Word study

Thrive

6 Hebrew words behind this English word

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

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • הָיָה hâyâhfall out, come to pass, become, betranslated this way 1 time of its 2,848 uses · Strong’s H1961Verb  ·  Translated: will be 206, become 178, came 169, was 151

    Genesis 30:29 Then Jacob answered, “You know how I have served you and how your livestock have thrived under my care.

    Full study and all 2,573 verses →
  • חָלַם châlambe healthy, strongtranslated this way 1 time of its 21 uses · Strong’s H2492Verb  ·  Translated: dream 8, dreams 4, dreamer 3

    Job 39:4 Their young ones thrive and grow up in the open field; they leave and do not return.

    Full study and all 18 verses →
  • טוּב ṭûbgood things, goods, goodnesstranslated this way 1 time of its 32 uses · Strong’s H2898Noun  ·  Translated: goodness 11, best 4, good things 3, prosperity 3

    Proverbs 11:10 When the righteous thrive, the city rejoices, and when the wicked perish, there are shouts of joy.

    Full study and all 31 verses →
  • פָּרַח pârachbud, sprout, shoottranslated this way 1 time of its 33 uses · Strong’s H6524Verb  ·  Translated: flourish 6, budded 3, broken 3, sprout 3

    Proverbs 11:28 He who trusts in his riches will fall, but the righteous will thrive like foliage.

    Full study and all 32 verses →
  • רָבָה râbâhbe, or become, much, many, greattranslated this way 1 time of its 219 uses · Strong’s H7235Verb  ·  Translated: multiply 39, multiplied 23, many 15, much 10

    Proverbs 29:16 When the wicked thrive, rebellion increases; but the righteous will see their downfall.

    Full study and all 207 verses →
  • רְבָבָה rebâbâhmultitude, myriad, ten thousandtranslated this way 1 time of its 16 uses · Strong’s H7233Number  ·  Translated: ten thousand 4, tens of thousands 4, myriads 3

    Ezekiel 16:7 I made you thrive like a plant of the field. You grew up and matured and became very beautiful. Your breasts were formed and your hair grew, but you were naked and bare.

    Full study and all 16 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.