Oleksandr Zhabenko

🇬🇧 Glory be to Jesus Christ! 🌞

Dedicated to Emma Kok.

There are two readings today, joined together in one sequence, as tomorrow is a great celebration. The dailyy Apostle (of Friday):
(2 Corinthians IV, 13-18)
2 Corinthians IV:13 – ‘ημεις’ – ‘emeis’ - ‘we’.

2 Corinthians IV, 14 – ‘ημας’ – ‘emas’ – ‘us’.

2 Corinthians IV:16, 17, 18 – ‘ημων’ – ‘emon’ – ‘us’. ‘ημερα’ - ‘emera’ – (to) ‘day’. ‘ημιν’ – ‘emin’ – ‘us’ (for us).

Paul had previously spoken about the difficulties, challenges and temptations of the apostolic work, so here he says that they cannot be compared to the eternal glory in Christ after the resurrection of the dead.

The inner man can be understood primarily as the heart of a person, as the core of their personality and life. More about this understanding is available here:
https://oleksandr-zhabenko.github.io/en/Adultery-briefly.html

The outer man refers, first of all, to the totality of the various circumstances of the apostles and many believers lives. For example, the circumstances of the apostolic work do not allow the apostles to become rich (they do not seek it), but contribute to their growth in Christ and eternal reward in glory.

For the Saturday:
(1 Corinthians I, 3-9)
See the link:
11072023.html

The daily Gospel (for Friday):
(Matthew XXIV, 27-33, 42-51)
For the first part, see here:
10042023.html

For the second part:
11042023.html

For the Saturday:
(Matthew XIX, 3-12)
The understanding of this passage differs between Orthodox and Roman Catholics. I will not dwell on this in detail now, but it will be seen later what I think Christ is saying here.

I have mentioned this place before in other posts, see, in particular:
https://www.facebook.com/Oleksandr.S.Zhabenko/

08062023.html

18072023.html

21072023.html

Now I will present my thoughts on how to understand these words. I hope that they come from God.

1. First of all, it is clear that Christ denies the understanding of Marriage as a purely human institution that emerges and develops according to human laws and rules, including the possibility of arbitrary understanding and the possibility of entering into and divorcing a marriage quite arbitrarily. No, Marriage has its origin in God, it is part of God’s intention (like the family and society) and cannot be treated as if everything is determined by people alone.

Marriage itself is a gift from God. But not every human marriage is established in accordance with God’s will; the situation here is much like the situation with authority. I wrote about the authority at the following link:
29072023.html

2. Divorce is not established by God, it is a human phenomenon, but Christ says that Moses allowed divorce because of the hardheartedness of the people.

3. On the other hand, Moses sees the inability to divorce as a form of punishment. In the Law of Moses, it is described that if a boy and a girl (man and woman) have sexual relations without being engaged to another, they must marry and will not be able to divorce for all their lives (as long as they live) as a punishment for dishonour (see Deuteronomy XXII, 13-19, 28-29).

In view of this, it is difficult to say whether the Church has (should have) divorce as such. The verses from Matthew V discussed above and this reading suggest that fornication is a possible cause of divorce.

I would also like to recall the story of the Nativity of Christ - Joseph, when he discovered that Mary was pregnant, wanted to secretly let Her go (they were engaged, that is, they were to be fidelitous, but not yet married), but was assured by an angel in a dream that he should not be afraid to take Mary as his wife (in chastity, virginity). In other words, the desire to divorce may be connected with fear, which is why the Angel says Do not fear.

In general, as far as I understand, Roman Catholics do not recognise such a thing as divorce in a solemnised marriage, but in the case of adultery, they believe that the marriage was invalid.

4. Divorce can also be part of adultery, unless it is justified by the other person’s guilt of fornication, and is followed by another marriage. If someone marries another person the day after the divorce (or on the same day), then the fact of adultery is said to be evident. But Christ says that the time distance between these two events does not matter for the human heart, for the person themselves. That is, even if the second marriage is remarried a long time after the divorce not because of fornication, adultery remains as such. We can see that Christ values marital love – a second marriage contradicts the unity of true love in marriage.

For the rest of the reading, see the link (it was also above, 4th in the list of links):
21072023.html

Glory be to Thee, our God, glory be to Thee!

Source:
https://www.facebook.com/Oleksandr.S.Zhabenko/