Regarding adultery

[janxharris]

Betrothment is tantamount to engagement without sex.

Biblical marriage is when two people come together to make one flesh - through intercourse.

If anyone goes out and has sex with another person who has also had sex/married with someone (i.e. is "physically bonded" to another person,) they are both adulterers. And, the affair bonds the new pair, and breaks the bond of the previous pair(s).

Adultery is the ONLY approved method of divorce under God; sex is what defines marriage under God. Everything else is an institutionalization of the meaning of marriage - writs, etc.

Adam and Eve married under the Word of God - under God - without need for a lisence. They were already kicked out of the garden, wandering the earth - yet they were recognized as married under God.

The woman at the well was told she had many husbands - because she slept with several people. (Even she first denied being married.)

The idea of marriage over time has become less of an issue of union under God, and more about an institutional privilege.

Thanks.

"If anyone goes out and has sex with another person who has also had sex/married with someone (i.e. is "physically bonded" to another person,) they are both adulterers. And, the affair bonds the new pair, and breaks the bond of the previous pair(s)."

This makes David an adulterer (even before Basthsheba) and, for which, he was never punished. You will know that adulterers were to be stoned.

Your definition is at odds with gadar perets:

Voluntary sexual intercourse between a married man and someone other than his wife or between a married woman and someone other than her husband.

 

[RDKirk]

As far as polygamy is concerned in the bible, what I get from that is that God did not condone polygamy - He simply "shook His head" as the biblical "heroes" continued in their [many] sins.

But, He is very clear that 1) no man can put asunder what He recognizes as unionized, 2) adultery breaks the union between wife and husband, and 3) offenders will be judged.

David allegedly had ~400 concubines; God didn't ignore that. A lot of the canon situations seemingly lacking [expected] judgment only seem like that.

It had been noted by Jews even in Jesus' time that the polygamy never went well for the OT patriarchs.

 

[RDKirk]

Are you a Calvinist?

gadar perets:
"It is one of the simplest things a human can do. All you need to do is make that free will choice after you hear the Gospel."

you:
"Before and until belief, it doesn't matter what an unbeliever does. Nothing he does is in obedience to Christ or pleasing to the Lord."

Do followers of Christ sing from the same hymn sheet on this matter?

I dance with some concepts that Calvin married.

I do believe that God looks at the world and knows everyone who will be saved, and that He has always known everyone who will be saved, and that "will be" is a phrase that is meaningful only to us temporal humans. In God's extemporal simultaneity, everyone who "will be" saved has always been saved.

But from our necessarily temporal viewpoint, all acts done for the satisfaction of the unrenewed mind are done in disobedience to God, and that was my point.

 

[gadar perets]

Then you will have little trouble furnishing us with your proof.

Just look out the window at the diversity of life. It is an impossibility for such intricate design to exist randomly from a one celled organism or worse, from rock soup.

Many people believe in Allah.

But not as the result of hearing the Gospel.

You mean a freewill choice to guess whether Jesus was as described in scripture?

No. A freewill choice to believe the Gospel is true by faith. Once you believe and receive Yeshua as your Savior, then you will know with certainty that what you embraced by faith as true was indeed true. You are exercising your freewill to guess that what the scriptures say about Yeshua is not true and so you have not received the blessing of salvation by faith. Hopefully, you will not remain in this condition of unbelief come judgment day. Time is short janxharris. You can lose your life tomorrow in a car accident or whatever. Do you really want to die guessing the Gospel is not true?

 

[Ygrene Imref]

Thanks.


This makes David an adulterer (even before Basthsheba) and, for which, he was never punished. You will know that adulterers were to be stoned.

Correct. If David slept with anyone other than the ONE he had slept with first, then he is an adulterer. But, David was the king; who was going to stone him? (This was an illusion to Christ as king now, showing how the JUSTICE laws are still in effect, but because the King demands us to be merciful first we don't stone people today. If He doesn't do it, we don't do it because we are not the King. Same with David: who would have the AUDACITY to judge the king?)

