Word study
Grip
4 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: grip, gripped, grips. 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 “grip” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- חָזַק châzaqbe or grow firm, strong, strengthentranslated this way 6 times of its 290 uses · Strong’s H2388Verb · Translated: strong 37, made repairs 22, strengthened 16, repaired 15Full study and all 264 verses →
Job 18:9 A trap seizes his heel; a snare grips him.
Jeremiah 6:24 We have heard the report; our hands hang limp. Anguish has gripped us, pain like that of a woman in labor.
- אָחַז âchazgrasp, take hold, take possessiontranslated this way 5 times of its 65 uses · Strong’s H270Verb · Translated: seized 9, seize 4, grip 3, took hold 3Full study and all 61 verses →
Exodus 15:14 The nations will hear and tremble; anguish will grip the dwellers of Philistia.
Job 30:16 And now my soul is poured out within me; days of affliction grip me.
- יָד yâdhandtranslated this way 1 time of its 1,403 uses · Strong’s H3027Noun · Translated: hand 664, hands 349, through 64, power 22Full study and all 1,290 verses →
- בּוֹא bôcome in, come, go in, gotranslated this way 1 time of its 2,442 uses · Strong’s H935Verb · Translated: come 358, came 298, bring 209, brought 201Full study and all 2,217 verses →
Greek words (New Testament)
- ἐπιπίπτω epipíptōI fall upon, press upontranslated this way 1 time of its 11 uses · Strong’s G1968Verb · Translated: fell 3, embraced 2, fallen 2Full study and all 11 verses →
Luke 1:12 When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and gripped with fear.
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.