Bible Strands
Mark 13:17
How miserable those days will be for pregnant and nursing mothers!
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Jesus addresses his disciples on the Mount of Olives, warning them of imminent tribulation as they prepare to flee Jerusalem.
The words — The text uses οὐαὶ (ouai) meaning "woe" and ἐχούσαις (echousais) meaning "having" to describe those with a γαστρὶ (gastri) or "womb."
The thread — This warning echoes the siege horrors of Lamentations 4:10 and contrasts with Jesus’ later statement in Luke 23:29 that barren women will be called blessed during those same days.
Why it lands — The text states that pregnancy and nursing will become a severe liability during the coming crisis, asking readers to recognize the concrete physical dangers of the predicted events.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
But woe to them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!
Cross-references
- Lamentations 4:10 The hands of compassionate women have cooked their own children, who became their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
- Luke 23:29 Look, the days are coming when people will say, ‘Blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore, and breasts that never nursed!’
- Deuteronomy 28:56 The most gentle and refined woman among you, so gentle and refined she would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground, will begrudge the husband she embraces and her son and daughter
- Lamentations 2:19 Arise, cry out in the night from the first watch of the night. Pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to Him for the lives of your children who are fainting from hunger on the corner of every street.
- Lamentations 4:3 Even jackals offer their breasts to nurse their young, but the daughter of my people has become cruel, like an ostrich in the wilderness.
- Hosea 9:14 Give them, O LORD—what will You give? Give them wombs that miscarry and breasts that dry up!
- Hosea 13:16 Samaria will bear her guilt because she has rebelled against her God. They will fall by the sword; their little ones will be dashed to pieces, and their pregnant women ripped open.
- Matthew 24:19 How miserable those days will be for pregnant and nursing mothers!
- Luke 21:23 How miserable those days will be for pregnant and nursing mothers! For there will be great distress upon the land and wrath against this people.