What Does the Bible Say About Jealousy And Envy?

James 3:14-16 ESV / 199 helpful votes

But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.

Proverbs 14:30 ESV / 135 helpful votes

A tranquil heart gives life to the flesh, but envy makes the bones rot.

Philippians 2:3 ESV / 98 helpful votes

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

Galatians 5:19-21 ESV / 80 helpful votes

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

1 Corinthians 13:4 ESV / 78 helpful votes

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant

James 3:16 ESV / 73 helpful votes

For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.

Proverbs 27:4 ESV / 53 helpful votes

Wrath is cruel, anger is overwhelming, but who can stand before jealousy?

1 Corinthians 3:3 ESV / 41 helpful votes

For you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 ESV / 39 helpful votes

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ...

Romans 13:13 ESV / 30 helpful votes

Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.

Song of Solomon 8:6 ESV / 24 helpful votes

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm, for love is strong as death, jealousy is fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord.

Ecclesiastes 4:4 ESV / 23 helpful votes

Then I saw that all toil and all skill in work come from a man's envy of his neighbor. This also is vanity and a striving after wind.

1 John 4:8 ESV / 22 helpful votes

Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

James 4:7 ESV / 21 helpful votes

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

Psalm 37:1 ESV / 20 helpful votes

Of David. Fret not yourself because of evildoers; be not envious of wrongdoers!

1 Peter 4:8 ESV / 18 helpful votes

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

Exodus 20:4-6 ESV / 16 helpful votes

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

John 8:32 ESV / 15 helpful votes

And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Exodus 20:4-5 ESV / 15 helpful votes

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,

1 Corinthians 13:1-8 ESV / 14 helpful votes

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ...

Psalm 36:1-12 ESV / 14 helpful votes

To the choirmaster. Of David, the servant of the Lord. Transgression speaks to the wicked deep in his heart; there is no fear of God before his eyes. For he flatters himself in his own eyes that his iniquity cannot be found out and hated. The words of his mouth are trouble and deceit; he has ceased to act wisely and do good. He plots trouble while on his bed; he sets himself in a way that is not good; he does not reject evil. Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds. ...

Psalm 91:1-16 ESV / 13 helpful votes

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, ...

1 Kings 19:14 ESV / 12 helpful votes

He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Deuteronomy 32:16 ESV / 12 helpful votes

They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger.

Deuteronomy 4:24 ESV / 12 helpful votes

For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

2 Corinthians 11:2 ESV / 11 helpful votes

For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.

Exodus 34:14 ESV / 11 helpful votes

(for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God),

Romans 1:1-32 ESV / 10 helpful votes

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, ...

John 3:16 ESV / 10 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Psalm 121:1 ESV / 10 helpful votes

A Song of Ascents. I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?

Job 10:8 ESV / 10 helpful votes

Your hands fashioned and made me, and now you have destroyed me altogether.

John 16:13 ESV / 9 helpful votes

When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.

Zechariah 1:14 ESV / 9 helpful votes

So the angel who talked with me said to me, ‘Cry out, Thus says the Lord of hosts: I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion.

Psalm 78:58 ESV / 9 helpful votes

For they provoked him to anger with their high places; they moved him to jealousy with their idols.

Psalm 35:7-8 ESV / 9 helpful votes

For without cause they hid their net for me; without cause they dug a pit for my life. Let destruction come upon him when he does not know it! And let the net that he hid ensnare him; let him fall into it—to his destruction!

Genesis 37:11 ESV / 9 helpful votes

And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind.

Psalm 150:1-6 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Praise the Lord! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty heavens! Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his excellent greatness! Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp! Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe! Praise him with sounding cymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals! ...

1 Samuel 15:23 ESV / 6 helpful votes

For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.”

Bible Verses about Jealousy And Envy