Matthew 19:4-6

Matthew 19:4-6

[4] And  he answered  and said  unto them,  not  read,  that  he which  made  them at  the beginning  made  them  male  and  female,  [5] And  said,  cause  shall a man  leave  father  and  mother,  and  to his  wife:  and  they twain  flesh?  [6] Wherefore  no more  twain,  but  flesh.  What  therefore  God  hath joined together,  not  man  put asunder. 

What does Matthew 19:4-6 Mean?

Contextual Meaning

Jesus" opponents based their thinking on divorce on Deuteronomy 24:1-4, where Moses permitted divorce. Jesus went back to Genesis 1 , 2as expressing God"s original intention for marriage: no divorce. He argued that the original principle takes precedence over the exception to the principle.
Jesus" citation of Genesis 1:27; Genesis 2:24 shows that He believed that marriage unites a man and a woman in a "one flesh" relationship.
"The union is depicted in the vivid metaphor of Genesis as one of "gluing" or "welding"-it would be hard to imagine a more powerful metaphor of permanent attachment. In the Genesis context the "one flesh" image derives from the creation of the woman out of the man"s side to be "bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" ( Genesis 2:21-23); in marriage that original unity is restored." [1]
"One flesh" expresses the fact that when a man and a woman marry, they become whole, as Adam was a whole person before God created Eve from his side. It is a way of saying that, as unmarried individuals, Adam and Eve were each lacking something, but when God brought them together in marriage they became whole.
God was the Creator in view ( Matthew 19:4) though Jesus did not draw attention to that point (cf. John 1:3; Colossians 1:16). The phrase "for this cause" ( Matthew 19:5) in Genesis 2:23-24 refers to becoming one flesh. Eve became related to Adam in the most intimate sense when they married. When a man and a woman marry, they become "one flesh," a whole entity, thus reestablishing the intimate type of union that existed between Adam and Eve.
". . . the "one flesh" in every marriage between a man and a woman is a reenactment of and testimony to the very structure of humanity as God created it." [2]
Note too that it is the union of a man and a woman that Jesus affirmed as constituting marriage, not same sex marriages.
In view of this union, Jesus concluded, a husband and wife are no longer two but one ( Matthew 19:6). God has united them in a "one flesh" relationship by marriage. Since God has done this, separating them by divorce is not only unnatural but rebellion against God. Essentially Jesus allied Himself with the prophet Malachi , as well as Moses, rather than with any of the rabbis. Malachi had revealed that God hates divorce ( Malachi 2:16).
". . . the argument here is expressed not in terms of what cannot happen, but of what must not happen: the verb is an imperative, "let not man separate." To break up a marriage is to usurp the function of God by whose creative order it was set up, and who has decreed that it shall be a permanent "one flesh" union." [3]
Jesus focused on the God-ordained and supernaturally created unity of the married couple. The rabbis stressed the error of divorce as involving taking another man"s wife. Jesus appealed to the principle. He went back to fundamental biblical Revelation , in this case Creation. He argued that marriage rests on how God made human beings, not just the sanctity of a covenantal relationship between the husband and the wife. This covenantal relationship is what some evangelical books on marriage stress primarily. Marriage does not break down simply because one partner breaks the covenant with his or her spouse. God unites the husband and wife in a new relationship when they marry that continues regardless of marital unfaithfulness.