Word study
Chest
6 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: chest, chests. 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 “chest” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side Compare the Greek words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- אָרוֹן ârônchest, arktranslated this way 6 times of its 195 uses · Strong’s H727Noun · Translated: ark 183, chest 6, Thus the ark 2, coffin 1Full study and all 173 verses →
2 Kings 12:9 Then Jehoiada the priest took a chest, bored a hole in its lid, and set it beside the altar on the right side as one enters the house of the LORD. There the priests who guarded the threshold put all the money brought into the house of the LORD.
2 Chronicles 24:8 At the king’s command a chest was made and placed outside, at the gate of the house of the LORD.
- אַרְגָּז argâzbox, chesttranslated this way 3 times of its 3 uses · Strong’s H712Noun · Translated: chest 2, along with the chest 1Full study and all 3 verses →
1 Samuel 6:8 Take the ark of the LORD, set it on the cart, and in a chest beside it put the gold objects you are sending back to Him as a guilt offering. Then send the ark on its way,
1 Samuel 6:11 Then they put the ark of the LORD on the cart, along with the chest containing the gold rats and the images of the tumors.
- לֵב lêbinner man, mind, will, hearttranslated this way 2 times of its 526 uses · Strong’s H3820Noun · Translated: heart 326, hearts 78, mind 30, judgment 11Full study and all 495 verses →
- חֲדִי chădîbreasttranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s H2306Noun · Translated: chest 1Full study and its 1 verse →
Daniel 2:32 The head of the statue was pure gold, its chest and arms were silver, its belly and thighs were bronze,
- בֵּין bêninterval, space betweentranslated this way 1 time of its 296 uses · Strong’s H996Preposition · Translated: between 108, and 30, among 23, at 13Full study and all 230 verses →
- סְגוֹר segôrenclosure, encasementtranslated this way 1 time of its 2 uses · Strong’s H5458Noun · Translated: gold 1, open their chests 1Full study and all 2 verses →
Hosea 13:8 Like a bear robbed of her cubs I will attack them, and I will tear open their chests. There I will devour them like a lion, like a wild beast tearing them apart.
Greek words (New Testament)
- μαστός mastósa breast, paptranslated this way 1 time of its 3 uses · Strong’s G3149Noun · Translated: breasts 2, chest 1Full study and all 3 verses →
Revelation 1:13 and among the lampstands was One like the Son of Man, dressed in a long robe, with a golden sash around His chest.
- στῆθος stēthosthe breasttranslated this way 1 time of its 3 uses · Strong’s G4738Noun · Translated: breast 1, breasts 1, chests 1Full study and all 3 verses →
Revelation 15:6 And out of the temple came the seven angels with the seven plagues, dressed in clean and bright linen and girded with golden sashes around their chests.
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.
What the Bible says about chest: passages by topic →
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.