αὐξάνω
to increase
‘to increase’ is one of 6 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Thayer's Greek Lexicon
From Thayer's Greek Lexicon
Where this word appears
See every Present-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
- Imperfect
- Continuous or repeated action in past time (“was writing”).
- 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).
- Future
- Action expected in future time.
Voice
- Active
- The subject performs the action.
- Passive
- The subject receives the action.
Mood
- Indicative
- States a fact or asks a factual question (the mood of reality).
- Participle
- A verbal adjective (“writing,” “having written”).
- Subjunctive
- Expresses probability, purpose, or possibility (the mood of contingency).
- Imperative
- Expresses a command or request.
- Infinitive
- A verbal noun (“to write”), unmarked for person or number.
Case
- Nominative
- The case of the subject (and the predicate nominative).
- Genitive
- The case of source, possession, or “of” — answers “whose / from what.”
Person
- 3rd person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 1st person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
- 2nd person
- The one addressed (“you”).
Gender
- Neuter
- Grammatically neuter.
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one.
Grammatical forms 14 distinct
- Verb, Imperfect, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 6 times (27%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 2 times (9%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 2 times (9%)
- Verb, Present, Passive, Participle, Nominative, Singular, Neuter 2 times (9%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Subjunctive, 1st person, Plural 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Subjunctive, 2nd person, Plural 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Subjunctive, 3rd person, Singular 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Future, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 1 time (5%)
+6 more forms (6 occurrences)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (Robinson–Tischendorf, public domain), counted across 22 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where G837 appears — 22 distinct verses across 11 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 2 verses
- Matthew 6:28 αὐξάνουσιν pres act ind 3pl Why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They don't toil, neither do they spin,
- Matthew 13:32 αὐξηθῇ aor pass subj 3sg which indeed is smaller than all seeds. But when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in its branches."
Mark 1 verse
Luke 3 verses
- Luke 1:80 ηὔξανεν impf act ind 3sg The child was growing, and becoming strong in spirit, and was in the desert until the day of his public appearance to Israel.
- Luke 2:40 ηὔξανεν impf act ind 3sg The child was growing, and was becoming strong in spirit, being filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him.
- Luke 13:19 ηὔξησεν aor act ind 3sg It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and put in his own garden. It grew, and became a large tree, and the birds of the sky lodged in its branches."
John 1 verse
Acts 4 verses
- Acts 6:7 ηὔξανεν impf act ind 3sg The word of God increased and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem exceedingly. A great company of the priests were obedient to the faith.
- Acts 7:17 ηὔξησεν aor act ind 3sg "But as the time of the promise came close which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt,
- Acts 12:24 ηὔξανεν impf act ind 3sg But the word of God grew and multiplied.
- Acts 19:20 ηὔξανεν impf act ind 3sg So the word of the Lord was growing and becoming mighty.
1 Corinthians 2 verses
2 Corinthians 2 verses
- 2 Corinthians 9:10 αὐξήσει fut act ind 3sg Now may he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food, supply and multiply your seed for sowing, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;
- 2 Corinthians 10:15 αὐξανομένης pres pass ptcp gen sg fem not boasting beyond proper limits in other men's labors, but having hope that as your faith grows, we will be abundantly enlarged by you in our sphere of influence,
Ephesians 2 verses
Colossians 3 verses
- Colossians 1:6 αὐξανόμενον pres pass ptcp nom sg neut which has come to you; even as it is in all the world and is bearing fruit and growing, as it does in you also, since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth;
- Colossians 1:10 αὐξανόμενοι pres pass ptcp nom pl masc that you may walk worthily of the Lord, to please him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;
- Colossians 2:19 αὔξει pres act ind 3sg and not holding firmly to the Head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and ligaments, grows with God's growth.
1 Peter 1 verse
2 Peter 1 verse
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.
The Greek verb αυξανω centers on the idea of “to increase.” Thayer's distinguishes 6 senses for it. Spanning 22 verses in 11 books, it ranks among the uncommon words of the Greek New Testament. Debuting at Matthew 6:28, it then recurs through the corpus. Sharing its root, it stands alongside αυξησις and υγιης. Dig into 22-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's G837 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 →
- 22
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 22 distinct verses.
- 11 / 27
- NT books
- The word appears in 11 of 27 New Testament books.
- #586
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Greek words (rank 586 of 5,347 Greek words by occurrence).
View all 22 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Acts 4 verses 18%
- Luke 3 verses 14%
- Colossians 3 verses 14%
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 22 distinct verses.
- Pauline corpus 9 verses · 41%
- Gospels 7 verses · 32%
- Lukan (Luke–Acts) 7 verses · 32%
- General (Catholic) Epistles 2 verses · 9%
- Johannine 1 verse · 5%
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: Grew 6×, Increase 2×, Increased 2×
- American Standard Version: Grew 6×, Groweth 2×, Increase 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Continued to spread 3×, Grew 3×, Grow 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Grows 3×, Grew 2×, Grow 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders G837 across 22 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 10 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 G837 across 21 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.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders G837 across 23 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 10 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 G837 across 25 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 12 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 6 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 cause to grow, augment
- to increase, become greater
- of plants
- of infants
- of a multitude of people
- of inward Christian growth
Word origin
Origin: a prolonged form of a primary verb
A prolonged form of a primary verb; to grow (wax) that is enlarge (literally or figuratively actively or passively): - grow (up) (give the) increase.
— Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance (1890), public domain.
Forms in the corpus
The 14 distinct written forms G837 takes in the Greek New Testament, most frequent first — each parse links to that tense’s occurrences in the concordance.
