hUSTERA and hUSTEREW

JKandJWilk at aol.com JKandJWilk at aol.com
Tue Feb 20 08:26:47 EST 2001


As a physician, my first exposure to ancient greek was through medical words; 
specifically the greek hUSTERA, meaning womb/uterus as in hysterectomy and 
hysteria (a mental condition originally thought to be limited to women and 
caused by the womb wandering through the abdomen).  When I began to learn 
biblical greek, I was struck by the similarity of forms of hUSTEREW, meaning 
to lack something (cf. John 2.3 KAI hUSTERHSANTOS OINOU, LEGEI hH MHTHR TOU 
IHSOU...)  and hUSTERHMA, meaning poverty (used to describe the state of the 
widow in Luke 21:4, ...hAUTH DE EK TOU hUSTERHMATOS AUTHS PANTA TON BION hON 
EICEN EBALEN).  Does anyone know if somehow the words for uterus and for 
poverty/lacking share some distant derivative?  If so, what is the connection 
between them and how did a uterus become associated with poverty? 

James S. Wilk, MD [New list-members please note: a full signature
is required by list protocol to be appended to messages to the list.]
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