Mark 10:1-12
New American Standard Bible
Jesus’ Teaching about Divorce
10 (A)Setting out from there, Jesus *went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan; crowds *gathered to Him again, and, (B)as He was accustomed, He once more began to teach them.
2 And some Pharisees came up to Jesus, testing Him, and began questioning Him whether it was lawful for a man to [a]divorce his wife. 3 And He answered and said to them, “What did Moses command you?” 4 They said, “(C)Moses permitted a man to write a [b]certificate of divorce and [c]send his wife away.” 5 But Jesus said to them, “[d](D)Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. 6 But (E)from the beginning of creation, God (F)created them male and female. 7 (G)For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother[e], 8 (H)and the two shall become one flesh; so they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9 Therefore, what God has joined together, no person is to separate.”
10 And in the house the disciples again began questioning Him about this. 11 And He *said to them, “(I)Whoever [f]divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; 12 and (J)if she herself [g]divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery.”
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Mark 10:2 Lit send away, the Heb term for divorce
- Mark 10:4 Permitting her to remarry
- Mark 10:4 Or divorce her
- Mark 10:5 Or With reference to
- Mark 10:7 Many late mss add and shall cling to his wife
- Mark 10:11 Or sends away
- Mark 10:12 Or sends away
Mark 10:1-12
J.B. Phillips New Testament
The divine purpose in marriage
10 1-2 Then he got up and left Galilee and went off to the borders of Judea and beyond the Jordan. Again great crowds assembled to meet him, and again, according to his custom, he taught them. Then some Pharisees arrived to ask him this test-question. “Is it right for a man to divorce his wife?”
3 Jesus replied by asking them, “What has Moses commanded you to do?”
4 “Moses allows men to write a divorce-notice and then to dismiss her,” they said.
5-9 “Moses gave you that commandment,” returned Jesus, “because you know so little of the meaning of love. But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female’. ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’. So that in body they are no longer two people but one. That is why man must never separate what God has joined together.”
10 On reaching the house, his disciples questioned him again about this matter.
11-12 “Any man who divorces his wife and marries another woman,” he told them, “commits adultery against his wife. And if she herself divorces her husband and marries someone else, she commits adultery.”
Read full chapterNew American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved.
The New Testament in Modern English by J.B Phillips copyright © 1960, 1972 J. B. Phillips. Administered by The Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England. Used by Permission.