עֲמָלֵק
Amalek
BDB lists 3 entries for ‘Amalek’ 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
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Proper
- A name of a specific person, place, or people (e.g. Abraham, Zion, Israel).
Every verse where H6002 appears — 37 distinct verses across 9 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 2 verses
- Genesis 36:12 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper Timna was concubine to Eliphaz, Esau's son; and she bore to Eliphaz Amalek. These are the sons of Adah, Esau's wife.
- Genesis 36:16 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper chief Korah, chief Gatam, chief Amalek: these are the chiefs who came of Eliphaz in the land of Edom; these are the sons of Adah.
Exodus 7 verses
- Exodus 17:8 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper Then Amalek came and fought with Israel in Rephidim.
- Exodus 17:9 בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק prep + n Proper Moses said to Joshua, "Choose men for us, and go out, fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with God's rod in my hand."
- Exodus 17:10 בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק prep + n Proper So Joshua did as Moses had told him, and fought with Amalek; and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.
- Exodus 17:11 עֲמָלֵֽק n Proper It happened, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed; and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.
- Exodus 17:13 עֲמָלֵ֥ק n Proper Joshua defeated Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
- Exodus 17:14 עֲמָלֵ֔ק n Proper Yahweh said to Moses, "Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under the sky."
- Exodus 17:16 בַּֽ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק prep + n Proper He said, "Yah has sworn: 'Yahweh will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.'"
Numbers 2 verses
- Numbers 13:29 עֲמָלֵ֥ק n Proper Amalek dwells in the land of the South: and the Hittite, and the Jebusite, and the Amorite, dwell in the hill-country; and the Canaanite dwells by the sea, and along by the side of the Jordan.
- Numbers 24:20 עֲמָלֵ֔ק עֲמָלֵ֔ק n Proper n Proper He looked at Amalek, and took up his parable, and said, Amalek was the first of the nations; But his latter end shall come to destruction.
Deuteronomy 2 verses
- Deuteronomy 25:17 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper Remember what Amalek did to you by the way as you came forth out of Egypt;
- Deuteronomy 25:19 עֲמָלֵ֔ק n Proper Therefore it shall be, when Yahweh your God has given you rest from all your enemies round about, in the land which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance to possess it, that you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under the sky; you shall not forget.
Judges 6 verses
- Judges 3:13 וַ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק conj + n Proper He gathered to him the children of Ammon and Amalek; and he went and struck Israel, and they possessed the city of palm trees.
- Judges 5:14 בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֔ק prep + n Proper Out of Ephraim [came down] they whose root is in Amalek; After you, Benjamin, among your peoples; Out of Machir came down governors, Out of Zebulun those who handle the marshal's staff.
- Judges 6:3 וַֽ/עֲמָלֵ֛ק conj + n Proper So it was, when Israel had sown, that the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east; they came up against them;
- Judges 6:33 וַ/עֲמָלֵ֛ק conj + n Proper Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the children of the east assembled themselves together; and they passed over, and encamped in the valley of Jezreel.
- Judges 7:12 וַ/עֲמָלֵ֤ק conj + n Proper The Midianites and the Amalekites and all the children of the east lay along in the valley like locusts for multitude; and their camels were without number, as the sand which is on the sea-shore for multitude.
- Judges 10:12 וַֽ/עֲמָלֵק֙ conj + n Proper The Sidonians also, and the Amalekites, and the Maonites, did oppress you; and you cried to me, and I saved you out of their hand.
1 Samuel 12 verses
- 1 Samuel 14:48 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper He did valiantly, and struck the Amalekites, and delivered Israel out of the hands of those who despoiled them.
- 1 Samuel 15:2 עֲמָלֵ֖ק n Proper Thus says Yahweh of Hosts, I have marked that which Amalek did to Israel, how he set himself against him in the way, when he came up out of Egypt.
- 1 Samuel 15:3 עֲמָלֵ֗ק n Proper Now go and strike Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and don't spare them; but kill both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.
