Deuteronomy 24: What’s the big deal about divorce?

Much has been lost in modern society has been lost by treating divorce and kidnapping as less serious matters than God does in Deuteronomy 24. Richard Agee explores a key question in this chapter: Why does God forbid remarriage to the first husband after a second marriage? The answer is clear in the original Hebrew text.

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Food for thought from the audio discussion

How was the skin disease Moshe’s sister Miriam faced (Numbers 12:1-10) related to disrespect of leaders to whom God delegates authority?

Why is kidnapping a capital offense (Deut. 24:7)? How is kidnapping connected to what we call “human trafficking” today?

Deut. 24:16 says that only the one who sins in a capital crime is the one who must die. Why did whole families die in the rebellion of Korah (Numbers 16)?

How do the Hebrew words in the original text of Deut. 24:1-4 (see the passage in Hebrew with lexicon links) greatly affect the understanding of divorce and remarriage?

What were the grounds for divorce in a recent as the 1940s and 1950s? What are the Biblical grounds for divorce (Ex. 21:7-11; Deut. 21:10-14; Deut. 24:1-4; Ezra 10:1-16; Neh. 13:23-30; Jer. 3:1; Micah 2:9; Mal. 2:14-16; Matt. 5:31-32; Matt. 19:3-12; Mark 10:2; Luke 16:18; 1 Cor. 7:10-17)? What does the word translated as “divorce” in Deuteronomy 24 mean? How is this related to Yosef of Netzeret’s actions with Miriam when she was pregnant with Yeshua (Matt. 1:18-25)?

How is the assembly of Messiah to relate to Yeshua?

In Deut. 24:4, how was a wife “defiled” during the second marriage? How is this related to straying from God to other gods then coming back (see Romans 9)? Did the prophet Hoshea disobey the Torah when he married and took back an adulterous woman (Hosea 1:2)? What is the difference between a “bondwoman” and a woman of Israel?

How much thought should go into getting married? (See. 1 Corinthians 7.)