לָבָן
white
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
- Adjective
- A word that describes or qualifies a noun.
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.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
23 distinct verses where H3836 appears in the Absolute state, across 5 books. 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.
Genesis 2 verses
- Genesis 30:35 לָבָן֙ adj Adjective ms That day, he removed the male goats that were streaked and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white in it, and all the black ones among the sheep, and gave them into the hand of his sons.
- Genesis 30:37 לְבָנ֔וֹת הַ/לָּבָ֔ן adj Adjective fp ptcl def.art + Adjective Adjective ms Jacob took to himself rods of fresh poplar, almond, plane tree, peeled white streaks in them, and made the white appear which was in the rods.
Exodus 1 verse
Leviticus 16 verses
- Leviticus 13:3 לָבָ֗ן adj Adjective ms and the priest shall examine the plague in the skin of the body: and if the hair in the plague has turned white, and the appearance of the plague is deeper than the body's skin, it is the plague of leprosy; and the priest shall examine him, and pronounce him unclean.
- Leviticus 13:4 לְבָנָ֨ה לָבָ֑ן adj Adjective fs adj Adjective ms If the bright spot is white in the skin of his body, and the appearance of it isn't deeper than the skin, and the hair of it hasn't turned white, then the priest shall isolate the infected person for seven days.
- Leviticus 13:10 לְבָנָה֙ לָבָ֑ן adj Adjective fs adj Adjective ms and the priest shall examine him. Behold, if there is a white rising in the skin, and it has turned the hair white, and there is raw flesh in the rising,
- Leviticus 13:13 לָבָ֖ן adj Adjective ms then the priest shall examine him; and, behold, if the leprosy has covered all his flesh, he shall pronounce him clean of the plague. It has all turned white: he is clean.
- Leviticus 13:16 לְ/לָבָ֑ן prep + Adjective Adjective ms Or if the raw flesh turns again, and is changed to white, then he shall come to the priest;
- Leviticus 13:17 לְ/לָבָ֑ן prep + Adjective Adjective ms and the priest shall examine him; and, behold, if the plague has turned white, then the priest shall pronounce him clean of the plague. He is clean.
- Leviticus 13:19 לְבָנָ֔ה לְבָנָ֣ה adj Adjective fs adj Adjective fs and in the place of the boil there is a white rising, or a bright spot, reddish-white, then it shall be shown to the priest;
- Leviticus 13:20 לָבָ֑ן adj Adjective ms and the priest shall examine it; and, behold, if the appearance of it is lower than the skin, and the hair of it has turned white, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean. It is the plague of leprosy. It has broken out in the boil.
- Leviticus 13:21 לָבָ֔ן adj Adjective ms But if the priest examines it, and, behold, there are no white hairs in it, and it isn't deeper than the skin, but is dim, then the priest shall isolate him seven days.
- Leviticus 13:24 לְבָנָ֥ה לְבָנָֽה adj Adjective fs adj Adjective fs "Or when the body has a burn from fire on its skin, and the raw flesh of the burn becomes a bright spot, reddish-white, or white,
- Leviticus 13:25 לָבָ֜ן adj Adjective ms then the priest shall examine it; and, behold, if the hair in the bright spot has turned white, and the appearance of it is deeper than the skin; it is leprosy. It has broken out in the burning, and the priest shall pronounce him unclean. It is the plague of leprosy.
- Leviticus 13:26 לָבָ֔ן adj Adjective ms But if the priest examines it, and, behold, there is no white hair in the bright spot, and it isn't lower than the skin, but is faded; then the priest shall isolate him seven days.
- Leviticus 13:38 לְבָנֹֽת adj Adjective fp "When a man or a woman has bright spots in the skin of the body, even white bright spots;
- Leviticus 13:39 לְבָנֹ֑ת adj Adjective fp then the priest shall examine them; and, behold, if the bright spots on the skin of their body are a dull white, it is a harmless rash, it has broken out in the skin; he is clean.
- Leviticus 13:42 לָבָ֣ן adj Adjective ms But if there is in the bald head, or the bald forehead, a reddish-white plague; it is leprosy breaking out in his bald head, or his bald forehead.
- Leviticus 13:43 לְבָנָ֣ה adj Adjective fs Then the priest shall examine him; and, behold, if the rising of the plague is reddish-white in his bald head, or in his bald forehead, like the appearance of leprosy in the skin of the flesh,
Ecclesiastes 1 verse
Zechariah 3 verses
- Zechariah 1:8 וּ/לְבָנִֽים conj + Adjective Adjective mp "I had a vision in the night, and, behold, a man riding on a red horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were in a ravine; and behind him there were red, brown, and white horses.
