Word study
Impose
9 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: imposed, imposing, impose. 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 “impose” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- נָתַן nâthangive, put, settranslated this way 2 times of its 1,957 uses · Strong’s H5414Verb · Translated: give 326, gave 206, given 187, put 135Full study and all 1,785 verses →
- עָבַד âbadwork, servetranslated this way 1 time of its 286 uses · Strong’s H5647Verb · Translated: serve 110, served 44, worship 32, work 9Full study and all 259 verses →
Exodus 1:14 and made their lives bitter with hard labor in brick and mortar, and with all kinds of work in the fields. Every service they imposed was harsh.
- עָלָה âlâhgo up, ascend, climbtranslated this way 1 time of its 873 uses · Strong’s H5927Verb · Translated: go 118, went 107, brought 56, come 42Full study and all 807 verses →
- מַשְׂאֵת masêthuprising, utterance, burden, portiontranslated this way 1 time of its 13 uses · Strong’s H4864Noun · Translated: gift 2, tax 2, gifts 2Full study and all 12 verses →
2 Chronicles 24:6 So the king called Jehoiada the high priest and said, “Why have you not required the Levites to bring from Judah and Jerusalem the tax imposed by Moses the servant of the LORD and by the assembly of Israel for the Tent of the Testimony?”
- עָנַשׁ ânashfine, mulcttranslated this way 1 time of its 8 uses · Strong’s H6064Verb · Translated: surely be fined 1, fine 1, imposed 1, punish 1Full study and all 8 verses →
2 Chronicles 36:3 And the king of Egypt dethroned him in Jerusalem and imposed on Judah a levy of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.
- שׂוּם sûmput, place, settranslated this way 1 time of its 560 uses · Strong’s H7760Verb · Translated: put 84, set 71, make 45, made 39Full study and all 533 verses →
Esther 10:1 Now King Xerxes imposed tribute throughout the land, even to its farthest shores.
- מַרְאֶה marehsight, appearance, visiontranslated this way 1 time of its 76 uses · Strong’s H4758Noun · Translated: appearance 16, vision 8, appear 6, sight 5Full study and all 63 verses →
Joshua 22:10 And when they came to Geliloth near the Jordan in the land of Canaan, the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh built an imposing altar there by the Jordan.
- מִן minfrom, out of, by, by reason of, at, more thantranslated this way 1 time of its 85 uses · Strong’s H4481Preposition · Translated: from 38, of 5, partly 4, and from 3Full study and all 66 verses →
Daniel 7:20 I also wanted to know about the ten horns on its head and the other horn that came up, before which three of them fell— the horn whose appearance was more imposing than the others, with eyes and with a mouth that spoke words of arrogance.
- רְמָה remâhthrow, set, assesstranslated this way 1 time of its 12 uses · Strong’s H7412Verb · Translated: thrown 7, throw 2, impose 1, threw 1Full study and all 12 verses →
Ezra 7:24 And be advised that you have no authority to impose tribute, duty, or toll on any of the priests, Levites, singers, doorkeepers, temple servants, or other servants of this house of God.
Greek words (New Testament)
- ἐπίκειμαι epíkeimaiI lie upon, am insistenttranslated this way 1 time of its 6 uses · Strong’s G1945Verb · Translated: pressing 1, insistent 1, laid 1, on it 1Full study and all 6 verses →
Hebrews 9:10 They consist only in food and drink and special washings — external regulations imposed until the time of reform.
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.