בֶּ֫טֶן

From the study of Isaiah 49:1

Range of meaning

Beten: belly, abdomen, womb. Meʿeh (mostly plural, meʿim): inward parts, entrails, belly, womb, and figuratively the seat of deep feeling ('my insides are churning', Isa 16:11; 63:15).

Against the English

KJV/YLT 'bowels' now makes a modern reader think of the intestines. In 1611 'bowels' meant the inner parts generally, including the womb and the emotions. BSB 'body' and WEB 'inside' avoid the problem, though they lose some of the inward, physical warmth.

How it drifted

English 'bowels' has narrowed to its medical meaning since the 17th century.

Used elsewhere in the period

Gen 25:23 ('two peoples from your meʿim'); Ruth 1:11; Ps 22:10 ('from my mother's beten'); Ps 71:6 (both words together); Jer 1:5 ('before I formed you in the beten'); Isa 44:2, 24; 46:3 (YHWH forming and carrying Israel 'from the womb').

From the study of Psalm 31:9

Range of meaning

Belly, abdomen, womb (Genesis 25:23), the inner parts generally, and figuratively the inmost self or seat of feeling (Proverbs 18:8; 20:27; Job 32:18–19; Habakkuk 3:16, 'my belly trembled').

Against the English

KJV's 'belly' is literal. BSB, WEB, ESV and NASB generalize it to 'body,' which loses the specific location: in Hebrew, deep emotion lives in the gut.

Used elsewhere in the period

Habakkuk 3:16, 'I heard, and my belly trembled.' Job 32:19, 'my belly is like wine with no vent.' The Septuagint renders it gastēr, 'stomach.'

From the study of Isaiah 49:15

Range of meaning

Belly, the inner body; specifically the womb. 'Son of the womb' or 'fruit of the womb' means one's own child by birth.

Against the English

Translations keep 'son of her womb' (KJV, BSB, ESV, WEB) or paraphrase it ('the child she has borne', NIV/NLT). The paraphrase is clear, but it loses the physical picture.

Used elsewhere in the period

Second Isaiah repeatedly describes God as having formed and carried Israel 'from the womb' (mibbeten): 44:2, 44:24, and especially 46:3, 'who have been borne by me from the womb (beten), carried from the womb (reḥem).' There God takes the role of the one who bore Israel.