Word study
Cliff
4 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: cliffs, cliff. 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 “cliff” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- סֶלַע selacrag, clifftranslated this way 8 times of its 54 uses · Strong’s H5553Noun · Translated: rock 30, rocks 11, cliffs 5, cliff 3Full study and all 51 verses →
Numbers 24:21 Next he saw the Kenites and lifted up an oracle, saying: “Your dwelling place is secure, and your nest is set in a cliff.
2 Chronicles 25:12 and the army of Judah also captured 10,000 men alive. They took them to the top of a cliff and threw them down so that all were dashed to pieces.
- שֵׁן shêntooth, ivorytranslated this way 2 times of its 51 uses · Strong’s H8127Noun · Translated: teeth 28, tooth 9, ivory 8, inlaid with ivory 2Full study and all 46 verses →
1 Samuel 14:4 Now there were cliffs on both sides of the pass that Jonathan intended to cross to reach the Philistine outpost. One was named Bozez and the other Seneh.
1 Samuel 14:5 One cliff stood to the north toward Michmash, and the other to the south toward Geba.
- מַדְרֵגָה madrêgâhsteep place, steeptranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H4095Noun · Translated: cliff 1, cliffs 1Full study and all 2 verses →
Song of Solomon 2:14 O my dove in the clefts of the rock, in the crevices of the cliff, let me see your face, let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet, and your countenance is lovely.
Ezekiel 38:20 The fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the beasts of the field, every creature that crawls upon the ground, and all mankind on the face of the earth will tremble at My presence. The mountains will be thrown down, the cliffs will collapse, and every wall will fall to the ground.
- צוּר tsûrrock, clifftranslated this way 1 time of its 77 uses · Strong’s H6697Noun · Translated: rock 56, rocks 8, flint 2Full study and all 73 verses →
Numbers 23:9 For I see them from atop the rocky cliffs, and I watch them from the hills. Behold, a people dwelling apart, not reckoning themselves among the nations.
Greek words (New Testament)
- κατακρημνίζω katakrēmnízōI cast down headlongtranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s G2630Verb · Translated: throw him over the cliff 1Full study and its 1 verse →
Luke 4:29 They got up, drove Him out of the town, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw Him over the cliff.
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.