Word study
Israelite
5 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: israelites, israelite. 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 “israelite” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side Compare the Greek words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- בֵּן bênsontranslated this way 450 times of its 4,587 uses · Strong’s H1121Noun · Translated: son 1,843, sons 892, Israelites 422, descendants 358Full study and all 3,473 verses →
Genesis 32:32 Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was struck near that tendon.
Genesis 36:31 These are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom before any king reigned over the Israelites:
- יִשְׂרָאֵל YisrâêlIsraeltranslated this way 126 times of its 1,998 uses · Strong’s H3478Noun · Translated: Israel 1,807, Israelites 111, caused israel 21, Israel's 19Full study and all 1,817 verses →
Genesis 47:27 Now the Israelites settled in the land of Egypt, in the region of Goshen. They acquired property there and became fruitful and increased greatly in number.
Exodus 3:9 And now the cry of the Israelites has reached Me, and I have seen how severely the Egyptians are oppressing them.
- אִישׁ îshmantranslated this way 8 times of its 1,399 uses · Strong’s H376Noun · Translated: man 650, men 198, one 79, each 79Full study and all 1,278 verses →
Deuteronomy 27:14 Then the Levites shall proclaim in a loud voice to every Israelite:
Judges 7:8 So Gideon sent the rest of the Israelites to their tents but kept the three hundred men, who took charge of the provisions and rams’ horns of the others. And the camp of Midian lay below him in the valley.
- יִשְׂרְאֵלִי Yisreêlîa Jisreelitetranslated this way 3 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H3481Noun · Translated: Israelite 3, Ishmaelite 1Full study and all 3 verses →
Leviticus 24:10 Now the son of an Israelite mother and an Egyptian father went out among the Israelites, and a fight broke out in the camp between him and an Israelite.
Leviticus 24:11 The son of the Israelite woman blasphemed the Name with a curse. So they brought him to Moses. (His mother’s name was Shelomith daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.)
- עָשָׂה âsâhdo, maketranslated this way 2 times of its 2,478 uses · Strong’s H6213Verb · Translated: done 292, made 265, make 143, did 112Full study and all 2,206 verses →
Exodus 14:4 And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart so that he will pursue them. But I will gain honor by means of Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD.” So this is what the Israelites did.
Greek words (New Testament)
- Ἰσραήλ IsraḗlIsraeltranslated this way 6 times of its 68 uses · Strong’s G2474Noun · Translated: Israel 60, Israelites 6, Israel's 1, elders of israel 1Full study and all 66 verses →
Acts 7:37 This is the same Moses who told the Israelites, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers.’
Romans 9:27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved.
- Ἰσραηλίτης Israēlítēsan Israelitetranslated this way 3 times of its 9 uses · Strong’s G2475Noun · Translated: Israel 6, Israelite 2, Israelites 1Full study and all 9 verses →
John 1:47 When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, He said of him, “Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is no deceit.”
Romans 11:1 I ask then, did God reject His people? Certainly not! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin.
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.