Jesus disagreed with the divorce law of Moses. Jesus said, "Moses gave you a bill of divorce because of your hardness of your hearts, but since the beginning this was not so."
God wrote that Law, so no Jesus didn't disagree with it. He permitted Old Covenant men to divorce their wives, if she wasn't a virgin when he married her, and did so because His people were hard hearted. The Law of Moses only had this one very limited cause for divorce, and there were no others, so this must be the "porneia" Jesus was referring to.
In the New Covenant however, Jesus says we are held to God's original standard, which is that there is no divorce whatsoever, and that anyone who attempts to and remarries is committing adultery. In other words, they are having an unlawful extramarital relationship with someone whom they are not married, while still joined to the one they supposedly "divorced":
Mark 10: 6-12 "But from the beginning of creation, God MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE. "FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH; so they are no longer two, but one flesh. "What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." In the house the disciples began questioning Him about this again. And He *said to them, "Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; and if she herself divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery."
Luke 16:18 "Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries one who is divorced from a husband commits adultery.”
Porneia has always been understood to be any unlawful sex such as incest or homosexuality.
It's a Greek term meaning sexual immorality. It includes those examples, along with any other sexual acts that are not permitted by God. You have to look at the context to determine what "porneia" is being referred to. In this case, it is referring to the Law of Moses, so you must look there to properly understand what He was refferring to:
The context of the verses that Jesus used the term, are of the Pharisees (Jewish law experts) asking “why did Moses command….” referring to the Jewish Moseic Law. In that context it is clear that we need to refer back to the Moseic Law in order to understand what is being taught here:
Deuteronomy 24:1-4
"When a man takes a wife and marries her..."
Here a man has taken a wife and married her which in Hebrew meant that he had literally taken lordship over her. If your not familiar with Jewish custom, sometime prior to this he would have made a betrothal covenant together, and they would have lived separately for a period of time, even though they were legally bound together by covenant. Now they have come together and officially consummated the marriage.
"... and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her..."
At the consummation of the marriage, he has found some sexual indecency in his wife. This situation was covered earlier in
Deut 22:13-21.
Deut. 22:13-21 "If any man takes a wife and goes in to her and {then} turns against her, and charges her with shameful deeds and publicly defames her, and says, 'I took this woman, {but} when I came near her, I did not find her a virgin,' then the girl's father and her mother shall take and bring out the {evidence} of the girl's virginity to the elders of the city at the gate. "The girl's father shall say to the elders, 'I gave my daughter to this man for a wife, but he turned against her; and behold, he has charged her with shameful deeds, saying, "I did not find your daughter a virgin." But this is the evidence of my daughter's virginity.' And they shall spread the garment before the elders of the city. "So the elders of that city shall take the man and chastise him, and they shall fine him a hundred {shekels} of silver and give it to the girl's father, because he publicly defamed a virgin of Israel. And she shall remain his wife; he cannot divorce her all his days. "But if this charge is true, that the girl was not found a virgin, then they shall bring out the girl to the doorway of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death because she has committed an act of folly in Israel by playing the harlot in her father's house; thus you shall purge the evil from among you.
Originally God called for stoning to death when a woman was found to have committed sexual immorality during or before her betrothal to her husband. You'll notice that if she was a virgin at the consummation that he may not divorce her all his days.
Then in
Deut 24 God says that a man may divorce her for sexual indecency rather than stoning, but can never take her back.
"..., and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts {it} in her hand and sends her out from his house, and she leaves his house and goes and becomes another man's {wife,} and if the latter husband turns against her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts {it} in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies who took her to be his wife, {then} her former husband who sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled; for that is an abomination before the LORD, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the LORD your God gives you as an inheritance. "
This is exactly what the mother of Jesus was being accused of by the Pharisees:
John 8:41 "You are doing the deeds of your father." They said to Him, "We were not born of "porneia"; we have one Father: God."
In this text, the Pharisees give a bit of a back handed sneer at Jesus, claiming that the was born of "porneia." This claim could be made by anyone since it is obvious that Mary was pregnant before her and Joseph were married. Therefore they are accusing Jesus of being born by sexual promiscuity before his parents were married (in the betrothal period).
This is the only “divorce” that is allowed anywhere in the Bible, and you’ll notice that it is before the consummation of the marriage, or immediately after. Many people try to use the immorality clause to suggest that God tolerates divorce, but this was specific to the Jews, and only before the consummation or immediately after. Once a couple was betrothed, they were considered husband and wife, and they needed a bill of divorcement in order to depart from one another. One example of this is regarding Mary and Joseph. Scripture says Mary was Joseph's wife (
Matthew 1:20,24,
Luke 2:5). But at the same time, she was betrothed to him:
Matthew 1:18-19,
"Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly.
Joseph thought Mary was guilty of "porneia" when he found out she was pregnant, and intended to divorce her according to this law. They were still betrothed at the time, which meant they were legally husband and wife, even though they lived separately, so they were not yet married. Of course he later realized she was a virgin and didn't go through with it.
This is the porneia Jesus was referring to, because there was no other provision in the Law of Moses. It wasn't a broad license to divorce as some assume, but a very specific cause which was actually at the moment they came together, for her lying about being a virgin. All of this is irrelevent to those under the New Covenant, for which Jesus said there is no divorce whatsoever, and whoever does and remarries is committing the sin of adultery.
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