Queen
Queen
()
The only person bearing this title that meets us in the apostolic writings is Candace, queen of the Ethiopians (Act 8:27). This people appear frequently to have had female sovereigns, and the name Candace seems to have been handed on from one to another, as we meet with several queens of this name in their early history. The only other passage in which the title occurs is Rev 18:7, where Babylon is represented as sitting as a queen, priding herself upon her power and immunity from sorrow (cf. Isa 47:7).
G. Wauchope Stewart.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
Queen
The Hebrews had no word properly answmering to our term queen in the sense of a female sovereign, neither had they the dignity which that word denotes. Of the three Hebrew terms used as the equivalents of queen in the A. V. ( ), the first (malkah) alone is applied to a queen reygnant; the first and second (shegal) equally to a queen consort; without, however, implying the dignity which in European nations attaches to that position; and the third (gebirah) to the queen mother, to whom that dignity is transferred in Oriental courts. The etymological force of the words accords with their application. Malkah is the feminine of mlek, king; it is applied in its first sense to the queen of Sheba (1Ki 10:1), and in its second to the chief wife, as distinguished from all other females in a royal harem (Est 1:9 sq.; Est 7:1 sq.; Son 6:8): the term princesses is similarly used in 1Ki 11:3. Shegal simply means wife, i.e. of the first rank, as distinguished from mere concubines; it is applied to Solomon’s bride or perhaps mother (Psa 45:9), and to the wives of the first rank in the harems of the Chaldee and Persian monarchs (Dan 5:2-3; Neh 2:6). Gebirdh, on the other hand, is expressive of authority; it means powerful or mistress, being the feminine of , gebir, master, or lord. The feminine is to be understood by its relation to the masculine, which is not applied to kingly power or to kings, but to general authority and dominion.
It is, in fact, the word which occurs twice with reference to Isaac’s blessing of Jacob: Be lord over thy brethren; and I have made him thy load (Gen 27:29; Gen 27:37). It would therefore be applied to the female who exercised the highest authority, and this, in an Oriental household, is not the wife, but the mother, of the master. Strange as such an arrangement at first sight appears, it is one of the inevitable results of polygamy: the number of the wives, their social position previous to marriage, and the precariousness of their hold on the affections of their lord combine to annihilate their influence, which is transferred to the mother, as being the only female who occupies a fixed and dignified position. Hence the application of the term gebirah to the queen mother, the extent of whose influence is well illustrated by the narrative of the interview of Solomon and Bathsheba, as given in 1Ki 2:19 sq. The term is applied to Maachah, Asa’s mother, who was deposed from her dignity in consequence of her idolatry (1Ki 15:13; 2Ch 15:16); to Jezebel as contrasted with Joram (2Ki 10:13, the children of the king and the children of the queen); and to the mother of Jehoiachin or Jeconiah (Jer 13:18; comp. 2Ki 24:12; Jer 29:2). In 1Ki 11:19, the text perhaps requires emendation, the reading followed in the Sept., the elder, according better ith the context. The limited use which is made even of the restricted term gebiraih is somewhat remarkable. It is only employed twice with reference to the wife of a king: in one of these two cases it is applied to the wife of the king of Egypt, where the condition of the royal consort was more queenly than in Palestine (1Ki 11:19; comp. Willkinson, Anc. Egypt. ii, 59; iii, 64; v, 28); and in the other to Jezebel, the wife of Ahab, who, as the daughter of a powerful king, appears to have enjoyed peculiar privileges in her matrimonial state (2Ki 10:13). In two other places it is not clear whether the king’s wife or mother is intended (Jer 13:18; Jer 29:2); and in the remaining passages it is pointedly referred to the king’s mother in such terms as clearly show that the state which she held was one of positive dignity and rank (1Ki 15:13; 2Ch 15:16). SEE WIFE.
The result of all inquiry into the subject seems to show that among the Jewish kings the usages bearing on this point were not different from those which are still exhibited in Western Asiatic courts. Where woman never becomes the head of the State, there can be no queen regnant; and where polygamy is allowed or practiced, there can be no queen consort. There will, however, be a chief wife in the harem; and this is no doubt the rank indicated in the Bible bv the words which we render queen. This rank may be variously acquired. The first wife of the king, or the first whom he took after his accession, usually obtained it; and if she is both of high birth and becomes the mother of the first son, her position is tolerably secure; but if she possesses neither of these advantages, she may be superseded in her position as head of the harem by a wife of higher birth and connections subsequently espoused, or by one who becomes the mother of the heir apparent.
