The last book of the Old Testament, by chronology as well as by canon, is Malachi, written a century or so after the exiles had returned from Babylon. The blessing of living once more in the Promised Land had turned out not to be as easy as people had expected. The hand of the Lord was not pouring out abundance for them, because even after their time in Exile, even after God had brought them back, they still had not learned faithfulness.

Thus the people were offering polluted offerings: blind and lame animals, rather than those that were the choicest of the flock (Malachi 1:8). “Try presenting that to your governor; will he be pleased with you or show you favor?” (1:8). And instead of teaching the people to do better, the priests were failing in their tasks of instruction. “The lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. But you have turned aside from the way; you have caused many to stumble by your instruction” (2:7-8).

And there was a problem of faithlessness in marriage as well. The famous verse “I hate divorce” is here (2:16), but we need to take note of its context. “The Lord was a witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant” (2:14) – this suggests that the problem especially was faithless older men divorcing their wives so that they could remarry younger women. “Look to yourselves, and do not let anyone be faithless to the wife of his youth” (2:15). “Take heed to yourselves and do not be faithless” (2:16)

This is how the full verse reads: “For I hate divorce, says the Lord, the God of Israel, and covering one’s garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So take heed to yourselves, and do not be faithless” (2:16). This tells us that there were two kinds of faithlessness going on: both divorce and “covering one’s garment with violence” – a euphemism for wife-beating. To read the verse fairly, then, we have to note that God hates divorce, and God hates violence and abuse; we have to see that both of these count as faithlessness. A woman who leaves an abusive husband, then, is not the one who is being faithless; it was the violent man who had already broken the covenant.

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Help us, Lord: for we are slow to learn the lessons of faithfulness. We are quick to suppose that if something is wrong it could never be our own fault. Teach us to set our hearts in faithfulness to you, and to one another: and give us your grace so that we may live in accordance with our promises.

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