Handmaid
Handmaid
servant (Gen. 16:1; Ruth 3:9; Luke 1:48). It is probable that Hagar was Sarah’s personal attendant while she was in the house of Pharaoh, and was among those maid-servants whom Abram had brought from Egypt.
Fuente: Easton’s Bible Dictionary
Handmaid
HANDMAID.Handmaid (Luk 1:38; handmaiden, v. 48; in the American Standard Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 handmaid in both passages) answers to the Gr. , which means literally, as the (Revised Version margin) shows, slave. In the LXX Septuagint rendering of Hannahs vow (1Sa 1:11), which is clearly echoed, almost cited, in Lk., represents the Hebrew mh, which, with the Aramaic equivalent amta and the Bab. [Note: Babylonian.] amtu, seems to have been a common Semitic designation of a female slave in Canaan and the neighbouring countries. It was sometimes used in courteous self-depreciation (1Ki 1:17, 1Sa 25:24 f., 1Sa 25:28; 1Sa 25:31; 1Sa 25:41; the letter of an Assyrian lady in Johns Babylonian and Assyrian Laws, Contracts, and Letters, p. 378), and then was naturally applied to relation to God (the above-mentioned vow, also Psa 86:16; Psa 116:16). In the Aram, text, which probably underlay the Song of the Virgin, handmaiden would be amta with suffix (Pal. [Note: Palestine, Palestinian.] Lect. of Gospels, 1899, p. 234). The use of the word in the Gospels illustrates the Oriental habit of describing man as the slave of God, of which there are so many examples in the OT (Psa 19:11; Psa 19:13, Neh 1:6; Neh 1:11 etc.), in the so-called Babylonian Penitential Psalms, in ancient Semitic namesObadiah found both in the Bible and on an ancient seal, Abdeel (Jer 36:26), Abdiel (1Ch 5:15), Abednego (Dan 1:7), Abd Ninip (Tell el-Amarna Letters, No. 53, Winckler), Abd Ashtoreth (KAT [Note: AT Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Test.] [ZW] 129); and in names current in the Holy Land at the present time, such as Abdallah (for many examples from southern and central Palestine cf. PEFSt [Note: EFSt Quarterly Statement of the same.] , 1904, p. 155, and 1905, p. 48f.). These illustrations, however, refer mainly if not entirely to men. In connexion with a list of personal names collected from various Moslem villages in the south of Palestine (PEFSt [Note: EFSt Quarterly Statement of the same.] , 1904, p. 155), it is remarked that female names of the type of Abdallah have not been found. Still it must always have been easy for an Oriental woman to call herself the handmaid of Deity. The transition from the courteous to the religious use would be readily effected.
W. Taylor Smith.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Handmaid
handmad: Which appears often in the Old Testament, but seldom in the New Testament, like bondmaid, is used to translate two Hebrew words (, shiphhah, and , ‘amah) both of which normally mean a female slave. It is used to translate the former word in the ordinary sense of female slave in Gen 16:1; Gen 25:12; Gen 29:24, Gen 29:29; Pro 30:23; Jer 34:11, Jer 34:16; Joe 2:29; to translate the latter word in Exo 23:12; Jdg 19:19; 2Sa 6:20. It is used as a term of humility and respectful self-depreciation in the presence of great men, prophets and kings, to translate the former word in Rth 2:13; 1Sa 1:18; 1Sa 28:21; 2Sa 14:6; 2Ki 4:2, 2Ki 4:16; it translates the latter word in the same sense in Rth 3:9; 1Sa 1:16; 1Sa 25:24, 1Sa 25:28, 1Sa 25:31, 1Sa 25:41; 2Sa 20:17; 1Ki 1:13, 1Ki 1:17; 1Ki 3:20. It is also used to express a sense of religious humility in translating the latter word only, and appears in this sense in but three passages, 1Sa 1:11; Psa 86:16; Psa 116:16.
In the New Testament it occurs 3 t, in a religious sense, as the translation of , doule, a female slave (Luk 1:38, Luk 1:48; Act 2:18), and twice (Gal 4:22, Gal 4:23) as the translation of , paidske, the King James Version bondmaid.