אֵיתָן
perpetual
also: constant, perennial, ever-flowing 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
- 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.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Grammatical forms
- Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 10 times (77%)
- Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Plural, Absolute 2 times (15%)
- Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Construct 1 time (8%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 13 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H386 appears — 13 distinct verses across 10 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 1 verse
Exodus 1 verse
Numbers 1 verse
Deuteronomy 1 verse
Job 2 verses
Psalms 1 verse
Proverbs 1 verse
Jeremiah 3 verses
- Jeremiah 5:15 אֵיתָ֣ן adj Adjective ms Behold, I will bring a nation on you from far, house of Israel, says Yahweh: it is a mighty nation, it is an ancient nation, a nation whose language you don't know, neither understand what they say.
- Jeremiah 49:19 אֵיתָן֒ adj Adjective ms Behold, he shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? and who will appoint me a time? and who is the shepherd who will stand before me?
- Jeremiah 50:44 אֵיתָן֒ adj Adjective ms Behold, [the enemy] shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? and who will appoint me a time? and who is the shepherd who can stand before me?
Amos 1 verse
Micah 1 verse
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.
“perpetual” is the headline sense of the Hebrew adjective איתן (ʼêythân). First canonically at Genesis 49:24, it enters the text early. It turns up in 13 verses across 10 books, an uncommon footprint. Not a single-sense word: its full sense range also takes in “constant”, “perennial”, and “ever-flowing”. From the same root come אתון, איתן and איתנים. The sections below give every sense, occurrence, and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H386 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 →
- 13
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 13 distinct verses.
- 10 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 10 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #2,001
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 2,001 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 13 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 13 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 5 verses · 38%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 4 verses · 31%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 4 verses · 31%
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 2 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†: Strong 4×, Mighty 3×, Strength 2×
- American Standard Version†: Mighty 3×, Against the strong 2×, Strength 2×
- Berean Standard Bible†: Constant 1×, Established 1×, Ever-flowing 1×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: Is permanent 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H386 across 13† 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 H386 across 13† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 6 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 H386 across 10† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Not rendered by a distinct English word in 3 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H386 across 11† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 9 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 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.
איתן I perennial, ever-flowing, fig. permanent, as subst. steady flow, permanence
- 1. 3 (opp. אַכְזָב), נַחַל אֵיתָן Am 5:24 an 3 wādy, Dt 21:4 (v. Dr); as subst. in נַהֲרוֹת אֵיתָן ψ 74:15 rivers of steady flow; as subst. also Ex 14:27 (J), the sea returned לְאֵיתָנוֹ to its steady flow, יֶרַח הָאֵיתָנִים 1 K 8:2 month of steady flowings = 7th mo., Oct.–Nov. (post-Bibl Tisri). e.g. Amos 5:24
- 2. fig. permanent, enduring גּוֹי אֵיתָן הוּא Je 5;15, i. e. a nation whose numbers never dwindle or fail, imperishable, וְרִיב עֲצָמָיו א׳ Jb 33:19 Kt the strife of his bones is constant, Gn 49:24 his bow abode בְּא׳ as an enduring, firm, one, א׳ מוֹשָֽׁבְךָ Nu 24:21 (‖ שִׂים בַּסֶּלַע), נְוֵה אֵיתָן Je 49:19 = 50:44 an abode of permanency (of Edom, and Babylon, suddenly depopulated by foe, figured as lion); האיתנים מוסדי ארץ Mi 6:2 ye ever-enduring ones, the foundations of the earth (but read prob. with We הַאֲזִינוּ), Jb 12:19 אֵיתָנִים יְסַלֵּף he subverteth them that are firmly seated (i.e. men established in hereditary offices or dignities). Very uncertain is Pr 13:15 דֶּרֶךְ בֹּגְדִים אֵיתָן, perhaps firm, hard, rugged (Ew De Hi Now: according to Str. the text is corrupt). e.g. Job 33:19
איתן II m. a wise man 1 K 5
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
II. adj. perennial, ever-flowing, fig. permanent, as subst. steady flow, permanence;—abs. אֵיתָן Gn 49:24 + 8 times; אֵתָן Jb 33:19; sf. אֵיתָנוֹ Ex 14:27; pl. אֵיתָנִים Jb 12:19; אֵתָנִים 1 K 8:2 Mi 6:2; (in form, an ‘elative,’ Ew§ 162 b = Arabic compar. and superl.;—
III. n.pr.m. a wise man 1 K 5:11 (where called הָאֶזְרָחִי) named with הֵימָן, כַּלְכֹּל, דַּרְדַּע; cf. 1 Ch 2:6 (where these 4 with זִמְרִי are בְּנֵי זֶרַח); also 2:8; 6:27; called בֶּן־קִישִׁי 6:29 = בֶּן־קוּשָׁיָ֫הוּ 15:17, where, and v 19, named as Levit. singer with הֵימָן and אָסָף (q.v.; יְדוּתוּן for אֵיתָן in this group 1 Ch 25:1, 6 2 Ch 5:12; 35:15, v. ידותון); לְאֵיתָן הָאֶזְרָחִי ψ 89:1 (title).
— 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 continue)
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.
אֵיתָן
- 1. essence, permanent or normal condition. Nidd. 48ᵇ חזר לאֵיתָנוֹ obtained again its normal condition. Sot. 36ᵇ שבה קשתו לא׳ his membrum resumed its normal condition. (Cmp. Ex. XIV, 27). e.g. Exodus 14:27
- 2. adj. essential, strong. R. Hash. 11ᵃ א׳ לישנא דתקיפי ethan means strong.— Pl. אֵיתָנִים. Ib. אֵיתָנֵי עולם the mighty of the world (patriarchs). Gen. R. s. 98 (play on ăthono Gen. XLIX, 11) בנים אֵתָנִים וכ׳ mighty sons (heroes) are destined to descend from him. e.g. Genesis 49:11
- 3. pr. n. river Ethan. Succ. 18ᵃ (Ms. M. נתן); a. e.
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 10 distinct written forms H386 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| אֵיתָֽן | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Amos 5:24 | 3 |
| אֵיתָן֒ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Jeremiah 49:19 | 2 |
| אֵיתָ֔ן | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Deuteronomy 21:4 | 1 |
| אֵיתָ֣ן | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Jeremiah 5:15 | 1 |
| אֵיתָן֙ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Numbers 24:21 | 1 |
| אֵתָֽן | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Job 33:19 | 1 |
| בְּ/אֵיתָן֙ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Genesis 49:24 | 1 |
| וְ/אֵֽתָנִ֣ים | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Job 12:19 | 1 |
| וְ/הָ/אֵתָנִ֖ים | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Micah 6:2 | 1 |
| לְ/אֵ֣יתָנ֔/וֹ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Construct | Exodus 14:27 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H386, 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
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 → 2 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 11 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 13 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 49:24
- Exodus 14:27
- Numbers 24:21
- Deuteronomy 21:4
- Job 12:19
- Proverbs 13:15
- Jeremiah 5:15
- Amos 5:24
- Micah 6:2
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.
