Bible word study

Meeh (Strong’s H4578): Meaning in the Bible

Meeh (מֵעֶה) is the Hebrew word numbered H4578 in Strong’s concordance of the Bible. Strong’s defines it as used only in plural the intestines, or (collectively) the abdomen, figuratively, sympathy; by implication, a vest; by extension the stomach, the uterus (or of men, the seat of generation), the heart (figuratively). In the King James Bible it is translated belly, bowels, womb..

• Original wordמֵעֶה
• Transliterationmêʻeh
• Pronunciationmay-aw'
• Part of speechnoun (masculine) (n-m)
• Strong’s numberH4578
• LanguageHebrew

The full Strong’s definition

Derivation. from an unused root probably meaning to be soft;

How the King James Bible translates it

Where Meeh appears in the Bible

In the King James Bible’s text tagged with Strong’s numbers, Meeh (H4578) stands behind 32 English renderings in 30 verses across 13 of the 66 books. It is most frequent in 2 Chronicles (5), Isaiah (4), 2 Samuel (3).

How the King James Bible renders Meeh, by count

• bowels27 of 32 (84 percent)
• belly3 of 32 (9 percent)
• heart1 of 32 (3 percent)
• womb1 of 32 (3 percent)

Three places to read Meeh

• Genesis 15:4 And, behold, the word of the LORD came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir.
• 2 Chronicles 32:21 And the LORD sent an angel, which cut off all the mighty men of valour, and the leaders and captains in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned with shame of face to his own land. And when he was come into the house of his god, they that came forth of his own bowels slew him there with the sword.
• Isaiah 49:1 Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name.

Counts are made at build time from the King James text tagged with Strong’s numbers (eBible.org, public domain). Verses are read from the stored King James text, never typed.

Why the word matters

Every word the biblical writers chose carries weight. Studying Meeh in the original Hebrew lets you read the passages where it appears more carefully, closer to what the first hearers understood, so the meaning is drawn from the text itself rather than from the English alone.

The lexical data on this page comes from the public-domain Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890), a Hebrew and Greek dictionary keyed to the King James Bible. It is a reference tool, not a settled verdict: no single word decides a doctrine, and meaning is finally shaped by how a word is used in its sentences. Read the passages themselves, prayerfully, and in full.

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