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What does the Bible say about disrespectful wife?

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The Bible calls a wife to honor her husband with respectful, faithful, and wise conduct, while also calling husbands to love and cherish their wives sacrificially. Proverbs 12:4 and 31:10-12 praise a wife whose character brings blessing rather than shame, and Proverbs 14:1 contrasts wise homebuilding with destructive folly. Proverbs 21:9, 19 warns against the misery of persistent quarrelsomeness, not to excuse a husband’s sin but to show the damage sinful speech brings to a household. Ephesians 5:22-24 and 33 teach willing respect within marriage, grounded in Christ’s order and joined to a husband’s Christlike love. By God’s grace, both spouses are called to repentance, tenderness, fidelity, and peace.

Top passages, ranked by readers

Rankings: OpenBible.info Topical Bible (CC BY) · Scripture: World English Bible

  • Proverbs 21:19 8 votes

    It is better to dwell in a desert land, Than with a contentious and fretful woman.

  • Proverbs 12:4 8 votes

    A worthy woman is the crown of her husband, But a disgraceful wife is as rottenness in his bones.

  • Proverbs 21:9 7 votes

    It is better to dwell in the corner of the housetop, Than to share a house with a contentious woman.

  • Proverbs 14:1 6 votes

    Every wise woman builds her house, But the foolish one tears it down with her own hands.

  • Ephesians 5:22-24 6 votes

    [22] Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. [23] For the husband is the head of the wife, and Christ also is the head of the assembly, being himself the savior of the body. [24] But as the assembly is subject to Christ, so let the wives also be to their own husbands in everything.

  • 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 4 votes

    [3] Let the husband render to his wife the affection owed her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. [4] The wife doesn't have authority over her own body, but the husband. Likewise also the husband doesn't have authority over his own body, but the wife. [5] Don't deprive one another, unless it is by consent for a season, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer, and may be together again, that Satan doesn't tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

  • Titus 2:3-5 3 votes

    [3] and that older women likewise be reverent in behavior, not slanderers nor enslaved to much wine, teachers of that which is good; [4] that they may train the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, [5] to be sober-minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands, that God's word may not be blasphemed.

  • Proverbs 31:10-12 3 votes

    [10] Who can find a worthy woman? For her price is far above rubies. [11] The heart of her husband trusts in her. He shall have no lack of gain. [12] She does him good, and not harm, All the days of her life.

  • 1 Timothy 2:11 3 votes

    Let a woman learn in quietness with all subjection.

  • Ephesians 5:33 3 votes

    Nevertheless each of you must also love his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

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