Word study

Rahab

3 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “rahab”. 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 “Rahab” 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)

  • רָחָב RâchâbRachabtranslated this way 5 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s H7343Noun  ·  Translated: Rahab 5

    Joshua 2:1 Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from Shittim, saying, “Go, inspect the land, especially Jericho.” So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.

    Joshua 2:3 So the king of Jericho sent to Rahab and said, “Bring out the men who came to you and entered your house, for they have come to spy out the whole land.”

    Full study and all 5 verses →
  • רַהַב Rahabstorm, arrogancetranslated this way 4 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H7294Noun  ·  Translated: Rahab 3, cut rahab 1

    Job 9:13 God does not restrain His anger; the helpers of Rahab cower beneath Him.

    Psalm 89:10 You crushed Rahab like a carcass; You scattered Your enemies with Your mighty arm.

    Full study and all 4 verses →
  • רַהַב rahabstorm, arrogancetranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H7293Noun  ·  Translated: Rahab 2

    Psalm 87:4 “I will mention Rahab and Babylon among those who know Me — along with Philistia, Tyre, and Cush — when I say, ‘This one was born in Zion.’”

    Isaiah 30:7 Egypt’s help is futile and empty; therefore I have called her Rahab Who Sits Still.

    Full study and all 2 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • Ῥαάβ RhaábRahabtranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s G4460Noun  ·  Translated: Rahab 2

    Hebrews 11:31 By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies in peace, did not perish with those who were disobedient.

    James 2:25 In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute justified by her actions when she welcomed the spies and sent them off on another route?

    Full study and all 2 verses →
  • Ῥαχάβ RhachábRahabtranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s G4477Noun  ·  Translated: Rahab 1

    Matthew 1:5 Salmon was the father of Boaz by Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse,

    Full study and its 1 verse →
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.

What the Bible says about Rahab: 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.