77 Bible Verses about Slave Marriage

Deuteronomy 21:10-14 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“When you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God gives them into your hand and you take them captive, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you desire to take her to be your wife, and you bring her home to your house, she shall shave her head and pare her nails. And she shall take off the clothes in which she was captured and shall remain in your house and lament her father and her mother a full month. After that you may go in to her and be her husband, and she shall be your wife. But if you no longer delight in her, you shall let her go where she wants. But you shall not sell her for money, nor shall you treat her as a slave, since you have humiliated her.

Exodus 21:16 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.

Exodus 21:7-11 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master, who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has broken faith with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights. And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out for nothing, without payment of money.

Genesis 2:24 ESV / 6 helpful votes

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

Galatians 3:28 ESV / 5 helpful votes

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 6:9 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

Deuteronomy 24:7 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“If a man is found stealing one of his brothers of the people of Israel, and if he treats him as a slave or sells him, then that thief shall die. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

Leviticus 25:44-46 ESV / 4 helpful votes

As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their clans that are with you, who have been born in your land, and they may be your property. You may bequeath them to your sons after you to inherit as a possession forever. You may make slaves of them, but over your brothers the people of Israel you shall not rule, one over another ruthlessly.

Leviticus 25:39 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“If your brother becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave:

Exodus 21:26-27 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free because of his eye. If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free because of his tooth.

Exodus 21:20-21 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged. But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his money.

Exodus 21:2-6 ESV / 4 helpful votes

When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall be his slave forever.

Colossians 4:1 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Masters, treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven.

Colossians 3:11 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.

Ephesians 6:5 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ,

Proverbs 31:10-31 ESV / 3 helpful votes

An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels. The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain. She does him good, and not harm, all the days of her life. She seeks wool and flax, and works with willing hands. She is like the ships of the merchant; she brings her food from afar. ...

Leviticus 19:20 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“If a man lies sexually with a woman who is a slave, assigned to another man and not yet ransomed or given her freedom, a distinction shall be made. They shall not be put to death, because she was not free;

Exodus 23:12 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“Six days you shall do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your servant woman, and the alien, may be refreshed.

Genesis 16:3 ESV / 3 helpful votes

So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife.

Genesis 2:18 ESV / 3 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 Peter 3:7 ESV / 2 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.

1 Peter 3:1 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives,

1 Peter 2:18 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust.

Titus 2:9-10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Bondservants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior.

1 Timothy 6:1-2 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Let all who are under a yoke as bondservants regard their own masters as worthy of all honor, so that the name of God and the teaching may not be reviled. Those who have believing masters must not be disrespectful on the ground that they are brothers; rather they must serve all the better since those who benefit by their good service are believers and beloved. Teach and urge these things.

1 Timothy 1:10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

The sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine,

Colossians 3:22-25 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Bondservants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.

Colossians 3:22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Bondservants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord.

Ephesians 6:5-8 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a bondservant or is free.

Ephesians 5:25 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

Ephesians 5:22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

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

2 Corinthians 6:14 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 ESV / 2 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; ...

1 Corinthians 7:21 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Were you a bondservant when called? Do not be concerned about it. (But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.)

1 Corinthians 7:21-23 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Were you a bondservant when called? Do not be concerned about it. (But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.) For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ. You were bought with a price; do not become bondservants of men.

1 Corinthians 7:1-40 ESV / 2 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. ...

John 3:16-17 ESV / 2 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. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Luke 14:28 ESV / 2 helpful votes

For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?

Mark 10:2 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”

Isaiah 10:1-34 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression, to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be their spoil, and that they may make the fatherless their prey! What will you do on the day of punishment, in the ruin that will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help, and where will you leave your wealth? Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or fall among the slain. For all this his anger has not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still. Woe to Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury! ...

Proverbs 30:10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Do not slander a servant to his master, lest he curse you, and you be held guilty.

Proverbs 23:13 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die.

Proverbs 22:7 ESV / 2 helpful votes

The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is the slave of the lender.

Proverbs 21:20 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Precious treasure and oil are in a wise man's dwelling, but a foolish man devours it.

Proverbs 13:22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous.

Psalm 37:21 ESV / 2 helpful votes

The wicked borrows but does not pay back, but the righteous is generous and gives;

2 Kings 4:1 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Now the wife of one of the sons of the prophets cried to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the Lord, but the creditor has come to take my two children to be his slaves.”

