Yet ye say, {s} Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy {t} companion, and the wife of thy {u} covenant.

(s) This is another fault, of which he accuses them, that is, that they broke the laws of marriage.

(t) As the one half of yourself.

(u) She that was united to you by a solemn covenant, and by the invocation of God's name.

Wesley's Notes

2:14 The wife of thy covenant - To whom thou art so firmly bound, that while she continues faithful, thou canst not be loosed.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14. Wherefore?-Why does God reject our offerings?

Lord . witness between thee and . wife-(so Ge 31:49, 50).

of thy youth-The Jews still marry very young, the husband often being but thirteen years of age, the wife younger (Pr 5:18; Isa 54:6).

wife of thy covenant-not merely joined to thee by the marriage covenant generally, but by the covenant between God and Israel, the covenant-people, whereby a sin against a wife, a daughter of Israel, is a sin against God [Moore]. Marriage also is called "the covenant of God" (Pr 2:17), and to it the reference may be (Ge 2:24; Mt 19:6; 1Co 7:10).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:10-17 Corrupt practices are the fruit of corrupt principles; and he who is false to his God, will not be true to his fellow mortals. In contempt of the marriage covenant, which God instituted, the Jews put away the wives they had of their own nation, probably to make room for strange wives. They made their lives bitter to them; yet, in the sight of others, they pretend to be tender of them. Consider she is thy wife; thy own; the nearest relation thou hast in the world. The wife is to be looked on, not as a servant, but as a companion to the husband. There is an oath of God between them, which is not to be trifled with. Man and wife should continue to their lives' end, in holy love and peace. Did not God make one, one Eve for one Adam? Yet God could have made another Eve. Wherefore did he make but one woman for one man? It was that the children might be made a seed to serve him. Husbands and wives must live in the fear of God, that their seed may be a godly seed. The God of Israel saith that he hateth putting away. Those who would be kept from sin, must take heed to their spirits, for there all sin begins. Men will find that their wrong conduct in their families springs from selfishness, which disregards the welfare and happiness of others, when opposed to their own passions and fancies. It is wearisome to God to hear people justify themselves in wicked practices. Those who think God can be a friend to sin, affront him, and deceive themselves. The scoffers said, Where is the God of judgement? but the day of the Lord will come.