Word study

Gladly

3 Hebrew and 4 Greek words behind this English word

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

  • שָׂמַח sâmachrejoice, be gladtranslated this way 2 times of its 152 uses · Strong’s H8055Verb  ·  Translated: rejoice 50, glad 27, rejoiced 20, gloat 6

    Judges 19:3 her husband got up and went after her to speak kindly to her and bring her back, taking his servant and a pair of donkeys. So the girl brought him into her father’s house, and when her father saw him, he gladly welcomed him.

    Habakkuk 1:15 The foe pulls all of them up with a hook; he catches them in his dragnet, and gathers them in his fishing net; so he rejoices gladly.

    Full study and all 147 verses →
  • שׂוּשׂ sûsexult, rejoicetranslated this way 1 time of its 27 uses · Strong’s H7797Verb  ·  Translated: rejoice 10, glad 3, exult 2, rejoice greatly 2

    Isaiah 64:5 You welcome those who gladly do right, who remember Your ways. Surely You were angry, for we sinned. How can we be saved if we remain in our sins?

    Full study and all 24 verses →
  • רָצוֹן râtsôngoodwill, favour, acceptance, willtranslated this way 1 time of its 54 uses · Strong’s H7522Noun  ·  Translated: favor 15, delight 5, acceptable 3, acceptance 3

    Malachi 2:13 And this is another thing you do: You cover the altar of the LORD with tears, with weeping and groaning, because He no longer regards your offerings or receives them gladly from your hands.

    Full study and all 54 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

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.