Deuteronomy 24:1-22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house, and if she goes and becomes another man's wife, and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, 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. “When a man is newly married, he shall not go out with the army or be liable for any other public duty. He shall be free at home one year to be happy with his wife whom he has taken. ...

Deuteronomy 23:15-16 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“You shall not give up to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you. He shall dwell with you, in your midst, in the place that he shall choose within one of your towns, wherever it suits him. You shall not wrong him.

Deuteronomy 23:15 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“You shall not give up to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you.

Deuteronomy 22:13-21 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“If any man takes a wife and goes in to her and then hates her and accuses her of misconduct and brings a bad name upon her, saying, ‘I took this woman, and when I came near her, I did not find in her evidence of virginity,’ then the father of the young woman and her mother shall take and bring out the evidence of her virginity to the elders of the city in the gate. And the father of the young woman shall say to the elders, ‘I gave my daughter to this man to marry, and he hates her; and behold, he has accused her of misconduct, saying, “I did not find in your daughter evidence of virginity.” And yet this is the evidence of my daughter's virginity.’ And they shall spread the cloak before the elders of the city. ...

Deuteronomy 21:10-11 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“When you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God gives them into your hand and you take them captive, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you desire to take her to be your wife,

Deuteronomy 20:14 ESV / 2 helpful votes

But the women and the little ones, the livestock, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as plunder for yourselves. And you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the Lord your God has given you.

Deuteronomy 15:18 ESV / 2 helpful votes

It shall not seem hard to you when you let him go free from you, for at half the cost of a hired worker he has served you six years. So the Lord your God will bless you in all that you do.

Deuteronomy 15:12 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you.

Deuteronomy 15:12-18 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you. And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed. You shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your winepress. As the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today. But if he says to you, ‘I will not go out from you,’ because he loves you and your household, since he is well-off with you, ...

Deuteronomy 14:21 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“You shall not eat anything that has died naturally. You may give it to the sojourner who is within your towns, that he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. “You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk.

Deuteronomy 5:1-33 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. Not with our fathers did the Lord make this covenant, but with us, who are all of us here alive today. The Lord spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire, while I stood between the Lord and you at that time, to declare to you the word of the Lord. For you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up into the mountain. He said: ...

Numbers 31:1-18 ESV / 2 helpful votes

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Avenge the people of Israel on the Midianites. Afterward you shall be gathered to your people.” So Moses spoke to the people, saying, “Arm men from among you for the war, that they may go against Midian to execute the Lord's vengeance on Midian. You shall send a thousand from each of the tribes of Israel to the war.” So there were provided, out of the thousands of Israel, a thousand from each tribe, twelve thousand armed for war. ...

Leviticus 25:53 ESV / 2 helpful votes

He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight.

Leviticus 25:44 ESV / 2 helpful votes

As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you.

Leviticus 25:43 ESV / 2 helpful votes

You shall not rule over him ruthlessly but shall fear your God.

Leviticus 19:20-22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“If a man lies sexually with a woman who is a slave, assigned to another man and not yet ransomed or given her freedom, a distinction shall be made. They shall not be put to death, because she was not free; but he shall bring his compensation to the Lord, to the entrance of the tent of meeting, a ram for a guilt offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he has committed, and he shall be forgiven for the sin that he has committed.

Exodus 22:3 ESV / 2 helpful votes

But if the sun has risen on him, there shall be bloodguilt for him. He shall surely pay. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft.

Exodus 21:20 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged.

Exodus 21:12 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death.

Exodus 21:11 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out for nothing, without payment of money.

Exodus 21:8 ESV / 2 helpful votes

If she does not please her master, who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has broken faith with her.

Exodus 21:7 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do.

Exodus 21:7-10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master, who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has broken faith with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.

Exodus 21:2 ESV / 2 helpful votes

When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing.

Exodus 21:1-4 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“Now these are the rules that you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out alone.

Exodus 21:1-36 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“Now these are the rules that you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ ...

Exodus 20:10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates.

Genesis 17:27 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And all the men of his house, those born in the house and those bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him.

Genesis 17:13 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant.

Genesis 16:1-16 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife. And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me!” ...

Suggest a Verse


Visit the Bible online to search for words if you don’t know the specific passage your’re looking for.