כְּמוֹ
like
‘like’ is one of 2 main senses 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
- Preposition
- A relational word (e.g. “in,” “to,” “from”) governing a noun.
Every verse where H3644 appears in the Book of Psalms — 25 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.
Psalms
- Psalms 29:6 כְּמוֹ כְּמ֣וֹ prep prep He makes them also to skip like a calf; Lebanon and Sirion like a young, wild ox.
- Psalms 35:10 כָ֫מ֥וֹ/ךָ prep + sfx pers 2ms All my bones shall say, "Yahweh, who is like you, Who delivers the poor from him who is too strong for him, Yes, the poor and the needy from him who robs him?"
- Psalms 50:21 כָמ֑וֹ/ךָ prep + sfx pers 2ms You have done these things, and I kept silent. You thought that the "I AM" was just like you. I will rebuke you, and accuse you in front of your eyes.
- Psalms 58:4 כְּמוֹ prep Their poison is like the poison of a snake; Like a deaf cobra that stops its ear,
- Psalms 58:7 כְמוֹ כְּמ֣וֹ prep prep Let them vanish as water that flows away. When they draw the bow, let their arrows be made blunt.
- Psalms 58:8 כְּמ֣וֹ prep Let them be like a snail which melts and passes away, Like the stillborn child, who has not seen the sun.
- Psalms 58:9 כְּמוֹ כְּמוֹ prep prep Before your pots can feel the heat of the thorns, He will sweep away the green and the burning alike.
- Psalms 61:6 כְּמוֹ prep You will prolong the king's life; His years shall be for generations.
- Psalms 63:5 כְּמ֤וֹ prep My soul shall be satisfied as with the richest food. My mouth shall praise you with joyful lips,
- Psalms 71:19 כָמֽוֹ/ךָ prep + sfx pers 2ms Your righteousness also, God, reaches to the heavens; You have done great things. God, who is like you?
- Psalms 73:15 כְמ֑וֹ prep If I had said, "I will speak thus;" Behold, I would have betrayed the generation of your children.
- Psalms 78:13 כְּמוֹ prep He split the sea, and caused them to pass through; He made the waters stand as a heap.
- Psalms 78:69 כְּמוֹ prep He built his sanctuary like the heights, Like the earth which he has established forever.
- Psalms 79:5 כְּמוֹ prep How long, Yahweh? Will you be angry forever? Will your jealousy burn like fire?
- Psalms 86:8 כָּמ֖וֹ/ךָ prep + sfx pers 2ms There is no one like you among the gods, Lord, Nor any deeds like your deeds.
- Psalms 88:5 כְּמ֤וֹ prep Set apart among the dead, Like the slain who lie in the grave, Whom you remember no more. They are cut off from your hand.
- Psalms 89:8 כָֽמ֖וֹ/ךָ prep + sfx pers 2ms Yahweh, God of hosts, who is a mighty one, like you? Yah, your faithfulness is around you.
- Psalms 89:46 כְּמוֹ prep How long, Yahweh? Will you hide yourself forever? Will your wrath burn like fire?
- Psalms 90:9 כְמוֹ prep For all our days have passed away in your wrath. We bring our years to an end as a sigh.
- Psalms 92:7 כְּמ֥וֹ prep Though the wicked spring up as the grass, And all the evil-doers flourish, They will be destroyed forever.
- Psalms 102:3 כְּ/מוֹ prep + pron indef For my days consume away like smoke. My bones are burned as a firebrand.
- Psalms 115:8 כְּ֭מוֹ/הֶם prep + sfx pers 3mp Those who make them will be like them; Yes, everyone who trusts in them.
- Psalms 135:18 כְּ֭מוֹ/הֶם prep + sfx pers 3mp Those who make them will be like them; Yes, everyone who trusts in them.
- Psalms 140:3 כְּֽמוֹ prep They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent. Viper's poison is under their lips. Selah.
- Psalms 141:7 כְּמ֤וֹ prep "As when one plows and breaks up the earth, Our bones are scattered at the mouth of Sheol."
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.
כמו (kᵉmôw) is a Hebrew word most often rendered “like.” It first appears in Genesis 19:15. Spanning 126 verses in 27 books, it ranks among the common words of the Hebrew Bible. It is not a single-sense word — see its full sense range. Related forms include כן, כן and כן. 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 H3644 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 →
- 126
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 126 distinct verses.
- 27 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 27 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #316
- by frequency
- Top 500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 316 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 126 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 126 distinct verses.
