p/c New Liturgical Movement.
A Correction on the Proper Interpretation of Matthew 19:9
The explosion of annulments and accompanying civil divorces (with second “marriages”) among Catholics, especially in the United States since Vatican II, is an underreported yet monstrous crisis that is destroying the fabric of American Catholic families and jeopardizing eternal souls. This is why I take this topic seriously, as should you.
I previously wrote an article entitled “Is There a Scriptural Basis for Annulments?” In that article, I noted that modernists in the Catholic Church, who tend to promote the issuance of Decrees of Nullity (annulments), wrongfully rely on the “exception clause” contained in Matthew 19:9 to justify hundreds of thousands of annulments using the Ordinary Process in marriage tribunals based on defect of consent. (Because of error, I deleted that article from my site, but it’s saved on the internet archive.)
While my ultimate conclusion that Matthew 19:9 was being abused to justify the out-of-control number of annulments being granted in the United States due to defect of consent was correct, I relied on unorthodox (and quite popular) interpretations of that passage to reach my point, which turned out to be a mistake.
This article is titled Annulment Correction Post because I was historically wrong in my insistence of the Fathers’ interpretation of Mt 19. I’m sorry for misleading you. Please forgive me and keep reading this post. I take my role as a priest seriously because my soul and those who read my work are at stake, which is why I welcome good faith corrections when they are in order. I welcomed such a correction from John Farrell, the purveyor of the YouTube channel Annulment Proof.[1] So let me set the record straight:
The traditional Catholic interpretation of Matthew 19:9 has nothing to do with annulments or marriages that were invalid due to impediments at the time the marriage was contracted.
This is not my personal opinion, this is the longstanding, authoritative opinion held by the Church Fathers, the Council of Trent, and respected Biblical scholars and theologians for almost 2000 years up until Vatican II.
First, notice the differences between traditional and modernist Biblical translations with their commentaries.
Matthew 19:9
| Douay-Rheims (DR)- traditional | New American Bible (NAB)- modernist |
| “And I say to you, that whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication [porneia], and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and he that shall marry her that is put away, committeth adultery.” | “I say to you, whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful)[porneia] and marries another commits adultery.” |
| DR Commentary | NAB Commentary |
| “’Except it be’: In the case of fornication, that is, of adultery, the wife may be put away: but even then the husband cannot marry another as long as the wife is living.” | “Matthew’s “exceptive clauses” are understood by some as a modification of the absolute prohibition. It seems, however, that the unlawfulness that Matthew gives as a reason why a marriage must be broken refers to a situation peculiar to his community: the violation of Mosaic law forbidding marriage between persons of certain blood and/or legal relationship (Lv 18:6–18). Marriages of that sort were regarded as incest (porneia), but some rabbis allowed Gentile converts to Judaism who had contracted such marriages to remain in them.” |
Notice how the NAB’s modernist version uses the word “divorce” instead of “put away” in the exception clause. Also, the Greek word “porneia” that Matthew uses in the exception clause is interpreted differently as well. In the DR, “porneia” becomes “fornication,” while in the NAB it is interpreted as “unless the marriage is unlawful.”
The respective commentaries for each translation are not only different but are incompatible. The unlawfulness of a marriage based on “certain blood and/or legal relationships” is not in the same ballpark as “fornication,” which is adultery in the case of a validly married couple.
Moreover, if the marriage was invalid (or unlawful) from the beginning as determined by the proper tribunal, then there remains the possibility of remarrying without committing the sin of adultery.[2] There is no possibility for remarriage in the DR. That’s because the DR is not referring to dissolution of marriage or the legal invalidity of the marriage by “putting away a wife,” but physical separation from one’s spouse due to adultery.
Both interpretations claim to be a Catholic interpretation. Which one is correct?