David considered Bathsheeba his "main girl," but he still had 400 concubines on call for whatever.

Even if he slept with 1% of the concubines, that means he married and divorced 4 people under God - through forming/breaking the union known as intercourse.

And, remember all of the calamity the befell David? Even Solomon fell because of his shortcomings, and he was wise enough to pray for wisdom to rule. Remember Absolon? Remember THE PSALMS?

David got his due cup of the wrath/judgment of God. David even recognized this in his Psalms. Just because he wasn't "struck by lightening" when he first committed adultery didn't mean God approved. In fact, we know God didn't approve because He said so in His law.

But, remember God is merciful, and patient, slow to anger - not lax in His judgments as we consider it - because He wants all to come to repentance.

I won't lie and say that if I killed a 9ft Champion warrior from a race of entities that continuously tormented my peiple, was appointed king, and then afforded the luxuries that come with it - I wouldn't be drunk off of my own "loftiness." I am flesh, and so was David.

But, let's think about the bigger picture since we have a speck of Godly insight (read: hindsight and the Word); David had several jobs to do:

1)Rule the Hebrews, and provide an exhibition of their God-smothered glory

2) Have Solomon

3) Further spread the word of God organically (e.g. Bathsheeba.)

4) Establish a checkpoint of greatness in Hebrew History such that we know that God was with David and the Hebrews.

5) Bring about the Christ.

After David was saturated, and likely wouldn't repent or see wrong in his action, God began dropping his hand of judgment. David did NOT have an easy last years, but he was spiritually enriched - which usually MUST imply that one is completely debased from a worldly perspective.

Your definition is at odds with gadar perets:

Voluntary sexual intercourse between a married man and someone other than his wife or between a married woman and someone other than her husband.

That's fine; I have the right to disagree - even vehemently - as a sovereign human agent, as does anyone else.

Husband and Wife have become secularized terms. As said, marriage, as it were, has been institutionalized by humans, but it has always meant the same thing to God: the breaking of a unionized bond with whomever you have had sex with by having sex with another person.

The woman at the well was told she had multiple husbands by Christ because she slept with multiple men.

We have bastardized the uniqueness, quality and sacredness of marriage (intercourse,) and we have the audacity to still call it "making love" even though the vast majority of the time love is never the motivation to have sex.

God doesn't recognize writs, and human morphology of His defined actions - which is why He scoffed at the plea by Hebrews to allow them to divorce. No man can put asunder what God brings together - unless they reject the union they have with someone, and create another one with someone else.

Sex is extremely sacred; the [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse] has serious physical and spiritual implications. It is meant to be shared with people in love.

 

[Ygrene Imref]

It had been noted by Jews even in Jesus' time that the polygamy never went well for the OT patriarchs.

Yes, it usually wasn't recorded in the canon, or the consequences were culturally associated with something else.

But to be argumentative fair, my position is very outside the norm.

 

[RDKirk]

Correct. If David slept with anyone other than the ONE he had slept with first, then he is an adulterer. But, David was the king; who was going to stone him? (This was an illusion to Christ as king now, showing how the JUSTICE laws are still in effect, but because the King demands us to be merciful first we don't stone people today. If He doesn't do it, we don't do it because we are not the King. Same with David: who would have the AUDACITY to judge the king?)

That is a huge point that a great many people don't understand with regard to Christ. Jesus created the Law. The Law is His creation. He is not subject to the Law, the Law is subject to Him.

 

[gadar perets]

The woman at the well was told she had multiple husbands by Christ because she slept with multiple men

That is an assumption. How do you know her previous husbands did not die allowing her to remarry lawfully as in Matthew 22:25? The woman's latest man was NOT her husband (John 4:18). Yet, if she had sex with him, you are saying they were married. So, for your view to be correct, she could not have had sex with her current man even though she possessed him. Highly unlikely.

The mere act of having sex cannot create a marriage. It only consummates the marriage of a man and women who agree to get married. Surely a woman who is raped is not automatically married to the rapist. Joseph did not have sex with Mary until after she gave birth to Yeshua, yet, Matthew 1:24-25 says she was his wife.

