7 Now concerning what you all wrote to me: “It’s good for a man not to touch a woman.” 2 However, because there is so much sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband. 3 Both husbands and wives have a marital duty to each other in terms of sexual needs: 4 wives’ bodies belong to their husbands, not to themselves, and similarly, husbands’ bodies belong to their wives, not to themselves. 5 Don’t deprive each other, except by mutual agreement so that you may devote yourselves to prayer for an agreed time, and then be together again, so that Satan can’t easily tempt you all because of your lack of self-control.

6 But that isn’t a command—I’m only suggesting that it’s good to do,[fn] 7 and I wish everyone could be like me. But each person has their own gift from God—one has such-and-such a gift while someone else has a different one.

8 Now to the unmarried and to the widows I say that it’s good if they remain like me,[fn] 9 but if they don’t have self-control, they should marry because it’s better to marry than to burn with sexual desire.

10 Now I (well, not I, but the master) command married people that a wife is not to be separated from her husband[ref] 11 (but even if she might be separated, let her remain unmarried, or let her be reconciled to the husband), and a husband is not to divorce a wife.

12 But to the rest I say (I, not the master) that if any believing husband has an unbelieving wife and she agrees to live with him, he shouldn’t divorce her. 13 Similarly, if any woman has an unbelieving husband and he agrees to live with her, she shouldn’t divorce him. 14 You see, the unbelieving husband is exposed to faith through his wife, and the unbelieving wife is exposed to faith through the believing husband, otherwise your children would be ‘defiled’, but now they are declared innocent. 15 But if the unbeliever departs, let that person go. In such cases, the believing spouse is not tied down to serving their departed spouse, but rather God has called us to peace. 16 You see, how do you know, woman, whether you will cause your husband to be saved? Or how do you know, man, whether you will cause your wife to be saved?