What does it mean to be unequally yoked? | GotQuestions.org
In this video we answer your question: What does it mean to be unequally yoked?
Transcript
Hi there, many others like you have asked, What does it mean to be unequally yoked?
You can also discover more on GotQuestions .org.
It's where you go to get an answer.
The phrase unequally yoked comes from this passage in the King James Version Be ye not
unequally yoked together with unbelievers for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness
and what communion hath light with darkness?
The New American Standard Version says Do not be bound together with unbelievers for what partnership
have righteousness and lawlessness or what fellowship has light with darkness?
A yoke is a wooden bar that joins two oxen to each other and to the burden they pull.
An unequally yoked team has one stronger ox and one weaker or one taller and one shorter.
The weaker or shorter ox would walk more slowly than the taller, stronger one causing the load to
go around in circles.
When oxen are unequally yoked, they cannot perform the task set before them.
Instead of working together, they are at odds with one another.
Paul's admonition is part of a larger discourse to the church at Corinth on the Christian life.
He discouraged them because believers and unbelievers are opposite just as light and darkness are opposites.
They simply have nothing in common just as Christ has nothing in common with Belial a Hebrew word
meaning worthlessness.
Here, Paul uses it to refer to Satan.
The idea is that the pagan, wicked, unbelieving world is governed by the principles of Satan and that
Christians should be separate from that wicked world just as Christ was separate from Satan.
Jesus didn't join in Satan's plans or methods.
Neither should we.
Attempting to live a Christian life with a non -Christian as our close friend and ally will only cause us to
go around in circles.
Of course, the closest alliance one can have with another is found in marriage and this is how the passage is
usually interpreted.
God's plan is for a man and a woman to become one flesh a relationship so intimate
that one literally and figuratively becomes part of the other.
Uniting a believer with an unbeliever is essentially uniting opposites which makes for a very difficult
marriage.
The unequal yoke is often applied to business relationships.
Daily business decisions will reflect the worldview of either partner.
For business partners with opposing worldviews to work together one or the other must abandon his moral
center and move toward that of the other.
Often, it is the believer who finds himself pressured to leave his Christian principles behind for the sake of
profit and company growth.
All right, that answers your question.
What does it mean to be unequally yoked?
On our website, GotQuestions .org, you'll find an in -depth article along with citations and resource suggestions.
If this helped you as much as it did others, like this video and subscribe to the GotQuestions channel.
Meanwhile, if you'd like to study more, as always, just keep asking.