What Does the Bible Say About Abortion?

Hosea 13:16 ESV / 113 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.

Ezekiel 9:6 ESV / 86 helpful votes

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.

Deuteronomy 28:53 ESV / 60 helpful votes

And you shall eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the Lord your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you.

Lamentations 2:20 ESV / 58 helpful votes

Look, O Lord, and see! With whom have you dealt thus? Should women eat the fruit of their womb, the children of their tender care? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

Psalm 137:9 ESV / 53 helpful votes

Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock!

Numbers 31:17 ESV / 51 helpful votes

Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him.

Deuteronomy 2:34 ESV / 44 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.

Job 3:16 ESV / 37 helpful votes

Or why was I not as a hidden stillborn child, as infants who never see the light?

Numbers 25:4-9 ESV / 34 helpful votes

And the Lord said to Moses, “Take all the chiefs of the people and hang them in the sun before the Lord, that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.” And Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Each of you kill those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor.” And behold, one of the people of Israel came and brought a Midianite woman to his family, in the sight of Moses and in the sight of the whole congregation of the people of Israel, while they were weeping in the entrance of the tent of meeting. When Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose and left the congregation and took a spear in his hand and went after the man of Israel into the chamber and pierced both of them, the man of Israel and the woman through her belly. Thus the plague on the people of Israel was stopped. ...

2 Kings 8:12 ESV / 33 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.”

Hosea 9:14 ESV / 31 helpful votes

Give them, O Lord— what will you give? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.

2 Kings 15:16 ESV / 30 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.

Isaiah 13:18 ESV / 28 helpful votes

Their bows will slaughter the young men; they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb; their eyes will not pity children.

Isaiah 13:16 ESV / 27 helpful votes

Their infants will be dashed in pieces before their eyes; their houses will be plundered and their wives ravished.

Psalm 58:8 ESV / 26 helpful votes

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

Genesis 2:7 ESV / 25 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.

Revelation 22:15 ESV / 22 helpful votes

Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

Luke 23:29 ESV / 19 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!’

Genesis 3:16 ESV / 11 helpful votes

To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”

Genesis 38:8-10 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Then Judah said to Onan, “Go in to your brother's wife and perform the duty of a brother-in-law to her, and raise up offspring for your brother.” But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his. So whenever he went in to his brother's wife he would waste the semen on the ground, so as not to give offspring to his brother. And what he did was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and he put him to death also.

Luke 1:44 ESV / 7 helpful votes

For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.

Proverbs 6:17 ESV / 7 helpful votes

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

Romans 13:9 ESV / 6 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.”

Psalm 51:5 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.

Job 10:8-12 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Your hands fashioned and made me, and now you have destroyed me altogether. Remember that you have made me like clay; and will you return me to the dust? Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese? You clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews. You have granted me life and steadfast love, and your care has preserved my spirit.

Job 1:1-22 ESV / 5 helpful votes

There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil. There were born to him seven sons and three daughters. He possessed 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 female donkeys, and very many servants, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east. His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of the feast had run their course, Job would send and consecrate them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my children have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.” Thus Job did continually. ...

Romans 9:11 ESV / 4 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—

Acts 4:20 ESV / 4 helpful votes

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

Luke 1:13 ESV / 4 helpful votes

But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John.

Ezekiel 18:20 ESV / 4 helpful votes

The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.

Jeremiah 6:10 ESV / 4 helpful votes

To whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, they cannot listen; behold, the word of the Lord is to them an object of scorn; they take no pleasure in it.

Isaiah 13:11-18 ESV / 4 helpful votes

I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; I will put an end to the pomp of the arrogant, and lay low the pompous pride of the ruthless. I will make people more rare than fine gold, and mankind than the gold of Ophir. Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, at the wrath of the Lord of hosts in the day of his fierce anger. And like a hunted gazelle, or like sheep with none to gather them, each will turn to his own people, and each will flee to his own land. Whoever is found will be thrust through, and whoever is caught will fall by the sword. ...

Ecclesiastes 11:5 ESV / 4 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.

Proverbs 24:11-12 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,” does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will he not repay man according to his work?

Proverbs 6:16 ESV / 4 helpful votes

There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him:

Proverbs 1:32 ESV / 4 helpful votes

For the simple are killed by their turning away, and the complacency of fools destroys them;

Psalm 128:4 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord.

Psalm 128:3-5 ESV / 4 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!

Psalm 82:3-4 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

Job 3:3 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“Let the day perish on which I was born, and the night that said, ‘A man is conceived.’

Deuteronomy 30:19 ESV / 4 helpful votes

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live,

Deuteronomy 27:25 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“‘Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

Numbers 12:12 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Let her not be as one dead, whose flesh is half eaten away when he comes out of his mother's womb.”

Leviticus 20:1-5 ESV / 4 helpful votes

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Say to the people of Israel, Any one of the people of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone him with stones. I myself will set my face against that man and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given one of his children to Molech, to make my sanctuary unclean and to profane my holy name. And if the people of the land do at all close their eyes to that man when he gives one of his children to Molech, and do not put him to death, then I will set my face against that man and against his clan and will cut them off from among their people, him and all who follow him in whoring after Molech.

Genesis 25:22 ESV / 4 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.

Genesis 9:6 ESV / 4 helpful votes

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

Genesis 1:27 ESV / 4 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 / 3 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.”

Titus 2:4 ESV / 3 helpful votes

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

1 Corinthians 6:12-13 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be enslaved by anything. “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.

Romans 9:10-12 ESV / 3 helpful votes

And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, 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— she was told, “The older will serve the younger.”

Matthew 19:18 ESV / 3 helpful votes

He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness,

Isaiah 61:1 ESV / 3 helpful votes

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;

Isaiah 44:2 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Thus says the Lord who made you, who formed you from the womb and will help you: Fear not, O Jacob my servant, Jeshurun whom I have chosen.

Isaiah 43:25 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.

Genesis 25:21-22 ESV / 3 helpful votes

And Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife, because she was barren. And the Lord granted his prayer, and Rebekah his wife conceived. 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.

Isaiah 49:5 ESV / 2 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 49:1 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my name.

Isaiah 49:15 ESV / 1 helpful vote

“Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.

Job 31:15 ESV / 1 helpful vote

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

Deuteronomy 5:17 ESV / 1 helpful vote

“‘You shall not murder.

Exodus 21:22-25 ESV / 1 helpful vote

“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. But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

Exodus 20:13 ESV / 1 helpful vote

“You shall not murder.

Bible Verses about Abortion