What Does the Bible Say About Abortion?

Hosea 13:16 ESV / 32,756 helpful votes

Samaria shall bear her guilt, because she has rebelled against her God; they shall fall by the sword; their little ones shall be dashed in pieces, and their pregnant women ripped open.

2 Kings 8:12 ESV / 31,742 helpful votes

And Hazael said, “Why does my lord weep?” He answered, “Because I know the evil that you will do to the people of Israel. You will set on fire their fortresses, and you will kill their young men with the sword and dash in pieces their little ones and rip open their pregnant women.”

Psalm 137:8-9 ESV / 28,966 helpful votes

O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed, blessed shall he be who repays you with what you have done to us! Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock!

Numbers 31:15-18 ESV / 28,947 helpful votes

Moses said to them, “Have you let all the women live? Behold, these, on Balaam's advice, caused the people of Israel to act treacherously against the Lord in the incident of Peor, and so the plague came among the congregation of the Lord. Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him. But all the young girls who have not known man by lying with him keep alive for yourselves.

Revelation 2:22-23 ESV / 28,874 helpful votes

Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, and I will strike her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works.

Ezekiel 9:5-7 ESV / 28,020 helpful votes

And to the others he said in my hearing, “Pass through the city after him, and strike. Your eye shall not spare, and you shall show no pity. Kill old men outright, young men and maidens, little children and women, but touch no one on whom is the mark. And begin at my sanctuary.” So they began with the elders who were before the house. Then he said to them, “Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain. Go out.” So they went out and struck in the city.

1 Samuel 15:3 ESV / 25,532 helpful votes

Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’”

2 Kings 15:16 ESV / 23,994 helpful votes

At that time Menahem sacked Tiphsah and all who were in it and its territory from Tirzah on, because they did not open it to him. Therefore he sacked it, and he ripped open all the women in it who were pregnant.

Judges 18:27 ESV / 22,249 helpful votes

But the people of Dan took what Micah had made, and the priest who belonged to him, and they came to Laish, to a people quiet and unsuspecting, and struck them with the edge of the sword and burned the city with fire.

Psalm 58:8 ESV / 20,622 helpful votes

Let them be like the snail that dissolves into slime, like the stillborn child who never sees the sun.

Deuteronomy 2:34 ESV / 20,354 helpful votes

And we captured all his cities at that time and devoted to destruction every city, men, women, and children. We left no survivors.

Numbers 5:20-21 ESV / 20,011 helpful votes

But if you have gone astray, though you are under your husband's authority, and if you have defiled yourself, and some man other than your husband has lain with you, then’ (let the priest make the woman take the oath of the curse, and say to the woman) ‘the Lord make you a curse and an oath among your people, when the Lord makes your thigh fall away and your body swell.

Deuteronomy 5:17 ESV / 40 helpful votes

“‘You shall not murder.

Ecclesiastes 11:5 ESV / 36 helpful votes

As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything.

Genesis 9:6 ESV / 30 helpful votes

“Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.

Exodus 20:13 ESV / 29 helpful votes

“You shall not murder.

Genesis 2:7 ESV / 29 helpful votes

Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

Jeremiah 1:5 ESV / 21 helpful votes

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Psalm 139:13-16 ESV / 21 helpful votes

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Luke 23:29 ESV / 20 helpful votes

For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’

Proverbs 6:17 ESV / 18 helpful votes

Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood,

Psalm 105:15 ESV / 16 helpful votes

Saying, “Touch not my anointed ones, do my prophets no harm!”

Job 31:15 ESV / 16 helpful votes

Did not he who made me in the womb make him? And did not one fashion us in the womb?

Romans 13:9 ESV / 14 helpful votes

For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Romans 9:11 ESV / 14 helpful votes

Though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls—

Titus 2:4 ESV / 13 helpful votes

And so train the young women to love their husbands and children,

Isaiah 49:5 ESV / 13 helpful votes

And now the Lord says, he who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him; and that Israel might be gathered to him— for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord, and my God has become my strength—

Isaiah 59:7-8 ESV / 11 helpful votes

Their feet run to evil, and they are swift to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their highways. The way of peace they do not know, and there is no justice in their paths; they have made their roads crooked; no one who treads on them knows peace.

Isaiah 59:6-8 ESV / 11 helpful votes

Their webs will not serve as clothing; men will not cover themselves with what they make. Their works are works of iniquity, and deeds of violence are in their hands. Their feet run to evil, and they are swift to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their highways. The way of peace they do not know, and there is no justice in their paths; they have made their roads crooked; no one who treads on them knows peace.

Acts 4:20 ESV / 10 helpful votes

For we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.”

Jeremiah 1:4-5 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Now the word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Psalm 128:3-5 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. The Lord bless you from Zion! May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life!

Numbers 5:24 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And he shall make the woman drink the water of bitterness that brings the curse, and the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain.

Genesis 1:27 ESV / 8 helpful votes

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

Revelation 21:8 ESV / 7 helpful votes

But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

1 Corinthians 3:16-18 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple. Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise.

Hebrews 4:13 ESV / 6 helpful votes

And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Numbers 5:27 ESV / 6 helpful votes

And when he has made her drink the water, then, if she has defiled herself and has broken faith with her husband, the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain, and her womb shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away, and the woman shall become a curse among her people.

Numbers 5:18 ESV / 6 helpful votes

And the priest shall set the woman before the Lord and unbind the hair of the woman's head and place in her hands the grain offering of remembrance, which is the grain offering of jealousy. And in his hand the priest shall have the water of bitterness that brings the curse.

Exodus 21:22 ESV / 6 helpful votes

“When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman's husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine.

Matthew 19:14 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”

Luke 18:15-16 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.

Genesis 25:22 ESV / 3 helpful votes

The children struggled together within her, and she said, “If it is thus, why is this happening to me?” So she went to inquire of the Lord.

Matthew 11:25 ESV / 2 helpful votes

At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children;

Psalm 127:3-5 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

45 Bible Verses about Abortion