Word study

Quota

5 Hebrew words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: quota, quotas. 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 “quota” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • דָּבָר dâbârspeech, wordtranslated this way 2 times of its 1,244 uses · Strong’s H1697Noun  ·  Translated: word 342, words 299, acts 51, Chronicles 42

    Exodus 5:13 The taskmasters kept pressing them, saying, “Fulfill your quota each day, just as you did when straw was provided.”

    Exodus 5:19 The Israelite foremen realized they were in trouble when they were told, “You must not reduce your daily quota of bricks.”

    Full study and all 1,120 verses →
  • מַתְכֹנֶת mathkônethmeasurement, tale, proportiontranslated this way 1 time of its 5 uses · Strong’s H4971Noun  ·  Translated: formula 2, quota 1, specifications 1, standard measure 1

    Exodus 5:8 But require of them the same quota of bricks as before; do not reduce it. For they are lazy; that is why they are crying out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’

    Full study and all 5 verses →
  • חֹק chôqsomething prescribed, a statute or duetranslated this way 1 time of its 122 uses · Strong’s H2706Noun  ·  Translated: statutes 78, statute 10, portion 7, decree 7

    Exodus 5:14 Then the Israelite foremen, whom Pharaoh’s taskmasters had set over the people, were beaten and asked, “Why have you not fulfilled your quota of bricks yesterday or today, as you did before?”

    Full study and all 122 verses →
  • תֹּכֶן tôkenmeasurementtranslated this way 1 time of its 2 uses · Strong’s H8506Noun  ·  Translated: full quota 1, quantity 1

    Exodus 5:18 Now get to work. You will be given no straw, yet you must deliver the full quota of bricks.”

    Full study and all 2 verses →
  • מִשְׁפָּט mishpâṭjudgmenttranslated this way 1 time of its 406 uses · Strong’s H4941Noun  ·  Translated: justice 111, ordinances 73, judgments 40, judgment 40

    1 Kings 4:28 Each one also brought to the required place their quotas of barley and straw for the chariot horses and other horses.

    Full study and all 394 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.