The king, however, will sometimes act according to his own pleasure in this matter, promote any favorite lady to this dignity, and also remove her from it at his pleasure; but more generally he finds it convenient to follow the established routine. The daughter of the king of Egypt was, doubtless, from her high rank, the chief wife of Solomon; as was Jezebel, for the same reason, the chief wife of Ahab. In like manner the high-born mother of Absalom was probably the chief wife of David, although it is possible that the mother of the eldest son, Amnon, at first enjoyed that distinction, which, we may safely presume, eventually devolved on Bathsheba, after her son Solomon had been recognised as the heir. In one of Mr. Morier’s amusing books (Hajii Baba in England) there is a passage which strikingly illustrates this matter. The court of Persia is there represented as being perplexed how to answer a letter which, in ignorance of Eastern customs, had been addressed by the queen consort of England to the queen of Persia. The cause of the dilemma thus created was that Although the shah’s principal wife is called the banou harem, or head of the seraglio, yet her situation in the State bears as little affinity to that of the queen of England as one may say the she buffalo kept in the enclosure for food and milk has to the cow fed and worshipped by the Hindu as his god. Our shah can kill and create banous at pleasure, whereas the queen of England maintains her post till the hand of fate lays her in the grave (comp. Chardin, Voyages [ed. Langles], vol. 6 ch. xii; Thornton’s Turkey, ii, 264-286).
Very different was, and is to this day, in Western Asia, the position of the king’s mother, whose state is much the nearest to that of a European queen of any with which the East is acquainted. It is founded on that essential principle of Oriental manners whichl in all cases considers the mother of the husband as a far superior person to his wife, and as entitled to more re. spect and attention. This principle should be clearly understood; for it extends throughout the Bible, and is yet entirely different from our own social arrangementsi under which the mother, as soon as she becomes widowed, abandons her place as head of the familv to the daughter-in-law. Mr. Urquhart has admirably illustrated and developed this principle in his Spirit of the East (ii, 387 sq.); and his remarks, although primarily illustrative of Turkish manners, are, with some unessential limitations, applicable to the ancient and modern East. In p. 389 there is an anecdote of the late Ibrahim Pasha, who is represented as staying a whole week in the harem of his mother, waiting to find a favorable opportunity of pressing a request upon her; and when admitted, kissing her feet, refusing to be seated, and standing an hour and a half before her with his arms crossed, without, after all, succeeding in the suit which he the conqueror of Syria and the victor of Konieh preferred to an aged woman.
The arrangement in the seraglios of the more magnificent Hebrew monarchs was probably similar to that of Turkey, with this difference, that the chief women in the harems of the Jewish sovereigns entered it as wives, and not as slaves. The grand signior, from an indeterminate number of female slaves, selects his favorites, who are distinguished by the title of cadun, which, as it means lady of the house, seems nearly equivalent to the Hebrew gebirah. The number of these is said to be limited to seven, and their rank seems to correspond to that of the wives of the Hebrew seraglio, whose number was unlimited. The mother of a boy is called hasseky, unless the boy die, in which case she descends to her former rank. The caduns, or wives, of a deceased or deposed sultan are all removed from the imperial harem to a separate palace, with the single exception of the valide sultan, the mother of the reigning sultan, who has her liberty, a palace, and revenues to support a suitable establishment. But the hassekies, or those who have a son living, are treated with marked respect, as in the natural course of events they may become valide. The title of sultan (for the Turkish has no distinction of gender), though from courtesy it may be given to the hassekies, is, strictly speaking, appropriate only to the sovereign’s mother, and to the sons and daughters of the imperial family (Thornton, 2, 276; Urquhart, 2, 433).
