Colossians 3:18

Amplified Bible

Wives, be subject to your husbands [out of respect for their position as protector, and their accountability to God], as is proper and fitting in the Lord.

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

King James Version (1611)
Wiues, submit your selues vnto your owne husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.

King James Version
Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.

English Standard Version
Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

New American Standard Bible
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

New Century Version
Wives, yield to the authority of your husbands, because this is the right thing to do in the Lord.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Legacy Standard Bible
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Berean Standard Bible
Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Contemporary English Version
A wife must put her husband first. This is her duty as a follower of the Lord.

Complete Jewish Bible
Wives, subject yourselves to your husbands, as is appropriate in the Lord.

Darby Translation
Wives, be subject to [your] husbands, as is fitting in [the] Lord.

Easy-to-Read Version
Wives, be willing to serve your husbands. This is the right thing to do in following the Lord.

Geneva Bible (1587)
Wiues, submit your selues vnto your husbands, as it is comely in the Lord.

George Lamsa Translation
Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands, as it is appropriate in Christ.

Good News Translation
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, for that is what you should do as Christians.

Lexham English Bible
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Literal Translation
Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

American Standard Version
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Bible in Basic English
Wives, be under the authority of your husbands, as is right in the Lord.

Hebrew Names Version
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

International Standard Version
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.Ephesians 5:3,22; Titus 2:5; 1 Peter 3:1;">[xr]

Etheridge Translation
WIVES, be subject to your husbands, as it is right in the Meshiha.

Murdock Translation
Wives, be ye subject to your husbands, as is right in the Messiah.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
Wiues, submit your selues vnto your owne husbandes, as it is comely in the Lorde.

English Revised Version
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

World English Bible
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Wesley's New Testament (1755)
Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands (as is fit) in the Lord.

Weymouth's New Testament
Married women, be submissive to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Wymmen, be ye sugetis to youre hosebondis, as it bihoueth in the Lord.

Update Bible Version
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Webster's Bible Translation
Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.

New English Translation
Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

New King James Version
Ephesians 5:21-6:9">[xr] Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

New Living Translation
Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting for those who belong to the Lord.

New Life Bible
Wives, obey your husbands. This is what the Lord wants you to do.

New Revised Standard
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Ye wives! be submitting yourselves unto your husbands, as is becoming in the Lord;

Douay-Rheims Bible
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as it behoveth in the Lord.

Revised Standard Version
Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Tyndale New Testament (1525)
Wyves submit youre selves vnto youre awne husbandes as it is comly in the Lorde.

Young's Literal Translation
The wives! be subject to your own husbands, as is fit in the Lord;

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Ye wyues, submytte youre selues vnto youre hussbandes, as it is comly in the LORDE.

Mace New Testament (1729)
Dames, be submissive to your husbands, as becomes christians.

THE MESSAGE
Wives, understand and support your husbands by submitting to them in ways that honor the Master.

Simplified Cowboy Version
Ladies, show respect for your husbands and submit to him out of your love for the Lord.

Contextual Overview

¹⁸Wives, be subject to your husbands [out of respect for their position as protector, and their accountability to God], as is proper and fitting in the Lord.¹⁹Husbands, love your wives [with an affectionate, sympathetic, selfless love that always seeks the best for them] and do not be embittered or resentful toward them [because of the responsibilities of marriage]. ²⁰Children, obey your parents [as God's representatives] in all things, for this [attitude of respect and obedience] is well-pleasing to the Lord [and will bring you God's promised blessings]. ²¹Fathers, do not provoke or irritate or exasperate your children [with demands that are trivial or unreasonable or humiliating or abusive; nor by favoritism or indifference; treat them tenderly with lovingkindness], so they will not lose heart and become discouraged or unmotivated [with their spirits broken]. ²²Servants, in everything obey those who are your masters on earth, not only with external service, as those who merely please people, but with sincerity of heart because of your fear of the Lord. ²³Whatever you do [whatever your task may be], work from the soul [that is, put in your very best effort], as [something done] for the Lord and not for men, ²⁴knowing [with all certainty] that it is from the Lord [not from men] that you will receive the inheritance which is your [greatest] reward. It is the Lord Christ whom you [actually] serve. ²⁵For he who does wrong will be punished for his wrongdoing, and [with God] there is no partiality [no special treatment based on a person's position in life].

