FROM THE GOSPEL LAW 1

FROM THE GOSPEL LAW  1

“And if your right hand scandalizes you, cut it off and cast it far from you, for it is beneficial for you that one of your members should perish, and not your whole body go into Gehenna.” 

      The desire for adultery can be implanted in the soul not only by looking with the eyes, but also by touching and handling when for the purpose of greeting we take in our right hand the right hand of the woman we are greeting. Then through a regular handshake the illegal thought aroused in the desirous faculty of the soul.  Then as Christ says, it becomes his duty to cut off his right hand that is, by never extending it to the woman that causes him such trouble and by his keeping away from her, he also keeps away from the fire of Gehenna and of everlasting hell. This preventative method is binding and to be used with every other illicit desire, such as acquiring money by theft, injustice, perjury fraud, etc. He who desires someone’s money or property, and decides to steal it but somehow he is prevented from carrying out his desire. Before Christ he is convicted for not only the act but also the desire is punished by our Lord.  But if such a man, changes his mind and decides against his plan, and before death he repents and confesses, he then escapes the penalty of the law. Our Lord established that although the act of stealing is punishable, merely the decision without the action is also punished as if the action took place.     

     No excuse will be found for those who  defend their hard-heartedness and unrepentance, and such attitudes will cause a person’s certain condemnation.  There is also the law which commands that we do unto others as we would have them do to us, which is widely applicable. None of us wants our wife to be taken or our goods stolen, thus we should not take another’s wife or steal another’s goods.

     There is in the Gospel law mercy and justice, mercy can give someone what they do not deserve, justice gives that which is deserved. Because we are sinners we never pray for justice but we repeatedly cry out for forgiveness with the cry of Lord have mercy!  

     It is in the present life that we must avail ourselves of God’s mercy, lest we fall into His unmerciful justice. Anyone who rejects and avoids God’s mercy will be cast aside into outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

     Christ forbids divorce except for adultery, but some modern Orthodox bishops, commit many misdeeds trampling on the law of Christ, for they grant numerous divorces unlawfully, and then bless adulterous and illicit marital unions. The fact remains, no one is permitted to marry a divorced person

     When a man meets and marries in the Church in the marriage the two have become one. Nothing other than adultery can dissolve this marriage. For if it is dissolved for other reasons, and the married partner remarries, it always becomes adultery. If there is canonical divorce due to adultery between two Orthodox Christians, the innocent party can re-marry, but the guilty one cannot marry.

     If a husband finds that the wife he married, having been debauched is no longer a virgin, he has the right to divorce her and take another. If either wife or husband should commit adultery, the innocent one can obtain a divorce. Every man has a right to have carnal knowledge of but one woman, the one who he joined in lawful marriage, and with no other woman whatever.  Every woman has a right to have carnal knowledge with but one man, the one with whom she has contracted a lawful marriage, and with no other man whatever.

     The preceding is not meant to include everything, but to demonstrate the strictness of the Gospel law that Jesus Christ established. It is the duty of every automobile driver to know the many laws  and ignorance of the law is never excusable, for the laws are to be studied and known from the start. More so with the divine law, every Orthodox Christian must learn and study the divine law and rid himself of all ignorance. Picking up the Bible, a good place to begin is Matthew chapeters 5,6,7.