Same root — word family
Other Thayer's entries built from the same root as G837, 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.
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint usage
The same Greek word αυξανω appears 35 times in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), across 34 verses in 12 books.
- 35
- LXX occurrences
- Tagged occurrences of this Greek word in the Septuagint.
- 34
- verses
- Distinct Septuagint verses containing this word.
- 12 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 12 of the 39 Old Testament books.
Sample Septuagint occurrences
- Genesis 1:22 αὐξάνω
- Exodus 1:7 αὐξάνω
- Leviticus 26:9 αὐξάνω
- Numbers 24:7 αὐξάνω
- Joshua 4:14 αὐξάνω
- Judges 5:11 αὐξάνω
- 1 Chronicles 14:2 αὐξάνω
- 2 Chronicles 11:23 αὐξάνω
- Job 42:10 αὐξάνω
- Psalms 104:24 αὐξάνω
- Isaiah 61:11 αὐξάνω
- Jeremiah 3:16 αὐξάνω
Septuagint occurrences (same lexeme)
Every verse where the same Strong’s number (G837) 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 1:22 αὐξάνω God blessed them, saying, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth."
- Genesis 1:28 αὐξάνω God blessed them. God said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
- Genesis 8:17 αὐξάνω Bring forth with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh, including birds, cattle, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply on the earth."
- Genesis 9:1 αὐξάνω God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
- Genesis 9:7 αὐξάνω Be fruitful, and multiply. Bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply in it."
- Genesis 17:6 αὐξάνω I will make you exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of you. Kings will come out of you.
- Genesis 17:20 αὐξάνω As for Ishmael, I have heard you. Behold, I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. He will become the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation.
- Genesis 21:8 αὐξάνω The child grew, and was weaned. Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned.
- Genesis 21:20 αὐξάνω God was with the boy, and he grew. He lived in the wilderness, and became, as he grew up, an archer.
- Genesis 25:27 αὐξάνω The boys grew. Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field. Jacob was a quiet man, living in tents.
- Genesis 26:22 αὐξάνω He left that place, and dug another well. They didn't argue over that one. He called it Rehoboth. He said, "For now Yahweh has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land."
- Genesis 28:3 αὐξάνω May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, that you may be a company of peoples,
- Genesis 30:30 αὐξάνω For it was little which you had before I came, and it has increased to a multitude. Yahweh has blessed you wherever I turned. Now when will I provide for my own house also?"
- Genesis 35:11 αὐξάνω God said to him, "I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations will be from you, and kings will come out of your loins.
- Genesis 41:52 αὐξάνω The name of the second, he called Ephraim: "For God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction."
- Genesis 47:27 αὐξάνω Israel lived in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen; and they got themselves possessions therein, and were fruitful, and multiplied exceedingly.
- Genesis 48:4 αὐξάνω and said to me, 'Behold, I will make you fruitful, and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your seed after you for an everlasting possession.'
- Genesis 49:22 αὐξάνω "Joseph is a fruitful vine, A fruitful vine by a spring; His branches run over the wall.
- Exodus 1:7 αὐξάνω The children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and grew exceedingly mighty; and the land was filled with them.
- Exodus 23:30 αὐξάνω Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and inherit the land.
- Leviticus 26:9 αὐξάνω "'I will have respect for you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and will establish my covenant with you.
- Numbers 24:7 αὐξάνω Water shall flow from his buckets, His seed shall be in many waters, His king shall be higher than Agag, His kingdom shall be exalted.
- Joshua 4:14 αὐξάνω On that day Yahweh magnified Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they feared him, as they feared Moses, all the days of his life.
- Judges 5:11 αὐξάνω Far from the noise of archers, in the places of drawing water, There shall they rehearse the righteous acts of Yahweh, [Even] the righteous acts of his rule in Israel. Then the people of Yahweh went down to the gates.
- 1 Chronicles 14:2 αὐξάνω David perceived that Yahweh had established him king over Israel; for his kingdom was exalted on high, for his people Israel's sake.
- 1 Chronicles 17:10 αὐξάνω and [as] from the day that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel; and I will subdue all your enemies. Moreover I tell you that Yahweh will build you a house.
- 1 Chronicles 23:17 αὐξάνω The sons of Eliezer were: Rehabiah the chief; and Eliezer had no other sons; but the sons of Rehabiah were very many.
- 2 Chronicles 11:23 αὐξάνω He dealt wisely, and dispersed of all his sons throughout all the lands of Judah and Benjamin, to every fortified city: and he gave them food in abundance. He sought [for them] many wives.
- Job 42:10 αὐξάνω Yahweh turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends. Yahweh gave Job twice as much as he had before.
- Psalms 104:24 αὐξάνω Yahweh, how many are your works! In wisdom have you made them all. The earth is full of your riches.
- Isaiah 61:11 αὐξάνω For as the earth brings forth its bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth; so the Lord Yahweh will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations.
- Jeremiah 3:16 αὐξάνω It shall come to pass, when you are multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says Yahweh, they shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of Yahweh; neither shall it come to mind; neither shall they remember it; neither shall they miss it; neither shall it be made any more.
- Jeremiah 22:30 αὐξάνω Thus says Yahweh, Write you this man childless, a man who shall not prosper in his days; for no more shall a man of his seed prosper, sitting on the throne of David, and ruling in Judah.
- Jeremiah 23:3 αὐξάνω I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and multiply.
These are occurrences of the same Greek lexeme (G837) 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.
