"married to others-however ye may "have been taught to abuse the toler❝ation of divorce on particular occafions that all the cafes which I have mentioned, touching men divorcing their "wives and marrying others, thereby caufing their unjustly-divorced wives to marry other men-of men marrying di"vorced women-and divorced women

marrying other men-this is all con"trary to the law of marriage itself, as "delivered to and pronounced by ADAM, "Gen ii. 24. as well as to the law of the feventh commandment, delivered to Mofes,

and by him delivered to the people at "Mount Sinai. In fhort, these are only " several methods of incurring the guilt "of adultery; therefore all the falvos "" which your confciences may derive "from your abufe of Mofes's permiffion, "with refpect to bills of divorcememt, however highly esteemed amongst men, are abo"mination in the fight of GOD. Luke xvi. ... 15." Here CHRIST puts the Pharifees to filence, by the very law which they had partially quoted, with the hope of enfnaring Him, and making Him appear as an enemy to the law of Moses. We do not read of any reply which they attempted to make this would certainly not

ther man's property. The law therefore of Deut. xxiv. I, &c. was especially made to prevent fuch abominable traffic.-See the preceding note.

" have

have been the case, had they understood him to have spoken against polygamy; the Pharifees could have defired nothing more to their purpose, of representing Him as an enemy to Mofes, as there was not a fingle paffage in the whole law of Mofes to have fupported Him against them on that point. It is therefore plain that they understood Him in no fuch fense. Neither did His own difciples understand Him to speak of any thing but divorce.They are faid, Mark x. 10, in the house to afk Him again of the fame matter; His anfwer was in fubftance the fame: the conclusion which the difciples draw from it is-If the cafe of the man be fo with his wife, it is not good to marry-i. e. "If a man "cannot get rid of his wife when he

pleafes, he had better not marry at "all." This conclufion must have been made from their understanding CHRIST to fpeak of divorce, for it is totally foreign from the matter of polygamy ;-How could they poflibly mean that a man had better have no wife at all, if he could not have more than one at once? It must likewise be fuppofed, that they did not misunderftand their Mafter, for if they had, He would doubtless have fet them right in his reply (Matt. xix. 11, 12) and not have there faid, what clearly fhews them to have understood Him aright.

7

Now

Now let us confider Matt. xix. 9. ftill more closely, taking it in connection with his fubfequent explanation of it to the difciples in the boufe. Mark x. 10, 11, 12.

I fay unto you-Whofoever shall put away his wife και γαμηση άλλην—and Thall marry another; dλλy must here agree with the antecedent yuvama, which we render by the word wife-therefore yuvana muft be understood as following the word daan, and this may be conftrued in the sense of annoтpray yuvama-another man's wife, i. e. a divorced woman. We find the word άλλης, το ufed, 1 Cor. x. 29. ὑπο άλλης GUVELdnoEw-which we rightly tranflateσυνειδήσεωςanother man's confcience. The learned Wetftein takes arany in this fenfe in his note on Matt. xix. 9.-His words areHis words are "Aaanu] i. e. Αλλοτρίαν ab alio itidem viro repudiatam -vel ab illo divertentem, ut Herodias * & Salome.

*Salome was fifter to Herod the Great. She is faid to have been the first woman who repudiated her husband. Herodias left her husband Philip, and married the faid Philip's brother, Herod Antipas; for which John the Baptift feverely reproved him, saying-it is not lawful for thee to have her. Matt. xiv. 4. For faying this, he had a double authority. First, as to the incest, Lev. xviii. 16. Secondly, with regard to her being another man's wife, Lev. xx. 10. Herod's fituation was just what our LORD condemns in the paffage of Mark x. 11, 12. He had put away his firft wife, who was the daughter of Aretas, king of Arabid, that he might take his brother Philip's wife, with whom he had fallen in love; and he did this at the VOL. I. C c

request

Salome." Another] that is—another man's wife, who has been repudiated by him, "or who has left her husband; as did Heσε rodias and Salome." He mentions afterwards a difficulty he was under from this interpretation of dλ-as it feems to make the text fay the fame thing twice over; and on ε duty, Mark x. 11. he has the following note, which I will lay before the reader in English, referring the learned to the original.-Againft her.] "There

..

are fome who interpret this to relate to "the fecond or latter wife, on whom the

requeft of Herodias herfelf. This was putting away his wife, and marrying dnan, i. e. danolpiav, another's, which was adultery; as was Herodias's leaving her hufband, and marrying Herod. All this (except the inceft) fell directly under the condemnation of the divine law, as explained by CHRIST to the difciples, and doubtlefs was meant by what he faid before, in the prefence of the multitude, to the Pharifees; and may ferve as a proper illustration of the doctrine of the divine law, as fet forth by our LORD, with respect to unlawful divorces, taking daan in the fenfe of αλλοτρίαν.

See alfo the cafe of Drufilla, a daughter of Herod Agrippa, who forfook Azizus king of Emefa, and married Felix-(fee Acts xxiv. 24.) alfo of her two fifters.Berenice, the eldeft, left her husband Polemon, king of Pontus, to go to others-and Mariamne, the youngeft, was married to Archelaus, and forfook him to marry Demetrius, an Alexandrian Jew. Ant. Univ. Hift. vol. x. p. 643, and note E.

The above-mentioned women were of high rank and dignity; but doubtless others practifed the fame, who were of too low a degree to be fubjects of the historian's pen.

"husband

"hufband might commit adultery, properly fo called which he cannot be "faid to commit if he should marry a vir"gin or a widow, but only by marrying a woman who had been in like manner

(ie, unjustly) divorced by another 66 man. But there is an objection to this interpretation, which is, that by this "method of interpreting the paffage, the "fame thing would be faid twice over, "once at this ver. 11, and again at ver.

Here I cannot help diffenting from this learned and judicious man; for furely a man's putting away bis wife, and marrying another divorced woman, and a woman's putting away her husband, and marrying another man, are very different ideas. In both cafes adultery is committed, whether the woman be unjustly put away from her husband, or the put herself away; but when we confider, as in the cafe of Herodias, and Salome, that this laft was growing into a custom-for Salome's example was foon followed by others, as Jofephus* writes—it was natural for CHRIST to Condemn this in as express terms in one cafe as in the other, both being equally oppofite to the law of GOD.

*See Ant. Univerfal Hiftory, vol. 3. p. 149. at the bottom of the note.

C & 2

The