What does δούλη (doúlē) mean in the Bible?
δούλη (doúlē) is a Greek word meaning "a female slave (involuntarily or voluntarily)".
Greek · G1399
δούλη
A female slave (involuntarily or voluntarily)
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δούλη G1399
Pronunciation doúlē
What does δούλη (doúlē) mean in the Bible?
δούλη (doúlē) is a Greek word meaning "a female slave (involuntarily or voluntarily)".
Full entry for δούλη (G1399) · Open the biblical lexicon
Questions this entry answers
How does the BSB render G1399?
The BSB source-word alignment has 3 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include servant (2), maidservants (1).
Where does δούλη (doúlē) appear in Scripture?
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Luke 1:38. Its strongest book concentrations include Luke (2), Acts (1).
Source Word Evidence
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders It servant 2× Luke 1:38, Luke 1:48
maidservants 1× Acts 2:18
Show sample aligned rows
Usage map
A compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
First aligned row Luke 1:38
Aligned rows 3
Books represented 2
Luke 2 Acts 1
Source forms
δούλας 1x doulas Acts 2:18
δούλη 1x doulē Luke 1:38
δούλης 1x doulēs Luke 1:48
Parsing patterns
Noun - Accusative Feminine Plural 1x Acts 2:18
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular 1x Luke 1:48
Noun - Nominative Feminine Singular 1x Luke 1:38
Evidence Summary
Greek word. a female slave (involuntarily or voluntarily)
Strong's G1399
Lexical occurrences 3 verses Greek text appearances 3 times Word forms 3 forms 3 references Verse guides 0 guides
Source Gloss
a female slave (involuntarily or voluntarily)
Extended definition
:--handmaid(-en).
Greek Text Appearances
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
3 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
Luke 1:38 Noun Nominative Singular Feminine
δούλη doulh
a female slave, bonds-maid
Read verse Luke 1:48 Noun Genitive Singular Feminine
δούλης doulhv
a female slave, bonds-maid
Read verse Acts 2:18 Noun Accusative Plural Feminine
δούλας doulav
a female slave, bonds-maid
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
Grammatical Forms
How this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
This word appears as a noun across 3 case and number patterns. The form changes show how the word functions in a sentence; they do not change the basic lexical meaning by themselves.
Form patterns 3 Aligned forms 3 Case pattern Accusative (1) Number pattern Singular (2)
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
Nominative · Singular · Feminine Luke 1:38 1×
Genitive · Singular · Feminine Luke 1:48 1×
Accusative · Plural · Feminine Acts 2:18 1×
Selected Scripture Witness
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Witnesses
Luke 1:26–38 δούλη doúlē
Female servant, bondservant
Showing 1 selected witness from 3 lexical occurrence verses.
Word Origins
δούλη is built from this root:
Sources
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain