Exploring the Meaning of Thelazo in Greek

Thelazō means “to suckle” and appears in passages that mention nursing babies or the act of nursing. In the Gospels it comes up in scenes of public speech, domestic imagery, and warnings of coming hardship.

Occurrences

Matthew 21:16: “and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes. Did you never read, ‘Out of the mouth of babes and nursing babies you have perfected praise?’ ””

Here thelazō is embedded in a citation that pairs “babes” with “nursing babies.” The word contributes the picture of very young children defined by their dependence on being fed at the breast. In the logic of the quotation, this dependence and smallness sharpen the contrast: the praise is framed as coming from those least associated with public voice and strength, “out of the mouth” of infants who are still in the stage of being suckled.

Matthew 24:19: “But woe to those who are with child and to nursing mothers in those days!”

In this warning, thelazō identifies a particular group—mothers actively nursing. The word contributes an everyday bodily reality: an infant’s need to be fed binds the mother to a schedule and to the child’s immediate vulnerability. In the force of “woe,” nursing is not presented as an idealized scene but as a circumstance that intensifies trouble “in those days,” because it describes people whose responsibilities cannot be easily paused or set aside.

Mark 13:17: “But woe to those who are with child and to those who nurse babies in those days!”

This parallel wording places thelazō alongside pregnancy (“with child”) as another condition that makes the warned-of days harder to endure. By saying “those who nurse babies,” the verse highlights the active practice rather than only a social label; it points to mothers in the ongoing act of sustaining a baby. The word thus carries the sense of continuous, repetitive care, making the “woe” sound concrete rather than abstract.

Luke 11:27: “It came to pass, as he said these things, a certain woman out of the multitude lifted up her voice, and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts which nursed you!””

Here thelazō is used in a spoken blessing that moves from pregnancy (“the womb that bore you”) to early nurture (“the breasts which nursed you”). The word supplies intimate, maternal imagery: nursing is the tangible sign of a mother’s provision after birth. In this scene thelazō functions as a way of honoring the one who raised and cared for Jesus in his earliest stage of life, focusing on the bodily act by which a baby is sustained.

Luke 21:23: “Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who nurse infants in those days! For there will be great distress in the land, and wrath to this people.”

In Luke’s form of the warning, thelazō again marks out nursing as a condition of heightened vulnerability when “great distress” comes. The verse adds explanatory weight—“For there will be great distress in the land, and wrath to this people”—so the mention of nursing is not incidental; it identifies those who will be especially burdened when public calamity meets private necessity. “Nurse infants” also narrows the focus to the smallest dependents, bringing the bodily act of feeding into the picture of societal upheaval.

Sense and Usage

Across these five occurrences, thelazō consistently operates in the domain of early childhood dependence: babies and infants are described through the fact that they are being suckled, and women are described through their role as the ones who nurse. The word’s force is therefore relational and concrete. It does not merely point to a child’s age; it evokes a bond of care in which nourishment must be personally given and received.

Two settings dominate. In Matthew 21:16 thelazō appears inside a quotation about “babes and nursing babies,” where the act of nursing marks the children as extremely young and thus intensifies the surprising theme that their “mouth” can be associated with “praise.” In the warnings of Matthew 24:19, Mark 13:17, and Luke 21:23, thelazō helps specify why certain people are singled out for “woe”: nursing mothers are tethered to the needs of infants. The word supplies the practical reason such days would be grievous—feeding cannot be postponed, and infants cannot be made self-sufficient.

Luke 11:27 shows thelazō in a different emotional key. There the word belongs to a blessing, with “the breasts which nursed you” naming nursing as a worthy, honor-giving act. Even in this celebratory statement, thelazō retains its realism: it points to a physical, nurturing action rather than to a vague sentiment. Taken together with the warning passages, the result is a balanced picture: thelazō can carry warmth and honor (as in the woman’s blessing), yet it can also sharpen the pathos of hardship (as in the “woe” sayings) precisely because the action is necessary and ongoing.

The distribution of thelazō also shows how the word can be applied with slightly different emphases while staying within the same core idea. It may modify children (“nursing babies,” “nurse infants”) to mark a stage of life defined by being fed, or it may describe the caregiver (“nursing mothers,” “those who nurse babies”) to mark a stage of responsibility defined by feeding. In either direction, the act of suckling is the anchor: it joins the vulnerability of the infant to the embodied duty of the one who provides nourishment.

Imagery

The imagery carried by thelazō in these passages is domestic and bodily: mouths, womb, breasts, babies, infants. Matthew 21:16 places that imagery in a public religious dispute, where “babes and nursing babies” become part of an argument about praise. Luke 11:27 uses it in a shouted benediction from the crowd, joining nursing to childbirth as a way of speaking well of a mother’s role. The warning sayings in Matthew 24:19, Mark 13:17, and Luke 21:23 bring the same domestic reality into a setting of distress, where nursing—normally associated with care and life—also becomes a marker of increased burden when calamity presses in.

Sources: Lexical data from Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance and the Translators Brief Lexicon of Extended Strongs for Greek (STEPBible, CC BY). Occurrence data from the Translators Amalgamated Greek New Testament (STEPBible, CC BY). Scripture quotations from the World English Bible (public domain).