Word study
Carve
7 Hebrew words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: carved, carve. 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 “carve” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- פֶּסֶל peselidol, imagetranslated this way 6 times of its 31 uses · Strong’s H6459Noun · Translated: idol 10, graven image 8, idols 6, carved image 3Full study and all 31 verses →
Leviticus 26:1 “You must not make idols for yourselves or set up a carved image or sacred pillar; you must not place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down to it. For I am the LORD your God.
Deuteronomy 27:15 ‘Cursed is the man who makes a carved idol or molten image — an abomination to the LORD, the work of the hands of a craftsman — and sets it up in secret.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
- פְּסִיל pesîlid.translated this way 6 times of its 23 uses · Strong’s H6456Noun · Translated: idols 13, carved images 4, images 3, carved idols 2Full study and all 23 verses →
2 Chronicles 34:3 In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, Josiah began to seek the God of his father David, and in the twelfth year he began to cleanse Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, the Asherah poles, the carved idols, and the cast images.
Jeremiah 8:19 Listen to the cry of the daughter of my people from a land far away: “Is the LORD no longer in Zion? Is her King no longer there?” “Why have they provoked Me to anger with their carved images, with their worthless foreign idols?”
- עָשָׂה âsâhdo, maketranslated this way 4 times of its 2,478 uses · Strong’s H6213Verb · Translated: done 292, made 265, make 143, did 112Full study and all 2,206 verses →
- קָלַע qâlasling, hurl forthtranslated this way 3 times of its 7 uses · Strong’s H7049Verb · Translated: carved 3, sling 2, slung 1, fling away 1Full study and all 7 verses →
1 Kings 6:29 Then he carved the walls all around the temple, in both the inner and outer sanctuaries, with carved engravings of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers.
1 Kings 6:32 The double doors were made of olive wood, and he carved into them cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers and overlaid the cherubim and palm trees with hammered gold.
- חֲרֹשֶׁת chărôshethcarving, skilful workingtranslated this way 2 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H2799Noun · Translated: cut 2, carve 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Exodus 31:5 to cut gemstones for settings, and to carve wood, so that he may be a master of every craft.
Exodus 35:33 to cut gemstones for settings, and to carve wood, so that he may be a master of every artistic craft.
- חָצַב châtsabhew, hew out, cleavetranslated this way 2 times of its 24 uses · Strong’s H2672Verb · Translated: stonecutters 7, dug 4Full study and all 22 verses →
Proverbs 9:1 Wisdom has built her house; she has carved out her seven pillars.
Isaiah 22:16 What are you doing here, and who authorized you to carve out a tomb for yourself here — to chisel your tomb in the height and cut your resting place in the rock?
- מִקְלַעַת miqlaathcarvingtranslated this way 2 times of its 3 uses · Strong’s H4734Noun · Translated: carved 2, engravings 1Full study and all 3 verses →
1 Kings 6:18 The cedar paneling inside the temple was carved with gourds and open flowers. Everything was cedar; not a stone could be seen.
1 Kings 6:29 Then he carved the walls all around the temple, in both the inner and outer sanctuaries, with carved engravings of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers.
How to study a word well
- 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.
- 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.
- Look at how it is translated. A word rendered five different ways has a wider meaning than any one English word can carry.
- 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.
- See what it keeps company with. The words that appear beside it again and again show how the Bible itself connects ideas.
- Then read the dictionaries. They give the considered view of scholars, with their evidence.
- 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.