The Great Gospel of John
Volume 3
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Jesus near Caesarea Philippi
- Chapter 70 -
Instances of lawful divorce.
Cyrenius says, "All my thanks to You for this; for now I am quite enlightened in an affair which constantly gives me much to deal with in order to hold a correct court in such cases, and I believe that there can now hardly be a case which could bring me into doubt whether I should judge this way or that way. Only one thing crops up as a very concerning question, and it is this: Is there then absolutely no case in which one could completely dissolve a once completed marriage so that the separated parties could marry another person without making themselves guilty of the fatal sin of open adultery?"
2
I say, "Oh, yes, of course there can be such cases, for example: A man had a wife who otherwise was very well equipped with all female attraction; but at the exposure it was shown that the wife was a hermaphrodite. In this case such dissolution of the completed marriage would be put into action if it was demanded; but naturally if there are no prosecutors then there is also no judge on Earth. A law should be made for this case in which such a marriage should not be made at all, and the party who knew well that he is not suitable for a maritable conjunction would be considered a deceiver to responsibility and damages. But whatever is said here is applicable for the female party as well if the male party was no complete man. If the wife leaves him and marries another, she does not commit adultery.
3
But there can also be among the men such people who either have castrated themselves because of the Kingdom of God or such who already in their youth were castrated for some worldly reason, as there are also such castrated people in the mother"s womb; all the named are fully unsuitable for marriage, and their full unsuitability decides the full dissolution of the marriage from the beginning.
4
Or one or the other married party could have such a body handicap with which the other party cannot possibly live, then the marriage would have to be completely dissolved - but only in the case that one party had not been able to find out anything about the affliction before the marriage; but if he knew about the handicap and nonetheless entered into marriage, the marriage is valid and cannot be dissolved! Such afflictions however, which allow a full dissolution of an already consecrated marriage, are: hidden possession of one or both parties, likewise a periodical madness, a covert leprosy of an evil kind, cancer boils, lice, an incurable consumption, epilepsy, full bluntness of at least two senses, gout and a pestilence-like bodily or breath smell.
5
If the healthy party had no information before the marriage that his other party was burdened with one of the just named afflictions, after a consecrated marriage he can immediately achieve full valid dissolution again and he must be allowed to do this! For in these cases the healthy part has been deceived and the deception dissolves every contract and therefore also that of marriage.
6
But if such spouses do not want to be divorced according to the will of the healthy party, the marriage must be considered valid and can later not be separated; for your saying is valid: VOLENTI NON FIT INIURIA!
7
Except for these cases, however, there are almost truly no others which could be accepted as the reason for a valid divorce.
8
In all other unsuccessful cases of marriage the marriage partners must have patience with each other until death; for if the young marriage partners had been happy with the honey of marriage, they must then be satisfied with the gall of the marriage.
9
The honey of marriage however is the worst part of it; only with the gallic parts does the marriage begin the golden seriousness of life. But this must occur everywhere; for if this did not come, things would be bad for the seed for heaven.
10
In often bitter seriousness of life the spiritual seed begins to activate and to develop, which would be stuck in the constant honey life like a fly which falls into the honey pot with all greed and loses its life from the too great sweetness of the honey. Are you now fully in the clear?"