אִישׁ
man
‘man’ is one of 3 main senses 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
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
34 verses where H376 appears in the Construct state in the Book of Proverbs. Filtered view — show all forms. 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.
Proverbs
- Proverbs 3:31 בְּ/אִ֣ישׁ prep + n c ms cs Don't envy the man of violence. Choose none of his ways.
- Proverbs 6:12 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A worthless person, a man of iniquity, Is he who walks with a perverse mouth;
- Proverbs 10:23 לְ/אִ֣ישׁ prep + n c ms cs It is a fool's pleasure to do wickedness, But wisdom is a man of understanding's pleasure.
- Proverbs 11:12 וְ/אִ֖ישׁ conj + n c ms cs One who despises his neighbor is void of wisdom, But a man of understanding holds his peace.
- Proverbs 11:17 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs The merciful man does good to his own soul, But he who is cruel troubles his own flesh.
- Proverbs 12:2 וְ/אִ֖ישׁ conj + n c ms cs A good man shall obtain favor from Yahweh, But he will condemn a man of wicked devices.
- Proverbs 14:17 וְ/אִ֥ישׁ conj + n c ms cs He who is quick to become angry will commit folly, And a crafty man is hated.
- Proverbs 15:18 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A wrathful man stirs up contention, But one who is slow to anger appeases strife.
- Proverbs 15:21 וְ/אִ֥ישׁ conj + n c ms cs Folly is joy to one who is void of wisdom, But a man of understanding keeps his way straight.
- Proverbs 16:27 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A worthless man devises mischief. His speech is like a scorching fire.
- Proverbs 16:28 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A perverse man stirs up strife. A whisperer separates close friends.
- Proverbs 16:29 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A man of violence entices his neighbor, And leads him in a way that is not good.
- Proverbs 17:27 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs He who spares his words has knowledge. He who is even tempered is a man of understanding.
- Proverbs 18:24 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A man of many companions may be ruined, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
- Proverbs 19:6 לְ/אִ֣ישׁ prep + n c ms cs Many will entreat the favor of a ruler, And everyone is a friend to a man who gives gifts.
- Proverbs 19:22 מֵ/אִ֥ישׁ prep + n c ms cs That which makes a man to be desired is his kindness. A poor man is better than a liar.
- Proverbs 20:5 אִ֑ישׁ וְ/אִ֖ישׁ n c ms conj + n c ms cs Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; But a man of understanding will draw it out.
- Proverbs 20:6 אִ֣ישׁ וְ/אִ֥ישׁ n c ms conj + n c ms cs Many men claim to be men of unfailing love, But who can find a faithful man?
- Proverbs 21:17 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs He who loves pleasure shall be a poor man: He who loves wine and oil shall not be rich.
- Proverbs 22:24 אִ֥ישׁ n c ms cs Don't befriend a hot-tempered man, And don't associate with one who harbors anger:
- Proverbs 24:1 בְּ/אַנְשֵׁ֣י prep + n c mp cs Don't be envious of evil men; Neither desire to be with them:
- Proverbs 24:5 וְ/אִֽישׁ conj + n c ms cs A wise man has great power; And a knowledgeable man increases strength;
- Proverbs 25:1 אַנְשֵׁ֤י n c mp cs These also are proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah king of Judah copied out.
- Proverbs 26:21 וְ/אִ֥ישׁ conj + n c ms cs As coals are to hot embers, And wood to fire, So is a contentious man to kindling strife.
- Proverbs 28:5 אַנְשֵׁי n c mp cs Evil men don't understand justice; But those who seek Yahweh understand it fully.
- Proverbs 28:20 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A faithful man is rich with blessings; But one who is eager to be rich will not go unpunished.
- Proverbs 28:22 אִ֭ישׁ n c ms cs A stingy man hurries after riches, And doesn't know that poverty waits for him.
- Proverbs 29:1 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs He who is often rebuked and stiffens his neck Will be destroyed suddenly, with no remedy.
- Proverbs 29:4 וְ/אִ֖ישׁ conj + n c ms cs The king by justice makes the land stable, But he who takes bribes tears it down.
- Proverbs 29:8 אַנְשֵׁ֣י n c mp cs Mockers stir up a city, But wise men turn away anger.
- Proverbs 29:10 אַנְשֵׁ֣י n c mp cs The bloodthirsty hate a man of integrity; And they seek the life of the upright.
- Proverbs 29:13 וְ/אִ֣ישׁ conj + n c ms cs The poor man and the oppressor have this in common: Yahweh gives sight to the eyes of both.
- Proverbs 29:22 אִֽישׁ n c ms cs An angry man stirs up strife, And a wrathful man abounds in sin.
- Proverbs 29:27 אִ֣ישׁ n c ms cs A dishonest man detests the righteous, And the upright in their ways detest the wicked.
