He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.
Jesus corrects the Pharisees’ mistaken interpretation. He states plainly that Moses did not command divorce, but permitted it because of hardness of heart. That is, it was a concession to the imperfection of sinful humanity, not God’s perfect will. “Hardness of heart” means that people were so stubborn in their hearts that they were unable to love, forgive, or humble themselves. Therefore, to avoid social and moral chaos, Moses established a legal order, regulating separation through a certificate of divorce. Yet Jesus reminds them that “from the beginning it was not so,” meaning that in God’s original design marriage was created as a sacred and unbreakable union. Human sin changed the course of relationships, but not God’s purpose. Jesus turns the gaze back not to the time of Moses, but to Eden, showing that the foundational institutions of life must be measured by the standard of God’s original will.