Does God have a wife?

WHAT DOES THE BIBLE SAY?

The notion that God was married comes from pagan inscriptions. However, the Bible teaches that there is no other God but God, alone. Rather than being married, He has always been perfectly fulfilled and satisfied within Himself. As triune God, He is one, yet in three Persons. Each Person of the Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, lives eternally in perfect unity without need for another thing or person to complete them and provide companionship. When God created us, He desired to give us a glimpse of that kind of intimate union and created marriage. Through it, a man and woman join together and become one flesh. While we are not perfect and can never truly understand God’s unity, as we grow to love and serve our spouse and forget our own needs, we see a picture of what the Godhead is like.

FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT

• The idea that God had a wife comes from ancient Semitic inscriptions referring to “Yahweh and his Asherah,” which some interpret as portraying Asherah—a Canaanite fertility goddess and frequent biblical idol—as God’s consort. Asherah was often worshiped alongside Baal, and both idols regularly appeared together in Israel’s history as stumbling blocks, prompting outrage when faithful leaders like Gideon tore them down (Judges 6:25–30; 1 Kings 16:32–33; 2 Kings 17:16; 21:3; 23:4).
• While God had told the Israelites to worship Him exclusively (Exodus 20:3–5), they continually strayed and worshiped the false gods of the Canaanites, including Asherah (2 Kings 17:16).
• Throughout Israel’s history the LORD, or one of the good kings, would regularly be faced with “cleaning house,” tearing down idols such as Asherah (Judges 6:25). Given Israel’s history of idolatry and the influence of the pagan nations around her, it would not be unexpected if the inscription “marrying” Yahweh and Asherah was found in her ruins. However, that does not mean that God had a wife. It only shows pagan influences on Israelite thinking.
• God had no wife. In Genesis 2, God created marriage for mankind (Genesis 2:18). Marriage is the union of a man and a woman into “one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). Since God is a triune being, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, He is unified within Himself and has never been alone. This means that He does not need to have a partner or a wife. He has a loving relationship within His very being.
• The Bible teaches that there is no other God but God, alone (Deuteronomy 6:4; Isaiah 44:6). Religions that give gods (whether the LORD or any other god) a wife, are trying to make a god that is needy like them. The inscriptions that reference “Yahweh and his Asherah” reflect that wickedness.
• Because Scripture does not teach that God had a wife but rather says that there are no other gods (Isaiah 44:6), we must reject scholarship’s theory about God having a wife as yet another pagan idea.
• The Bible does speak about God being married to the nation of Israel in a metaphorical way. However, it does not mean that Israel was God’s wife in a human sense. Rather, that language was used to vividly illustrate God’s relationship to Israel—a relationship in which Israel often committed spiritual adultery by worshiping other gods (Jeremiah 3:6–9; Ezekiel 16:30–32). For example, the book of Hosea was written largely to show Israel just how wicked her “adultery” was, describing her as prostituting herself with other gods (Hosea 1:2; 2:2–5; 3:1).

FROM THE NEW TESTAMENT

• The New Testament does not mention Asherah nor any other potential “wife” for the LORD. However, it does teach us that marriage was given for the current age and will not continue on into eternity. In one key example, the Sadducees tried to trick Jesus by asking a hypothetical question about marriage after death. Jesus replied, “in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven” (Matthew 22:30). Jesus’ point was that just like angels have no need for marriage, nor will humans in the age to come. While that doesn’t directly address whether or not God was married, it does remind us that marriage is not an eternal concept but one initiated by God in creation with a limited timeframe in which it is needed.

IMPLICATIONS FOR TODAY

God is, was, and will be the same. He is complete within Himself, not needing a “cohort” or other female companionship. This is but one example of how very different God is from us.

We need to be very careful about how we think about God. When we imagine a wife for Him, we say that He is like us with our needs and desires. However, as our Creator, God created us to show our need for Him. One of the ways He did this was by making us need companionship and the type of intimate relationship that only a man and woman can have in marriage. Through that, we get a small glimpse of what it’s like for God to exist eternally in perfect unity as One God yet in three Persons.

Marriage is more than simply reduced taxes, a temporary bond between two people, or a way of fulfilling our sexual desires. It is a relationship that mirrors that relationship between God and His people (Ephesians 5:25–33). We are reminded to love our husbands and wives as He loved the church, sacrificing ourselves for the other person. Marriage is never about what we get out of it, but about what we can do for our “other half.”

God showed this type of sacrificial love by sending His eternal Son to die for us. Let us not think of God like us on the basis of a random inscription by people acting like pagans. Instead, let us think about how God describes Himself. He is perfectly satisfied within Himself. Let us be perfectly satisfied with who He is!

UNDERSTAND

• God does not have a wife; He is eternally complete in Himself as the triune God.
• The idea of God having a wife comes from pagan beliefs, specifically references to “Yahweh and his Asherah,” but these reflect Israel’s idolatrous history, not biblical truth.
• Marriage was created by God for humans, not for Himself, to reflect His unity and love.

REFLECT

• How does understanding that God is complete within Himself change the way you view your own need for relationships?
• How can your marriage—or desire for marriage—reflect God's sacrificial love and unity?
• Have you ever been tempted to imagine God in human terms? How can you realign your thoughts with how God reveals Himself in Scripture?

ENGAGE

• Why would ancient cultures have created gods in their own image, including giving them spouses?
• How does the biblical view of God’s completeness challenge our modern assumptions about identity, companionship, or independence?
• What can we learn from Israel’s repeated idolatry about how easily we can be influenced by surrounding culture today?