This statement, especially the last point of it, strikingly illustrates the view we have taken as to the more queenly position of the king’s mother than of his wife in the Jewish and other Asiatic courts. It must be clearly understood that this position is by no means peculiar to the modern East, or to the Jews among the ancient Orientals. Heeren, indeed, thinks that the power of the queen mother was even more considerable among the ancient Persians than among the modern Turks (Hist. Researches, i, 400); and the narratives of Herodotus and Ctesias respecting the tyrannical influence exercised by Parysatis, Amestris, and others bear ample testimony to this fact. The careful reader of Scripture will easily be able to trace the same ideas respecting the position of the king’s mother among the Israelites. In how marked a manner does the mother of Solomon come forward at the end of her husband’s and the beginning of her son’s reign! She takes an active part in securisng her son’s succession; it is in the conviction of her commanding influence that Adonijah engages her to promote his suit, alleging he will not say thee nay; and then, when Bathsheba appears before her son, the monarch rises from his place, advances to meet her, bows himself before her, and seats her on the right hand of his throne (1Ki 1:2). That the king’s mother possessed high dignity is further evinced by the fact that Asa found it necessary to remove his mother, Maachah, from being queen, on account of her abuse of the power which that character conferred (1Ki 15:13). Jezebel was, as already stated, very powerful in the lifetime of her husband; but it is only under her son that she is called the queen (gebiraih); and the whole history of his reign evinces the important part lwhich she took in public affairs (2Ki 9:22; 2Ki 9:30; 2Ki 9:37; 2Ki 10:13). Still more marked was the influence which ler daughter Athaliah exercised in Judah during the reign of her son Ahaziah, which was, indeed, such as enabled her at his death to set the crown on her own head, and to present the anomaly in Jewish history of a regnant queen (2 Kings 11). SEE WOMAN.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Queen
No explicit mention of queens is made till we read of the “queen of Sheba.” The wives of the kings of Israel are not so designated. In Ps. 45:9, the Hebrew for “queen” is not _malkah_, one actually ruling like the Queen of Sheba, but _shegal_, which simply means the king’s wife. In 1 Kings 11:19, Pharaoh’s wife is called “the queen,” but the Hebrew word so rendered (g’birah) is simply a title of honour, denoting a royal lady, used sometimes for “queen-mother” (1 Kings 15:13; 2 Chron. 15:16). In Cant. 6:8, 9, the king’s wives are styled “queens” (Heb. melakhoth).
In the New Testament we read of the “queen of the south”, i.e., Southern Arabia, Sheba (Matt. 12:42; Luke 11:31) and the “queen of the Ethiopians” (Acts 8:27), Candace.
Fuente: Easton’s Bible Dictionary
Queen
malkah “queen regnant” (1Ki 10:1; Dan 5:10; Est 1:9); sheegal “the queen consort” (Psa 45:9; Dan 5:2-3); gebirah “powerful mistress,” “the queen mother.” Polygamy, lessened the influence of the kings wives, whose hold on his affections was shared by others and was at best precarious; but the queen mother enjoyed a fixed position of dignity. So Bathsheba (1Ki 2:19, etc.); Maachah (1Ki 15:13); 2Ki 10:13, Jezebel; Jehoiachin’s mother (2Ki 24:12; Jer 13:18; Jer 29:2).
Fuente: Fausset’s Bible Dictionary
Queen
QUEEN ().A title occurring only once in the Gospels (Mat 12:42, Luk 11:31), in our Lords reference to the queen of Sheba as the queen of the south. The visit of the queen of Sheba to king Solomon is related in 1Ki 10:1-13 and in 2Ch 9:1-9, and the chief object of her journey was to satisfy herself as to his great wisdom, the report of which had reached her, although she was also attracted by the accounts which had been brought to her of his riches and magnificence. It is to the former of these two purposes of her visit that our Lord refers. The Pharisees had demanded of Him a special sign, and He replied that no such sign should be given them, but that they should have a sign in Himself and in His burial and resurrection, as the Ninevites had had in Jonah. But the Ninevites, He added, would in the judgment condemn the men of that generation; for they had repented at the preaching of Jonah, who was a sign to them, while the men of that generation, He implied, would not repent at the preaching of one greater than Jonah. Then, referring to the celebrated queen, He added: The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it; for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here.