- Zechariah 6:3 לְבָנִ֑ים adj Adjective mp in the third chariot white horses; and in the fourth chariot dappled horses, all of them powerful.
- Zechariah 6:6 וְ/הַ/לְּבָנִ֔ים conj + ptcl def.art + Adjective Adjective mp The one with the black horses goes out toward the north country; and the white went out after them; and the dappled went forth toward the south country."
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.
“white” is the headline sense of the Hebrew adjective לבן (lâbân). It clusters heavily in Leviticus, which alone accounts for 67% of its uses. With 24 verses in 5 books, it is an uncommon word in the Hebrew Bible. First canonically at Genesis 30:35, it enters the text early. It clusters with לבן, לבנה and לבנה under a shared root. See the sense tree, 24-verse concordance, and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H3836 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 →
- 24
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 24 distinct verses.
- 5 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 5 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,160
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,160 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 24 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 24 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 20 verses · 83%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 3 verses · 13%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 1 verse · 4%
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).
BDB lists this Strong’s number as 3 distinct words (homographs). Each count above pools all of them and is not split by sense — see the Senses section below. A low-frequency rendering may belong to a different one of those words, not the primary meaning.
- King James Version†: White 19×, Be white 3×, Behold there be no white 2×
- American Standard Version†: White 17×, - white 3×, It 2×
- Berean Standard Bible†: White 18×, Reddish-white 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: White 26×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H3836 across 29† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 5 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 H3836 across 29† 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 H3836 across 28† 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. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 1 further occurrence.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H3836 across 31† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 5 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 0 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.
לבן I white
לבן II m. son of Bethuel, brother of Rebekah, and father-in-law of Jacob (𝔊 Λαβαν), Gn 24
לבן III loc., connected with desert-journey of Israelites Dt 1
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
I. adj. white;—ל׳ abs. Gn 30:35 + 13 times; cstr. לְבֶן־ Gn 49:12 (cf. Ges§ 93, 2, R. 1 Kö Lgb ii, 74 BaNB 166); f. לְבָנָה Lv 13:4 + 6 times; pl. לְבָנִים Zc 1:8 + 3 times; לְבָנוֹת Gn 30:37 + 2 times;—white, of wood under bark Gn 30:37(×2) (cf. Jo 1:7); of spots on goats v 35 (all J); of manna Ex 16:31 (P); garments Ec 9:8 (sign of cheerfulness and joy); of teeth וּלְבֶן־שִׁנַּיִם מֵחָלָב Gn 49:12 (poem in J; ‖ הַכְלִילִי עֵינַיִם מִיָּ֑יִן) of Judah (on interpr. v. Di and, differently, Marc. JastrJBL xi. (1892), 128); of horses Zc 1:8; 6:3, 6 (in vision); chfly. of diseased skin or flesh on body (בַּהֶרֶת Lv 13:4, 19, 24, 25, 26, 38) Lv 13:4, 10, 13, 16, 17, 19, 24, 38; and of hair on such spots 13:3, 4, 10, 20, 21, 25, 26; + אֲדַמְדֶּ֫מֶת 13:19, 24, 43, cf. v 42; + כֵּהָה v 39 (all P).
II. n.pr.m. son of Bethuel, brother of Rebekah, and father-in-law of Jacob (𝔊 Λαβαν), Gn 24:29(×2), 50; 27:43; 28:2, 5 + 17 times J (Gn 29, 30, 31, 32); 29:15, 16, 19, 21, 22, 26 + 18 times E (Gn 31, 32, ל׳ הָאֲרַמִּי 31:24); 25:20 (ל׳ הָאֲרַמִּי) 28:5 (id.), also 28:2; 29:24, 29; 46:18, 25 (all P).
III. n.pr.loc., connected with desert-journey of Israelites Dt 1:1, 𝔊 Λοβον; poss. = לִבְנָה 2, q.v.
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from לבן (lâban) (H3835) — to be white.
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.
בֵּן
- , constr. בֶּן (b. h.; בנה) offspring, son, child. שבוע הב׳ the male child’s week, a disguise for circumcision day, adopted during the Hadrianic persecutions. Snh. 32ᵇ; Y. Keth. I, 25ᶜ; a. e.—ישוע הב׳ a disguise for פִּדְיוֹן הבן. B. Kam. 80ᵃ.—… בְּנוֹ של the son of, v. שֶׁל. בְּנָן של קדושים descendant of holy men. Ab. Zar. 50ᵃ; a. e.—Pl. בָּנִים, constr. בְּנֵי. Ab. III, 14 ב׳ למקום chosen children of God. Gen. R. s. 82 בָּנֶיהָ של תורה children (followers) of the Law.—Trnsf. belonging to, fit for &c.; e.g. בני גולה those belonging to the colony of exiles, Babylonians &c.; בני גליל Galileans; בני אכילה things fit to be eaten &c. [For such compounds as are not self-evident, see the respective determinants.] [בני פיקרין, v. בְּנִיפיקָרִין.]
