A. First Opinion

72. Here is it said that in the Mosaic Law it was licit to repudiate a wife, and that he who marries a repudiated wife sinned mortally, because he went to someone impure, for she was only repudiated, as it seems, because she was impure. This sin, however, was not punished in the Law but was permitted because of homicide, lest men would kill their wives. And therefore, to avoid a greater evil, this lesser evil was permitted in the Law.a

a.a [Note by Scotus] I reply: when it is said that it is probable a woman is repudiated because she is unclean, this is true if she was repudiated by two men, but not if by one only. And so then he sinned mortally by marrying her.

73. The proof of this is:

First by the authority of Christ condemning repudiation, Matthew 19.9, “I say to you that whoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, commits adultery: and he that shall marry her that is put away, commits adultery.”

74. This is also proved by the reason that Christ brought forward for himself, which is that from the beginning God joined male and female in matrimony, as he proves from the word of Adam, and he adds, “What God has joined, let not man put asunder” [Matthew 19-4-6].

75. It is proved also, third, from his response to the question of the Pharisees [Matthew 19.7-8], “They say to him, ‘Why then did Moses command to give her a bill of divorce, and to put her away?’ He says to them: ‘Because Moses by reason of the hardness of your heart permitted you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so’.” The interlinear gloss on “Moses.. .permitted” says “not God.” And the gloss says that “it was the council of man, not the command of God” [Nicolas of Lyra]. And the Master in this distinction [Lombard, Sent. IV d.33 ch.3] says that this was permitted by Moses “not to concede separation but to remove murder.”

76. And Augustine On the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount I ch.14 n.39, “He who commanded to give a bill of repudiation did not command the wife to be dismissed; but let him who has dismissed her, he says, give her a bill of repudiation, so that the thinking about the bill would temper his rash anger in dismissing his wife.” This can be understood from something that Ambrose prescribed to the Emperor Theodosius for a certain cruelty impetuously effected by Theodosius’ command: Ambrose wanted him to pass a law that no minister should carry out his cruel commands for thirty days, if perchance within that time his anger would quieten and temper his judgment. Hence too Plato said to a certain person [Archytas of Tarentum], as Jerome reports [On Joel 1.5; Epistle 79 to Salvina, n.9; also in Valerius Maximus, Memorable Deeds and Words IV ch.1 ex.1]: “I would punish if I was not angry.” And Augustine adds, ibid., “He who sought a delay in the dismissal did signify, as far as he could to harsh men, that he did not wish separation.”

77. Also Gregory IX, Decretals V tit.19 ch.8], ‘On Divorce’, “Repudiation of a wife is condemned by Truth in the Gospel.”