You remember the story – two women stood before the king. They lived together in one house and had each given birth a few days apart. They had with them one of the little newborns because the other baby had died – and they were each claiming to be the living baby’s real mother! King Solomon called to have a sword brought before him. And when that was done he said, “Now cut the baby in half, and give half to one woman and half to the other.”
As in other places, the King James Bible uses some interesting terminology to describe what happened next. It says about the true mother of the child, that “her bowels yearned upon her son, and she said, O my lord, give her the living child and in no wise slay it!” (1 Kings 3:26)
As you can imagine, some strong emotion welled up within the true mother when she saw the sword and heard the words of the king! Gut-level emotion made it clear who the real mother was, and so King Solomon commanded that the baby be given to her.
The Hebrew of 1 Kings 3:26 uses the word “rechem” which means “bowels”, while also used to convey intense affection and compassion. And New Testament Greek preserves this usage of “intestinal” language with the word “splanchna” – in famous phrases such as “bowels of mercies” (Colossians 3:12) or “bowels and mercies” (Philippians 2:1). More recent translations of the Bible have not retained the intestinal meaning of the words, translating them incompletely as metaphors for “affection” or “compassion”. In the modern era, who would have thought that emotional affection could flow from the gut anyway?!
Yet, biomedical science is now realizing that there is an important gut-brain connection. The gut and brain are in communication – via hormones, neurotransmitters, other nerve action and immune system effects.
What we see revealed here from the original languages is another depth of truth contained in the Scripture – where science is finally catching up. When the original Greek or Hebrew says “bowels” or “belly”, we lose some truth if we think about only the metaphorical meaning. The Bible holds scientific clues throughout. Something goes on in the inner cavity of our bodies that is more than what we have been able to rationally understand in all eras, including the modern one.
– Mark Cadwallader, Creation Moments Board Chairman
Painting: Judgment of Solomon, artist unknown. (CC BY-SA 3.0) 116
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