Word study
Donkey
4 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: donkey, donkeys. 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 “donkey” 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)
- חֲמוֹר chămôrheaptranslated this way 96 times of its 96 uses · Strong’s H2543Noun · Translated: donkey 49, donkeys 44, male and female donkeys 1, donkey's 1Full study and all 93 verses →
Genesis 12:16 He treated Abram well on her account, and Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants, and camels.
Exodus 4:20 So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey, and headed back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand.
- אָתוֹן âthônshe-asstranslated this way 29 times of its 31 uses · Strong’s H860Noun · Translated: donkey 12, donkeys 11, female donkeys 4Full study and all 26 verses →
Genesis 32:15 30 milk camels with their young, 40 cows, 10 bulls, 20 female donkeys, and 10 male donkeys.
Numbers 22:21 So in the morning Balaam got up, saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab.
- פֶּרֶא perewild asstranslated this way 10 times of its 10 uses · Strong’s H6501Noun · Translated: wild donkey 5, wild donkeys 4, like a wild donkey 1Full study and all 10 verses →
Genesis 16:12 He will be a wild donkey of a man, and his hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand against him; he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”
Job 6:5 Does a wild donkey bray over fresh grass, or an ox low over its fodder?
- עַיִר ayirmale asstranslated this way 6 times of its 8 uses · Strong’s H5895Noun · Translated: donkeys 4, colt 2, male donkeys 1, donkey 1Full study and all 8 verses →
Genesis 32:15 30 milk camels with their young, 40 cows, 10 bulls, 20 female donkeys, and 10 male donkeys.
Judges 10:4 He had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys. And they had thirty towns in the land of Gilead, which to this day are called Havvoth-jair.
Greek words (New Testament)
- ὄνος ónosa donkey, an asstranslated this way 5 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s G3688Noun · Translated: donkey 5Full study and all 5 verses →
Matthew 21:2 saying to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt beside her. Untie them and bring them to Me.
Luke 13:15 “You hypocrites!” the Lord replied. “Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it to water?
- ὑποζύγιον hypozýgiona beast of burden, an ass or muletranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s G5268Noun · Translated: donkey 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Matthew 21:5 “Say to the Daughter of Zion, ‘See, your King comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’”
2 Peter 2:16 But he was rebuked for his transgression by a donkey, otherwise without speech, that spoke with a man’s voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.
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.