What does the Bible say about widow?

Top passages, ranked by readers

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

• Exodus 22:22-24

  [22] "You shall not take advantage of any widow or fatherless child. [23] If you take advantage of them at all, and they cry at all to me, I will surely hear their cry; [24] and my wrath will grow hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.

• Psalms 68:5

  A father of the fatherless, and a defender of the widows, Is God in his holy habitation.

• James 1:27

  Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

• 1 Timothy 5:3-6

  [3] Honor widows who are widows indeed. [4] But if any widow has children or grandchildren, let them learn first to show piety towards their own family, and to repay their parents, for this is acceptable in the sight of God. [5] Now she who is a widow indeed, and desolate, has her hope set on God, and continues in petitions and prayers night and day. [6] But she who gives herself to pleasure is dead while she lives.

• Proverbs 15:25

  Yahweh will uproot the house of the proud, But he will keep the widow's borders intact.

• Mark 12:41-44

  [41] Jesus sat down opposite the treasury, and saw how the multitude cast money into the treasury. Many who were rich cast in much. [42] A poor widow came, and she cast in two small brass coins, which equal a quadrans coin. [43] He called his disciples to himself, and said to them, "Most assuredly I tell you, this poor widow gave more than all those who are giving into the treasury, [44] for they all gave out of their abundance, but she, out of her poverty, gave all that she had to live on."

• 1 Corinthians 7:8

  But I say to the unmarried and to widows, it is good for them if they remain even as I am.

• 2 Kings 4:1-10

  [1] Now there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets to Elisha, saying, Your servant my husband is dead; and you know that your servant did fear Yahweh: and the creditor is come to take to him my two children to be bondservants. [2] Elisha said to her, What shall I do for you? tell me; what have you in the house? She said, Your handmaid has nothing in the house, except a pot of oil. [3] Then he said, Go, borrow you vessels abroad of all your neighbors, even empty vessels; borrow not a few. [4] You shall go in, and shut the door on you and on your sons, and pour out into all those vessels; and you shall set aside that which is full. [5] So she went from him, and shut the door on her and on her sons; they brought [the vessels] to her, and she poured out. [6] It happened, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, Bring me yet a vessel. He said to her, There isn't another vessel. The oil stayed. [7] Then she came and told the man of God. He said, Go, sell the oil, and pay your debt, and live you and your sons of the rest. [8] It fell on a day, that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a great woman; and she constrained him to eat bread. So it was, that as often as he passed by, he turned in there to eat bread. [9] She said to her husband, See now, I perceive that this is a holy man of God, that passes by us continually. [10] Let us make, Please, a little chamber on the wall; and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a seat, and a lamp stand: and it shall be, when he comes to us, that he shall turn in there.

• 1 Timothy 5:16

  If any man or woman who believes has widows, let them relieve them, and don't let the assembly be burdened; that it might relieve those who are widows indeed.

• Isaiah 1:17

  Learn to do well. Seek justice, Relieve the oppressed, Judge the fatherless, Plead for the widow."

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