Return to Me

Deu. 24:1-4 

When a man shall take a wife, and is a husband to her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her away from his house. So she departs out of his house and goes and becomes another man’s wife. If the latter husband hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her away from his house, or if the latter husband dies, who had taken her to be his wife; the first husband who sent her away may not take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled. For that is an abomination before YHWH. And you shall not bring sin on the Land which YHWH your Mighty One gives you for an inheritance.”

In the heart of this section of Moses’s farewell message to the children of Israel, there is this curious judgment concerning divorce and remarriage.  

To be clear, this statute (like the other ones found in this section) was to be enforced in the promised Land, as the end of verse four indicates. It was also to be enforced by the judges and courts that YHWH had Moses instruct the people to establish. Deu. 16:18 

Judges and officers, you shall appoint for yourself in all your gates which YHWH your Mighty One is giving you, according to your tribes. And they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.”

The important takeaway from this ancient judgment is also found in Deu. 24:4:

…since she has been defiled.”

Because she had remarried, after being divorced, she had become defiled. Had she not remarried in the first place, she would not have been considered defiled.  

Moreover, had she not remarried, she could have reconciled with her first [and only] husband and the Land would have no sin on her account. 

Speaking on YHWH’s behalf, Jeremiah relates this judgment to YHWH and His people. Jer. 3:1 

Saying, “If one sends away his wife, and she has gone from him, and she has been to another man, does he [the first husband] turn back unto her again? Is not the land greatly defiled? And you have committed whoredom with many lovers. Yet turn again to Me”  

In this comparison, YHWH is the first husband and Israel is His wife. As the prophet later told them (Jer. 3:8), YHWH gave her a certificate of divorce and put her away. The reason He puts her away is given in both verse one and verse eight: adultery. 

And yet, what does YHWH tell them? 

Jer. 3:1, 14 

“…turn again to Me”  

“Turn, O backsliding children,” says YHWH: “for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion” 

What we can learn from reading the first four verses of the twenty-fourth chapter of Deuteronomy is that divorce and remarriage were never YHWH’s desire. While He allowed it in the ancient land of Israel, He taught that it would defile the woman involved, and the Land if she returned to her first husband. Additionally, YHWH told His people, through the prophet Jeremiah, that reconciliation is His preferred course of action, even in the case of adultery.