A PRACTICAL EXPOSITION
BY CHARLES GORE, D.D., D.C.L., LL.D.
bishop of oxford
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1912
December, 1896. | |
Reprinted in the same month. | |
Reprinted | January, 1897. |
Reprinted | March, 1897. |
Reprinted | June, 1897. |
Reprinted | March, 1898. |
Reprinted | December, 1898. |
Reprinted | June, 1900. |
Reprinted | October, 1901. |
Reprinted | October, 1903. |
Reprinted | January, 1905. |
Edition (6d.) for distribtttion in paper covers, March, 1904. | |
Reprinted | October, 1904. |
Reprinted | March, 1906. |
Second Edition (1/-) | June, 1910. |
Reprinted | October, 1911. |
Third Edition (2/6) | March, 1912. |
PREFACE TO THE REISSUE OF 1910
In reissuing this little book in a new form I wish, by way of preface, to say a few words upon the passages (pp. 72–78 and Appendix III., p. 227) in which I deal with the question of divorce in the Christian Church. I am not prepared to alter the conclusions there drawn, so far as they were drawn from the first Gospel, upon which alone I was commenting. But I should wish to express a different opinion on the relation of the statements about divorce in the first Gospel to those given us by St. Mark and St. Luke.
The course of recent criticism seems to make it fairly certain that we must regard the Gospels of St. Mark and St. Luke as giving us our Lord’s teaching on this subject in its original form. They are as follows:
St. Mark 10:11, 12: “And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her: and if she herself shall put away her husband, and marry another, she committeth adultery.”
St. Luke 16:18: “Every one that putteth away his wife and marrieth another, committeth adultery: and he that marrieth one that is put away from a husband committeth adultery.”
Cp. 1 Cor. 7:10, 11: “But unto the married I give charge, yea not I, but the Lord, That the wife depart not from her husband (but and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband); and that the husband leave not his wife.”
Our Lord in these passages is represented as recognizing remarriage after divorce in no case at all. He treats marriage as strictly indissoluble. The astonishment of the disciples as expressed even in the first Gospel (St. Matt. 19:10: “If the case of the man is so with his wife, it is not expedient to marry”) seems to require this teaching to make it intelligible. It would not be intelligible if our Lord were only reasserting the stricter of two views about divorce already current among the Jews.1 On the other hand, it is certain that the passages in the first Gospel upon which I have commented in the text of this book do admit an exception to the indissolubility of marriage in favour at least of the innocent husband in the case of his wife’s adultery. I must adhere to all that is said in this book in support of this conclusion; but I now find myself constrained to believe that the exception as recorded in St. Matthew, though ...
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About The Sermon on the Mount: A Practical ExpositionIn the preface, Gore says that The Sermon on the Mount: A Practical Exposition is “intended simply to assist ordinary people to meditate on the Sermon on the Mount in the Revised Version, and to apply its teaching to their own lives.” As such, the book is geared toward practical and devotional reflection rather than scholarly study. |
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