חַרְטֹם
diviner
also: magician, astrologer fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
See every Absolute-state word in the Hebrew Bible →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Common
- A common noun — a general class of person, place, or thing (“king,” “city,” “water”), not a specific name.
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
- Construct
- A noun bound to a following noun in a possessive / “of” relationship (the construct chain).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Grammatical forms
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute 8 times (73%)
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Construct 3 times (27%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 11 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H2748 appears — 10 distinct verses across 3 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 Hebrew 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 Hebrew Bible; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences are not indexed here.
Genesis 2 verses
- Genesis 41:8 חַרְטֻמֵּ֥י n c mp cs It happened in the morning that his spirit was troubled, and he sent and called for all the magicians of Egypt, and all the wise men of it. Pharaoh told them his dream, but there was no one who could interpret them to Pharaoh.
- Genesis 41:24 הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֔ים ptcl def.art + n c mp The thin heads of grain swallowed up the seven good heads of grain. I told it to the magicians; but there was no one who could explain it to me."
Exodus 6 verses
- Exodus 7:11 חַרְטֻמֵּ֥י n c mp cs Then Pharaoh also called for the wise men and the sorcerers. They also, the magicians of Egypt, did in like manner with their enchantments.
- Exodus 7:22 חַרְטֻמֵּ֥י n c mp cs The magicians of Egypt did in like manner with their enchantments; and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he didn't listen to them; as Yahweh had spoken.
- Exodus 8:7 הַֽ/חֲרְטֻמִּ֖ים ptcl def.art + n c mp The magicians did in like manner with their enchantments, and brought up frogs on the land of Egypt.
- Exodus 8:18 הַ/חַרְטֻמִּ֧ים ptcl def.art + n c mp The magicians tried with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they couldn't. There were lice on man, and on animal.
- Exodus 8:19 הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּים֙ ptcl def.art + n c mp Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God:" and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he didn't listen to them; as Yahweh had spoken.
- Exodus 9:11 הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֗ים בַּֽ/חֲרְטֻמִּ֖ם ptcl def.art + n c mp prep + n c mp The magicians couldn't stand before Moses because of the boils; for the boils were on the magicians, and on all the Egyptians.
Daniel 2 verses
- Daniel 1:20 הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּים֙ ptcl def.art + n c mp In every matter of wisdom and understanding, concerning which the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters who were in all his realm.
- Daniel 2:2 לַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֜ים prep det + n c mp Then the king commanded to call the magicians, and the enchanters, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans, to tell the king his dreams. So they came in and stood before the king.
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.
“diviner” is the headline sense of the Hebrew noun חרטם (charṭôm). More than half of its appearances fall in Exodus. The Hebrew Bible uses it across 10 verses — uncommon. Its earliest occurrence is Genesis 41:8. Beyond “diviner” it also covers “magician” and “astrologer” — see its full sense range. The sections below give every sense, occurrence, and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H2748 catalogs a Hebrew word from the Hebrew Old Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Hebrew Old Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 10
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 10 distinct verses.
- 3 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 3 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #2,210
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 2,210 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 10 occurrences in the concordance →
By section of the Old Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Each share is this word’s portion of its verses in that division of the Hebrew canon. Each figure is a share of the word’s 10 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 8 verses · 80%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 2 verses · 20%
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: Magicians 7×
- American Standard Version: Magicians 7×
- Berean Standard Bible: Magicians 8×, Enchanters 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Magicians 8×, Magicians of 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H2748 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 4 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 H2748 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 4 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 H2748 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 1 rendering that appears 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 H2748 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Senses in the full BDB
What do BDB’s symbols mean?
BDB uses these scholarly abbreviations:
| Symbol | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 𝔊 | the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation, LXX) |
| 𝔙 | the Vulgate (the Latin translation) |
| 𝔖 | the Syriac version (the Peshitta) |
| 𝔗 | the Targum (the Aramaic translation) |
| ψ | the Psalms |
| √ | root (the underlying root or stem) |
| ‖ | parallel passage (a synonymous or contrasted parallel) |
| † | the dagger: every passage where the word occurs is cited |
The 2 senses and sub-senses the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency), with BDB’s own verbatim wording and sub-sense lettering. Shown in Hebrew script with BDB’s own scholarly abbreviations. The condensed entry is in the Lexicon Entry tab. See also the Forms in the corpus table below.
- 1. magicians of Egypt Gn 41:8 (E; ‖ חֲכָמִים), v 24 (E), Ex 8:3, 14, 15; 7:11 (‖ חֲכָמִים, מְכַשְּׁפִים), v 22 9:11(×2) (all P). e.g. Genesis 41:8
- 2. magicians of Babylon Dn 1:20; 2:2 (‖ אַשָּׁפִים, מְכַשְּׁפִים, כַּשְׂדִּים). the fact that the word is always applied to Egypt. magicians, except Dn 2:2 (late), suggests Egypt. origin, but no agreement among Egyptologists: HarkavyJAs, 1870, Mars–Avril, 169 proposes xar, speak + tum, hidden = teller of hidden things; WiedSamml 44: thinks Heb. word perhaps imitating an Egypt. cher-ṭem-t, he who holds the book; FCCook ‘Speaker’s’ Comm. i. 279 proposes cher-tum = bearer of sacred words. e.g. Daniel 1:20
Senses from the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon (Brown, Driver, Briggs; Oxford 1906 — public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). Full attribution on Sources.
Word origin
n.m. Ex 7:22 engraver, writer, only in deriv. sense of one possessed of occult knowledge, diviner, astrologer, magician (prob. = ם + חֶרֶט, v. Di Ol§ 216, 5 Sta§§ 295, 327 a)—only pl. abs. חַרְטֻמִּים Gn 41:24 + 4 times; חַרְטֻמִּם Ex 8:15; 9:11; cstr. חַרְטֻמֵּי Gn 41:8 + 2 times;—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from חרט (chereṭ) (H2747) — stylus.
Forms in the corpus
The 8 distinct written forms H2748 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that state’s occurrences in the concordance. Hebrew forms include their vowel points and cantillation, so a single lemma takes many written forms.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| חַרְטֻמֵּ֥י | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Construct | Exodus 7:11 | 3 |
| הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּים֙ | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 1:20 | 2 |
| בַּֽ/חֲרְטֻמִּ֖ם | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Exodus 9:11 | 1 |
| הַ/חַרְטֻמִּ֧ים | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Exodus 8:18 | 1 |
| הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֔ים | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Genesis 41:24 | 1 |
| הַֽ/חֲרְטֻמִּ֖ים | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Exodus 8:7 | 1 |
| הַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֗ים | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Exodus 9:11 | 1 |
| לַֽ/חַרְטֻמִּ֜ים | Noun, Common, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 2:2 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H2748, 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
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 10 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 10 Hebrew verses it occurs in. You can read those verses in Greek by switching the Old Testament edition to the Septuagint.
Read these verses in the Septuagint
This is a verse-level parallel only — the same verses exist in both the Hebrew and Greek Old Testaments. No word-level Hebrew↔Greek correspondence is claimed: the data carries no such alignment, so no Greek word is shown as this Hebrew word’s translation. Coverage is not total — the Septuagint omits the deuterocanon and renumbers the Psalms, so some Hebrew verses have no direct Greek parallel.
