Is Praying the Rosary Biblical?

The Rosary as a Devotional Prayer to Mary

The Catholic prayer, known as the Rosary, is a devotional prayer primarily to Mary. It's recited using a string of beads made up of five sets, with each set containing one large bead and ten smaller beads.

The introduction consists of the Apostles' Creed, the Our Father, three Hail Marys, and one Glory Be. For each larger bead, the Our Father is repeated, for each smaller bead, a Hail Mary, and at the end, the Hail Holy Queen, asking for her mercy and calling Mary our life, hope, and advocate.

Praying the Rosary entails more prayer to Mary than to God. Some of the Hail Mary is taken from Scripture, like when the angel Gabriel said to Mary, Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you. And Elizabeth said, Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.

But it's worded in a prayer that goes like this.

Hail. Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Hail. Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

The Lack of Biblical Basis for Praying to Mary

And that's repeated over 50 times. There is no biblical basis for this. Nowhere in the Bible does anyone pray to Mary or any other saint. On the contrary, God said that one who inquires of the dead is an abomination to the Lord.

Now Catholics get around this by saying no one in heaven is really dead. But where in the Bible does God approve of praying to anyone in heaven other than God? As 1 Timothy 2 .5 says, there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.

Christ as the Only Mediator and Advocate

And 1 John 2 .1 says, Christ is our advocate before the Father. About praying the same thing over and over to someone other than God, Jesus addressed practices like that. Saying when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words.

Do not be like them. Instead, pray like Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles prayed in the Bible when we understand the text.