אֲמַר
to say
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
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Stem
- Qal
- The basic, simple active stem — the plain form of the verb (“he wrote”).
Form
- Participle Active
- A verbal adjective expressing ongoing or characteristic action (“writing / one who writes”).
- Perfect
- A completed action or state — Hebrew marks aspect (completeness) more than strict tense (“he wrote”).
- Imperative
- A direct command (“write!”).
- Infinitive Construct
- A bound verbal noun, frequently with prepositions (“to write / in writing”).
- Imperfect
- An incomplete, ongoing, or future action (“he will / would write”).
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
Person
- 3rd Person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 2nd Person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 1st Person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Common
- Either gender — not distinguished for this form.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Every verse where H560 appears in the Book of Jeremiah — 1 distinct verse. 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.
Jeremiah
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.
The Hebrew verb אמר centers on the idea of “to say.” Daniel dominates its distribution — 59 of 65 verses. Spanning 65 verses in 3 books, it ranks among the moderately common words of the Hebrew Bible. Its earliest occurrence is Ezra 5:3. Related forms include אמר, אמיר and אמר. Dig into 65-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H560 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 →
- 65
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 65 distinct verses.
- 3 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 3 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #558
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 558 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 65 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 65 distinct verses.
- Writings (Ketuvim) 64 verses · 98%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 1 verse · 2%
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: Said 38×, Commanded 9×, Tell 3×
- American Standard Version: Said 34×, Commanded 9×, Tell 3×
- Berean Standard Bible: Said 9×, Asked 6×, Tell 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Said 34×, Gave an order 3×, He said 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H560 across 71 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 15 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 H560 across 71 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 17 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 H560 across 47 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 25 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 24 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H560 across 72 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 17 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 1 sense 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.
- (Peal) to say, to speak, to command, to tell, to relate
Word origin
אֲמַר 71 vb. say, tell, command
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from אמר (ʼâmar) (H559) — to say.
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.
אָמַר I
- (a) to join, knot; to be knotted, thick; b) to heap up; c) transf. to join words, compose, cmp. דבר; d) to contract, bargain, exchange. [As to Assyr. to see, cmp. חמא.])
- 1. to speak, think, say, relate &c. … א׳ ר׳ … א׳ ר׳ Rabbi … related in the name of R. … Ber. 3ᵇ; a. v. fr.—Part. pass. אָמוּר expression. Yoma 70ᵇ, a. fr. הוא הא׳ וכ׳ it is the same expression (‘one ram’) used here and in the Book of Numbers. Sifré Deut. s. 334, a. fr. אֱמוֹר מעתה say from now, i.e. from this draw the conclusion. Gen. R. s. 39 תאמר שהבירה וכ׳ (usu. שמא תאמר) will you say (is it possible), this castle has no commander?—אֲמוּרִים דברים במה (abbr. בד׳'א) in what case are these words said? i.e. this applies only. Ḥull. 3ᵃ; a. fr.—זאת אוֹמֶרֶת this tells, i.e. this proves. Ber. 11ᵇ; a. fr.—אָמְרוּ it is said, told &c.; v. next w.—Inf. לוֹמַר = לֵאמֹר. Ḥag. 14ᵇ; a. fr.
- 2. to vow, devote. אָמוּר (לגבוה) devoted to the Lord. Succ. 55ᵇ; v. אֲמִירָה I, 3, a. אֵימוּרִים.
- (b. h.) to be said, to read … נא׳ כאן … ונ׳ להלן we read here … and we read there … (the same expression is used here and there in the Scriptural text). Ber. 9ᵃ; a. v. fr.—שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (abbr. שנ׳, שנא׳) for it is said in the Scriptures (as evidence in favor of an opinion). Snh. X, 1; a. v. fr.; also כמה שנ׳ (כמו) as it is said.—מִשּׁוּם שנ׳ because it is said in the Scriptures, i.e. you may possibly be misled by a certain expression to think …, therefore another term is used in its stead in an analogous case, or added to the ambiguous word; v. שׁוּם.