 

[Ygrene Imref]

That is an assumption. How do you know her previous husbands did not die allowing her to remarry lawfully as in Matthew 22:25? The woman's latest man was NOT her husband (John 4:18). Yet, if she had sex with him, you are saying they were married. So, for your view to be correct, she could not have had sex with her current man even though she possessed him. Highly unlikely.

The mere act of having sex cannot create a marriage. It only consummates the marriage of a man and women who agree to get married. Surely a woman who is raped is not automatically married to the rapist. Joseph did not have sex with Mary until after she gave birth to Yeshua, yet, Matthew 1:24-25 says she was his wife.

The woman herself told Jesus that she wasn't married (carnal, secular marriage with ceremony or legitimacy in written form.)

Jesus, as usual, revealed that He was talking about something deeper - beyond her understanding (remember, this is a SAMARITAN woman, so she would likely not adhere to Hebrew definitions of marriage anyway, and would subscribe to a more worldly definition of marriage which implies a ceremony and certificate.

In fact, when Christ was talking about a source of water that would quench thirst forever, she had no idea what he was talking about (keep in mind, she just insulted Christ while at the same time asked Him for the "living water" she actually believed could be drawn with a bucket! She was spiritually dead.)

"The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”​

He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”​

“I have no husband,” she replied.
​

But then, Jesus "told her about herself," and got her straight:

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband.

The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”​

Then, she begins to "get it":

Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet.

Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

John 4:15-20
​

This was an allusion to her "harlot" characteristics - that she slept around with men without getting any time of legitimate worldly vindication of a union. I used "harlot," but compared to today she would be a prude - having only slept with 5 people.

It was also an allusion made by Christ to show that the law hasn't change: when you leave your parents to cleave to someone else (as, that is the proper reason for leaving your parents' house... look at how royalty treats their families) you are joined to them forever.

The word "proskollaw" in Matt 19:5 is the Greek word for "cleave" - which means "to glue togeter, or join forever." This union is substantiated by intercourse, and is broken by intercourse with a other after already being cleaved to someone else.

Sexual intercourse as marriage between a man and woman is also an allusion to the Church as the bride of Christ being forever bonded to Him. In the past, our own "whorish" ways of going after other idols (including our ego,) and gods, and literally divorced us from God: that worship of false gods and idols was the spiritual analogue of intercourse. I am not saying we have sex with God spiritually, I am saying that everything physical, especially intercourse, has a spiritual analogue. Worship and devotion to God (way beyond sex) is the spiritual analogue of the worship and devotion one would execute with his/her partner (including, but not limited to Intercourse and procreation.)

Again, sexual Intercourse and the consequences of it are serious business. We were allowed to have pleasurable sex with our mates so that we would be encouraged to be fruitful and multiply by our own choice - as opposed to nature dictating our mating cycles (like animals.) That privilege of intercourse, too, is an allusion to the pleasure God has in us, and in creating - as opposed to mathematical chaos ordering itself into something without desire or reason other than obedience to physical laws of nature.

​

 

[gadar perets]

The woman herself told Jesus that she wasn't married (carnal, secular marriage with ceremony or legitimacy in written form.)

Just so you know, I agree that neither a ceremony or a marriage license make a marriage in YHWH's eyes. It takes a covenant between a man and a woman (Malachi 2:14). That covenant is consummated by becoming one flesh. That is why adultery and rape do not create a marriage.

This was an allusion to her "harlot" characteristics - that she slept around with men without getting any time of legitimate worldly vindication of a union.

You are still assuming her previously marriages were unlawful.

 

[Ygrene Imref]

Just so you know, I agree that neither a ceremony or a marriage license make a marriage in YHWH's eyes. It takes a covenant between a man and a woman (Malachi 2:14). That covenant is consummated by becoming one flesh. That is why adultery and rape do not create a marriage.


You are still assuming her previously marriages were unlawful.

The issue is what we are calling lawful.

