יָרֵךְ
thigh
also: side, loin, base fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
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
- Construct
- A noun bound to a following noun in a possessive / “of” relationship (the construct chain).
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
Gender
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Dual
- Exactly two — for natural pairs and some measures of time.
Every verse where H3409 appears in the Book of Song of Solomon — 2 distinct verses. 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.
Song of Solomon
- Song of Solomon 3:8 יְרֵכ֔/וֹ n c fs cs + sfx pers 3ms They all handle the sword, and are expert in war. Every man has his sword on his thigh, Because of fear in the night.
- Song of Solomon 7:1 יְרֵכַ֔יִ/ךְ n c fd cs + sfx pers 2fs How beautiful are your feet in sandals, prince's daughter! Your rounded thighs are like jewels, The work of the hands of a skillful workman.
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.
“thigh” is the headline sense of the Hebrew noun ירך (yârêk). Beyond “thigh” it also covers “side”, “loin”, and “base” — see its full sense range. It appears 32 verses across 10 books of the Hebrew Bible, among its moderately common vocabulary. First canonically at Genesis 24:2, it enters the text early. Related forms include ירכה. The sections below give every sense, occurrence, and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H3409 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 →
- 32
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 32 distinct verses.
- 10 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 10 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,041
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,041 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 32 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 32 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 21 verses · 66%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 8 verses · 25%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 3 verses · 9%
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: Thigh 14×, Side 7×, Shaft 3×
- American Standard Version: Thigh 13×, Side 6×, 's thigh 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Thigh 11×, Side 9×, Base 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Thigh 13×, Side of 5×, Hip 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H3409 across 34 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 H3409 across 34 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 7 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 H3409 across 29 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 5 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H3409 across 33 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
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 5 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. thigh,
- a. outside of thigh, where sword was worn, שִׂים חֶרֶב עַל־יְרֵכוֹ Ex 32:27 (E); וַיַּחְגֹּר אֹתָהּ עַל־יֶרֶךְ יְמִינוֹ Ju 3:16 and he girded it upon his right thigh, v 21 ψ 45:4 Ct 3:8; כַּף הַיָּרֵךְ Gn 32:33 hollow of the thigh, v 26(×2), 33 (all J); חַמּוּקֵי יְרֵכַיִךְ Ct 7:2 the roundings of thy thighs; מִמָּתְנַיִם וְעַד־יְרֵכַיִם Ex 28:42 (P); ‖ בֶּטֶן Nu 5:21, 22, 27 (P); צֹלֵעַ עַל־יְרֵכוֹ Gn 32:32 (J), limping upon his thigh; סָפַק עַל־יָרֵךְ Je 31:19 and (c. אֶל־) Ez 21:17, smite upon thigh, in token of consternation; וַיַּךְ אוֹתָם שׁוֹק עַל־ יָרֵךְ Ju 15:8 and he smote them, hip upon thigh, a great slaughter. e.g. Exodus 32:27
- b. thigh = loins, as seat of procreative power (RSK 34; Sem i, 360 (380)) יֹצְאֵי ירך those proceeding from the loins of any one Gn 46:26 Ex 1:5 (both P), Ju 8:30; hence שִׂים יַד תַּחַת ירך place the hand under thigh, in taking oath Gn 24:2, 9 (J), 47:29. e.g. Genesis 46:26
- 2. side (flank) of altar 2 K 16:14 Lv 1:11 (P); of tabernacle Ex 40:22, 24 Nu 3:29, 35 (all P); also יֶרֶךְ הַשַּׁעַר (for MT תּוֹךְ הַשּׁ׳) 𝔊 Th We Dr Bu Kit. e.g. 2 Kings 16:14
- 3. base (loins) of candlestick Ex 25:31; 37:17 Nu 8:4 (all P). e.g. Exodus 25:31
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.f. Nu 5:27 thigh, loin, side, base (NH id.; Aramaic יַרְכָּא; Zinj. ירך loin; Assyrian arku, arkâtu, back, rear, hereafter DlHWB 242; Arabic وَرِكٌ hip)—abs. יָרֵךְ Ju 15:8 + 6 times; cstr. יֶ֫רֶךְ Gn 24:9 + 11 times + 2 S 3:27 (v. infr.); sf. יְרֵכִי Gn 24:2; 47:29; יְרֵכֵךְ Nu 5:21; יְרֵכוֹ Gn 32:26 + 6 times; יְרֵכָהּ Ex 25:31 + 3 times; du. יְרֵכַיִם Ex 28:42; sf. יְרֵכַיִךְ Ct 7:2;—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Origin: from an unused root meaning to be soft
Jastrow Dictionary
A second Hebrew/Aramaic lexicon for comparison, covering Aramaic and post-biblical (Talmudic, Targumic, Midrashic) usage that the biblical-Hebrew BDB does not. Matched by lemma rather than by Strong’s number, so a lemma may carry more than one Jastrow headword (shown separately below), and the entries cover usage well beyond the Bible.
