See the notes at Matthew 5:32. These verses occur in Matthew in a different order, and it is not improbable that they were spoken by our Saviour at different times. The design, here, seems to be to reprove the Pharisees for not observing the law of Moses, notwithstanding their great pretensions to external righteousness, and to show them that they had "really" departed from the law.

Putteth away (or divorceth) his wife - See on Matthew 5:31, Matthew 5:32 (note); Matthew 19:9, Matthew 19:10 (note); Mark 10:12 (note); where the question concerning divorce is considered at large. These verses, from the 13th to the 18th inclusive, appear to be part of our Lord's sermon on the mount; and stand in a much better connection there than they do here; unless we suppose our Lord delivered the same discourse at different times and places, which is very probable.

Whosoever putteth away his wife,.... For any other cause than for adultery, as the Jews used to do upon every trifling occasion, and for every little disgust: by which instance our Lord shows, how the Jews abused and depraved the law, and as much as in them lay, caused it to fail; and how he, on the other hand, was so far from destroying and making it of none effect, that he maintained the purity and spirituality of it; putting them in mind of what he had formerly said, and of many other things of the like kind along with it; how that if a man divorces his wife, for any thing else but the defiling his bed,

and marrieth another, committeth adultery: with her that he marries: because his marriage with the former still continues, and cannot be made void by, such a divorce:

and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband; the phrase "from her husband", is omitted in the Syriac and Persic versions:

committeth adultery; with her that he marries, because notwithstanding her husband's divorce of her, and his after marriage with her, she still remains his lawful and proper wife; See Gill on Matthew 5:32. The Ethiopic version reads this last clause, quite different from all others, thus, "and whosoever puts away her husband, and joins to another, commits adultery", agreeably to See Gill on Mark 10:12.

Whosoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adultery: and whosoever marrieth her {g} that is put away from her husband committeth adultery.

(g) They that gather by this passage that a man cannot be married again after he has divorced his wife for adultery, while she lives, reason incorrectly: for Christ speaks of those divorces which the Jews had which were not because of adultery, for adulterers were put to death by the law.

16:18 Every one that putteth away his wife. See PNT Mt 5:31.

16:18 But ye do; particularly in this notorious instance. Mt 5:31; 19:7.

18. putteth away his wife, &c.-(See on [1680]Mt 19:3-9). Far from intending to weaken the force of the law, in these allusions to a new economy, our Lord, in this unexpected way, sends home its high requirements with a pungency which the Pharisees would not fail to feel.

16:13-18 To this parable our Lord added a solemn warning. Ye cannot serve God and the world, so divided are the two interests. When our Lord spoke thus, the covetous Pharisees treated his instructions with contempt. But he warned them, that what they contended for as the law, was a wresting of its meaning: this our Lord showed in a case respecting divorce. There are many covetous sticklers for the forms of godliness, who are the bitterest enemies to its power, and try to set others against the truth.