Word study
Queen
6 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: queen, queens. 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 “Queen” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- מַלְכָּה malkâhqueentranslated this way 35 times of its 35 uses · Strong’s H4436Noun · Translated: Queen 32, queens 2, queen's 1Full study and all 34 verses →
1 Kings 10:1 Now when the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the LORD, she came to test him with difficult questions.
2 Chronicles 9:1 Now when the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of Solomon, she came to test him with difficult questions. She arrived in Jerusalem with a very large caravan— with camels bearing spices, gold in abundance, and precious stones. And she came to Solomon and spoke with him about all that was on her mind.
- מְלֶכֶת melekethqueentranslated this way 5 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s H4446Noun · Translated: Queen 5Full study and all 5 verses →
Jeremiah 7:18 The sons gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven; they pour out drink offerings to other gods to provoke Me to anger.
Jeremiah 44:17 Instead, we will do everything we vowed to do: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and offer drink offerings to her, just as we, our fathers, our kings, and our officials did in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. At that time we had plenty of food and good things, and we saw no disaster.
- גְּבִירָה gebîrâhlady, queentranslated this way 4 times of its 6 uses · Strong’s H1377Noun · Translated: queen mother 3, from 2, Queen 1Full study and all 6 verses →
1 Kings 11:19 There Hadad found such great favor in the sight of Pharaoh that he gave to him in marriage the sister of Queen Tahpenes, his own wife.
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.”
- שֵׁגָל shêgâlconsorttranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H7694Noun · Translated: queen 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Nehemiah 2:6 Then the king, with the queen seated beside him, asked me, “How long will your journey take, and when will you return?” So it pleased the king to send me, and I set a time.
Psalm 45:9 The daughters of kings are among your honored women; the queen stands at your right hand, adorned with the gold of Ophir.
- מָלַךְ mâlakbe or become king, or queen, reigntranslated this way 2 times of its 340 uses · Strong’s H4427Verb · Translated: reigned 132, became king 68, reign 36, king 32Full study and all 283 verses →
- גְּבֶרֶת geberethmistresstranslated this way 2 times of its 9 uses · Strong’s H1404Noun · Translated: mistress 7, queen 2Full study and all 9 verses →
Isaiah 47:5 “Sit in silence and go into darkness, O Daughter of the Chaldeans. For you will no longer be called the queen of kingdoms.
Isaiah 47:7 You said, ‘I will be queen forever.’ You did not take these things to heart or consider their outcome.
Greek words (New Testament)
- βασίλισσα basílissaa queentranslated this way 4 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s G938Noun · Translated: Queen 4Full study and all 4 verses →
Matthew 12:42 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and now One greater than Solomon is here.
Luke 11:31 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them; for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and now One greater than Solomon is here.
How to study a word well
- 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.
- 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.
- Look at how it is translated. A word rendered five different ways has a wider meaning than any one English word can carry.
- 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.
- See what it keeps company with. The words that appear beside it again and again show how the Bible itself connects ideas.
- Then read the dictionaries. They give the considered view of scholars, with their evidence.
- 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 Queen: 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.