Word study
Grass
5 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “grass”. 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 “grass” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- חָצִיר châtsîrgreen grass, herbagetranslated this way 19 times of its 21 uses · Strong’s H2682Noun · Translated: grass 11, like grass 5Full study and all 20 verses →
1 Kings 18:5 Then Ahab said to Obadiah, “Go throughout the land to every spring and every valley. Perhaps we will find grass to keep the horses and mules alive so that we will not have to destroy any livestock.”
2 Kings 19:26 Therefore their inhabitants, devoid of power, are dismayed and ashamed. They are like plants in the field, tender green shoots, grass on the rooftops, scorched before it is grown.
- עֶשֶׂב esebherb, herbagetranslated this way 10 times of its 32 uses · Strong’s H6212Noun · Translated: plant 9, plants 7, grass 6, like the grass 2Full study and all 31 verses →
Deuteronomy 11:15 And I will provide grass in the fields for your livestock, and you will eat and be satisfied.
Job 5:25 You will know that your offspring will be many, your descendants like the grass of the earth.
- דֶּשֶׁא deshegrasstranslated this way 6 times of its 14 uses · Strong’s H1877Noun · Translated: vegetation 3, green shoots 2Full study and all 14 verses →
Deuteronomy 32:2 Let my teaching fall like rain and my speech settle like dew, like gentle rain on new grass, like showers on tender plants.
2 Samuel 23:4 is like the light of the morning at sunrise of a cloudless dawn, the glistening after the rain on the sprouting grass of the earth.’
- עָשׁ âshmothtranslated this way 5 times of its 11 uses · Strong’s H6211Noun · Translated: grass 5, like a moth 3, like a moth's cocoon 1, moths 1Full study and all 11 verses →
Daniel 4:15 But leave the stump with its roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze around it, in the tender grass of the field. Let him be drenched with the dew of heaven and graze with the beasts on the grass of the earth.
Daniel 4:25 You will be driven away from mankind, and your dwelling will be with the beasts of the field. You will feed on grass like an ox and be drenched with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass you by, until you acknowledge that the Most High rules over the kingdom of mankind and gives it to whom He wishes.
- דֶּתֶא dethegrasstranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H1883Noun · Translated: tender grass 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Daniel 4:15 But leave the stump with its roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze around it, in the tender grass of the field. Let him be drenched with the dew of heaven and graze with the beasts on the grass of the earth.
Daniel 4:23 And you, O king, saw a watcher, a holy one, coming down from heaven and saying: ‘Cut down the tree and destroy it, but leave the stump with its roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze around it, in the tender grass of the field. Let him be drenched with the dew of heaven, and graze with the beasts of the field till seven times pass him by.’
Greek words (New Testament)
- χόρτος chórtosgrass, haytranslated this way 9 times of its 15 uses · Strong’s G5528Noun · Translated: grass 9, field 2, wheat 1, stalk 1Full study and all 13 verses →
Matthew 6:30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
Mark 6:39 Then Jesus directed them to have the people sit in groups on the green grass.
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.
What the Bible says about grass: 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.