אֲמַר
- 1) as preced. 1). Targ. Gen. I, 3; a. v. fr.—א׳ מר above you quoted an authority, or, it has been stated. Ber. 2ᵃ; a. fr.—א׳ קרא the Scripture says. Ib. 13ᵃ; a. fr.—Y. Orl. III, end, 63ᵇ, a. fr. אמרונה בשם … (in Bab. heb. אֲמָרוּהָ) they said it in behalf of … i.e. as a tradition.—Y. Ber. I, 2ᵈ מילתיה אמרה his word (statement, opinion &c.) proves.—הדא אמרה = זאת אומרת; v. preced.—אַמְרֵי (h. אָמְרוּ) they say, it is said. Sabb. 19ᵃ אמרו עליו על … ואמרי לה וכ׳ it is told about R. …, and another relation refers this to R.—; a. fr.—קאמר, קאמרי &c. = קא אמר &c. Ḥull. 85ᵃ; a. fr.—מנא תימרא whence dost thou prove? Sabb. 23ᵃ; a. fr.—Inf. מֵימַר, מֵימְרָא. סבר מ׳, סבר למ׳ originally he was of the opinion. Y. Sabb. VI, 8ᶜ top; Keth. 87ᵇ; a. v. fr.—לְמֵימְרָא does this mean to say? Sabb. 15ᵇ; a. fr. לא אמרן אלא … אבל … this has been said, i.e. this applies only to a case … but if … Ber. 43ᵇ; a. fr.—כְּלוֹמַר as if saying, meaning to say, viz; v. כִּילּוּ.—Y. Kil. IV, 32ᶜ bot. אימורין לבני וכ׳ say ye to &c.—מאי איכא למימר, v. אִיכָּא; Answ. אֵימוּר say … Sabb. 6ᵃ; a. fr.—Hor. 13ᵃ א׳ כולה who orders every thing (as an etymol. of אֲמַרְכָּל).—2) to praise, proclaim. Targ. Is. VIII, 13; a. fr.—Part. pass. אָמִיר q. v.
- , contr. אִתְּמַר, אִיתְּ׳ it is said, taught. Targ. Job XXXIV, 31.—Y. Yoma V, end, 43ᵃ אתאמרת, contr. אִתַּמְרַת it has been said with refer. to the opinion of …—אִתְּ׳, אִיתְּ׳ it has been said (above);we have been taught. Succ. 15ᵃ; a. fr.
- same. Targ. Gen. XXII, 14; a. e.
אָמַר II
- , v. אָמַר I, a) to be thick, strong.
- 1. to thrive; to boast, vaunt, be oppressive (cmp. Ps. XCIV, 4). Sot. IX, 15 (49ᵇ) יוקר יַאֲמִיר the nobility shall be oppressive (Snh. 97ᵃ יְעַוֵּת; Der. Er. Zut. X יעוות; Cant. R. to II, 13 הווה).—*[ e.g. Psalms 94:4
- 2. (denom. of מריא to fatten. Sabb. XXIV, 3 (155ᵇ) Bab. מַאֲמִירִין, Ms. Oxf., Mish. a. Y. מַמְרִים, מַמְרִין, v. מרי.]
אֵמֶר
- , v. אֵימַר a. אִמְרָה.
אִמַּר
- lamb, v. אִימַּר.
מְרַר
- same, to be bitter; to grieve, mourn. Perf. מַר, imperf. יֵימַר, יֵמַר. Targ. Is. XXIV, 9. Targ. I Sam. XXX, 6; a. fr.—Targ. Zech. XII, 10 ויֵימְרוּן, v. infra.
- to embitter, aggrieve. Targ. Ruth I, 13 תְמָרְרוּן (ed. Amst. תִמְרְ׳). Targ. Y. I Deut. XXXII, 32 מְמַרְרִין (some ed. מְמַרְרַן; Y. II מַרְרַן).
