κατανοέω
to observe
‘to observe’ is one of 2 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Thayer's Greek Lexicon
From Thayer's Greek Lexicon
Where this word appears
See every Aorist-tense verb in the Greek New Testament →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Tense
- Aorist
- Action viewed as a simple whole, without regard to duration — often past (perfective aspect).
- Present
- Ongoing or general action in present time (imperfective aspect).
- Imperfect
- Continuous or repeated action in past time (“was writing”).
Voice
- Active
- The subject performs the action.
Mood
- Imperative
- Expresses a command or request.
- Indicative
- States a fact or asks a factual question (the mood of reality).
- Infinitive
- A verbal noun (“to write”), unmarked for person or number.
- Participle
- A verbal adjective (“writing,” “having written”).
- Subjunctive
- Expresses probability, purpose, or possibility (the mood of contingency).
Case
- Nominative
- The case of the subject (and the predicate nominative).
- Dative
- The case of the indirect object, means, or location — “to / for / with / in.”
Person
- 2nd person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 3rd person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 1st person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Plural
- More than one.
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms 9 distinct
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Imperative, 2nd person, Plural 3 times (21%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 2 times (14%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Infinitive 2 times (14%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 2nd person, Singular 2 times (14%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Participle, Nominative, Singular, Masculine 1 time (7%)
- Verb, Imperfect, Active, Indicative, 1st person, Singular 1 time (7%)
- Verb, Imperfect, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Plural 1 time (7%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Dative, Singular, Masculine 1 time (7%)
+1 more form (1 occurrence)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (Robinson–Tischendorf, public domain), counted across 14 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where G2657 appears — 14 distinct verses across 6 books. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Greek form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Greek New Testament; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences of this word are not indexed here.
Matthew 1 verse
Luke 4 verses
- Luke 6:41 κατανοεῖς pres act ind 2sg Why do you see the speck of chaff that is in your brother's eye, but don't consider the beam that is in your own eye?
- Luke 12:24 κατανοήσατε aor act impv 2pl Consider the ravens: they don't sow, they don't reap, they have no warehouse or barn, and God feeds them. How much more valuable are you than birds!
- Luke 12:27 κατανοήσατε aor act impv 2pl Consider the lilies, how they grow. They don't toil, neither do they spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
- Luke 20:23 κατανοήσας aor act ptcp nom sg masc But he perceived their craftiness, and said to them, "Why do you test me?
Acts 4 verses
- Acts 7:31 κατανοῆσαι aor act inf When Moses saw it, he wondered at the sight. As he came close to see, a voice of the Lord came to him,
- Acts 7:32 κατανοῆσαι aor act inf 'I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' Moses trembled, and dared not look.
- Acts 11:6 κατενόουν impf act ind 1sg When I had looked intently at it, I considered, and saw the four-footed animals of the earth, wild animals, creeping things, and birds of the sky.
- Acts 27:39 κατενόουν impf act ind 3pl When it was day, they didn't recognize the land, but they noticed a certain bay with a beach, and they decided to try to drive the ship onto it.
Romans 1 verse
Hebrews 2 verses
James 2 verses
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
κατανοεω (katanoéō) is a Greek verb most often rendered “to observe.” Scripture first uses it in Matthew 7:3. Spanning 14 verses in 6 books, it ranks among the uncommon words of the Greek New Testament. Luke dominates its distribution — 4 of 14 verses. Ranging over 2 senses, it is not a single-sense word. For the data behind this summary, explore the sense tree and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's G2657 catalogs a Greek word from the Greek New Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Greek New Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 14
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 14 distinct verses.
- 6 / 27
- NT books
- The word appears in 6 of 27 New Testament books.
- #814
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Greek words (rank 814 of 5,347 Greek words by occurrence).
View all 14 occurrences in the concordance →
By section of the New Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Some books belong to more than one corpus (Luke is in both the Gospels and the Lukan corpus, and so on), so these shares overlap and need not total 100%. Each figure is a share of the word’s 14 distinct verses.
