Word study

Handsome

4 Hebrew words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “handsome”. 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 “handsome” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • יָפֶה yâphehfair, beautifultranslated this way 4 times of its 42 uses · Strong’s H3303Adjective  ·  Translated: beautiful 25, handsome 4, sleek 3, lovely 2

    Genesis 39:6 So Potiphar left all that he owned in Joseph’s care; he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph was well-built and handsome,

    1 Samuel 17:42 When the Philistine looked and saw David, he despised him because he was just a boy, ruddy and handsome.

    Full study and all 38 verses →
  • טוֹב ṭôbpleasant, agreeable, goodtranslated this way 4 times of its 538 uses · Strong’s H2896Adjective  ·  Translated: good 249, better 72, prosperity 19, good things 12

    1 Samuel 9:2 And he had a son named Saul, choice and handsome, without equal among the Israelites — a head taller than any of the people.

    1 Kings 1:6 (His father had never once reprimanded him by saying, “Why do you act this way?” Adonijah was also very handsome, born next after Absalom.)

    Full study and all 499 verses →
  • תֹּאַר tôaroutline, formtranslated this way 1 time of its 9 uses · Strong’s H8389Noun  ·  Translated: form 3

    1 Samuel 16:18 One of the servants answered, “I have seen a son of Jesse of Bethlehem who knows how to play the harp. He is a mighty man of valor, a warrior, eloquent and handsome, and the LORD is with him.”

    Full study and all 9 verses →
  • יָפָה yâphâhbe fair, beautifultranslated this way 1 time of its 8 uses · Strong’s H3302Verb  ·  Translated: beautiful 3, adorn 2, most handsome 1, delightful 1

    Psalm 45:2 You are the most handsome of men; grace has anointed your lips; therefore God has blessed you forever.

    Full study and all 8 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.

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.