- 1. same. Targ. Ruth I, 20 (not same. Targ. Ruth I, 20 (not אֲמַרִ׳). Targ. Ex. I, 14; a. e.
- 2. to arrange mourning. Targ. Zech. XII, 10 ויימרון … כמא דמַמְרִין וכ׳ they shall arrange mourning for him, as is arranged for &c. (v. infra).—[אָמְרָרוּ, v. Ithpa.]
- to aggrieve. Targ. Prov. XVII, 25. Targ. Y. I Gen. XLIX, 23 ממרירו, read: מַרְמִירוּ; (Y. II אֲמָרוּ, read: אַמָּ׳ Af.).
- 1. to be enraged, fight. Targ. O. Gen. l. c. (Var. אָמְרָרוּ, v. Berl. Targ. O. II, p. 18; oth. ed. אַמְרָרוּ Af.).
- 2. to mourn. Targ. Zech. l. c. Var. (v. Lag. Proph. I, p. XLII).
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 44 distinct written forms H560 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that stem’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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| וְ/אָמַ֗ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 2:15 | 7 |
| וְ/אָמַ֣ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 2:5 | 7 |
| וְ/אָמַ֔ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 2:8 | 5 |
| אָמְרִ֣ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 6:6 | 3 |
| אֲמַר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 2:25 | 2 |
| אֲמַ֖ר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 2:46 | 2 |
| אֲמַ֣ר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 5:2 | 2 |
| אֲמַ֣רְנָא | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Plural | Ezra 5:4 | 2 |
| אֲמַר֙ | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 3:13 | 2 |
| אָֽמְרִין֙ | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 3:4 | 2 |
| וְ/אָ֣מְרִ֔ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 2:10 | 2 |
| וְ/אָמַר֙ | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 3:19 | 2 |
| וַ/אֲמַר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 7:16 | 2 |
| אֱמַ֗ר | Verb, Qal, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 4:18 | 1 |
| אֱמַ֣רוּ | Verb, Qal, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Plural | Daniel 2:9 | 1 |
| אֱמַ֥ר | Verb, Qal, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 2:4 | 1 |
| אֱמַֽר | Verb, Qal, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 4:9 | 1 |
| אֲמַ֗ר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 6:16 | 1 |
| אֲמַ֗רוּ | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural | Daniel 4:26 | 1 |
| אֲמַֽר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 7:1 | 1 |
| אֲמַר֒ | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 7:23 | 1 |
| אַמְרֵֽת | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular | Daniel 4:8 | 1 |
| אָֽמְרִ֔ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 6:5 | 1 |
| אָמַ֗ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 4:14 | 1 |
| אָמַ֤ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 4:7 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִ֑ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 2:7 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִ֖ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 3:16 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִ֣ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 6:15 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִ֥ין | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 6:12 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִין֙ | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 3:24 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמְרִין֮ | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Daniel 6:13 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמַ֑ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 2:27 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמַ֜ר | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 3:24 | 1 |
| וְ/אָמַר֩ | Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Daniel 4:23 | 1 |
| וְ/יֵ֥אמַר | Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 4:35 | 1 |
| וַ/אֲמֶ֗רֶת | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular | Daniel 5:10 | 1 |
| וַ/אֲמַ֣ר | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 6:24 | 1 |
| וַ/אֲמַר֙ | Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 2:12 | 1 |
| יֵאמַ֤ר | Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 3:29 | 1 |
| יֵאמַ֥ר | Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Daniel 2:7 | 1 |
| לְ/מֵאמַ֣ר | Verb, Qal, Infinitive Construct | Daniel 2:9 | 1 |
| לְ/מֵמַ֑ר | Verb, Qal, Infinitive Construct | Ezra 5:11 | 1 |
| נֵאמַ֥ר | Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Plural | Daniel 2:36 | 1 |
| תֵּאמְר֣וּן | Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Plural | Jeremiah 10:11 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H560, 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
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 10 — not the complete family. 4 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 61 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 65 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.