If we mean a writ, or certification that serves to vindicate a legitimate marriage under the State, then the Samaritan woman still give implication that she was never married - in context.

When you have been married, and then divorced (and remain single, but perhaps have a boyfriend/girlfriend) and someone says, "Go get your husband and bring him here," your response would be contextually confusing if you said, "I have no husband." Rather, you would make a distinction between the person you are with, and the people you have been with (including any person with whom you have shared marriage vows and ceremony - especially under the State.)

In reality - even under the State, you MAY have at least one (ex)husband. And, unless you wanted to be deceptive, you would say something like:

"I am not married anymore," which would beg further questions of the identity of the previous spouse.

"[Husband name] and I are divorced."

"I haven't been married in (x) years..." which would beg the question of the identity of the previous spouse.

If you had one ex-husband, let alone five, you wouldnt respond to the demand, "Go get your husband," with "I dont have a husband." Or, if you do, you would/should provide context.

In fact, the only person confused about the Samaritan woman and her marriage history (secular and/or spiritual) is the Samaritan woman herself. The fact that Christ continues to say she not only has one husband, but she had several, and the one she is with now is NOT her husband highlights the spiritual condition for being married.

"The one you have now is NOT your husband."

This is a commentary on the sexual relationship the Samaritan woman had with her current "boyfriend" in a spiritual context - that they hadn't had sex yet. The one she is with now is not her husband because the last person she had sex with is her husband, and she is not with that man right now. When she has sex with the man she was currently with, she would then be spiritually divorced from her previous sexual partner, and cleaved to the new man.

Christ was both affirming her worldly view of marriage while at the same time educating her on what real spiritual marriage is. That is why she said He is a prophet: He knew how many people she had slept with. It would be like me saying to someone, "Go get your husband - not the guy you are currently dating, but the last guy you slept with!"

 

[gadar perets]

By saying the Samaritan woman had past husbands through whoring, you are slandering her. You have absolutely no proof that her past husbands did not each die before she married the next one.

Yeshua said, "What God [Elohim] has joined together, let no man put asunder." (Mark 10:9). In doing so, he was teaching us that YHWH joins two people together in marriage. There is no way that YHWH joins adulterers, rapists, fornicators, those who commit incest, pedophiles, homosexuals, etc. together in marriage with whoever they had sex with when He forbid such acts in the first place. They are sins that lead to death, not sins that lead to marriage.

 

[RDKirk]

By saying the Samaritan woman had past husbands through whoring, you are slandering her. You have absolutely no proof that her past husbands did not each die before she married the next one.

Yeshua said, "What God [Elohim] has joined together, let no man put asunder." (Mark 10:9). In doing so, he was teaching us that YHWH joins two people together in marriage. There is no way that YHWH joins adulterers, rapists, fornicators, those who commit incest, pedophiles, homosexuals, etc. together in marriage with whoever they had sex with when He forbid such acts in the first place. They are sins that lead to death, not sins that lead to marriage.

Well, dismissing unions that scripture explicitly prohibits, there is "marriage" language expressed here:

Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh.

This description of one-off sexual intercourse between a man and even a prostitute uses is the same scriptural reference as Jesus' description of a husband and wife. This makes me very, very leery of being too facile in declaring that such unions mean nothing spiritually.

I don't know for sure what constitutes the minimum manifestation of "what God has joined together." I feel pretty sure, though, that when a believing couple joins in a public covenant and consummates it with sexual intercourse, that is definitely included in everything scripture has to say about marriage.

 

[janxharris]

Just look out the window at the diversity of life. It is an impossibility for such intricate design to exist randomly from a one celled organism or worse, from rock soup.

That's not proof.

But not as the result of hearing the Gospel.

?

No. A freewill choice to believe the Gospel is true by faith. Once you believe and receive Yeshua as your Savior, then you will know with certainty that what you embraced by faith as true was indeed true. You are exercising your freewill to guess that what the scriptures say about Yeshua is not true and so you have not received the blessing of salvation by faith.

