Word study

Bind

7 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: bind, binding, binds. English often uses one word where Hebrew or Greek has several, each with its own shade of meaning. Under each word are verses where it is translated this way; choose the word itself for its full study: every verse, how else it is translated, the forms it takes and what the dictionaries say.

At a glance

How often each original word is translated “bind” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • חָבַשׁ châbashbind, bind on, bind uptranslated this way 6 times of its 32 uses · Strong’s H2280Verb  ·  Translated: saddled 11, binds 3, Saddle 2, bind 2

    Job 5:18 For He wounds, but He also binds; He strikes, but His hands also heal.

    Psalm 147:3 He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.

    Full study and all 30 verses →
  • אָסַר âsartie, bind, imprisontranslated this way 3 times of its 66 uses · Strong’s H631Verb  ·  Translated: bound 16, tied 5, prisoners 4, confined 3

    Job 36:13 The godless in heart harbor resentment; even when He binds them, they do not cry for help.

    Psalm 118:27 The LORD is God; He has made His light to shine upon us. Bind the festal sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar.

    Full study and all 62 verses →
  • קָשַׁר qâsharbind, league together, conspiretranslated this way 3 times of its 44 uses · Strong’s H7194Verb  ·  Translated: conspired 18, Tie 4, tied 3, bind 3

    Job 38:31 Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades or loosen the belt of Orion?

    Proverbs 3:3 Never let loving devotion or faithfulness leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.

    Full study and all 44 verses →
  • קוּם qûmarise, stand up, standtranslated this way 2 times of its 594 uses · Strong’s H6965Verb  ·  Translated: rise 68, got 61, set 44, Get 42

    Numbers 30:9 Every vow a widow or divorced woman pledges to fulfill is binding on her.

    Ruth 4:7 Now in former times in Israel, concerning the redemption or exchange of property, to make any matter legally binding a man would remove his sandal and give it to the other party, and this was a confirmation in Israel.

    Full study and all 570 verses →
  • צָרַר tsârarbind, tie up, be restricted, narrow, scant, crampedtranslated this way 2 times of its 53 uses · Strong’s H6887Verb  ·  Translated: distress 5, foes 4, enemy 4, enemies 4

    Proverbs 26:8 Like binding a stone into a sling is the giving of honor to a fool.

    Isaiah 8:16 Bind up the testimony and seal the law among my disciples.

    Full study and all 52 verses →
  • עַל alheighttranslated this way 2 times of its 4,859 uses · Strong’s H5921Preposition  ·  Translated: on 777, over 297, in 218, against 216Full study and all 3,996 verses →
  • הָיָה hâyâhfall out, come to pass, become, betranslated this way 2 times of its 2,848 uses · Strong’s H1961Verb  ·  Translated: will be 206, become 178, came 169, was 151Full study and all 2,573 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • δέω déōI bindtranslated this way 3 times of its 43 uses · Strong’s G1210Verb  ·  Translated: bound 18, tied 4, bind 3, tie 2

    Matthew 16:19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

    Acts 21:11 Coming over to us, he took Paul’s belt, bound his own feet and hands, and said, “The Holy Spirit says: ‘In this way the Jews of Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and hand him over to the Gentiles.’”

    Full study and all 40 verses →
How to study a word well
  1. Start from the verse, not the dictionary. Find which Hebrew or Greek word stands in the verse you are studying. One English word often translates several different original words.
  2. Read every place the word is used. A word means what its writers used it to mean. The list of verses and the count by book show its range, and who uses it most.
  3. Look at how it is translated. A word rendered five different ways has a wider meaning than any one English word can carry.
  4. Notice the form. A command is not a statement, and a passive verb is something done to the subject. The form in your verse is part of the meaning.
  5. See what it keeps company with. The words that appear beside it again and again show how the Bible itself connects ideas.
  6. Then read the dictionaries. They give the considered view of scholars, with their evidence.
  7. Come back to the verse. Context decides. A word does not carry every one of its meanings into every verse, and where a word came from does not settle what it means in a sentence written centuries later.

Scripture text and translation counts: Berean Standard Bible. Full entry: Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906, public domain), in the digital edition Brown-Driver-Briggs Enhanced by unfoldingWord (Joel Ruark, J. de Joode), based on data by Eliran Wong and Stephen Ku; its additions are used under CC BY 4.0. Strong’s Hebrew Dictionary: Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible Project, CC BY 4.0. Hebrew-to-English verse numbering: original work of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible available at https://github.com/openscriptures/morphhb, CC BY 4.0. We reformatted the data, linked the references to this site’s Bible text and left out words in other scripts that the source holds only as images. These are historical reference works; an entry gives its authors’ view, and a word’s meaning in any verse depends on how it is used there.