were permitted to a king, though to a private man not more than four or five.[1]
The facility of divorce was very great, for the reigning school of casuists gave the widest interpretation to the ambiguous phrase in the book of Deuteronomy, to which all agreed to appeal. When, as we shall see presently, our Lord decided in favour of the more rigorous view, His words caused astonishment and even consternation among His hearers. "If the case of the man is so with his wife," they said, "it is not expedient to marry." We could not have a more impressive indication of the depravation of the theory of marriage in the common view. Of Hillel’s teaching it would hardly be excessive to say in the words of Gibbon that "the most tender of human connections was degraded to a transient society of profit or pleasure."
There existed, however, two powerful influences which tended to correct the practice of
- ↑ See Schürer, "Jewish People in Time of Jesus Christ," div. i. vol. i. p. 455 (note)