- Writings (Ketuvim) 53 verses · 42%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 47 verses · 37%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 26 verses · 21%
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: Like 4×, Side according 2×
- American Standard Version: Like 4×
- Berean Standard Bible: Like 28×, As 12×, Like you 11×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Like 37×, Like you 18×, Like him 9×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H3644 across 20 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 14 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 H3644 across 20 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 16 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 H3644 across 127 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 34 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 16 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H3644 across 147 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 27 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 3 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.
- a. prep., as poet. syn. of כְּ, like, as, Ex 15:5 they went down כמו־אבן like a stone (hence in prose Ne 9:11), v 8 (ψ 78:13), Is 30:22; 51:6 (v. כֵּן), 26:17 כְּמוֹ הָרָה תַּקְרִיב לָלֶרֶת (see כְּ 1 c (2), on the constr.: so 41:25 ψ 58:5, 8a. 9), v 18 we have brought forth the like of, as it were, wind, Je 13;21; 15:18; 50:26 Ez 16:57 (כמו עת as at the time of: v. כְּ Note), Ho 7:4; 8:12; 13:7 Hb 3:14 (as it were), Zc 9:15; 10:2, 7 (as with wine: v. ib.) Elsewhere chiefly in ψψ (19 times) and Jb (11 times), as ψ 29:6; 61:7; 63:6; 78:69; 79:5; 88:6; 90:9, Jb 6:15; 10:22(×2); 12:3 כמו אלה the like of these things, 14:9 Ct 6:10; 7:2 La 4:6 כמו רגע (in prose כרגע). Repeated, like כְּ … כְּ, †ψ 58:10 and answered by כֵּן Is 26:17.—ψ 58:8 b כמו יתמוללו, as it were is against usage of כמו (with a vb.), and yields a lame sense: read perhaps ית׳ [חָצִיר] כמו (Lag Che); ψ 73:15 if I said, אֲסַפְּרָה כְמ֑וֹ, the text is untranslateable, the rendering thus for כמו being indefensible: prob. הֵנָּה has dropped out before the following הִנֵּה: for כְּמוֹ הֵנָּה the like of these things, cf. Jb 23:14 כָּהֵנָּה, and 12:3 supr. e.g. Exodus 15:5
- b. conj. = כַּאֲשֶׁר: (α) of time, once, †Gn 19:15 כְּמוֹ עָלָה הַשַּׁחַר when the dawn arose; (β) of mode, according as, †Zc 10:8 וְרָבוּ כְּמוֹ רָבוּ Pr 23:7 (answered by כֵּן).— e.g. Genesis 19:15
- 2. (before sfs.), see כְּ.
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
adv. and conj. like, as, when (lit. the like of what (viz.) …, a pleon. form of כְּ (v. מוֹ), and, like it, proposes a subst.: cf. Aramaic כְּמָא like ψ 78:68 Levy, usually כְּמָא דְּ like as; ܐܰܟ݂ܡܳܐ (i.e. ܐܰܝܟ݂ ܡܳܐ) like what, like, usually sq. ܕ ? like as; Sam. ࠊࠌࠄ; Arabic كَمَا; Ethiopic ከመ kama, like as, DiGr § 63 a Sab. כמו ZMG 1883, 394)—used 1. (56 times) as an indep. word (except Gn 19:15 Ne 9:11, only in poetry); 2. as an equivalent for כְּ before sfs., always before light ones, and occasionally before heavy ones (v. כְּ ad init.):—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from כן (kên) (H3651) — thus.
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.
כְּמוֹ
- v. כְּמָה) as, like. Yalk. Ex. 246 הקשו לבם כ׳ אבן they made their hearts hard like stones (Mekh. B’shall., Shirah, s. 5 כאבן). With suffixes: כָּמוֹנִי, כָּמוֹךָ &c. like me, like thee &c. Ned. 9ᵇ, v. כְּמוֹת. Mekh. l. c., s. 8; a. fr.—V. כְּמוֹת.
