Word study
Swell
6 Hebrew and 1 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: swell, swelling. 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 “swell” or one of its forms.
Compare the Hebrew words side by side
Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)
- שְׂאֵת seêthexaltation, dignitytranslated this way 7 times of its 14 uses · Strong’s H7613Noun · Translated: swelling 7Full study and all 13 verses →
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 13:10 The priest will examine him, and if there is a white swelling on the skin that has turned the hair white, and there is raw flesh in the swelling,
- צָבָה tsâbâhswell, swell uptranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H6638Verb · Translated: swell 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Numbers 5:22 May this water that brings a curse enter your stomach and cause your belly to swell and your thigh to shrivel.’ Then the woman is to say, ‘Amen, Amen.’
Numbers 5:27 When he has made her drink the water, if she has defiled herself and been unfaithful to her husband, then the water that brings a curse will enter her and cause bitter suffering; her belly will swell, her thigh will shrivel, and she will become accursed among her people.
- בָּצֵק bâtsêqswelltranslated this way 2 times of its 2 uses · Strong’s H1216Verb · Translated: swell 2Full study and all 2 verses →
Deuteronomy 8:4 Your clothing did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years.
Nehemiah 9:21 For forty years You sustained them in the wilderness, so that they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell.
- צָבֶה tsâbehswelling, swollentranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s H6639Adjective · Translated: swell 1Full study and its 1 verse →
Numbers 5:21 and the priest shall have the woman swear under the oath of the curse— ‘then may the LORD make you an attested curse among your people by making your thigh shrivel and your belly swell.
- רָחַב râchabbe, or grow, wide, largetranslated this way 1 time of its 23 uses · Strong’s H7337Verb · Translated: enlarges 4, enlarge 4, broaden 2Full study and all 23 verses →
Isaiah 60:5 Then you will look and be radiant, and your heart will tremble and swell with joy, because the riches of the sea will be brought to you, and the wealth of the nations will come to you.
- עָלָה âlâhgo up, ascend, climbtranslated this way 1 time of its 873 uses · Strong’s H5927Verb · Translated: go 118, went 107, brought 56, come 42Full study and all 807 verses →
Greek words (New Testament)
- πίμπρημι pímprēmiI am inflamed, I swelltranslated this way 1 time of its 1 use · Strong’s G4092Verb · Translated: swell 1Full study and its 1 verse →
Acts 28:6 The islanders were expecting him to swell up or suddenly drop dead. But after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god.
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.