Word study

Mother

4 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: mother, mothers. English often uses one word where Hebrew or Greek has several, each with its own shade of meaning. Under each word are verses where it is translated this way; choose the word itself for its full study: every verse, how else it is translated, the forms it takes and what the dictionaries say.

At a glance

How often each original word is translated “mother” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • אֵם êmmothertranslated this way 210 times of its 217 uses · Strong’s H517Noun  ·  Translated: mother 139, mother's 58, mothers 9, grandmother 2

    Genesis 2:24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

    Exodus 2:8 “Go ahead,” Pharaoh’s daughter told her. And the girl went and called the boy’s mother.

    Full study and all 201 verses →
  • יָלַד yâladbear, bring forth, begettranslated this way 5 times of its 484 uses · Strong’s H3205Verb  ·  Translated: father 111, born 57, bore 52, gave birth 44

    1 Chronicles 2:17 Abigail was the mother of Amasa, whose father was Jether the Ishmaelite.

    Jeremiah 15:9 The mother of seven will grow faint; she will breathe her last breath. Her sun will set while it is still day; she will be disgraced and humiliated. And the rest I will put to the sword in the presence of their enemies,” declares the LORD.

    Full study and all 395 verses →
  • גְּבִירָה gebîrâhlady, queentranslated this way 3 times of its 6 uses · Strong’s H1377Noun  ·  Translated: queen mother 3, from 2, Queen 1

    2 Kings 10:13 Jehu met some relatives of Ahaziah king of Judah and asked, “Who are you?” “We are relatives of Ahaziah,” they answered, “and we have come down to greet the sons of the king and of the queen mother.”

    Jeremiah 13:18 Say to the king and to the queen mother: “Take a lowly seat, for your glorious crowns have fallen from your heads.”

    Full study and all 6 verses →
  • אִשָּׁה ishshâhwoman, wife, femaletranslated this way 2 times of its 711 uses · Strong’s H802Noun  ·  Translated: wife 251, woman 172, wives 92, women 88

    Leviticus 24:10 Now the son of an Israelite mother and an Egyptian father went out among the Israelites, and a fight broke out in the camp between him and an Israelite.

    Full study and all 638 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • μήτηρ mḗtēra mothertranslated this way 80 times of its 80 uses · Strong’s G3384Noun  ·  Translated: mother 74, mother's 4, mothers 2

    Matthew 1:18 This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged in marriage to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit.

    Mark 3:31 Then Jesus’ mother and brothers came and stood outside. They sent someone in to summon Him,

    Full study and all 75 verses →
How to study a word well
  1. Start from the verse, not the dictionary. Find which Hebrew or Greek word stands in the verse you are studying. One English word often translates several different original words.
  2. Read every place the word is used. A word means what its writers used it to mean. The list of verses and the count by book show its range, and who uses it most.
  3. Look at how it is translated. A word rendered five different ways has a wider meaning than any one English word can carry.
  4. Notice the form. A command is not a statement, and a passive verb is something done to the subject. The form in your verse is part of the meaning.
  5. See what it keeps company with. The words that appear beside it again and again show how the Bible itself connects ideas.
  6. Then read the dictionaries. They give the considered view of scholars, with their evidence.
  7. Come back to the verse. Context decides. A word does not carry every one of its meanings into every verse, and where a word came from does not settle what it means in a sentence written centuries later.

What the Bible says about mother: passages by topic →

Scripture text and translation counts: Berean Standard Bible. Full entry: Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906, public domain), in the digital edition Brown-Driver-Briggs Enhanced by unfoldingWord (Joel Ruark, J. de Joode), based on data by Eliran Wong and Stephen Ku; its additions are used under CC BY 4.0. Strong’s Hebrew Dictionary: Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible Project, CC BY 4.0. Hebrew-to-English verse numbering: original work of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible available at https://github.com/openscriptures/morphhb, CC BY 4.0. We reformatted the data, linked the references to this site’s Bible text and left out words in other scripts that the source holds only as images. These are historical reference works; an entry gives its authors’ view, and a word’s meaning in any verse depends on how it is used there.