לָבַן I
- to make or pile bricks. B. Mets. X, 5 (118ᵇ) ואין לוֹבְנִין לבנים but you are not permitted to pile up bricks (on the public road). Ib. גובלין טיט … אבל לא לובנין Ms. M. (v. Rabb. D. S. a. l. note; ed. לבנים; Y. ed. ללבינים) you may knead clay on the public road (for immediate use), but you are not permitted to form bricks; (Y. ed.: but not for making bricks). Tosef. Kel. B. Kam. III, 7; ib. Ohol. XVII, 7.
לָבַן II
- (cmp. לָבָה) to glisten.
- 1. to polish, brighten; to finish. Sabb. VII, 2 הגוזז … והמְלַבְּנוֹ he who clips wool and he who cleanses it (by washing, removing clods &c.); Y. ib. 10ᶜ top המלבנו ההן דמגפר וכ׳ under m’labben of the Mishnah is implied (any preparation for improving raw material, e. g.) he who pitches wood &c., v. אֶלִּיקָה. Ib. המיינטון חייב משום מְלַבֵּן he who cleanses amiant (v. אַמְיַינְטוֹן) comes under the law forbidding polishing (on the Sabbath). Tosef. Ber. VII (VI), 2; Ber. 58ᵃ; Y. ib. IX, 13ᶜ top גזז ול׳ וכ׳ he (Adam) clipped (wool) and cleansed &c. Ab. Zar. V, 12 את שדרכו … לְלַבֵּן באור יְלַבֵּן וכ׳ such utensils as are ordinarily cleansed by being put in the fire (metal spits &c.) he must cleanse by fire.—Gen. R. s. 70 (play on לָבָן, Gen. XXIX, 5) do you know Him שהוא עתיד ללַבֵּן וכ׳ who will cleanse your sins to make them appear like snow (Is. I, 18)?; a. fr.—Part. pass. מְלוּבָּן finished, polished, refined. Nidd. 31ᵃ (of an embryo) מל׳ ומזורז well-formed and of strong vitality; Snh. 70ᵇ; Num. R. s. 10.—Ib. מל׳ ברשע finished (refined) in wickedness, v. אפדכסיס; Gen. R. s. 60; Ruth R. to II, 1; Yalk. Gen. 109.—Esp. a) to glaze tiles; to heat tiles. Bets. IV, 7 (33ᵃ) אין מְלַבְּנִין את וכ׳ you must not heat (new) tiles (on Holy Days) for roasting on them; Y. ib. IV, end, 62ᵈ מאן דאמר מלבנין בבדוקים he who says that you may heat tiles &c., refers to such as have been tested (to be sound under fire).—b) (of metal utensils, v. supra) to glow. Ḥull. 8ᵃ ל׳ סכין וכ׳ if one made a knife glowing hot and cut with it; a. fr.—Part. pass. מְלוּבָּן, f. מְלוּבֶּנֶת. Y. Yeb. XVI, 15ᶜ bot. e.g. Genesis 29:5
- 1. to grow white, glossy, be cleansed. Ex. R. s. 23 (play on שְׁלמ̇ה̇ a. שַׂלְמָה) מה השלמה הזאת מתלכלכת וחוזרת ומִתְלַבֶּנֶת as the garment gets soiled and is cleansed again &c.; (Yalk. Cant. 982 מתכבסת). Ib.; Cant. R. to I, 6 נ׳ גופו his tanned skin became white again, v. כִּרְכֵּם.
- 2. to be glowed, heated. Sabb. 27ᵇ והאונין … משיִתְלַבְּנוּ bundles of flax are considered finished after they are baked; Sifra Thazr., Neg., Par. 5, ch. XIII.
- 1. to grow white. Neg. I, 6 היו … והִלְבִּינוּ if the hair was black and turned white. Ib. IV, 4 עיקרן … וראשן מַלְבִּין if their roots are black and their tops white. Yoma VI, 8; a. fr.