A Summary of the Traditional Catholic Interpretation
According to Cornelius a Lapide, who cites the Council of Trent in addition to Sts. Paul, Jerome, Chrysostom, Bede, and Augustine as his authorities:
“When [Christ] here promulgated His new law, by which He revoked the power of giving a bill of divorce, and brought back marriage to its primeval institution and indissolubility. 2. Shortly afterwards He repeated the words in private to his disciples. (Mark 10:10, 11, 12.)…Except for fornication. That is, except on account of adultery. For what in those who are free is fornication, in the married is adultery. And this dissolves marriage quoad thorum [i.e. bed and board], though not quoad vinculum [i.e. the marriage bond]. For the adulterer does not keep the faith which he gave to his spouse. Whence he may be put away by his spouse, according to the saying, ‘With him who has broken troth, let troth be broken.’”[3][4]
In other words, Lapide distinguishes between marital separation, which may be permitted in the case of adultery, and Old Testament divorce, which is never permitted. The translation of “porneia” as adultery is assumed to be correct since it refers to unchastity in general, and there is no reason to believe a Lapide or any of the authorities he cited considered “porneia” in a restricted or limited sense that only refers to consanguinity or similar impediments under a Rabbinic understanding.
The emphasis in the above interpretation of Matthew 19:9 was on the fact that although separation of bed and board (not dissolution of the marriage) was permissible in the case of adultery, it was never permissible to remarry—precisely because the marriage bond still existed.[5]
This interpretation of Matthew 19:9 was always understood as the proper Catholic interpretation of this passage even up to modern times. According to Professor Fr. Dominic Prummer, O.P. (1866-1931), referring to Matthew 19:9:
“The indissolubility of marriage was once more instituted by Christ, and therefore the valid marriage of Christians, consummated by the conjugal act, cannot be dissolved by any human authority for any reason (c. 1118). Neither can the following text from Scripture be urged as an objection: ‘He who puts away his wife, not for any unfaithfulness of hers, and so marries another, commits adultery’ (Mt. xix, 9). For God certainly allows a separation from the wife in the event of her unfaithfulness, as will be explained more fully below, but in those circumstances neither of the parties is permitted to contract a new marriage.”[6]
And yet, this interpretation flies in the face of the modernist Catholic interpretation of Matthew 19:9, which insists the exception clause was referring to situations that would cause the marriage to be invalid in the first place and no marriage at all. Under the traditional Catholic understanding, Matthew 19:9 assumes a valid marriage was contracted and, therefore, absolutely prohibits remarriage even after adultery occurs.
The Origins of the Modernist View
If one listens to most Catholic apologists today, including Catholic Answers and other popular online priests, the everyday Catholic will be exposed to the modernist view that considers the Matthew 19:9 exception as referring to annulments, and not the traditional Catholic view. So where did this popular, but erroneous, view come from?
It appears a major contributor to the modern interpretation was one Jesuit priest, Fr. Joseph Bonsirven, S.J. Fr. Bonsirven was considered a “pioneer” of a new “philo-Semite” theological movement within the Catholic Church at the height of the modernist crisis in the time of Pope St. Pius X.
Born in France in 1880, Bonsirven criticized traditional Biblical studies and admired modernist Biblical scholars Fr. Marie-Joseph Lagrange and Fr. Alfred Loisy. In 1910, his ideas were rejected by the Biblical Commission, leading to suspicions of modernism and he was banned from teaching by Roman authorities.
After World War I, he petitioned to resume teaching but faced scrutiny for his pro-Jewish approach, and was forbidden to publish by his own Jesuit superior. Despite these condemnations, Bonsirven made important contacts like neo-modernists Jacques Maritain and Fr. Henri de Lubac. He later returned to the Biblical Institute in Rome under Father Augustin Bea’s rectorship, who played a key role at Vatican II for the advancement of ecumenism. Bonsirven died in 1958.
This background sets the stage for understanding how Bonsirven could reach such a novel interpretation of Matthew 19:9—in contrast to the longstanding teaching of the Church.
