Word study
Ten
5 Hebrew and 2 Greek words behind this English word
The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: ten, tens. 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 “ten” 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)
- עֶשֶׂר esertentranslated this way 147 times of its 168 uses · Strong’s H6235Number · Translated: ten 127, 10 000 15, weighing ten 12, tens 3Full study and all 149 verses →
Genesis 16:3 So after he had lived in Canaan for ten years, his wife Sarai took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to Abram to be his wife.
Exodus 18:21 Furthermore, select capable men from among the people — God-fearing, trustworthy men who are averse to dishonest gain. Appoint them over the people as leaders of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens.
- רְבָבָה rebâbâhmultitude, myriad, ten thousandtranslated this way 9 times of its 16 uses · Strong’s H7233Number · Translated: ten thousand 4, tens of thousands 4, myriads 3Full study and all 16 verses →
Leviticus 26:8 Five of you will pursue a hundred, and a hundred of you will pursue ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you.
Deuteronomy 32:30 How could one man pursue a thousand, or two put ten thousand to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, unless the LORD had given them up?
- עֲשַׂר ăsara tentranslated this way 4 times of its 4 uses · Strong’s H6236Number · Translated: ten 4Full study and all 3 verses →
Daniel 7:7 After this, as I watched in my vision in the night, suddenly a fourth beast appeared, and it was terrifying — dreadful and extremely strong — with large iron teeth. It devoured and crushed; then it trampled underfoot whatever was left. It was different from all the beasts before it, and it had ten horns.
Daniel 7:20 I also wanted to know about the ten horns on its head and the other horn that came up, before which three of them fell— the horn whose appearance was more imposing than the others, with eyes and with a mouth that spoke words of arrogance.
- עָשׂוֹר âsôra ten, decadetranslated this way 3 times of its 16 uses · Strong’s H6218Noun · Translated: tenth 11, ten strings 2, ten 1, tenth day 1Full study and all 16 verses →
Genesis 24:55 But her brother and mother said, “Let the girl remain with us ten days or so. After that, she may go.”
Psalm 33:2 Praise the LORD with the harp; make music to Him with ten strings.
- רִבּוֹ ribbôten thousand, myriadtranslated this way 2 times of its 5 uses · Strong’s H7239Number · Translated: tens of thousands 2, 10 000 1, 18 000 1, great things 1Full study and all 4 verses →
Psalm 68:17 The chariots of God are tens of thousands — thousands of thousands are they; the Lord is in His sanctuary as He was at Sinai.
Daniel 11:12 When the army is carried off, the king of the South will be proud in heart and will cast down tens of thousands, but he will not triumph.
Greek words (New Testament)
- δέκα dékatentranslated this way 24 times of its 27 uses · Strong’s G1176Adjective · Translated: ten 24, eighteen 3Full study and all 24 verses →
Matthew 20:24 When the ten heard about this, they were indignant with the two brothers.
Mark 10:41 When the ten heard about this, they became indignant with James and John.
- μύριοι mýrioiten thousand, innumerabletranslated this way 3 times of its 3 uses · Strong’s G3463Adjective · Translated: ten thousand 2, owing ten thousand 1Full study and all 3 verses →
Matthew 18:24 As he began the settlements, a debtor owing ten thousand talents was brought to him.
1 Corinthians 4:15 Even if you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel.
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.
What the Bible says about ten: 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.