Divorce

In the world of the Bible, divorce is a legitimate custom, and a husband could send his wife away if he no longer wished to be married to her.

A marriage was regarded as (in principle) a contract for life. There are therefore some texts in the Bible where we read that God hates it if a husband sends his wife away, as in Malachi 2:16. In the New Testament as well, there are texts against divorcing, such as the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:10-16.

If a husband wanted a divorce, he did not have to have a clear reason for it. He could simply send his wife away. A wife could never take the initiative for a divorce.
The husband did, however, have to give his wife a letter of divorce. In that way, she could not be accused of adultery if she wanted to remarry (see Deuteronomy 24:1-4). Divorced partners could not marry each other a second time.
The wife went back to the house of her father until she remarried.

In the Old Testament, there was one exception to the possibility of divorce. In ancient Israel, if a husband wrongly accused a young woman of not having been a virgin when they married, then he could never divorce her (Deuteronomy 22:13-19).
According to Paul, divorce was only allowed if an unbelieving partner wanted a divorce.