“State Of Marriage”

Friday, July 21, 2017

Does Romans 7:1-3 imply divorce or a polygamist state when the woman marries another man?  Furthermore, if the verse implies divorce, does the wording of the verse convey that the woman will be in a continuous state of adultery? Since it would not be a one-time wrong against her husband, she would be in a continual state of adultery giving her the title of ‘adulteress’.

Sincerely,
Annulled And Void?

Dear Annulled And Void,

Romans 7:1-3 doesn’t state that she will be in a continuous state of adultery (none of the verb tenses specify continuous action), but it doesn’t necessarily state that she wouldn’t be.  Romans 7:1-3 isn’t really even focused on addressing marriage and divorce – it is using a simple truth (that marriage is intended to be for a lifetime) to illustrate that the Old Law had to pass away in order for the New Law to take over (Rom 7:4-6).  The verse doesn’t specifically imply divorce.  It simply says, “if she be joined to another man” (Rom 15:3)… that doesn’t mean she divorced her husband.  It is possible for someone to be joined to another without divorce – it is called ‘fornication’.  In short, all the verse is saying is that once you are married, you are bound to that spouse for life.  That is the normal circumstance of all marriages.  Other verses (such as Matthew 19:9 and 1 Cor 7:12-15) deal with abnormal marital circumstances.  If you would like more information on the topic of marriage, divorce, and remarriage, we recommend you listen to a series of lessons one of our AYP writers preached on the topic.  That series can be downloaded from here.

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