Word study

Refresh

3 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: refreshed, refresh, refreshes, refreshing. 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 “refresh” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • סָעַד sâadsupport, sustain, staytranslated this way 4 times of its 12 uses · Strong’s H5582Verb  ·  Translated: refresh 4, sustain 3

    Genesis 18:5 And I will bring a bit of bread so that you may refresh yourselves. This is why you have passed your servant’s way. After that, you may continue on your way.” “Yes,” they replied, “you may do as you have said.”

    Judges 19:5 On the fourth day, they got up early in the morning and prepared to depart, but the girl’s father said to his son-in-law, “Refresh your heart with a morsel of bread, and then you can go.”

    Full study and all 12 verses →
  • נָפַשׁ nâphashbreathe, refreshedtranslated this way 3 times of its 3 uses · Strong’s H5314Verb  ·  Translated: refreshed 3

    Exodus 23:12 For six days you are to do your work, but on the seventh day you must cease, so that your ox and your donkey may rest and the son of your maidservant may be refreshed, as well as the foreign resident.

    2 Samuel 16:14 Finally, the king and all the people with him arrived, exhausted. And there he refreshed himself.

    Full study and all 3 verses →
  • רָוָה râvâhbe saturated, drink one's filltranslated this way 2 times of its 14 uses · Strong’s H7301Verb  ·  Translated: feast 1, soak 1, satisfy 1, take our fill 1

    Proverbs 11:25 A generous soul will prosper, and he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.

    Jeremiah 31:25 for I will refresh the weary soul and replenish all who are weak.”

    Full study and all 14 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • ἀναπαύω anapaúōI make to rest, give rest to, rest, take my easetranslated this way 4 times of its 12 uses · Strong’s G373Verb  ·  Translated: rest 3, refreshed 3, resting 2

    1 Corinthians 16:18 For they refreshed my spirit and yours as well. Show your appreciation, therefore, to such men.

    2 Corinthians 7:13 On account of this, we are encouraged. In addition to our own encouragement, we were even more delighted by the joy of Titus. For his spirit has been refreshed by all of you.

    Full study and all 12 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.