Word study
Merchant
5 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: merchants, merchant. 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 “merchant” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- רָכַל râkalgo about, from one to anothertranslated this way 9 times of its 17 uses · Strong’s H7402Verb · Translated: merchants 6, traded 4, merchant 3, traders 2Full study and all 15 verses →
Nehemiah 3:31 Next to him, Malchijah, one of the goldsmiths, made repairs as far as the house of the temple servants and the merchants, opposite the Inspection Gate, and as far as the upper room above the corner.
Song of Solomon 3:6 Who is this coming up from the wilderness like a column of smoke, scented with myrrh and frankincense from all the spices of the merchant?
- סָחַר sâchartravel round, palpitatetranslated this way 7 times of its 21 uses · Strong’s H5503Verb · Translated: merchants 5, trade 3, traders 3, traded 2Full study and all 20 verses →
Genesis 23:16 Abraham agreed to Ephron’s terms and weighed out for him the price he had named in the hearing of the Hittites: four hundred shekels of silver, according to the standard of the merchants.
1 Kings 10:28 Solomon’s horses were imported from Egypt and Kue; the royal merchants purchased them from Kue.
- כְּנַעַן KenaanCanaantranslated this way 4 times of its 91 uses · Strong’s H3667Noun · Translated: Canaan 84, Canaanite 3, merchants 3, merchant 1Full study and all 90 verses →
Isaiah 23:8 Who planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose traders are princes, whose merchants are renowned on the earth?
Ezekiel 16:29 So you extended your promiscuity to Chaldea, the land of merchants — but even with this you were not satisfied!
- אֱנוֹשׁ ĕnôshman, mankindtranslated this way 2 times of its 470 uses · Strong’s H582Noun · Translated: men 368, man 25, people 5, husbands 4Full study and all 447 verses →
1 Kings 10:15 not including the revenue from the merchants, traders, and all the Arabian kings and governors of the land.
2 Chronicles 9:14 not including the revenue from the merchants and traders. And all the Arabian kings and governors of the land also brought gold and silver to Solomon.
- כְּנַעַנִי Kenaanîtrader, merchanttranslated this way 2 times of its 72 uses · Strong’s H3669Noun · Translated: Canaanites 56, Canaanite 10, Canaanite woman 2, merchants 2Full study and all 70 verses →
Job 41:6 Will traders barter for him or divide him among the merchants?
Proverbs 31:24 She makes linen garments and sells them; she delivers sashes to the merchants.
Greek words (New Testament)
- ἔμπορος émporosa merchant, tradertranslated this way 5 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s G1713Noun · Translated: merchants 4, merchant 1Full study and all 5 verses →
Matthew 13:45 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls.
Revelation 18:3 All the nations have drunk the wine of the passion of her immorality. The kings of the earth were immoral with her, and the merchants of the earth have grown wealthy from the extravagance of her luxury.”
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.
What the Bible says about merchant: passages by topic →
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.