A girl (from infancy to adolescence)
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The Hebrew noun naʿărāh refers to a girl or young woman and can also identify a female attendant or servant. It is a social-stage and relationship term, not a precise age formula and not a statement of sexual history.
Reader summary
Full entry for נַעֲרָה (H5291) · Open the biblical lexicon
The Hebrew noun naʿărāh refers to a girl or young woman and can also identify a female attendant or servant. It is a social-stage and relationship term, not a precise age formula and not a statement of sexual history.
The BSB source-word alignment has 63 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include The girl (5), . . . (3), the young woman (3), young (3), but the girl’s (2).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 24:14. Its strongest book concentrations include Deuteronomy (14), Esther (13), Genesis (9), Judges (7).
The Hebrew noun naʿărāh refers to a girl or young woman and can also identify a female attendant or servant. It is a social-stage and relationship term, not a precise age formula and not a statement of sexual history. Scripture uses it for Rebekah at the well, Ruth among Boaz’s workers, Esther and the women gathered into a royal harem, a captured Israelite girl serving Naaman’s household, and young women whose safety or sexual vulnerability is directly at issue.
The contexts range from ordinary labor and family consultation to war capture, royal power, assault law, and household service. Faithful teaching must therefore ask who has agency, who holds power, whose words are heard, and what danger is present. The word never makes beauty, marriageability, virginity, obedience to an adult, or usefulness the measure of a girl’s God-given worth.
Narrative, law, wisdom, and court settings use naʿărāh for girls, young women, and attendants whose work, speech, family ties, vulnerability, and courage remain visible within unequal social worlds.
At this time the Arameans had gone out in bands and had taken a young girl from the land of Israel, and she was serving Naaman’s wife.
The young Israelite girl has been taken captive and placed in service, yet the narrative preserves her identity, knowledge, and consequential speech.
But if the man encounters a betrothed woman in the open country, and he overpowers her and lies with her, only the man who has done this must die.
The law identifies the man as the responsible actor when he overpowers the betrothed young woman in the open country.
Do nothing to the young woman, because she has committed no sin worthy of death. This case is just like one in which a man attacks his neighbor and murders him.
The next verse explicitly assigns the young woman no death-worthy sin and compares the attack against her to an assaulting murder.
So they said, “We will call the girl and ask her opinion.”
Rebekah’s family says they will call the young woman and ask her own response before the journey is finalized.
And Naomi said to her daughter-in-law Ruth, “My daughter, it is good for you to work with his young women, so that nothing will happen to you in another field.”
Naomi recognizes that Ruth’s safety is affected by where and with whom she works, commending proximity to Boaz’s young women.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Hebrew word. Young female in prepubescent to early adolescent stage; often marks vulnerable social status requiring protection or provision
Young female in prepubescent to early adolescent stage; often marks vulnerable social status requiring protection or provision
a girl (from infancy to adolescence) BDB: girl Usage: damsel, maid(-en), young (woman).
How this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Naʿărāh names girls and young women without making them interchangeable. One is drawing water and answering a family question, another is gleaning near workers whose presence offers safety, another has been taken captive by a raiding army, and others are gathered under royal command or addressed in laws about sexual harm. The shared term must never blur those distinct stories.
It invites readers to notice how youth and female social location can limit power while never erasing voice, knowledge, courage, or responsibility. Deuteronomy 22:26 is especially important for pastoral use because it refuses to place an attacker’s guilt on the overpowered woman. Responsible teaching should neither romanticize girlhood nor approach every occurrence through danger alone.
It should let each passage show the person, the relationships around her, and the protection or accountability the text demands.
2Kgs.5.2
Naʿărāh is the feminine counterpart to a youth designation and can describe a girl, young woman, maid, or attendant. It does not encode one exact age range or necessarily state virginity, consent, marital status, or free employment.
The New Testament likewise preserves the words and faith of girls and young women while confronting adults who dismiss or exploit people with less social power. Jesus receives children, restores daughters, and warns against causing little ones to stumble; those trajectories support attentive dignity and protection without making this Hebrew noun carry every later teaching.