- 1 Samuel 15:5 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper Saul came to the city of Amalek, and laid wait in the valley.
- 1 Samuel 15:6 עֲמָלֵֽק n Proper Saul said to the Kenites, Go, depart, get you down from among the Amalekites, lest I destroy you with them; for you shown kindness to all the children of Israel, when they came up out of Egypt. So the Kenites departed from among the Amalekites.
- 1 Samuel 15:7 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper Saul struck the Amalekites, from Havilah as you go to Shur, that is before Egypt.
- 1 Samuel 15:8 עֲמָלֵ֖ק n Proper He took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
- 1 Samuel 15:18 עֲמָלֵ֔ק n Proper and Yahweh sent you on a journey, and said, 'Go, and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed.'
- 1 Samuel 15:20 עֲמָלֵ֔ק עֲמָלֵ֖ק n Proper n Proper Saul said to Samuel, Yes, I have obeyed the voice of Yahweh, and have gone the way which Yahweh sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.
- 1 Samuel 15:32 עֲמָלֵ֔ק n Proper Then said Samuel, Bring you here to me Agag the king of the Amalekites. Agag came to him cheerfully. Agag said, Surely the bitterness of death is past.
- 1 Samuel 28:18 בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק prep + n Proper Because you didn't obey the voice of Yahweh, and didn't execute his fierce wrath on Amalek, therefore has Yahweh done this thing to you this day.
- 1 Samuel 30:18 עֲמָלֵ֑ק n Proper David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken; and David rescued his two wives.
2 Samuel 2 verses
- 2 Samuel 1:1 הָ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק ptcl def.art + n Proper It happened after the death of Saul, when David was returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites, and David had abode two days in Ziklag;
- 2 Samuel 8:12 וּ/מֵֽ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק conj + prep + n Proper of Syria, and of Moab, and of the children of Ammon, and of the Philistines, and of Amalek, and of the spoil of Hadadezer, son of Rehob, king of Zobah.
1 Chronicles 3 verses
- 1 Chronicles 1:36 וַ/עֲמָלֵֽק conj + n Proper The sons of Eliphaz: Teman, and Omar, Zephi, and Gatam, Kenaz, and Timna, and Amalek.
- 1 Chronicles 4:43 לַ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק prep + n Proper They struck the remnant of the Amalekites who escaped, and have lived there to this day.
- 1 Chronicles 18:11 וּ/מֵֽ/עֲמָלֵֽק conj + prep + n Proper These also did king David dedicate to Yahweh, with the silver and the gold that he carried away from all the nations; from Edom, and from Moab, and from the children of Ammon, and from the Philistines, and from Amalek.
Psalms 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.
עמלק — transliterated ʻĂmâlêq — is a Hebrew name carrying the sense “Amalek.” Debuting at Genesis 36:12, it then recurs through the corpus. Spanning 37 verses in 9 books, it ranks among the moderately common words of the Hebrew Bible. Its uses concentrate in 1 Samuel (32% of all occurrences). 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 H6002 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 →
- 37
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 37 distinct verses.
- 9 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 9 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #922
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 922 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 37 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 37 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 20 verses · 54%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 13 verses · 35%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 4 verses · 11%
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: Amalek 23×, Amalekites 14×
- American Standard Version: Amalek 23×, Amalekites 12×
- Berean Standard Bible: Amalekites 20×, Amalek 14×, Against amalek 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Amalek 35×, Against amalek 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H6002 across 39 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 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 H6002 across 39 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.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H6002 across 39 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H6002 across 39 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 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.