יָרֵךְ
- , constr. יֶרֶךְ f. (b. h.; cmp. ארך) [length-side,]
- 1. haunch, thigh, i.e. “the thick and fleshy member which commences at the bottom of the spine and extends to the lower leg (שׁוֹק)” (Ges. H. Dict. s. v.). Ḥull. VII, 1 נוהג בי׳ של ימין applies to the right leg. Ib. 2 שולח אדם י׳ וכ׳ one may send to a gentile a haunch with the nervus ischiadicus (v. גִּיד) in it. Sot. 11ᵇ; Ex. R. s. 1 י׳ מכאן וי׳ מכאן וכ׳ a leg on one side, and a leg on the other, and the potter’s mould between; a. fr.—Y. Pes. VII, beg. 34ᵃ כיָרֵיךְ עבה עבד וכ׳ R. J … wants the Passover lamb roasted like a thick (stuffed) thigh.—יוצאי י׳ descendants. B. Bath. VIII, 2 כל יוצאי יְרֵיכוֹ של בן וכ׳ all direct descendants of the (deceased) son (male heir) have the precedence to the daughter (the decedent’s sister); a. fr.—Du. יְרֵכַיִם. Tosef. Ohol. III, 4, sq.—Pl. יְרֵיכוֹת. Sot. l. c.; Ex. R. l. c. (expl. אָבְנַיִם, Ex. I, 16) בשעה … יְרֵכיֹתֶיהָ … כאבנים when a woman is about to give birth, her thighs grow cold like stones. e.g. Exodus 1:16
- 2. side. Gen. R. s. 69, v. חָדד. Meg. 13ᵃ אין אשה … בי׳ של חבירתה a woman is made jealous only by the side of another woman (rival).
- 3. the perpendicular stroke of a letter, leg. Y. Meg. I, 71ᶜ top יְרֵיכוֹ של ה"א the leg (stroke on the left side) of the He; ib. י׳ קטנה a small indication of it. Ib. אם גורדו … י׳ קטנה if he erases the (blotted letter Gimmel) and there remains a slight leg (indication of the vertical stroke connecting the head of the Gimmel with its foot).—Pl. as ab. Gitt. 20ᵃ, v. חָקַק. Sabb. 138ᵇ כירה … אחת מִיְּרֵכוֹתֶיהָ a portable stove one of whose legs is off.
יְרַךְ
- Targ. O. Num. V, 22 יירך ed. Berl. (Mss. יַרְכָּא, יָרֵךְ; ed. יַרְכִין pl.). Ib. 21. Targ. Ex. I, 5; a. fr.—Gen. R. s. 78 מטלע על יַרְכֵיה (not יריכה) limping on his thigh; a. e.—Pl. יִרְכָן, יַרְכָּן, (יַרְכִין). Targ. Ex. XXVIII, 42; a. e.—[B. Bath. 4ᵇ, v. דָּיְכֵי.]
A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (Marcus Jastrow; London, Luzac, 1903) — Public Domain. Digitized via Sefaria. Digitized via Sefaria. Full attribution on Sources.
Forms in the corpus
The 20 distinct written forms H3409 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.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H3409, 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 verse parallels
This word appears in 32 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 32 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
- Genesis 24:2
- Exodus 1:5
- Leviticus 1:11
- Numbers 3:29
- Judges 3:16
- 2 Kings 16:14
- Psalms 45:3
- Song of Solomon 3:8
- Jeremiah 31:19
- Ezekiel 21:12
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.