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.
At its core, איש (ʼîysh) means “man.” The King James Version also renders it “every man,” a usage modern versions have dropped for “man” — see the renderings breakdown. Spanning 1,851 verses in 38 books, it ranks among the most common words of the Hebrew Bible. It first appears in Genesis 2:23. Ranging over 3 senses, it is not a single-sense word. Each statement above links to its evidence; the full detail follows below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H376 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 →
- 1,851
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 1,851 distinct verses.
- 38 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 38 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #19
- by frequency
- Top 25 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 19 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 1,851 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 1,851 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 1,006 verses · 54%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 477 verses · 26%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 368 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: Man 560×, Men 175×, Every man 154×
- American Standard Version: Man 521×, Men 165×, Every man 146×
- Berean Standard Bible: Man 556×, Men 188×, Each 97×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Man 921×, Men 425×, Men of 210×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H376 across 1,623 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 221 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.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H376 across 1,625 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 297 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 1 further occurrence.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H376 across 1,396 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 132 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 266 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H376 across 2,256 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 79 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in BDB
The 3 senses BDB 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.
- man
- whosoever
- each (adjective)
Word origin
n.m. man (= vir) (MI, SI, Ph. אש, perh. also Sab. אסם cf. Prät l.c., but DHMZMG 1883, 330)—א׳ abs. Gn 2:23 +; cstr. Gn 25:27 +; sf. אִישִׁי Gn 29:32 +, etc.; pl. אִישִׁים ψ 141:4 + 2 textual (Ph. אשם); usually אֲנָשִׁים Gn 12:20 +, fr. √ אנשׁ q.v.; cstr. אַנְשֵׁי Ju 6:27 +; sf. אֲנָשַׁי 1 S 23:12 etc.;—man, opp. woman Gn 2:23, 24 Lv 20:27 Nu 5:6 Dt 17:2f Jos 6:21; 8:25 Je 40:7, emph. on sexual distinction & relation Gn 19:8; 24:16; 38:25 Ex 22:15 Lv 15:16 (שִׁכְבַת זָ֑רַע) v 18 (וְאִשָּׁה אֲשֶׁר יִשְׁכַּב אִישׁ אֹתָהּ שׁ׳־ז׳) 20:10f Nu 5:13f Dt 22:22f Is 4:1 +; thence = husband, especially c. sf. Gn 3:6, 16; 16:3; 29:32, 34 Lv 21:7 Nu 30:7f Dt 28:56 Ju 13:6f Ru 1:3f 1 S 25:19 Je 29:6 Ez 16:45 +; fig. of י׳ as husb. of Isr. אִישִׁי Ho 2:18 (opp. בַּעְלִי); man as procreator, father Ec 6:3; of male child Gn 4:1 cf. זֶרַע אֲנָשִׁים 1 S 1:11, man, opp. beast Ex 11:7 Lv 20:15 (cf. אָדָם); cf. fig. ψ 22:7 but also of male of animals Gn 7:2(×2) (אִישׁ וְאִשְׁתּוֹ); man, opp. God Gn 32:29 Nu 23:19 לֹא אִישׁ אֵל וִיכַזֵּב (‖ וּבֶן־אָדָם וְיִתְנֶחָ֑ם); Jb 9:32; 32:13 Ho 11:9 cf. Is 31:8 Jb 12:10 (רוּחַ כָּל־בְּשַׂר־אִישׁ); hence in phrases to denote ordinary, customary, common שֵׁבֶט אֲנָשִׁים 2 S 7:14 (‖ נִגְעֵי בְּנֵי אָדָם); לֶחֶם אֲנָשִׁים Ez 24:17, 22 (cf. Is 8:1); אֲנָשִׁים Ez 24:17, 22 is textual error; We (ap. Sm) אֲנֻשִׁים; ToyHpt אוֹנִים (Ho 9:4). אַמַּת־אִישׁ Dt 3:11; but also contr. אָדָם ψ 49:3; 62:10; man, as valiant 1 S 4:9(×2) (וִהְיוּ לַאֲנָשִׁים) so 1 K 2:2 cf. 1 S 26:15; so אִישׁ חַיִל 31:12 2 S 24:9 1 K 1:42 +; also אִישׁ מִלְחָמָה Nu 31:49 Dt 2:14, 16 Jos 5:4, 6 +; even of י׳ Ex 15:3 יהוה אִישׁ מִלְחָמָה; oft. prefixed to other nouns in app. הא׳ אָדוֹן Gn 42:30, 33, א׳ שַׂר וְשֹׁפֵט Ex 2:14, א׳ כֹּהֵן Lv 21:9, א׳ סָרִיס Je 38:7; partic. bef. adj. gent. אִישׁ מִצְרִי Gn 39:1 Ex 2:11, 19 cf. Gn 37:28; 38:1, 2; 39:14 1 S 17:12; 30:11, 13 +; a man as resident in, or belonging to a place or people Nu 25:6 Ju 10:1 + (so Ph.); usually pl. אַנְשֵׁי יִשְׂרָאֵל 1 S 7:11; 31:7(×2) cf. Jos 7:4, 5 +; also sg. coll. Dt 27:14 Jos 9:6, 7 Ju 20:11 1 S 11:8 (v. Dr) +; 2 S 10:6, 8 (א׳ טוֹב); (so MI 10. 13); men = retainers, followers, soldiers 1 S 18:27; 23:3f; 24:3; 25:13 + cf. Dt 33:8 sg. coll. v. Di; אִישׁ אֱלֹהִים man of God = proph. Dt 33:1 Jos 14:6 1 S 9:6f 1 K 12:22; 13:1f + (v. אלהים); in phrase sq. abstr. v. supr.; א׳ רִיב Ju 12:2 Je 15:10, א׳ שֵׂיבָה Dt 32:25, א׳ הַדָּמִים 2 S 16:7 cf. v. 8, א׳ הַבְּלִיַּעַל 2 S 16:7, א׳ מָוֶת 1 K 2:26, א׳ חָמָס ψ 140:12 Pr 3:31 +; sq. word of occupation, etc. א׳ שָׂדֶה Gn 25:27, א׳ הָאֲדָמָה Gn 9:20 (cf. Zc 13:5), א׳ הַבֵּנַיִם champion 1 S 17:4 (cf. Dr) v 23, א׳ בְּשֹׂרָה 2 S 18:20, אִישׁ עֲצָתוֹ his counsellor Is 40:13, cf. אִישׁ חֶרְמִי 1 K 20:42, א׳ רֵעִים Pr 18:24; oft. distrib. = each, every Gn 9:5; 10:5; 40:5(×2) Ex 12:3 +; incl. women Jb 42:11 1 Ch 16:3 וַיְחַלֵּק לְכָל־אִישׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵאִישׁ וְעַד אִשָּׁה לְאִישׁ כִּכַּר־לֶחֶם; of inanim. things 1 K 7:30, 36; also אִישׁ אִישׁ Ex 36:4 Nu 4:19, 49 Ez 14:4, 7 +; any one Ex 34:3(×2), 24 +; also אִישׁ אִישׁ Lv 15:2; 22:4, 18 +; of gods 2 K 18:33 = Is 36:18; one … another וְהִרְגוּ אִישׁ־אֶת־אָחִיו וְאִישׁ אֶת־רֵעֵהוּ וְאִישׁ אֶת־קְרֹבוֹ Ex 32:27, אִישׁ … אָחִיו Dt 1:16 Mi 7:2 (v. אָח), אִישׁ … רֵעֵהוּ Gn 11:3, 7 + (v. רֵעַ) of inanimate things Gn 15:10.
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from אנוש (ʼĕnôwsh) (H582) — man.
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.
אִישׁ
- , v. אֱינָשׁ) being, man; husband; lord.—א׳ ירושלים a native or citizen of Jerusalem Aboth I, 4; a. fr.—Yoma I, 7 אִישִׁי כה"ג my lord the High-priest. Sot. 17ᵃ א׳ ואשה husband and wife; a. fr.—Pl. אֲנָשִׁים, v. אֱנוֹשׁ.
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 285 distinct written forms H376 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.
The 60 most common forms are shown; 225 rarer forms follow in the full concordance.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H376, 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
- איש ʼîysh H377 to be a man
- אישון ʼîyshôwn H380 pupil
- אישחיל ʼÎysh-Chayil H381 a mighty man, valiant man
- אשה ʼishshâh H802 woman
Proper names from this root
People and places named from this root — a name, not an additional meaning of the word.
- אנוש ʼĔnôwsh H583 Enos
- אישבשת ʼÎysh-Bôsheth H378 Ishbosheth
- אישהוד ʼÎyshᵉhôwd H379 Ishod
- אישטוב ʼÎysh-Ṭôwb H382 Ish-tob
- אשבעל ʼEshbaʻal H792 Eshbaal
- בןימיני Ben-yᵉmîynîy H1145 Benjamite
Compare all same-root words → Showing 4 of 13 — not the complete family. 6 of the same-root words are proper names (people or places). They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 1,751 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 1,851 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 2:23
- Exodus 1:1
- Leviticus 7:8
- Numbers 1:4
- Deuteronomy 1:13
- Joshua 1:5
- Judges 1:4
- Ruth 1:1
- 1 Samuel 1:1
- 2 Samuel 1:2
- 1 Kings 1:5
- 2 Kings 1:6
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.
