Genesis 2:24

Paul explicitly cites Gen 2:24 with a citation formula ('For, he says, the two will become one flesh', v.16) to prove that union with a prostitute makes one body with her. High volume and an unambiguous LXX quotation; the creation text is wrenched into an argument it never anticipated, a paradigmatic Pauline use.

'For this cause a man will leave his father and mother, and will be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh' is a verbatim Septuagintal citation introduced as scripture. Maximal volume and explicit quotation; the cornerstone OT text for the one-flesh/Christ-and-church mystery.

The words 'a man will leave his father and mother, and will join to his wife, and the two will become one flesh' reproduce the etiological marriage saying nearly word-for-word. This is the load-bearing prooftext; Jesus stacks it on Genesis 1:27 to argue indissolubility. Maximal Volume and Recurrence in early Jewish marriage discourse.

'For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall join to his wife; and the two shall become one flesh' is a verbatim quotation of Genesis 2:24, the foundational one-flesh text.

The prohibition of divorce-and-remarriage as adultery rests on the creational one-flesh union that divorce cannot truly dissolve. The coherence with Genesis is high (Jesus' parallel teaching elsewhere makes the link explicit), supplying the theological ground here.

The mutual conjugal claim Paul articulates (neither spouse has authority over their own body) presupposes the one-flesh union of Gen 2:24, the foundational text Paul cites explicitly in the prior pericope (6:16). Coherence is high because Paul's entire marriage theology in this letter rests on the Genesis joining; the body-language of belonging to one another extends that figure. Volume is moderate since no words are shared, but recurrence in the immediate context strengthens it.

Paul's dominical prohibition of divorce ('the wife not leave her husband... the husband not leave his wife') is grounded in the one-flesh permanence of Gen 2:24, the very text Jesus cited against divorce in the tradition Paul invokes ('not I, but the Lord'). Coherence is high; the indissolubility logic flows directly from the Genesis joining. Volume is conceptual rather than verbal, hence medium.

'The two become one flesh' — the creation order of marriage underlies Jesus' restriction of divorce (made explicit in Mt 19).

Paul's rule that 'a wife is bound by law as long as her husband lives' but is freed at his death restates the lifelong one-flesh bond of Gen 2:24 in legal terms. Coherence with Paul's recurrent use of the Genesis joining throughout the chapter is good; volume here is conceptual and the legal formulation generic, so the echo is faint.

The picture of a woman 'joined to' (lit. 'becoming another man's') stands behind 7:3-4's language of being 'joined to another'; the one-flesh union of Genesis supplies the marital frame Paul figuratively repurposes for union with the risen Christ.