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

submit: Genesis 3:16, Esther 1:20, 1 Corinthians 11:3, 1 Corinthians 14:34, Ephesians 5:22-24, Ephesians 5:33, 1 Timothy 2:12, Titus 2:4, Titus 2:5, 1 Peter 3:1-6

as: Acts 5:29, Ephesians 5:3, Ephesians 6:1

Reciprocal: Ruth 1:8 - the dead 1 Timothy 2:11 - General

Cross-References

Genesis 3:14
The LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all the cattle, And more than any animal of the field; On your belly you shall go, And dust you shall eat All the days of your life.

Genesis 3:15
"And I will put enmity (open hostility) Between you and the woman, And between your seed (offspring) and her Seed; He shall [fatally] bruise your head, And you shall [only] bruise His heel."

Joshua 23:13
know and understand with certainty that the LORD your God will not continue to drive these nations out from before you; but they will be a snare and trap to you, and a whip on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

Job 1:21
He said, "Naked (without possessions) I came [into this world] from my mother's womb, And naked I will return there. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; Blessed be the name of the LORD."

Job 5:5
"The hungry devour his harvest And take it even [when it grows] among the thorns; The trap opens for [his] wealth.

Job 31:40
Let thorns grow instead of wheat, And stinkweed and cockleburs instead of barley." So the words of Job [with his friends] are finished.

Psalms 90:3
You turn man back to dust, And say, "Return [to the earth], O children of [mortal] men!"

Psalms 104:2
[You are the One] who covers Yourself with light as with a garment, Who stretches out the heavens like a tent curtain,

Proverbs 22:5
Thorns and snares are in the way of the obstinate [for their lack of honor and their wrong-doing traps them]; He who guards himself [with godly wisdom] will be far from them and avoid the consequences they suffer.

Proverbs 24:31
And, behold, it was all overgrown with thorns, And nettles were covering its surface, And its stone wall was broken down.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands,.... The apostle proceeds from those duties which related to them as church members one towards another, for their mutual good and edification, and the glory of God, to such as concerned them in their own houses and families, as in a natural relation to each other; as husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants; showing hereby, that the Gospel does not at all break in upon, but establishes the duties of common and civil life. Concerning the duty wives to their husbands, here exhorted to, :-. The reason urging to a regard to it is,

as it is fit in the Lord; that is, Christ, as the Syriac version reads it. Subjection of wives to their own husbands is "fit" and proper in its own nature, by reason of the original creation of man, and of the woman from him: man was made first, and then the woman; and the woman was made out of the man, out of one of his ribs; and so, though not to be trampled under his feet, but to be by his side, and an help meet to him, yet not to be head, or to rule over him. Moreover, the woman was made for the man, and not the man for the woman; add to this, that the woman was in the transgression, and the means of the fall of man, which gave a fresh reason for, and made the obligation to subjection to him the stronger: and it is also a "decent" and becoming thing for wives to be subject to their husbands; for as it is giving honour to them, it is a real ornament to themselves, and is one of those good works which women professing godliness should adorn themselves with; and makes more comely and beautiful than broidered hair; gold, pearls, or costly array, yea, than their natural favour and beauty: it is what is fitting "in the Lord": it is what he requires, not only what the law of God requires, see 1 Corinthians 14:34 and which was enjoined originally, see Genesis 3:16 and was charged as a duty under the legal dispensation; but is what is commanded by Christ under the Gospel dispensation, and is to be observed by all those that are "in" him, that profess to be new creatures, converted persons, that so the word of God be not blasphemed, and the enemy have no occasion to reproach, see Titus 2:5 though this phrase may also be considered as a restriction and limitation of this subjection; that though it reaches to all things, yet only to such as are agreeable to the will of the Lord, and not contrary to the Gospel of Christ; for in these they are not to be subject to them, but to Christ the Lord; but in all other things they are, even as the church is subject to Christ: and when this is the case, such subjection is regarded by Christ as if it was done to himself; and indeed his honour and glory should be the governing view in it; see Ephesians 5:22.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Wives, submit yourselves ... - Notes on the parallel passage in Ephesians 5:21-24.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 18. Wives, submit yourselves — Having done with general directions, the apostle comes to particular duties, which are commonly called relative; because they only belong to persons in certain situations; and are not incumbent on all. No woman has the duty of a wife to perform but she who is one, and no man has the duty of a husband to perform but he who is married.

The directions here to wives, husbands, children, parents, servants, and masters, are so exactly the same in substance with those in Ephesians 5:22-33(note); Ephesians 6:1-9 (note), that there is no need to repeat what has been said on those passages; and to the notes there the reader is requested to refer.

As it is fit in the Lord. — God commands it; and it is both proper and decent.