Word study

Cleanse

4 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: cleansed, cleanse, cleansing, cleanses. 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 “cleanse” 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)

  • טָהֵר ṭâhêrbe clean, puretranslated this way 42 times of its 94 uses · Strong’s H2891Verb  ·  Translated: clean 25, cleansed 22, cleanse 16, purified 6

    Leviticus 12:7 And the priest will present them before the LORD and make atonement for her; and she shall be ceremonially cleansed from her flow of blood. This is the law for a woman giving birth, whether to a male or to a female.

    Numbers 8:7 This is what you must do to cleanse them: Sprinkle them with the water of purification. Have them shave their whole bodies and wash their clothes, and so purify themselves.

    Full study and all 79 verses →
  • טׇהֳרָה ṭohŏrâhpurifying, cleansingtranslated this way 8 times of its 15 uses · Strong’s H2893Noun  ·  Translated: purification 6, cleansing 6, cost of his cleansing 1, according to the purification 1

    Leviticus 13:7 But if the rash spreads further on his skin after he has shown himself to the priest for his cleansing, he must present himself again to the priest.

    Numbers 6:9 If someone suddenly dies in his presence and defiles his consecrated head of hair, he must shave his head on the day of his cleansing — the seventh day.

    Full study and all 14 verses →
  • חָטָא châṭâmisstranslated this way 3 times of its 233 uses · Strong’s H2398Verb  ·  Translated: sinned 73, sin 33, committed 26, sins 21

    Leviticus 14:52 And he shall cleanse the house with the bird’s blood, the fresh water, the live bird, the cedar wood, the hyssop, and the scarlet yarn.

    Ezekiel 43:20 You are to take some of its blood and put it on the four horns of the altar, on the four corners of the ledge, and all around the rim; thus you will cleanse the altar and make atonement for it.

    Full study and all 217 verses →
  • נָקָה nâqâhbe empty(?), cleantranslated this way 2 times of its 36 uses · Strong’s H5352Verb  ·  Translated: go unpunished 10, leave anyone unpunished 2, leave the guilty unpunished 2, acquit 2

    Psalm 19:12 Who can discern his own errors? Cleanse me from my hidden faults.

    Psalm 19:13 Keep Your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me. Then I will be blameless and cleansed of great transgression.

    Full study and all 32 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • καθαρίζω katharízōI make cleantranslated this way 15 times of its 31 uses · Strong’s G2511Verb  ·  Translated: cleansed 9, clean 7, cleanse 4, make me clean 3

    Matthew 8:3 Jesus reached out His hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” He said. “Be clean!” And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

    Mark 1:42 And immediately the leprosy left him, and the man was cleansed.

    Full study and all 30 verses →
  • καθαρισμός katharismóscleansing, purifying, purificationtranslated this way 3 times of its 7 uses · Strong’s G2512Noun  ·  Translated: purification 3, cleansing 2, ceremonial washing 1, cleansed 1

    Mark 1:44 “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and present the offering Moses prescribed for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.”

    Luke 5:14 “Do not tell anyone,” Jesus instructed him. “But go, show yourself to the priest and present the offering Moses prescribed for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.”

    Full study and all 7 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.