NOTES for Deu 24:1-22
The question of observing the Torah was never in Yahwism a purely and strictly formal question, at least if we are speaking of the sacred books that describe the way of the Torah. The Book of Deuteronomy is no exception: for all its religious intensity and tension, it still does not remain at the level of purely religious formalism. In any case, the focus of attention is first of all the inner state of the person, although the prescriptions connected with it may seem completely unsystematic.
Take, for example, the prohibition against remarrying the woman from whom one was previously divorced. What does it have to do, for example, with the command not to enter a debtor's house when demanding repayment of a debt? Or with paying a hired worker on time? Or with the rule prescribing that one should not gather the whole harvest down to the last berry or the last ear of grain, so as to leave something for the poor who pass by? In fact there is a connection here, but it must be sought not at the level of legal formulations, but at the level of the spiritual state from which the behavior described by these norms flows. To leave something for the poor requires generosity. The same generosity is needed in order not to break into the house of someone who owes you something, and in order to pay on time those whom you have hired - especially when there is some opportunity to delay payment. For such generosity to become the norm of life, however, something more is needed.
What is needed is that inner, spiritual wholeness in which a person is aware of his real self and accordingly of his real life as well. The very life that, according to the Savior's words, does not depend on the abundance of one's possessions. This wholeness allows a person to make decisions and commit actions that he does not later regret, even if they turn out to be mistaken. Of course, one can and must repent of a committed sin, but repentance is not regret over the committed sin; it is work connected with overcoming its consequences, inner and outer. This is where the prohibition against remarrying the one from whom one was formerly divorced becomes understandable: when leaving, leave; when parting, part. Otherwise there is life in the past, phantom pains and phantom joys. Everything that is as far as possible from the Kingdom.