Matthew 19:1–15

Teaching about Divorce

¹⁹When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan.^{* 2}Large crowds followed him, and he cured them there.^*

³Some Pharisees came to him, and to test him they asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause?”^{* 4}He answered, “Have you not read that the one who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’^{* 5}and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?^{* 6}So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” ⁷They said to him, “Why then did Moses command us to give a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her?”^{* 8}He said to them, “It was because you were so hard-hearted that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. ⁹And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”^d*

¹⁰The^e disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” ¹¹But he said to them, “Not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is given.^{* 12}For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.”

Jesus Blesses Little Children

¹³Then children were being brought to him in order that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples spoke sternly to those who brought them, ¹⁴but Jesus said, “Let the children come to me, and do not stop them, for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”^{* 15}And he laid his hands on them and went on his way.