Word study

Simeon

3 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with “simeon”. 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 “Simeon” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • שִׁמְעוֹן ShimônShimontranslated this way 32 times of its 39 uses · Strong’s H8095Noun  ·  Translated: Simeon 31, Simeonites 6, brought simeon 1, Shimeon 1

    Genesis 29:33 Again she conceived and gave birth to a son, and she said, “Because the LORD has heard that I am unloved, He has given me this son as well.” So she named him Simeon.

    Exodus 1:2 Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah;

    Full study and all 36 verses →
  • שִׁמְעֹנִי ShimônîShimonitetranslated this way 2 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H8099Noun  ·  Translated: Simeon 2, Simeonite 1, Simeonites 1

    Numbers 26:14 These were the clans of Simeon, and there were 22,200 men.

    Joshua 21:4 The first lot came out for the Kohathite clans. The Levites who were descendants of Aaron the priest received thirteen cities by lot from the tribes of Judah, Simeon, and Benjamin.

    Full study and all 4 verses →
  • בֵּן bênsontranslated this way 2 times of its 4,587 uses · Strong’s H1121Noun  ·  Translated: son 1,843, sons 892, Israelites 422, descendants 358Full study and all 3,473 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • Συμεών SymeṓnSimeon or Simontranslated this way 5 times of its 7 uses · Strong’s G4826Noun  ·  Translated: Simeon 5, Simon 2

    Luke 2:25 Now there was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.

    Acts 13:1 Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen (who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch), and Saul.

    Full study and all 7 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.

What the Bible says about Simeon: 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.