Q
Q — the letter Q (from the German word Quelle, meaning “source”) refers to a hypothetical document containing material that Matthew and Luke used as they wrote certain sections of their gospels. This document supposedly contained many sayings of Jesus. Not all scholars accept the existence of Q as an information source for these gospels.
QUAIL — a small bird. The Hebrew people probably ate dried, salted quail while they were slaves to the Egyptians. When they were hungry for meat in the Sinai desert, God promised He would provide enough meat for a month. He sent thousands of quail to their camp and the birds fell to the ground from exhaustion (Num. 11:31–34; Exod. 16:13; Ps. 105:40).
QUARRY — a huge opening in the ground where stone is cut, usually for building purposes. Archaeologists have discovered quarries throughout Palestine. In Old Testament times, there were quarries near Megiddo, Samaria, Jerusalem, and Ramat Rahel.
QUEEN — a female member of the royal house, either the wife of a king or a woman who ruled by her own power. The word usually means an actual ruler, like the queen of Sheba (1 Kings 10) or Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians (Acts 8:27). Sometimes the word is used as a reference to the king’s favorite wife, like with both Queen Vashti and Queen Esther (Esther 1–2).
This massive cut stone was never removed from an ancient quarry at the Phoenician city of Baalbek, perhaps because of its weight and size.
Cave Four at Qumran, where hundreds of Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, is visible at the upper right. The Dead Sea looms in the background.
QUICK, QUICKEN — the KJV translation of several Hebrew and Greek words translated by the NKJV as “alive” (Ps. 55:15), “living” (Acts 10:42), “revive” (Ps. 119:25), and “gives life to” (John 5:21).
QUIRINIUS [kwy-ren´-e-us] — a Roman governor of Syria at the time of Jesus’ birth (Luke 2:1–5; Cyrenius, KJV).
QUIVER — when used as a noun it is a pouch for carrying arrows (Lam. 3:13, NKJV); when used as a verb it means to tremble or shake (Hab. 3:16, NKJV).
QUMRAN, KHIRBET [koom´-rahn, kir´bet] — an ancient ruin on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea. In 1947 a wandering goatherder looking for his goats in the caves above the dry riverbed of Qumran found several large jars. The jars contained the ancient scrolls that are now known as the Dead Sea Scrolls.