Bible Verses About Marriage
The Catholic Church teaches that marriage is one of the seven sacraments, instituted by Christ and raising the natural institution to a supernatural dignity. The foundation of this teaching in Scripture is threefold: the creation accounts in Genesis, which establish the goodness of the marital union in God's design; the covenant framework, through which God's own fidelity to Israel becomes the model for spousal fidelity; and Ephesians 5, where Paul explicitly calls marriage a great mystery that reflects the union of Christ and the Church.
The indissolubility of marriage — "what God has joined together, let no man put asunder" — is not a Church-imposed rule but a re-statement of what marriage is by its very nature. The deuterocanonical Book of Tobit gives the most extended narrative of a holy marriage in the Old Testament, with Tobias and Sarah as models of prayer within marital life.
Note: 1 verse on this page is from the deuterocanonical books — books included in the Catholic Bible but absent from most Protestant translations (Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1–2 Maccabees).
9 verses — Douay-Rheims Bible (1899 Challoner revision) — Public domain
Wherefore a man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they shall be two in one flesh.Genesis 2:24 — Douay-Rheims
The foundational verse of marriage in Scripture, cited by Jesus in the Gospels and by Paul in Ephesians.
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church, and delivered himself up for it ... This is a great sacrament; but I speak in Christ and in the church.Ephesians 5:25-32 — Douay-Rheims
Paul's analogy between Christian marriage and the union of Christ and the Church — the core text for the sacramental theology of marriage.
Therefore now they are not two, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.Matthew 19:6 — Douay-Rheims
Jesus answers the Pharisees on divorce by appealing to the original creation design — indissolubility is not a Church rule but God's work.
Let the husband render the debt to his wife, and the wife also in like manner to the husband. The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband. And in like manner the husband also hath not power of his own body, but the wife.1 Corinthians 7:3-4 — Douay-Rheims
Paul on the mutual self-giving at the heart of the marital covenant — each spouse belongs to the other.
Then Tobias exhorted the virgin, and said to her: Sara, arise, and let us pray to God today, and tomorrow, and the next day: because for these three nights we are joined to God: and when the third night is over, we will be in our own wedlock. For we are the children of saints, and we must not be joined together like heathens that know not God.Tobit 8:4-7Deuterocanonical — Douay-Rheims
Tobias and Sara pray together on their wedding night — the deuterocanonical model of a marriage founded on prayer and chastity.
Who shall find a valiant woman? far and from the uttermost coasts is the price of her. The heart of her husband trusteth in her, and he shall have no need of spoils.Proverbs 31:10-11 — Douay-Rheims
The valiant woman of Proverbs 31 — celebrated as a model of the Christian wife in the Catholic liturgical tradition.
My beloved to me, and I to him who feedeth among the lilies.Song of Solomon 2:16 — Douay-Rheims
The Song of Solomon's lyric of mutual belonging — beloved by the Church as both a celebration of conjugal love and an allegory of the soul's union with God.
And you have said: For what cause? Because the Lord hath been witness between thee, and the wife of thy youth, whom thou hast despised: yet she was thy partner, and the wife of thy covenant.Malachi 2:14-15 — Douay-Rheims
God rebukes Israel's unfaithfulness in marriage, linking marital fidelity to covenant fidelity before God.
Marriage honourable in all, and the bed undefiled. For fornicators and adulterers God will judge.Hebrews 13:4 — Douay-Rheims
A brief but unequivocal affirmation of the goodness and holiness of marriage.
Related Topics
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Source
All verse texts from the Douay-Rheims Bible (1899 Challoner revision), public domain. The Douay-Rheims is the traditional Catholic English Bible, translated from the Latin Vulgate.