- Amalek = "dweller in a valley"
- son of Eliphaz by his concubine Timnah, grandson of Esau, and progenitor of a tribe of people in southern Canaan
- descendants of Amalek
Word origin
n.pr.gent. Amalek (on—ָ v. LagBN 162 BaNB 160);—ancient people Nu 24:20(×2), S. of Canaan—in Negeb 13:29 (all JE), fierce and warlike Bedawin (cf. GASmGeogr. 282 GFM Ju 6:3, 33), foes of Isr. during Exodus Ex 17:8 + 6 times Ex 17 (E), Dt 25:17, 19; later marauders in Isr. territory Ju 3:13; 6:3, 33; 7:12; 10:12, defeated by Saul 1 S 14:48; 15:2 + times 1 S 14:28, 18, and by David 30:18 (cf. adj.gent. infr.), 2 S 8:12 = 1 Ch 18:11, cf. ψ 83:8; also הָע׳ 2 S 1:1 (where read עֲמָלֵק or הָעֲמָלֵקִי, v. Comm.); ע׳ 1 Ch 4:43; as grandson of Esau Gn 36:12 (P) = 1 Ch 1:36, Gn 36:16; appar. connected with Ephr. territory Ju 5:14 (cf. 12:15 infr.; yet GFM conj. עֵמֶק).—On Amalek v. NöAmalekites (1864); Ency. Bi. s.v..
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Origin: probably of foreign origin
Forms in the corpus
The 19 distinct written forms H6002 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | Deuteronomy 25:17 | 8 |
| עֲמָלֵ֔ק | Noun, Proper | Deuteronomy 25:19 | 7 |
| בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | Exodus 17:9 | 3 |
| עֲמָלֵ֖ק | Noun, Proper | 1 Samuel 15:2 | 3 |
| וַ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | Judges 3:13 | 2 |
| עֲמָלֵ֥ק | Noun, Proper | Exodus 17:13 | 2 |
| עֲמָלֵֽק | Noun, Proper | Exodus 17:11 | 2 |
| בַּ/עֲמָלֵ֔ק | Noun, Proper | Judges 5:14 | 1 |
| בַּֽ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | Exodus 17:16 | 1 |
| הָ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | 2 Samuel 1:1 | 1 |
| וַ/עֲמָלֵ֛ק | Noun, Proper | Judges 6:33 | 1 |
| וַ/עֲמָלֵ֤ק | Noun, Proper | Judges 7:12 | 1 |
| וַ/עֲמָלֵֽק | Noun, Proper | 1 Chronicles 1:36 | 1 |
| וַֽ/עֲמָלֵק֙ | Noun, Proper | Judges 10:12 | 1 |
| וּ/מֵֽ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | 2 Samuel 8:12 | 1 |
| וּ/מֵֽ/עֲמָלֵֽק | Noun, Proper | 1 Chronicles 18:11 | 1 |
| וַֽ/עֲמָלֵ֛ק | Noun, Proper | Judges 6:3 | 1 |
| לַ/עֲמָלֵ֑ק | Noun, Proper | 1 Chronicles 4:43 | 1 |
| עֲמָלֵ֗ק | Noun, Proper | 1 Samuel 15:3 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H6002, 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.
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 → 1 of the same-root words is a proper name (a person or place). They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Bible dictionary
Public-domain dictionary articles matched to this entry by name (Amalek). A biblical name can be shared by more than one person or place, so an article may treat several.
Easton's Bible Dictionary · M. G. Easton, 1897
Dweller in a valley, the son of Eliphaz and grandson of Esau (Gen. 36:12; 1 Chr. 1:36); the chief of an Idumean tribe (Gen. 36:16). His mother was a Horite, a tribe whose territory the descendants of Esau had seized.
Smith's Bible Dictionary · William Smith, 1863
(dweller in a valley), a son of Eliphaz by his concubine Timnah grandson of Esau, and chieftain ("duke," Authorized Version) of Edom. (Genesis 36:12,16; 1 Chronicles 1:36) (B.C. about 1700.)
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary · Roswell D. Hitchcock, 1869
a people that licks up
Classic public-domain reference works; full attribution on Sources.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 37 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 37 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 36:12
- Exodus 17:8
- Numbers 13:29
- Deuteronomy 25:17
- Judges 3:13
- 1 Samuel 14:48
- 2 Samuel 1:1
- 1 Chronicles 1:36
- Psalms 83:7
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.
