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BELLY

The front part of the human trunk not enclosed by the ribs, and containing the digestive system and other organs; generally considered synonymous with the abdomen.

Besides being used to denote the general area of the abdomen (Jg 3:21, 22; Pr 13:25), the Hebrew word beʹten is used several times in connection with the formation of a child in its mother’s body. (Ge 25:23, 24; Job 1:21; Ps 127:3; Ec 11:5; Isa 44:2; Ho 9:11) Children are the fruitage of the womb, located in the belly. However, another Hebrew word, reʹchem (or raʹcham), specifically refers to the womb, as can be noted at Job 31:15: “Did not the One making me in the belly make him, and did not just One proceed to prepare us in the womb?”​—See also Ge 49:25; Ps 22:10; Pr 30:16.

The Hebrew beʹten (belly) is also used as an architectural term at 1 Kings 7:20, referring to a protuberance, a rounded projection.

In the Christian Greek Scriptures the word koi·liʹa means a “cavity” and is variously rendered “belly” (1Co 6:13, Int; Php 3:19), “womb” (Lu 1:15, 41), “intestines” (Mt 15:17), and “inmost part” (Joh 7:38), according to the context.

“Belly” is used figuratively to denote fleshly appetite, or desire (Ro 16:18; Php 3:19), and as a source of speech or argument. (Job 15:2; 32:18, 19) When in the fish’s belly, Jonah compared the inside of the fish to Sheol when he said, “Out of the belly of Sheol I cried for help,” because he was as good as dead unless Jehovah would deliver him miraculously.​—Jon 2:2; see INTESTINES; WOMB.