- 2. to whiten, cleanse. Cant. R. to V, 11 להַלְבִּין כנף וכ׳ to make white one wing of a raven. Yoma. 39ᵇ the Temple is called Lebanon שמַלְבִּין וכ׳ because it cleanses the sins &c.—Keth. 59ᵇ הרוצה שיַלְבִּין את בתו he who desires to make his daughter white-complexioned (handsome); a. e.—Transf. (with פנים) to put to shame, expose. Ab. III, 11 המַלְבִּין פני וכ׳ he who exposes his fellowman to shame in public. B. Mets. 59ᵃ נוח לו לאדם שיפיל … ואל יַלְבִּין וכ׳ man should rather have himself thrown into a furnace than put his neighbor to shame. Yalk. Deut. 938 אני מלבין פניהם I should put them to shame; (Pirké d’R. El. ch. XLIV מגלה, v. גָּלָה). B. Mets. 58ᵇ כל המלבין … כאילו שופך דמים he who puts his neighbor to public shame is considered as if he shed blood; a. fr.—Y. Succ. V, 55ᶜ bot. (play on נ̇ב̇ל̇) שמל̇ב̇ין כמה מיני זמר it shames (excels) many a musical instrument.
לְבַן
- (denom. of לִבְנָא, cmp. אֲרִיחַ) to have a strong rest; to be well balanced. Sabb. 104ᵃ מ"ט שקר אחידא כרעיה ואמת מִלְבַּן לַבְנֵי Ms. M. why has the word שקר one single foot (in the letter ק), while the letters of אמת have a level foundation?; (ed. שיקרא אחדא כרעא קאי ואמת מְלַבַּן לִבּוּנֵיה falsehood (שקר) stands on one leg, while the foundation of truth (אמת) is level).
- to found, rest. Erub. 14ᵃ מְלַבֵּין ליה בטינא וכ׳ you may form a level rest for it by plastering, partly on this, partly on the other side, so that it will be firm.—Part. pass. מְלַבַּן, v. supra.
לָבָן I
- (b. h.) pr. n. m. Laban, son of Bethuel, freq. ל׳ הארמי L. the Aramaean. Snh. 105ᵃ. Ab. Zar. 3ᵃ יבוא ל׳ וכ׳ let L. come and give testimony for Jacob &c. Gen. R. s. 60, v. אפדכסיס. Koh. R. to II, 26; a. fr.
לָבָן II
- v. לָבַן) white; white color, white substance. Gen. R. s. 73 בן ל׳ a white child, opp. כּוּשִׁי. Men. IV, 1 התכלת … את הל׳ the absence of the blue fringe is no obstacle to using the white one &c. Bekh. 45ᵇ, v. בָּהַק. Lev. R. s. 31 אין אדם רואה מתוך הל׳ וכ׳ man does not see through the white (of the eye). Yoma 75ᵃ ל׳ כמרגלית, v. גַּד II. Ib. VII, 4, a. fr. בגדי ל׳ garments of white stuff. Ib. 1, v. אִסְטַלִּית; a. v. fr.—שְׂדֵה (ה)ל׳ a bright, shadeless field, vegetable or grain field, opp. שדה אילן orchard. Shebi. II, 1; M. Kat. I, 4ᶜ; a. fr.—Pl. לְבָנִים, לְבָנִין. Mikv. VIII, 2 (מים) ל׳ נמשכים white and cohesive matter (urin). Tosef. Sabb. I, 22 הל׳ white garments, opp. צבועין colored; a. fr.—Fem. לְבָנָה. Y. Shek. VI, 49ᵈ bot.; Cant. R. to V, 11 אש ל׳ white fire. Sifra Thazr., Neg., Par. 5, ch. XIII מה פשתים ל׳ אף צמר ל׳ as ‘linen’ means ‘of natural white color’, so does ‘wool’ &c. Gen. R. s. 73 שחורה או ל׳ is it the portrait of a black or of a white person?; a. fr.—Pl. לְבָנוֹת. Macc. 20ᵇ במלקט ל׳ וכ׳ when he plucks the gray hair from among the black. B. Kam. 60ᵇ; a. fr.
לָבָן
- 1. same. Targ. Y. Gen. XXX, 37, v. next w.—*2) = לִבְנָא, brick. Targ. Y. II, Ex. XXIV, 10 (Y. I, a. O. אבן; h. text לבנת).
לְבָן
- , white poplar. Targ. O. Gen. XXX, 37 (Y. דפרח לבן, v. פְּרַח). Targ. Hos. IV, 13.
לֹבֶן
- , v. לוֹבֶן
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 22 distinct written forms H3836 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 H3836, 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
- לבנה libneh H3839 poplar
- לבנה libnâh H3840 tile
- לבנה lᵉbânâh H3842 moon
- לבנה lᵉbênâh H3843 brick
- מלבן malbên H4404 brick mold
Derived from this word
Proper names from this root
People and places named from this root — a name, not an additional meaning of the word.
Compare all same-root words → Showing 4 of 11 — not the complete family. 3 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 24 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 24 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.
