Word study
Stream
8 Hebrew words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: streams, stream, streaming. 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 “stream” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- נַחַל nachaltorrent, torrent-valley, wadytranslated this way 15 times of its 138 uses · Strong’s H5158Noun · Translated: Valley 49, Brook 26, river 17, streams 8Full study and all 123 verses →
Genesis 32:23 He took them and sent them across the stream, along with all his possessions.
Leviticus 11:9 Of all the creatures that live in the water, whether in the seas or in the streams, you may eat anything with fins and scales.
- פֶּלֶג pelegchanneltranslated this way 9 times of its 10 uses · Strong’s H6388Noun · Translated: streams 8, waterway 1, like streams 1Full study and all 10 verses →
Job 29:6 when my steps were bathed in cream and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!
Psalm 1:3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, whose leaf does not wither, and who prospers in all he does.
- יְאֹר yeôrstreamtranslated this way 8 times of its 62 uses · Strong’s H2975Noun · Translated: Nile 26, river 10, streams 8, like the nile 6Full study and all 48 verses →
2 Kings 19:24 I have dug wells and drunk foreign waters. With the soles of my feet I have dried up all the streams of Egypt.”
Isaiah 7:18 On that day the LORD will whistle to the flies at the farthest streams of the Nile and to the bees in the land of Assyria.
- נָהָר nâhârstream, rivertranslated this way 7 times of its 114 uses · Strong’s H5104Noun · Translated: River 34, Euphrates 24, rivers 24, streams 6Full study and all 108 verses →
Numbers 24:6 They spread out like palm groves, like gardens beside a stream, like aloes the LORD has planted, like cedars beside the waters.
Job 28:11 He stops up the sources of the streams to bring what is hidden to light.
- אָפִיק âphîqchanneltranslated this way 6 times of its 19 uses · Strong’s H650Noun · Translated: ravines 7, streams 4, channels 3Full study and all 19 verses →
Job 6:15 But my brothers are as faithless as wadis, as seasonal streams that overflow,
Psalm 42:1 For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul longs after You, O God.
- נָהַר nâharflow, streamtranslated this way 3 times of its 6 uses · Strong’s H5102Verb · Translated: stream 3, radiant 2, radiant with joy 1Full study and all 6 verses →
Isaiah 2:2 In the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.
Jeremiah 51:44 I will punish Bel in Babylon. I will make him spew out what he swallowed. The nations will no longer stream to him; even the wall of Babylon will fall.
- נָזַל nâzalflow, trickle, drop, distiltranslated this way 2 times of its 16 uses · Strong’s H5140Verb · Translated: flow 3, currents 2, pour 2, streams 2Full study and all 16 verses →
Psalm 78:16 He brought streams from the stone and made water flow down like rivers.
Psalm 78:44 He turned their rivers to blood, and from their streams they could not drink.
- גָּלַשׁ gâlashsit, sit uptranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H1570Pronoun · Translated: streaming 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Song of Solomon 4:1 How beautiful you are, my darling— how very beautiful! Your eyes are like doves behind your veil. Your hair is like a flock of goats streaming down Mount Gilead.
Song of Solomon 6:5 Turn your eyes away from me, for they have overcome me. Your hair is like a flock of goats streaming down from Gilead.
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.