Word study
Shatter
6 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: shattered, shatter, shatters, shattering. 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 “shatter” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- שָׁבַר shâbarbreak, break in piecestranslated this way 33 times of its 146 uses · Strong’s H7665Verb · Translated: broken 32, shattered 23, break 21, broke 10Full study and all 142 verses →
Exodus 32:19 As Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, he burned with anger and threw the tablets out of his hands, shattering them at the base of the mountain.
Deuteronomy 9:17 So I took the two tablets and threw them out of my hands, shattering them before your eyes.
- נָפַץ nâphatsshattertranslated this way 13 times of its 22 uses · Strong’s H5310Verb · Translated: shatter 11, shattered 2Full study and all 17 verses →
Psalm 2:9 You will break them with an iron scepter; You will shatter them like pottery.”
Jeremiah 22:28 Is this man Coniah a despised and shattered pot, a jar that no one wants? Why are he and his descendants hurled out and cast into a land they do not know?
- חָתַת châthathbe shattered, dismayedtranslated this way 11 times of its 52 uses · Strong’s H2865Verb · Translated: dismayed 11, discouraged 10, shattered 10, terrified 7Full study and all 46 verses →
Isaiah 7:8 For the head of Aram is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. Within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered as a people.
Jeremiah 48:1 Concerning Moab, this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: “Woe to Nebo, for it will be devastated. Kiriathaim will be captured and disgraced; the fortress will be shattered and dismantled.
- דְּקַק deqaqbe shattered, fall to piecestranslated this way 5 times of its 10 uses · Strong’s H1855Verb · Translated: crushed 3, shattered 2, shatter 2, shatters 1Full study and all 9 verses →
Daniel 2:35 Then the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold were shattered and became like chaff on the threshing floor in summer. The wind carried them away, and not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that had struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.
Daniel 2:40 Finally, there will be a fourth kingdom as strong as iron; for iron shatters and crushes all things, and like iron that crushes all things, it will shatter and crush all the others.
- מָחַץ mâchatssmite through, wound severely, shattertranslated this way 2 times of its 14 uses · Strong’s H4272Verb · Translated: crush 4, crushed 3, shattered 2Full study and all 14 verses →
Judges 5:26 She reached for the tent peg, her right hand for the workman’s hammer. She struck Sisera and crushed his skull; she shattered and pierced his temple.
Job 26:12 By His power He stirred the sea; by His understanding He shattered Rahab.
- שֶׁבֶר sheberbreaking, fracture, crushing, breach, crashtranslated this way 2 times of its 44 uses · Strong’s H7667Noun · Translated: destruction 17, wound 4, brokenness 3, broken 2Full study and all 42 verses →
Isaiah 1:28 But rebels and sinners will together be shattered, and those who forsake the LORD will perish.
Jeremiah 14:17 You are to speak this word to them: ‘My eyes overflow with tears; day and night they do not cease, for the virgin daughter of my people has been shattered by a crushing blow, a severely grievous wound.
Greek words (New Testament)
- συντρίβω syntríbōI break by crushingtranslated this way 2 times of its 7 uses · Strong’s G4937Verb · Translated: bruised 1, shattered 1, broke open 1, keeps mauling 1Full study and all 7 verses →
Mark 5:4 Though he was often bound with chains and shackles, he had broken the chains and shattered the shackles. Now there was no one with the strength to subdue him.
Revelation 2:27 He will rule them with an iron scepter and shatter them like pottery — just as I have received authority from My Father.
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.