Word study
Detestable
5 Hebrew words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “detestable”. 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 “detestable” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- תּוֹעֵבַה tôêbahabominationtranslated this way 38 times of its 116 uses · Strong’s H8441Noun · Translated: abominations 52, detestable 30, abomination 14, detests 3Full study and all 111 verses →
Genesis 43:32 They separately served Joseph, his brothers, and the Egyptians. They ate separately because the Egyptians would not eat with the Hebrews, since that was detestable to them.
Exodus 8:26 But Moses replied, “It would not be right to do that, because the sacrifices we offer to the LORD our God would be detestable to the Egyptians. If we offer sacrifices that are detestable before the Egyptians, will they not stone us?
- שִׁקּוּץ shiqqûtsdetested thingtranslated this way 10 times of its 28 uses · Strong’s H8251Noun · Translated: abominations 9, abomination 8, detestable idols 5, detestable things 2Full study and all 26 verses →
2 Chronicles 15:8 When Asa heard these words and the prophecy of Azariah son of Oded the prophet, he took courage and removed the detestable idols from the whole land of Judah and Benjamin and from the cities he had captured in the hill country of Ephraim. He then restored the altar of the LORD that was in front of the portico of the LORD’s temple.
Jeremiah 4:1 “If you will return, O Israel, return to Me,” declares the LORD. “If you will remove your detestable idols from My sight and no longer waver,
- שֶׁקֶץ sheqetsdetestation, detestable thingtranslated this way 9 times of its 11 uses · Strong’s H8263Noun · Translated: detestable 8, detestable thing 1, abomination 1, vermin 1Full study and all 11 verses →
Leviticus 7:21 If one touches anything unclean, whether human uncleanness, an unclean animal, or any unclean, detestable thing, and then eats any of the meat of the peace offering that belongs to the LORD, that person must be cut off from his people.”
Ezekiel 8:10 So I went in and looked, and engraved all around the wall was every kind of crawling creature and detestable beast, along with all the idols of the house of Israel.
- מִפְלֶצֶת miphletsethhorrid thingtranslated this way 2 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H4656Noun · Translated: detestable 2, pole 2Full study and all 2 verses →
1 Kings 15:13 He also removed his grandmother Maacah from her position as queen mother because she had made a detestable Asherah pole. Asa chopped down the pole and burned it in the Kidron Valley.
2 Chronicles 15:16 King Asa also removed his grandmother Maacah from her position as queen mother because she had made a detestable Asherah pole. Asa chopped down the pole, crushed it, and burned it in the Kidron Valley.
- תַּעָב taâbloathe, detesttranslated this way 2 times of its 21 uses · Strong’s H8581Verb · Translated: despise 6, abhor 3, vile 2, abhorred 2Full study and all 20 verses →
1 Kings 21:26 He committed the most detestable acts by going after idols, just like the Amorites whom the LORD had driven out before the Israelites.)
1 Chronicles 21:6 But Joab did not include Levi and Benjamin in the count, because the king’s command was detestable to him.
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.