- Lukan (Luke–Acts) 8 verses · 57%
- Gospels 5 verses · 36%
- Hebrews 2 verses · 14%
- General (Catholic) Epistles 2 verses · 14%
- Pauline corpus 1 verse · 7%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
- King James Version: Consider 3×, Behold 2×
- American Standard Version: Consider 3×, Behold 2×, Considerest 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Consider 2×, Look 2×, Notice 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Consider 2×, Look 2×, Notice 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders G2657 across 14 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 9 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders G2657 across 13 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 6 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders G2657 across 14 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 8 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders G2657 across 16 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 8 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in Thayer's
The 2 senses Thayer's distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency or importance). The full entry — with sub-senses — is in the Lexicon Entry tab.
- to perceive, remark, observe, understand
- to consider attentively, fix one's eyes or mind upon
Word origin
Derived from κατα (katá) (G2596) — down.
Forms in the corpus
The 8 distinct written forms G2657 takes in the Greek New Testament, most frequent first — each parse links to that tense’s occurrences in the concordance.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| κατανοήσατε katanoḗsate | Verb, Aorist, Active, Imperative, 2nd person, Plural | Luke 12:24 | 3 |
| κατενόουν katenóoun | Verb, Imperfect, Active, Indicative, 1st person, Singular | Acts 11:6 | 2 |
| κατανοεῖς katanoeîs | Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 2nd person, Singular | Matthew 7:3 | 2 |
| κατανοῆσαι katanoē̂sai | Verb, Aorist, Active, Infinitive | Acts 7:31 | 2 |
| κατενόησεν katenóēsen | Verb, Aorist, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular | Romans 4:19 | 2 |
| κατανοήσας katanoḗsas | Verb, Aorist, Active, Participle, Nominative, Singular, Masculine | Luke 20:23 | 1 |
| κατανοοῦντι katanooûnti | Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Dative, Singular, Masculine | James 1:23 | 1 |
| κατανοῶμεν katanoō̂men | Verb, Present, Active, Subjunctive, 1st person, Plural | Hebrews 10:24 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other Thayer's entries built from the same root as G2657, grouped by Strong’s listed origin. These share a root / origin per the lexicon — not necessarily a shared meaning. Each links to that word’s own entry.
Derives from
Shares the same root
- καθα kathá G2505 according as
- καθαιρεω kathairéō G2507 to tear down
- καθαπτω katháptō G2510 to fasten down
- καθεδρα kathédra G2515 seat
- καθεζομαι kathézomai G2516 to sit down
- καθεξης kathexēs G2517 in order
- καθευδω katheúdō G2518 to fall asleep
- καθηγητης kathēgētḗs G2519 guide
- καθηκω kathḗkō G2520 to come down
- καθημαι káthēmai G2521 to sit down
- καθημερινος kathēmerinós G2522 daily
- καθιημι kathíēmi G2524 to send down
- καθιστημι kathístēmi G2525 to place
- καθο kathó G2526 according to what
- καθολου kathólou G2527 wholly
- καθοπλιζω kathoplízō G2528 to arm
- καθοραω kathoráō G2529 to see clearly
- καθοτι kathóti G2530 according to what
- καθως kathṓs G2531 according as
- καμμυω kammýō G2576 to close eyes
- καταβαινω katabaínō G2597 to descend
- καταβαλλω katabállō G2598 to cast down
- καταβαρεω katabaréō G2599 to weigh down
- καταβιβαζω katabibázō G2601 to bring down
+103 more words share this root (not shown).
Compare all same-root words → Showing 4 of 129 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint usage
The same Greek word κατανοεω appears 23 times in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), across 23 verses in 9 books.
- 23
- LXX occurrences
- Tagged occurrences of this Greek word in the Septuagint.
