²⁶ I think that, in view of the impending^[a] crisis,^[b] it is good for you to remain as you are.^(A)

⁸ To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain unmarried as I am.^(A)

Directions concerning Marriage

7 Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to touch a woman.”

¹⁷ For the time has come for judgment to begin with the household of God; if it begins with us, what will be the end for those who do not obey the gospel of God?^(A)

³⁵ I say this for your own benefit, not to put any restraint upon you but to promote good order and unhindered devotion to the Lord.

³⁶ If anyone thinks that he is behaving indecently toward his fiancée,^[a] if his passions are strong and so it has to be, let him marry as he wishes; it is no sin. Let them marry. ³⁷ But if someone stands firm in his resolve, being under no necessity but having his own desire under control, and has determined in his own mind to keep her as his fiancée,^[b] he will do well. ³⁸ So then, he who marries his fiancée^[c] does well, and he who refrains from marriage will do better.

²⁸ But if you marry, you do not sin, and if a virgin marries, she does not sin. Yet those who marry will experience distress in the flesh, and I would spare you that.

²⁸ But Jesus turned to them and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.^{(A) 29} For the days are surely coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’

²³ Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress on the earth and wrath against this people;

¹⁹ Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days!

² You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place.^{(A) 3} For thus says the Lord concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place and concerning the mothers who bear them and the fathers who father them in this land:^{(B) 4} They shall die of deadly diseases. They shall not be lamented, nor shall they be buried; they shall become like dung on the surface of the ground. They shall perish by the sword and by famine, and their dead bodies shall become food for the birds of the air and for the wild animals of the earth.^(C)