Word study

Dust

4 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “dust”. 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 “dust” 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)

  • עָפָר âphârdry earth, dusttranslated this way 82 times of its 110 uses · Strong’s H6083Noun  ·  Translated: dust 73, soil 6, like dust 5, like the dust 3

    Genesis 2:7 Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.

    Exodus 8:16 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth, that it may turn into swarms of gnats throughout the land of Egypt.’”

    Full study and all 103 verses →
  • אָבָק âbâqdusttranslated this way 6 times of its 6 uses · Strong’s H80Noun  ·  Translated: dust 4, fine dust 1, like dust 1

    Exodus 9:9 It will become fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and festering boils will break out on man and beast throughout the land.”

    Deuteronomy 28:24 The LORD will turn the rain of your land into dust and powder; it will descend on you from the sky until you are destroyed.

    Full study and all 6 verses →
  • אֲדָמָה ădâmâhground, landtranslated this way 3 times of its 220 uses · Strong’s H127Noun  ·  Translated: land 121, ground 38, earth 34, soil 12

    2 Samuel 1:2 On the third day a man with torn clothes and dust on his head arrived from Saul’s camp. When he came to David, he fell to the ground to pay him homage.

    Nehemiah 9:1 On the twenty-fourth day of the same month, the Israelites gathered together, fasting and wearing sackcloth, with dust on their heads.

    Full study and all 207 verses →
  • אֶרֶץ eretsearth, landtranslated this way 3 times of its 2,375 uses · Strong’s H776Noun  ·  Translated: land 1,483, earth 564, ground 119, lands 41Full study and all 2,120 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • κονιορτός koniortósdusttranslated this way 5 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s G2868Noun  ·  Translated: dust 5

    Matthew 10:14 And if anyone will not welcome you or heed your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town.

    Luke 9:5 If anyone does not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that town, as a testimony against them.”

    Full study and all 5 verses →
  • χόος chóosdusttranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s G5522Noun  ·  Translated: dust 2

    Mark 6:11 If anyone will not welcome you or listen to you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that place, as a testimony against them.”

    Revelation 18:19 Then they will throw dust on their heads as they weep and mourn and cry out: “Woe, woe to the great city, where all who had ships on the sea were enriched by her wealth! For in a single hour she has been destroyed.”

    Full study and all 2 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.

What the Bible says about dust: 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.