- 23
- verses
- Distinct Septuagint verses containing this word.
- 9 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 9 of the 39 Old Testament books.
Sample Septuagint occurrences
- Genesis 3:6 κατανοέω
- Exodus 2:11 κατανοέω
- Numbers 32:8 κατανοέω
- 1 Kings 3:21 κατανοέω
- Job 23:15 κατανοέω
- Psalms 9:35 κατανοέω
- Isaiah 5:12 κατανοέω
- Daniel 7:21 κατανοέω
- Habakkuk 3:2 κατανοέω
Septuagint occurrences (same lexeme)
Every verse where the same Strong’s number (G2657) appears in the Greek Septuagint. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context; the Greek form is the matched word — the English is not keyword-highlighted.
- Genesis 3:6 κατανοέω When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit of it, and ate; and she gave some to her husband with her, and he ate.
- Genesis 42:9 κατανοέω Joseph remembered the dreams which he dreamed about them, and said to them, "You are spies! You have come to see the nakedness of the land."
- Exodus 2:11 κατανοέω It happened in those days, when Moses had grown up, that he went out to his brothers, and looked at their burdens. He saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his brothers.
- Exodus 19:21 κατανοέω Yahweh said to Moses, "Go down, charge the people, lest they break through to Yahweh to gaze, and many of them perish.
- Exodus 33:8 κατανοέω It happened that when Moses went out to the Tent, that all the people rose up, and stood, everyone at their tent door, and watched Moses, until he had gone into the Tent.
- Numbers 32:8 κατανοέω Thus did your fathers, when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to see the land.
- Numbers 32:9 κατανοέω For when they went up to the valley of Eshcol, and saw the land, they discouraged the heart of the children of Israel, that they should not go into the land which Yahweh had given them.
- 1 Kings 3:21 κατανοέω When I rose in the morning to give my child suck, behold, it was dead; but when I had looked at it in the morning, behold, it was not my son, whom I bore.
- Job 23:15 κατανοέω Therefore I am terrified at his presence. When I consider, I am afraid of him.
- Job 30:20 κατανοέω I cry to you, and you do not answer me. I stand up, and you gaze at me.
- Psalms 9:35 κατανοέω
- Psalms 21:18 κατανοέω
- Psalms 36:32 κατανοέω
- Psalms 90:8 κατανοέω You have set our iniquities before you, Our secret sins in the light of your presence.
- Psalms 93:9 κατανοέω
- Psalms 118:15 κατανοέω The voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tents of the righteous. "The right hand of Yahweh does valiantly.
- Psalms 118:18 κατανοέω Yah has punished me severely, But he has not given me over to death.
- Psalms 141:5 κατανοέω Let the righteous strike me, it is kindness; Let him reprove me, it is like oil on the head; Don't let my head refuse it; Yet my prayer is always against evil deeds.
- Isaiah 5:12 κατανοέω The harp, lyre, tambourine, and flute, with wine, are at their feasts; But they don't regard the work of Yahweh, Neither have they considered the operation of his hands.
- Isaiah 57:1 κατανοέω The righteous perishes, and no man lays it to heart; and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil [to come].
- Isaiah 59:16 κατανοέω He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: therefore his own arm brought salvation to him; and his righteousness, it upheld him.
- Daniel 7:21 κατανοέω I saw, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them;
- Habakkuk 3:2 κατανοέω Yahweh, I have heard of your fame. I stand in awe of your deeds, Yahweh. Renew your work in the midst of the years. In the midst of the years make it known. In wrath, you remember mercy.
These are occurrences of the same Greek lexeme (G2657) in the Septuagint — not a translation of any one Hebrew word. The store carries no word-level Hebrew↔Greek alignment, so no Hebrew original is asserted here. Counts come from the recovered LXX Strong's tagging — high-frequency vocabulary is well covered, while rare or late forms may be untagged — so they reflect tagged occurrences and may slightly undercount.
