What does the Bible say about Wedding Rings?

Submit YOUR questions, through our easy to use form,
to our team of mature Christians known as the Email Evangelists!

Question: What does the Bible say about wedding rings? What do they symbolize?

Answer: Various societies, throughout history, have their own customs regarding marriage and the symbols they use to represent the union between two people. The giving of a ring to mark a betrothal is an old Roman custom that predates Christianity. At a time when arranged marriages were quite common, the ring was likely pledging the fulfilling of the marriage contract. Christians, under the Roman Empire, tolerated rings given in a betrothal ceremony. There is not much evidence, if any, that suggests they had any religious significance. The Bible is also silent about them.

Why place a ring on the left hand? Because ancient Romans believed the left hand’s fourth finger (the 'ring finger') contained a special vein connected directly to the heart. According to Jewish tradition, the placing of the ring, without stone or inscription, is on the first finger of the bride's right hand. In early times, it often bore the portraits of the bridal pair.
 
Wedding Rings

The ring itself represented a never-ending circle that symbolized eternal love. A European tradition encourages the engraving of the name of one's intended spouse and the date of one's intended marriage on the ring's inside surface.

Traditions

Why do brides generally stand to the left of the groom when both face the person who officiates the ceremony? Tradition states that since grooms often had to defend their brides during the ceremony that standing in such a way freed his right hand to grab his sword.


Although the Bible does not mention wedding rings, it does give couples a clear admonition on how to treat each other: "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. (Ephesians 5:22-25, 28, NKJV)

Jesus underscored the importance of marriage as a lifelong commitment by referring back to God's institution of the marriage covenant:

"And He answered and said to them, "Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning 'made them male and female,’ and said, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate." " (Matthew 19:4-6, NKJV)

Although the Bible says much about courtship and being married it does not establish the use of any particular symbol during the marriage ceremony. Since God did not command the use of wedding rings, there is nothing holy about them. The choice is yours whether to use or not use them during a marriage ceremony.

Additional Study Materials
How is celibacy
BETTER than marriage?
What are the Ten
Commandments of marriage?
What does the Bible say about
PRENUPTIAL AGREEMENTS?
 
 
 
 
   
 
 
 
Bible Answers to Questions  -  Basic Articles  -  Beginners Studies  -  Pictures  -  In-Depth Articles  -  Life of Paul
Maps and Timelines  -  Prophecy  -  Reference Materials  -  Roman Empire  -  The Sabbath  -  Study by Topic
Homeschool links  -  Discount Bookstore  -  FREE books