While he never denied that there is no salvation outside the Catholic Church and defended the Church against Protestant attacks, his love for both ancient and modern Judaism penetrated all his work, including his interpretation of the New Testament.[7]
Bonsirven was rightly concerned about defending the Church’s teaching against the Protestants who claimed Matthew 19:9 permitted Christians to divorce if a spouse committed adultery. In his book Le divorce dans le Nouveau Testament (Divorce in the New Testament), Bonsirven examined what was considered “unchaste” (porneia) behavior in the Old Testament, concluding that it referred to sexual relations with close blood relatives (see Leviticus 18:6-18). Thus, as the thesis goes, adultery could not be used to excuse divorce because when Matthew used the Greek word “porneia” in the exception clause, he meant unlawful consanguinity. Matthew used the word “moicheia” in other contexts to denote adultery.[8]
Bonsirven’s argument centers on the Greek word “porneia” mentioned in the exception clause of Matthew 19:9. He claims it refers to “unchaste” behaviors that occurred before or at the time the marriage was contracted. Such immoral actions included incest and other impediments that could nullify a marriage attempt. Therefore, while Christ did not permit divorce, the exception clause refers to marriages that were never valid, which necessarily must be a reference to what we call today annulments.
Comparing and Contrasting Traditional and Modernist Interpretations
The traditional Catholic interpretation agrees with the modernist view that Matthew 19:9 never permits divorce or dissolution of the marriage contract, even in cases of adultery. A validly contracted marriage is permanent.
However, under the long-standing Catholic interpretation, a spouse may “put away,” or separate bed and board without dissolving the marriage in cases of adultery or other unchaste behavior, if permitted to do so under the Church’s canon law. Authoritative teaching and theological opinion never considered Matthew 19:9 in the context of annulment, let alone as scriptural support for the modern annulment culture promoted in today’s post-Vatican II Church.
For example, the Catechism of the Council of Trent (Roman Catechism) states “To the wife, then, who for a just cause has left her husband, the Apostle offers this alternative: Let her either remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband. Nor does holy Church permit husband and wife to separate without weighty reasons.”
Obviously, if she can relinquish her husband based on a “failed marriage” and then quickly get an annulment to “justify” her divorce from bed and board after the fact, then the Apostle’s “alternative” is false. In fact, the ubiquitous modernist interpretation of Mattthew 19:9 encourages divorce because if such concepts as “good of the spouses” is essential to validity just as prohibitions against consanguinity – then why would God want you to remain with someone you are “not married to?”
Under the Bonsirven modernist view, now widely promoted and incorporated into the New American Bible, Matthew 19:9 is governed by the Jewish understanding of unchastity under the Mosaic Law, which limits porneia or unchastity to relations with close blood relatives. Such an interpretation opens the door to conclude that Christ was speaking of Declarations of Nullity. This theory simply ignores the Church Fathers, the Council of Trent, and authoritative Catholic Biblical scholars and theologians in favor of the ideas of one modernist Jesuit priest, whose ideas on Biblical interpretation were suppressed.
I, for one, choose to avoid novelty and stick to the Catholic interpretation handed down to us since the time of the Church Fathers.
[1] YouTube. “Annulment Proof,” n.d. https://www.youtube.com/@AnnulmentProof.
[2] Remarriage could only occur after a Declaration of Nullity is issued under current canon law.
[3] “The Great Commentary Cornelius À Lapide,” n.d. https://www.ecatholic2000.com/lapide /.
[4] For further explanation of a Lapide’s commentary on Matthew 19:9 see Padre Peregrino. “VLX 117: Is It Lawful to Divorce?,” August 8, 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUyWB0XJQnQ.
[5]See 1983 Code of Canon Law, § 1152 (§ 1129 in the 1917 code). Canon law requires the innocent spouse seeking separation “to introduce a cause for separation within six months to the competent ecclesiastical authority which, after having investigated all the circumstances, is to consider carefully whether the innocent spouse can be moved to forgive the fault and not to prolong the separation permanently.”
[6] Prummer, Dominic M. Handbook of Moral Theology. Benedictus, 2022., n. 847.
[7] Andrevon, Theresa. Joseph Bonsirven: A Pioneer of a Theologian of Judaism Before Vatican II.
[8] For contemporary adaptation of this argument , see Staff, Catholic Answers. “Does Jesus Leave a Loophole for Divorce in Matthew 19:9?” Catholic Answers, July 11, 2019. https://www.catholic.com/qa/does-jesus-leave-a-loophole-for-divorce-in-matthew-199 and Broussard, Karlo. “Matthew’s ‘Get Out of Marriage Free’ Card.” Catholic Answers, April 26, 2021. https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/matthews-get-out-of-marriage-free-card.