I haven't asserted that 'Yeshua is not true'.

Hopefully, you will not remain in this condition of unbelief come judgment day. Time is short janxharris. You can lose your life tomorrow in a car accident or whatever.

The atheist might equally aver that you should cease believing in that which is unproven.

Do you really want to die guessing the Gospel is not true?

What I guess at (ie what I guess at as to be the truth) could not possibly be of interest to any (possible) God.

 

[gadar perets]

Well, dismissing unions that scripture explicitly prohibits, there is "marriage" language expressed here:

Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh.

This description of one-off sexual intercourse between a man and even a prostitute uses is the same scriptural reference as Jesus' description of a husband and wife. This makes me very, very leery of being too facile in declaring that such unions mean nothing spiritually.

I don't know for sure what constitutes the minimum manifestation of "what God has joined together." I feel pretty sure, though, that when a believing couple joins in a public covenant and consummates it with sexual intercourse, that is definitely included in everything scripture has to say about marriage.

Becoming one flesh refers to sexual relations, not marriage. A couple is already married before they have relations as seen in Matthew 1:24-25. God does not join us in marriage to harlots through sex.

 

[RDKirk]

Becoming one flesh refers to sexual relations, not marriage. A couple is already married before they have relations as seen in Matthew 1:24-25. God does not join us in marriage to harlots through sex.

Except that Matthew 19 says:

Haven’t you read,” He replied, “that He who created them in the beginning made them male and female,” and He also said:

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh?

So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, man must not separate.”

And then 1 Corinthians 6:16 says:

Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh.

And they both say the same thing, referencing the same OT scripture.

You can't just ignore that

 

[gadar perets]

Except that Matthew 19 says:

Haven’t you read,” He replied, “that He who created them in the beginning made them male and female,” and He also said:

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh?

So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, man must not separate.”

And then 1 Corinthians 6:16 says:

Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh.

And they both say the same thing, referencing the same OT scripture.

You can't just ignore that

I didn't ignore it. I addressed it in my last post. Since 1 Corinthians 6:16 refers to a sexual union, it is sex that makes the two one flesh, but that comes after marriage. If sex precedes the marriage, it is adultery or fornication. The same holds true for Matthew 19. In fact, Matthew 19:5 says the joining is to a wife, not a prostitute. First come the marriage joining husband and wife. Then comes sexual relations making the two one flesh. If one lies with a prostitute before marrying her, it is a defilement to both, but the marriage bed is undefil.

Hebrews 13:4 Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.
​

Why? Because the acts that whoremongers and adulterers commit do not constitute marriage. If they did, their bed would be undefiled as well.

 

[janxharris]

This is a commentary on the sexual relationship the Samaritan woman had with her current "boyfriend" in a spiritual context - that they hadn't had sex yet. The one she is with now is not her husband because the last person she had sex with is her husband, and she is not with that man right now. When she has sex with the man she was currently with, she would then be spiritually divorced from her previous sexual partner, and cleaved to the new man.

Hmm..not sure that you have proven this.

 

[janxharris]

Becoming one flesh refers to sexual relations, not marriage. A couple is already married before they have relations as seen in Matthew 1:24-25. God does not join us in marriage to harlots through sex.

What do you understand as the significance of 'one flesh'?

 

[janxharris]

I didn't ignore it. I addressed it in my last post. Since 1 Corinthians 6:16 refers to a sexual union, it is sex that makes the two one flesh, but that comes after marriage. If sex precedes the marriage, it is adultery or fornication. The same holds true for Matthew 19. In fact, Matthew 19:5 says the joining is to a wife, not a prostitute. First come the marriage joining husband and wife. Then comes sexual relations making the two one flesh. If one lies with a prostitute before marrying her, it is a defilement to both, but the marriage bed is undefil.

Hebrews 13:4 Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.
​

Why? Because the acts that whoremongers and adulterers commit do not constitute marriage. If they did, their bed would be undefiled as well.

Can a man keep his marriage bed pure if he marries a second wife and has sex with her? That cannot be possible.