This is what the LORD says: “Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce with which I sent her away? …Because of your sins you were sold; because of your transgressions your mother was sent away.
-Isaiah 50:1a,c, NIV
Is divorcing a spouse incompatible with loving a spouse?
In other words, do you have to hate your spouse in order to divorce him or her?
Short answer: No.
That said, circumstances matter greatly in answering this question.
In general, I do not believe love and divorce are incompatible. Sometimes, we love people while still needing to detach from them.
Certainly, God loved Israel yet divorced her (see Jeremiah 3:8). It was an act flowing from heart-break. God refused to tolerate ongoing infidelity on the part of Israel. That said, I am sure God would have wished it had turned out otherwise, just as many faithful spouses do in regards to their marriages.
We wanted to stay married; however, we could not tolerate unrepentant cheating. That would be both unhealthy for us and ungodly.
Here’s a word picture about divorce:
Say two ships are tied together side by side.
One is taking on water and the captain of that ship is blasting holes in his ship’s bottom instead of fixing the already gaping ones.
The captain of the other ship is faced with a choice:
Does she stay tied to this other sinking ship and go down with it or does she cut the ropes and survive allowing the other ship to sink alone along with its foolish captain?
It is not hate that motivates such a captain to cut the ropes. Self-preservation is not hatred. That is how I see divorce in matters of infidelity and abuse (more info here).
You do not have to hate your cheating spouse to divorce him or her. However, you will likely have to accept the reality of their refusal to repair the ship–i.e. repent.
Choices and actions have consequences. It would be unjust to expect the faithful spouse to “go down” with the cheating spouse because of the cheater’s refusal to repent.
Sure, it is sad that the “ships” are no longer a beautiful flotilla traveling together tied side by side. It is sad that ropes are cut, and one boat is sinking.
But this sad situation was not created by the faithful spouse. It was created by the foolish captain who decided he or she preferred blowing holes into his or her boat’s bottom.
The faithful spouse–by “cutting the ropes”–is merely engaging in self-preservation allowing the cheater to experience the consequences of his or her own foolish choices alone.
Hatred is not the point of such a divorce even if the sinking captain and his cohorts suggest otherwise.
It is an acknowledgment of reality:
The cheater’s boat is sinking–emotionally and spiritually–and the faithful spouse is choosing to exercise their biblical permission not to go down with the cheater.
I love this analogy, DM! Great illustration of divorcing a cheater – it’s not motivated by “meanness” or “hatred”, it’s motivated by self-preservation and the right to live an authentic life. Our ship isn’t required to sink because the one we were tied to has chosen to blast holes in it’s hull and head for the bottom. God doesn’t want or expect us to lose ourselves to sin because our cheating spouse refuses to give up sinning. He gives us the right to divorce in these circumstances for exactly that reason.