The connexion between the case of the Ninevites and that of the queen of Sheba does not lie on the surface. Some have supposed that our Lord refers to a woman as the correlative to the men of Nineveh previously spoken of. Others think that, having spoken of the Ninevites to whom without any seeking of theirs a preaching of repentance was brought, He refers, to complete the warning, to one who was herself a spontaneous seeker of wisdom. Without setting aside these suggestions, it is more to the point to observe that our Lord brings into juxtaposition the two characteristicsso strongly emphasized in the case of Jew and Gentileof the desire for a sign, and the seeking after wisdom; and it has been suggested that St. Paul may well have had this whole incident in mind when he wrote 1Co 1:18-27 (see esp. 1Co 1:22). We may also notice how our Lord in effect boldly claims to be what St. Paul says that He is, the wisdom of God. Solomon was wiser than all men (1Ki 4:31), and later Jewish literature delighted to magnify his wisdom (cf. Wis 7:17-21). For our Lord, then, to claim before a Jewish audience to be something more than Solomon, was to claim to be Wisdom itself. We may also remark how here again, as in the discourse at Nazareth, our Lord chooses His examples from among Gentiles (cf. also Mat 8:11-12; Mat 10:15; Mat 11:22-24).
Abyssinian legend has many strange tales of the queen of Sheba, declaring that she came from Ethiopia, that her name was Maqueda, and that she had a son by Solomon. (For many curious details, see Ludolf, Hist. Aethiop. ii. 3; Vit sanctorum indigenarum, ed. K. Conti Rossini; Legend of the Queen of Sheba, ed. E. Littmann; also Josephus Ant. viii. vi. 5). All this, however, probably rests on a confusion between Seba () and Sheba (), cf. Psa 72:10. Our Lords phrase, the queen of the south, falls in with the most widely accepted opinion, i.e. that Sheba was in South Arabia; her land was accordingly more than a thousand miles from Jerusalem, a fact which justifies our Lords words, (cf. Jer 6:20).
Albert Bonus.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Queen
QUEEN.The functions of a queen reigning in her own right would be identical with those of a king (wh. see). The queen as the wife of a monarch in Israel held a position of comparatively little importance, whereas that of a dowager-queen (queen-mother) commanded great influence (cf. the cases of Bathsheba, Jezebel, Athaliah).
Fuente: Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible
Queen
kwen: The Bible applies this term: (1) To the wife of a king (queen consort) (, malkah). In the Book of Esther it is the title given to Vashti (Est 1:9) and Esther (Est 2:22); compare Son 6:8 f. Another Hebrew word for queen consort is , gebhrah, literally mistress (compare 1Ki 11:19, the wife of Pharaoh; 2Ki 10:13, the children of the king and the children of the queen). In Neh 2:6 and Psa 45:9 we find the expression , sheghal, which some trace back to , shaghal, to ravish, a rather doubtful derivation. Still another term is , sarah, literally, princess (Isa 49:23). The Septuagint sometimes uses the word , baslissa; compare Psa 45:9. (2) To a female ruler or sovereign (queen regnant). The only instances are those of the queen (malkah) of Sheba (1Ki 10:1-13; compare 2Ch 9:1-12) and of Candace, the queen (basilissa) of the Ethiopians (Act 8:27). In Mat 12:42 (compare Luk 11:31) Christ refers to the queen of the south ( , baslissa notou), meaning, of course, the queen of Sheba. (3) To a heathen deity, , melekheth ha-shamayim, the queen of heaven (Jer 7:18; Jer 44:17 ff). See QUEEN OF HEAVEN.
(4) Metaphorically, to the city of Babylon (Rome) (Rev 18:7): an expression denoting sovereign contempt and imaginary dignity and power.
Fuente: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Queen
The Hebrews had no word properly answering to our term ‘queen,’ which is the feminine of ‘king;’ neither had they the dignity which that word denotes. Among them there was neither a ‘queen regnant’ nor a ‘queen consort.’ The Jewish kings however had, like other eastern monarchs, a chief wife in their harem, and this is no doubt the rank indicated in the Bible by the words which we render ‘queen.’
Very different was, and is to this day, in Western Asia, the position of the king’s mother, whose state is much the nearest to that of an European queen of any with which the East is acquainted. It is founded on that essential principle of Oriental manners which in all cases considers the mother of the husband as a far superior person to his wife, and as entitled to more respect and attention. This principle should be clearly understood, for it extends throughout the Bible, and is yet entirely different from our own social arrangements, under which the mother, as soon as she becomes widowed, abandons her place as head of the family to the daughter-in-law. Examples of the great influence possessed by the king’s mother, occur frequently in Scripture.