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 71 distinct written forms H3644 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| כְּמוֹ | Preposition | Exodus 15:5 | 26 |
| כְמוֹ | Preposition | Exodus 15:8 | 9 |
| כְּמ֣וֹ | Preposition | Hosea 7:4 | 8 |
| כְּמ֤וֹ | Preposition | Isaiah 26:17 | 4 |
| כָּמֽוֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Deuteronomy 5:14 | 4 |
| כְּמ֥וֹ | Preposition | Job 10:22 | 3 |
| כָּמ֣וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | 1 Kings 8:23 | 3 |
| כָּמֹ֑/הוּ | Preposition | Deuteronomy 7:26 | 3 |
| כָּמֹ֨/הוּ֙ | Preposition | Exodus 11:6 | 3 |
| כָּמֹֽ/הוּ | Preposition | Deuteronomy 4:32 | 3 |
| כָמ֛וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | 1 Kings 22:4 | 2 |
| כָמ֨וֹ/ךָ֙ | Preposition | 1 Samuel 26:15 | 2 |
| כָמ֨וֹ/נִי֙ | Preposition | Jeremiah 49:19 | 2 |
| כָמֹ֨/הוּ֙ | Preposition | Exodus 9:18 | 2 |
| כָמֽוֹ/נִי | Preposition | Judges 9:48 | 2 |
| כְּ֭מוֹ/הֶם | Preposition | Psalms 115:8 | 2 |
| כְּמ֖וֹ | Preposition | Isaiah 26:18 | 2 |
| כָּמ֑וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Deuteronomy 18:18 | 2 |
| כָּמ֔וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | 1 Chronicles 17:20 | 2 |
| כָּמ֖וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Jeremiah 10:6 | 2 |
| כָּמ֗וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | 2 Samuel 7:22 | 2 |
| כָּמ֧וֹ/נִי | Preposition | 1 Kings 22:4 | 2 |
| כָּמֹ֔/הוּ | Preposition | Exodus 10:14 | 2 |
| כָּמֹ֗/הוּ | Preposition | Joel 2:2 | 2 |
| כָּמֽוֹ/נִי | Preposition | 2 Samuel 9:8 | 2 |
| וְ/כָמֹ/הוּ֩ | Preposition | 2 Kings 23:25 | 1 |
| וְ/כָמֹ֖/הוּ | Preposition | Exodus 11:6 | 1 |
| וּ/כְמ֥וֹ | Preposition | Isaiah 41:25 | 1 |
| וּ/כְמוֹ֙ | Preposition | Genesis 19:15 | 1 |
| כְמ֑וֹ | Preposition | Psalms 73:15 | 1 |
| כְמוֹ/הֶ֔ם | Preposition | Judges 8:18 | 1 |
| כָ֫מ֥וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Psalms 35:10 | 1 |
| כָֽמ֖וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Psalms 89:8 | 1 |
| כָמ֑וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Psalms 50:21 | 1 |
| כָמ֖וֹ/הָ | Preposition | Exodus 30:38 | 1 |
| כָמ֖וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Genesis 44:18 | 1 |
| כָמ֖וֹ/נוּ | Preposition | Isaiah 14:10 | 1 |
| כָמ֗וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Deuteronomy 33:29 | 1 |
| כָמ֛וֹ/נִי | Preposition | Nehemiah 6:11 | 1 |
| כָמ֣וֹ/נִי | Preposition | Isaiah 44:7 | 1 |
| כָמ֥וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | 1 Kings 3:13 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֔/נוּ | Preposition | Genesis 34:15 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֖/הוּ | Preposition | Ezekiel 5:9 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֖/נוּ | Preposition | 2 Samuel 18:3 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֗/הוּ | Preposition | 2 Kings 18:5 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֛/הוּ | Preposition | Haggai 2:3 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֣/הוּ | Preposition | Job 36:22 | 1 |
| כָמֹ֤/כָה | Preposition | Exodus 15:11 | 1 |
| כָמֽוֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Psalms 71:19 | 1 |
| כְּ/מוֹ | Pronoun, Indefinite | Psalms 102:3 | 1 |
| כְּֽמוֹ | Preposition | Psalms 140:3 | 1 |
| כְּֽמוֹ/כֶ֗ם | Preposition | Job 12:3 | 1 |
| כְּמ֗וֹ | Preposition | Ezekiel 16:57 | 1 |
| כָּמ֖וֹ/הָ | Preposition | 1 Samuel 21:9 | 1 |
| כָּמ֣וֹ/הָ | Preposition | Zechariah 5:3 | 1 |
| כָּמ֣וֹ/נִי | Preposition | Isaiah 38:19 | 1 |
| כָּמ֤וֹ/נִי | Preposition | 2 Chronicles 18:3 | 1 |
| כָּמ֥וֹ/הָ | Preposition | Zechariah 5:3 | 1 |
| כָּמ֥וֹ/ךָ | Preposition | Job 35:8 | 1 |
| כָּמ֨וֹ/ךָ֙ | Preposition | 1 Kings 3:12 | 1 |
The 60 most common forms are shown; 11 rarer forms follow in the full concordance.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H3644, 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 → Showing 4 of 5 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 115 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 126 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 19:15
- Exodus 9:14
- Leviticus 19:18
- Numbers 23:10
- Deuteronomy 4:32
- Judges 8:18
- 1 Samuel 10:24
- 2 Samuel 7:22
- 1 Kings 3:12
- 2 Kings 3:7
- 1 Chronicles 17:20
- 2 Chronicles 6:14
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.
