My DEAR BROTHER, Thank you very much for your letter and account of Ireland. I bless God with all my heart for the blessing He has given and for the part you have had in it through grace. Be assured of my unfeigned sympathy in your proposed union. Always a serious thing, it is doubly so for you, occupied as you have been in the Lord's work; for it is, and specially in such cases, a help or a great hindrance, even where there is genuine affection, and the Lord is not individually the first object, because each will have the other for themselves. I pray you may be blessed. It is a serious thing beginning, when in. the work, life afresh, so to speak; but it may be a help-meet and a resource in solitary labor. I am passing out of the world even humanly, though at present gradually, for though fagged, I am very well, but have only to say, my salvation is nearer than when I believed. You are, so to speak, entering into it, for it is a new life. To carry your wife to a home, be she ever so devoted, is another thing than going as a preacher. This is a serious thing, I do not mean not a right thing: it may be the very best thing possible for you. I only say a serious thing-makes me think of you and pray for you, as I do, that God may make it minister in much blessing to you, and even to your work. If you go to Australia and New Zealand, it may be a great thing for you. The gracious Lord guide and bless you abundantly in your soul and in your work!..
Ever, dear brother, affectionately yours,
1872. J. N. D.
MY DEAR BROTHER, I write to reply to your question at the close of your letter, though most thankful to get your account of the work. The only difficulty with me is the question whether the law of C... does not require a formal divorce in these cases. If it does not, I should just leave the matter where it is. In the first place what was done originally was before her conversion, but when the unbeliever leaves, the other party is free according to 1 Cor. 7 and if a divorce be not required she is free according to the law of man (if it be, there is irregularity which perhaps may be rectified). As the man had left her she practically entered. the church of God as a lone woman, and I do not occupy myself with what was before, unless sin to be repented of When I meet her now I meet her as one whom the law considers free, and the previous desertion left her free when deliberately done, if I take Christian ground. I may regret her doing it, and do as to the manner of it. But as unconverted I recognize nothing before unless sin: say a heathen, he may as such have had and left twenty wives, I ignore it all when he is converted. Being abandoned, she did not stand as a married woman, when she married-unless a formal divorce was required.
In England the courts hold a woman free after seven years, the husband not being heard of, but there is no law to say so. I know not how it is in C.... I question it a little unless it be known to be so. But I do not think a deserted woman could be held to perpetual celibacy where the law recognized her as free. Many questions would arise as to her conduct. Did she tell her present husband before she was married? What oath or equivalent assertion. was made to get married? I suppose there is some as in civil marriage, and publishing banns? Did she say there was no impediment when, if a formal divorce was required, there was?
A person in London was kept out on this ground, he had sworn or solemnly declared there was no obstacle as they went, and it was his- wife's sister, not allowed in England. But if a formal divorce is not required by law, but the woman held free, ipso facto, after seven years, I should say she stood as a free woman, though I may regret her path and inquire, as I have said, as to the circumstances. If taken on profession as a Christian, she was free according to 1 Cor. 8; if looked at as merely of the world, she had no husband. It was all before conversion. And legally (if divorce be not required) she was free when she married, only I should look to where her conscience was in doing it. The passage in Romans does not exactly apply. The word ' married is not in the Greek at all. The woman is supposed to be in full connection with and under the authority of the husband, and then is to another man, that is faithless to the existing bond. Here the question is whether the bond was not dissolved and an actual marriage a lawful one. I should fear if her conscience had been clear, she would have spoken to brethren. But that is another question.
Things are in too moving and uncertain a state to say much of Chicago. I have plenty to hear. The brethren are getting on very happily and several have been added. Kindest love to the brethren.
Your affectionate brother in Christ,
J. N. D.
There is a worse case of this kind at Chicago, only the person is not married but wants to be, and another at St. Louis. We had often worse in England, but when happening before conversion we took them as they were to begin with.
Chicago.
BELOVED BROTHER, My meaning in saying the tie was broken was this, that God never allowed the Christian to break the tie, but when adultery was committed the one doing so had broken the tie, and the Lord allowed the other party to hold it to be broken and act on it by formal divorce-did not require it, but allowed it. The legalization of it is submission to the powers that be, for common order, just as the divorce was in Jewish law. Things are so loose in many parts of the States, as in Illinois, that Christians should be very particular. A person having left and being a long time away is not sufficient, as
he may come back and the tie had not been broken, only that as to criminality after some seven years in England the courts would not hold a person guilty of bigamy.
On the other hand, according to 1 Cor. 7, I cannot doubt that the Christian deliberately deserted by the unchristian partner was in every way free, free that is to marry, but it assumes deliberate forsaking by the one who went away. The Christian was never to do it, and, if obliged to leave, to remain unmarried or return. Rom. 7:33So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. (Romans 7:3) has nothing, I think, to do with it; the case supposed is of being "married " to another man while the tie subsists, then she is guilty of adultery; not, if the husband be dead. Divorce is not in question, but acts of sin while the marriage subsists. This is evident. Mark 10 does not annul Matthew 19, a man putting away his wife is looked at as his act or will. If he puts away he has broken a tie God formed, by his own will; then marrying another is adultery. By act of sin the tie was broken already, and judicial divorce allowed.
If all had passed before conversion, I should take it as I found it, but when a person has merely gone off, now when a person is a Christian, I should be very slow to accept a marriage as in the Lord. Have they sought them out, or proof of the unfaithfulness? If so, let them obtain a divorce, and then they are free to marry. But if not, I could not accept their doing their own will any more than the unfaithful one doing his. The marriage is not in the Lord, and it says even of widows-only in the Lord. Matt. 5 is to me equally clear with chapter 19, but I think the person should obtain a divorce, otherwise they remain legally married, and the new connection is concubine. In any ease forgiveness is allowed.
I was aware of the state of H..., but it had got a good deal better, in one family I knew there was still a feeling of rancor. It was partly baptism working on partially healed griefs. One has to work on in grace seeing the evil to be overcome, even if the more we love the less we are loved. We work for Christ, and His love was perfect. I am afraid I take it sometimes too much for granted that we are so to work on, for Paul cultivated the affections of the saints much. Here, thank God, with such trials as are incident to working where the world and temptation and flesh is, there is blessing and progress. Though we are far short of what we might be, and I look for more, still we have much to be thankful for. Here in the west where I was somewhat downhearted, I find things much better than I '' thought.
As to my translation, it is all printed these two or three months, but a new edition of the French was transferring the notes and emendations, and in doing it they corrected errata, and we waited till they had gone through it to publish it, but I have the last sheet of French in hand, so that it will be soon out now. But I have no satisfaction in critical labors. K- wanted to publish an edition of what my translation has adopted as the reading to be accepted, but I declined. I feel no sufficient competency, though I have done the best I could, and am satisfied they have no adequate history of the text. I shall be glad, if the Lord permit, to see you all, but at past 70 such of course is on every ground uncertain. Kindest love to all.
Ever affectionately yours. j. N. D.