Old Testament, there was not a law given capping the number of wives. The king was not allowed to have many wives. Solomon didn't follow that. He had lots of horses also, and the king was not allowed to accumulate horses. But the Lord Jesus pointed back to the original intention for marriage, two shall be one flesh.

Jewish culture in the first century in the Roman empire was largely monogamous, or at least serially monogamous.

The law of Moses called for death for the male and female adulterer.

I referred to it above in the discussion of Matthew 19. The actual law is for a first husband not to take his wife back after he had given a certificate and put her away and she had married another man and got divorced again or he died, or else it would pollute the land. The Pharisees took the stuff about the certificate of divorce as a command. Jesus taught that Moses allowed divorce due ot the hardness of their hearts.

I know about that, too. They sent them away. There were certain people-groups the Israelites were not allowed to intermarry with. Priests were not allowed to marry foreigners. If all the Egyptian women in the passage were married to priest, Ezra's actions make sense.

The Gospel also does not mean making sinful decisions. If I were to post a message warning men about the temptations to fornicate or to commit adultery with their neighbor's wives, would you accuse me of not believing that God forgives or Jesus saves.

- People arguing.
- People saying other people don't know the Bible.
- People doing deep dives to fish out obscure translations of greek words.
- People accusing others of being triggered.
- People accusing others of attacking, using scripture as a weapon, being touchy, all kinds of accusations.

Did I take a wrong turn at the main forum page and end up in BDF? Or did y'all drag BDF into our nice Singles Forum?

Either I need a map to find my way back, or a squeegee to clean up the mess you are making on our nice clean forum floor. We just had it waxed too!

Lynx said:

- People arguing.
- People saying other people don't know the Bible.
- People doing deep dives to fish out obscure translations of greek words.
- People accusing others of being triggered.
- People accusing others of attacking, using scripture as a weapon, being touchy, all kinds of accusations.

Click to expand...

I'll try to lay off on the counter-accusations. I posted a few questions and some scriptures and came under attack here.

I don't post here a lot, but from what I see, the trend is you post something, and most people don't really respond to the post. They just tell you why you shouldn't have posted it. Maybe they want to just play games like name a pizza after the last poster who posted... or whatever.

I don't see the 'you shouldn't have posted that' thing much in BDF. Most posts there do not consist of personal attacks. Some posters do that some.....I've seen JohnDB in BDF.

Those are some broad generalizations. Do you think all or most married people look at divorced people with contempt? It sure seems like there are a lot of divorced people who are victims, where they didn't do anything worthy of getting divorced and the divorce seemed pretty much to be totally the other person's fault.

I can't ever remember looking at a remarried person with envy over their getting remarried. I suspect married people who look at the remarried with envy are very much in the minority.

Some of those who were divorced multiple times may have lived with their spouse before marriage, or someone else, and had occasional hookups. Some of them may have had the hookups while married leading to the divorce, too.

If you get a divorce you do not __have to__ remarry. And statistically someone who has been divorced once has a higher chance of getting another one after remarriage when compared to first marriages for both parties involved.

Doesn't count for what? Fornicatio n or adultery?

So....
Let's dismiss all of the quotes of Josephus....after all it's clearly showing that you really don't know what you are saying....then let's dismiss all of the OBVIOUS and well known anthropology of the day too. Because if you dismiss what has been well documented as to anthropology (which explains perfectly why Jesus says what He said and why He said it the way He said it in) Then we are left with a huge inconsistency here with Ezra's command for the Jewish men to "put away" their foreign wives.

(We also get to dismiss your anthropology statements as well as to the two arguing Schmeekhah Rabbis too) You can't claim them either....
You can't claim two different sets of rules in a debate....either they are uniform or they are not.

Then there's the issue of Bible shopping....because you don't like what the KJV says you shop for a Bible translation that says what you want it to say? Why not do as most people do and translate the scriptures to say what you want it to say instead of what it does say? (There is a name for such behavior, also a prohibition and a result for doing such as stated quite clearly by God)

So for someone claiming piety above everyone else you sure do have a very dishonest way of discussing things.

Or...

OR...

... Maybe seoulsearch was right about you having no idea what kind of audience this is here, and you should go back and reread her posts carefully. She spent a bit of time and effort trying to explain it to you multiple times. You just brushed her off as though she didn't have any idea what she was talking about. Go back and read them again.

If you keep missing the target, do you tell the target to jump in front of your arrow? Or do you correct your aim?