Word study
Growl
6 Hebrew words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “growl”. 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 “growl” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- קוֹל qôlsound, voicetranslated this way 1 time of its 425 uses · Strong’s H6963Noun · Translated: voice 197, sound 63, voices 22, thunder 11Full study and all 378 verses →
Job 4:10 The lion may roar, and the fierce lion may growl, yet the teeth of the young lions are broken.
- לוּן lûnlodge, pass the nighttranslated this way 1 time of its 80 uses · Strong’s H3885Verb · Translated: spend the night 17, spent the night 7, grumbled 7, remain 6Full study and all 76 verses →
Psalm 59:15 They scavenge for food, and growl if they are not satisfied.
- נָהַם nâhamgrowl, groantranslated this way 1 time of its 5 uses · Strong’s H5098Verb · Translated: groan 2, Like a roaring 1, growl 1, roar 1Full study and all 5 verses →
Isaiah 5:29 Their roaring is like that of a lion; they roar like young lions. They growl and seize their prey; they carry it away, and no one can rescue it.
- הָמָה hâmâhmurmur, growl, roar, be boisteroustranslated this way 1 time of its 33 uses · Strong’s H1993Verb · Translated: roar 6, unease 3, rage 3, laments 3Full study and all 31 verses →
Isaiah 59:11 We all growl like bears and moan like doves. We hope for justice, but find none, for salvation, but it is far from us.
- נָעַר nâargrowltranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s H5286Verb · Translated: growl 1Full study and its 1 verse →
Jeremiah 51:38 They will roar together like young lions; they will growl like lion cubs.
- נָתַן nâthangive, put, settranslated this way 1 time of its 1,957 uses · Strong’s H5414Verb · Translated: give 326, gave 206, given 187, put 135Full study and all 1,785 verses →
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.