Word study

Spot

5 Hebrew words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: spot, spotted, spots. 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 “spot” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • בֹּהֶרֶת bôherethbrightness, bright spottranslated this way 10 times of its 10 uses · Strong’s H934Noun  ·  Translated: spot 7, spots 2, bright spot 1

    Leviticus 13:2 “When someone has a swelling or rash or bright spot on his skin that may be an infectious skin disease, he must be brought to Aaron the priest or to one of his sons who is a priest.

    Leviticus 13:4 If, however, the spot on his skin is white and does not appear to be deeper than the skin, and the hair in it has not turned white, the priest shall isolate the infected person for seven days.

    Full study and all 10 verses →
  • טָלָא ṭâlâpatch, spottranslated this way 6 times of its 8 uses · Strong’s H2921Verb  ·  Translated: spotted 6, patched 1, colorful 1

    Genesis 30:32 Let me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb, and every spotted or speckled goat. These will be my wages.

    Genesis 30:33 So my honesty will testify for me when you come to check on my wages in the future. If I have any goats that are not speckled or spotted, or any lambs that are not dark-colored, they will be considered stolen.”

    Full study and all 6 verses →
  • בָּרֹד bârôdspotted, markedtranslated this way 2 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H1261Adjective  ·  Translated: spotted 2, dappled 1, and 1

    Genesis 31:10 When the flocks were breeding, I saw in a dream that the streaked, spotted, and speckled males were mating with the females.

    Genesis 31:12 ‘Look up,’ he said, ‘and see that all the males that are mating with the flock are streaked, spotted, or speckled; for I have seen all that Laban has done to you.

    Full study and all 4 verses →
  • שָׁם shâmthere, thithertranslated this way 2 times of its 551 uses · Strong’s H8033Adverb  ·  Translated: there 309, from there 42, and there 38, where 29

    2 Samuel 2:23 But Asahel refused to turn away. So Abner thrust the butt of his spear into his stomach, and it came out his back, and he fell dead on the spot. And every man paused when he came to the place where Asahel had fallen and died.

    2 Samuel 6:7 And the anger of the LORD burned against Uzzah, and God struck him down on the spot for his irreverence, and he died there beside the ark of God.

    Full study and all 502 verses →
  • מָקוֹם mâqômstanding, spot, conditiontranslated this way 2 times of its 381 uses · Strong’s H4725Noun  ·  Translated: place 279, home 16, places 11, wherever 7Full study and all 364 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.