The directions say to identify "a, b and c"...

I'm so bad I can't even FIND the "c"

From jswranch, is a comment on this post that begins with a statement "...before we can begin to look at something like annulments, we have to understand marriage is indissolveable. If it is dissolveable, the whole annulment thing is bunk. Is marriage dissolveable?"

I believe that God created marriage to be between a man and a woman, to be a life-long covenantal arrangement.

But does this mean that it cannot be dissolved? What does the Bible say?

First, what is a covenant? Strong's says, b@riyth {ber-eeth'},
1) covenant, alliance, pledge
..a) between men
....treaty, alliance, league (man to man)
....constitution, ordinance (monarch to subjects)
....agreement, pledge (man to man)
....alliance (of friendship)
....alliance (of marriage)
..b)between God and man
....alliance (of friendship)
....covenant (divine ordinance with signs or pledges)
2)(phrases)
..a) covenant making
..b) covenant keeping
..c) covenant violation

Covenants are not meant to be broken, but can they be?

Between men (or - in the case of marriage - a man and a woman) can treaties be broken, or agreements between monarchs and subjects? Obviously, treaties are broken nearly every day. Between humans, covenants can be broken.

(NOTE: Before the next accusation comes, this does not mean that I think they should be; I do not. Repeat: I believe that God created marriage to be between a man and a woman, to be a life-long covenantal arrangement.)

If we take the stand that marriage covenants cannot be broken, then divorce cannot happen. Or, at the very least, breaking a covenant in order to divorce would be a sin and that puts God in the difficult position of regulating (and not prohibiting) sin (Search the Levitical Law). Levitical priests were the only men who were prohibited from marrying divorced women, and they were also prohibited from marrying widows.

We know that covenants have terms.

Can a Covenant be broken? Can a divorce (for Biblical cause) validly break a covenant?

God seemed to say so. Jeremiah 3:6-8

The LORD said to me in the days of King Josiah: "Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and there played the whore? And I thought, 'After she has done all this she will return to me,' but she did not return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it. She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce. Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore.

God sent Israel away (for the cause of adultery) with a writ of divorce. This is a clear confirmation that sexual sin within a covenant is cause for a divorce.

What does this do to the covenant?

From Hebrews 8:6-7

But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion to look for a second.

Verse 13

In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

Note: In this passage, the author writes (verses 8-9):

"Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord,
when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah,
not like the covenant that I made with their fathers
on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt.
For they did not continue in my covenant,
and so I showed no concern for them, declares the Lord.

God will make a NEW covenant with Israel and Judah - IT IS NOT THE SAME COVENANT, THE OLD ONE WAS BROKEN.

(NOTE: Before the next accusation comes, this does not mean that I think they should be; I do not. Repeat: I believe that God created marriage to be between a man and a woman, to be a life-long covenantal arrangement.)

Biblically, we cannot say that a covenant cannot be broken, because God Himself has demonstrated that covenant can be broken.

Biblically, with God as the model, God Himself has demonstrated that there is Biblical cause to break a marriage covenant - because God Himself has done it.

(NOTE: Before the next accusation comes, this does not mean that I think they should be; I do not. Repeat: I believe that God created marriage to be between a man and a woman, to be a life-long covenantal arrangement.)

This is Biblical and I have used Scripture as a foundation for my belief.