Word study
Illuminate
1 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: illuminated, illuminate, illuminates. 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 “illuminate” or one of its forms.
Compare the Greek words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- אוֹר ôrbe or become lighttranslated this way 3 times of its 40 uses · Strong’s H215Verb · Translated: shine 12, light 6, lit 2, gives light 2Full study and all 40 verses →
Exodus 25:37 Make seven lamps and set them up on the lampstand so that they illuminate the area in front of it.
Nehemiah 9:19 You in Your great compassion did not forsake them in the wilderness. By day the pillar of cloud never turned away from guiding them on their path; and by the night the pillar of fire illuminated the way they should go.
Greek words (New Testament)
- φωτίζω phōtízōI illuminate, bring to lighttranslated this way 4 times of its 10 uses · Strong’s G5461Verb · Translated: gives light 1, bring to light 1, enlightened 1, illuminate 1Full study and all 10 verses →
Ephesians 3:9 and to illuminate for everyone the stewardship of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things.
2 Timothy 1:10 And now He has revealed this grace through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has abolished death and illuminated the way to life and immortality through the gospel,
- φανερόω phaneróōI make clear, visible, or manifesttranslated this way 1 time of its 49 uses · Strong’s G5319Verb · Translated: revealed 17, appeared 6, appears 4, made 3Full study and all 43 verses →
Ephesians 5:13 But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that is illuminated becomes a light itself.
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.