In how marked a manner does the mother of Solomon come forward at the end of her husband’s and the beginning of her son’s reign! She takes an active part in securing her son’s succession; it is in the conviction of her commanding influence that Adonijah engages her to promote his suit, alleging ‘he will not say thee nay;’ and then, when Bathsheba appears before her son, the monarch rises from his place, advances to meet her, bows himself before her, and seats her on the right hand of his throne (1 Kings 1-2). That the king’s mother possessed high dignity is further evinced by the fact that Asa found it necessary to remove his mother Maachah ‘from being queen,’ on account of her abuse of the power which that character conferred (1Ki 15:13). Jezebel was, as already stated, very powerful in the lifetime of her husband; but it is only under her son that she is called ‘the queen;’ and the whole history of his reign evinces the important part which she took in public affairs (2Ki 9:22; 2Ki 9:30; 2Ki 9:37; 2Ki 10:13). Still more marked was the influence which her daughter Athaliah exercised in Judah during the reign of her son Ahaziah, which was indeed such as enabled her at his death to set the crown on her own head, and to present the anomaly in Jewish history of a regnant queen (2 Kings 11).
Fuente: Popular Cyclopedia Biblical Literature
Queen
This is applied, as now, to one reigning in her own right, as the queen of Sheba, 2Ch 9:1-12; and Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, Act 8:27. The title was also given to the consort of a reigning sovereign, as queen Esther; and to the queen-mother, who often had great influence at court, as Bathsheba, Jezebel, etc.
Fuente: Concise Bible Dictionary
Queen
The wife of a king
1Ki 11:19
Crowned
Est 1:11; Est 2:17
Divorced
Est 1:10-22
Sits on the throne with the king
Neh 2:6
Makes feasts for the women of the royal household
Est 1:9
Exerts an evil influence in public affairs
Jezebel
Counsels the king
Dan 5:10-12
Of Sheba, visits Solomon
1Ki 10:1-13
Candace, of Ethiopia
Act 8:27
The reigning sovereign, Athaliah
Athaliah
The moon called queen of heaven
Jer 7:18; Jer 44:7-19; Jer 44:25
Worshiped
Idolatry
Fuente: Nave’s Topical Bible
Queen
Queen. This title in the A. V. represents three Hebrew words. It is applied to a ruling queen, as the queen of Sheba, 1Ki 10:1; and to Athaliah, 2Ki 11:1-21; to the wives of the king, Est 1:9; Est 7:1; and to the queen-mother, as Bathsheba, Maachah, 1Ki 2:19; 1Ki 15:13; and to Jezebel, 2Ki 10:13.
Fuente: People’s Dictionary of the Bible
Queen
Queen of heaven, Jer 7:18; Jer 44:17-19; Jer 44:25, is the moon, worshipped as Ashtaroth or Astarte, to whom the Hebrew women offered cakes in the streets of Jerusalem.
Fuente: People’s Dictionary of the Bible
Queen
Queen. This title is properly applied to the queen-mother, since in an Oriental household, it is not the wife, but the mother of the master, who exercises the highest authority. Strange as such an arrangement at sight appears, it is one of the inevitable results of polygamy. An illustration of the queen-mother’s influence is given in 1Ki 2:19; ff. The term is applied to Maachah, 1Ki 15:13; 2Ch 16:16, and to Jezetiel, 2Ki 10:13, and to the mother of Jehoiachin or Jeconiah, Jer 13:18, compare 2Ki 24:12; Jer 29:2.
Fuente: Smith’s Bible Dictionary
Queen
the feminine of basileus, “a king,” is used (a) of the “Queen of Sheba,” Mat 12:42; Luk 11:31; of “Candace,” Act 8:27; (b) metaphorically, of “Babylon,” Rev 18:7.
Fuente: Vine’s Dictionary of New Testament Words
Queen
Psa 45:9 (b) This is one of the names applied to the church. She will one day be married to the Bridegroom and will stand at His right hand as His bride forever. She is called a queen because she is married to the King of kings.
Rev 18:7 (b) This word describes the pride of Babylon (the great false religions of Christendom) in which she takes the place of being the bride of the King of kings, whereas in reality she is really a harlot, and is so named by our Lord.