What Does the Bible Say About Marriage Vows?

Ephesians 5:31 ESV / 41 helpful votes

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

Hebrews 13:4 ESV / 36 helpful votes

Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.

Ephesians 5:22 ESV / 34 helpful votes

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

Matthew 5:32 ESV / 29 helpful votes

But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

1 Corinthians 7:1-40 ESV / 26 helpful votes

Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. ...

1 Peter 3:7 ESV / 25 helpful votes

Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

Malachi 2:16 ESV / 25 helpful votes

“For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”

Genesis 2:24 ESV / 23 helpful votes

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Romans 7:2 ESV / 22 helpful votes

For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage.

Ecclesiastes 5:4 ESV / 22 helpful votes

When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow.

Matthew 19:9 ESV / 17 helpful votes

And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

1 Corinthians 7:12-13 ESV / 16 helpful votes

To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him.

Ephesians 5:33 ESV / 13 helpful votes

However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ESV / 13 helpful votes

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; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

1 Corinthians 7:39 ESV / 12 helpful votes

A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is free to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord.

Matthew 19:3-9 ESV / 12 helpful votes

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” ...

Amos 3:3 ESV / 11 helpful votes

“Do two walk together, unless they have agreed to meet?

Genesis 2:18 ESV / 11 helpful votes

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

1 Timothy 3:2 ESV / 10 helpful votes

Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach,

1 Corinthians 7:15 ESV / 10 helpful votes

But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace.

1 Corinthians 7:2 ESV / 9 helpful votes

But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

Luke 16:18 ESV / 9 helpful votes

“Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.

Mark 10:12 ESV / 9 helpful votes

And if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

Genesis 1:28 ESV / 9 helpful votes

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

Mark 10:11 ESV / 7 helpful votes

And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her,

Song of Solomon 1:1-17 ESV / 7 helpful votes

The Song of Songs, which is Solomon's. Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth! For your love is better than wine; your anointing oils are fragrant; your name is oil poured out; therefore virgins love you. Draw me after you; let us run. The king has brought me into his chambers. We will exult and rejoice in you; we will extol your love more than wine; rightly do they love you. I am very dark, but lovely, O daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents of Kedar, like the curtains of Solomon. ...

Job 31:1 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?

Matthew 5:31 ESV / 6 helpful votes

“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’

Colossians 3:23 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,

Ephesians 5:1-33 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. ...

Matthew 19:7-8 ESV / 5 helpful votes

They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

Psalm 116:18 ESV / 5 helpful votes

I will pay my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people,

Mark 10:1-52 ESV / 4 helpful votes

And he left there and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan, and crowds gathered to him again. And again, as was his custom, he taught them. And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.” And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. ...

Ruth 1:1-22 ESV / 4 helpful votes

In the days when the judges ruled there was a famine in the land, and a man of Bethlehem in Judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons. The name of the man was Elimelech and the name of his wife Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah. They went into the country of Moab and remained there. But Elimelech, the husband of Naomi, died, and she was left with her two sons. These took Moabite wives; the name of the one was Orpah and the name of the other Ruth. They lived there about ten years, and both Mahlon and Chilion died, so that the woman was left without her two sons and her husband. ...

Numbers 30:1-16 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Moses spoke to the heads of the tribes of the people of Israel, saying, “This is what the Lord has commanded. If a man vows a vow to the Lord, or swears an oath to bind himself by a pledge, he shall not break his word. He shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth. “If a woman vows a vow to the Lord and binds herself by a pledge, while within her father's house in her youth, and her father hears of her vow and of her pledge by which she has bound herself and says nothing to her, then all her vows shall stand, and every pledge by which she has bound herself shall stand. But if her father opposes her on the day that he hears of it, no vow of hers, no pledge by which she has bound herself shall stand. And the Lord will forgive her, because her father opposed her. ...

1 Corinthians 7:11 ESV / 3 helpful votes

(but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and the husband should not divorce his wife.

Psalm 20:1-9 ESV / 3 helpful votes

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble! May the name of the God of Jacob protect you! May he send you help from the sanctuary and give you support from Zion! May he remember all your offerings and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices! Selah May he grant you your heart's desire and fulfill all your plans! May we shout for joy over your salvation, and in the name of our God set up our banners! May the Lord fulfill all your petitions! ...

Exodus 21:10 ESV / 3 helpful votes

If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.

Jeremiah 3:8 ESV / 2 helpful votes

She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce. Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore.

Deuteronomy 24:4 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Then her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the Lord. And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance.

1 Corinthians 7:24 ESV / 1 helpful vote

So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God.

Romans 13:1 ESV / 1 helpful vote

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.

Romans 7:3 ESV / 1 helpful vote

Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

John 1:1-51 ESV / 1 helpful vote

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. ...

Matthew 19:8 ESV / 1 helpful vote

He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

Matthew 19:1-30 ESV / 1 helpful vote

Now when Jesus had finished these sayings, he went away from Galilee and entered the region of Judea beyond the Jordan. And large crowds followed him, and he healed them there. And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? ...

Bible Verses about Marriage Vows