Word study

Spend

2 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: spend, spending. 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 “spend” 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)

  • לוּן lûnlodge, pass the nighttranslated this way 21 times of its 80 uses · Strong’s H3885Verb  ·  Translated: spend the night 17, spent the night 7, grumbled 7, remain 6

    Genesis 19:2 and said, “My lords, please turn aside into the house of your servant; wash your feet and spend the night. Then you can rise early and go on your way.” “No,” they answered, “we will spend the night in the square.”

    Numbers 22:8 “Spend the night here,” Balaam replied, “and I will give you the answer that the LORD speaks to me.” So the princes of Moab stayed with Balaam.

    Full study and all 76 verses →
  • נָתַן nâthangive, put, settranslated this way 2 times of its 1,957 uses · Strong’s H5414Verb  ·  Translated: give 326, gave 206, given 187, put 135Full study and all 1,785 verses →

Greek words (New Testament)

  • ἐπιμένω epiménōI remain, tarry, persist intranslated this way 2 times of its 16 uses · Strong’s G1961Verb  ·  Translated: stayed 3, continue 3, stay 2, spend 2

    Acts 28:14 There we found some brothers who invited us to spend the week with them. And so we came to Rome.

    1 Corinthians 16:7 For I do not want to see you now only in passing; I hope to spend some time with you, if the Lord permits.

    Full study and all 16 verses →
  • ποιέω poiéōI do, maketranslated this way 2 times of its 544 uses · Strong’s G4160Verb  ·  Translated: do 50, done 44, doing 40, made 34

    Acts 15:33 After spending some time there, they were sent off by the brothers in peace to return to those who had sent them.

    James 4:13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make a profit.”

    Full study and all 494 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.