King James Bible Dictionary

For a woman to be barren was accounted a severe punishment among the Jews (Genesis 16:2; 30:1-23; 1 Samuel 1:6, 27; Isaiah 47:9; 49:21; Luke 1:25). Instances of barrenness are noticed (Genesis 11:30; 25:21; 29:31; Judges 13:2, 3; Luke 1:7, 36).

BAR'REN, adjective [from the same root as bare.]

1. Not producing young, or offspring; applied to animals.

2. Not producing plants; unfruitful; steril; not fertile; or producing little; unproductive; applied to the earth.

3. Not producing the usual fruit; applied to tree, etc.

4. Not copious; scanty; as a scheme barren of hints.

5. Not containing useful or entertaining ideas; as a barren treatise.

6. Unmeaning; uninventive; dull; as barren spectators.

7. Unproductive; not inventive; as a barren mind.

BAR'REN, noun In the States west of the Allegheny, a word used to denote a tract of land, rising a few feet above the level of a plain, and producing trees and grass. The soil of these barrens is not barren as the name imports, but often very fertile. It is usually alluvial, to a depth sometimes of several feet.

2. Any unproductive tract of land; as the pine barrens of South Carolina.

BAR'RENLY, adverb Unfruitfully.

Sterility of women.

A reproach
Genesis 30:22-23; 1 Samuel 1:6-7; 1 Samuel 2:1-11; Isaiah 4:1; Luke 1:25

Miraculously removed, instances of:

Sarai
Genesis 17:15-21

Rebecca
Genesis 25:21

Manoah's wife
Jude 1:13

Hannah
1 Samuel 1:6-20

Elizabeth
Luke 1:5-25

Sent as a judgment
Genesis 20:17-18
Childlessness

BAR'RENNESS, adverb The quality of not producing its kind; want of the power of conception; applied to animals.

2. Unfruitfulness; sterility, infertility. The quality of not producing at all, or in small quantities; as the barrenness of soil.

3. Want of invention; want of the power of producing any thing new; applied to the mind.

4. Want of matter; scantiness; as the barrenness of a cause.

5. Defect of emotion, sensibility or fervency; as the barrenness of devotion.

BAR'RENWORT, noun [See Wort.] A plant, constituting the genus Epimedium, of which the alpinum is the only species; a low herbaceous plant, with a creeping root, having many stalks, each of which has three flowers.