אָפַד
to gird
‘to gird’ is one of 3 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Stem
- Qal
- The basic, simple active stem — the plain form of the verb (“he wrote”).
Form
- Sequential Perfect
- A perfect with prefixed waw continuing a preceding imperfect or command (waw-consecutive perfect).
- Sequential Imperfect
- An imperfect with prefixed waw — the standard past-narrative form (waw-consecutive imperfect).
Person
- 2nd Person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 3rd Person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms
- Verb, Qal, Sequential Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular 1 time (50%)
- Verb, Qal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 1 time (50%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 2 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H640 appears — 2 distinct verses across 2 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.
Exodus 1 verse
Leviticus 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.
אפד (ʼâphad) is a Hebrew verb most often rendered “to gird.” The Hebrew Bible uses it only 2 verses. It clusters heavily in Exodus, which alone accounts for 50% of its uses. Debuting at Exodus 29:5, it then recurs through the corpus. It is not a single-sense word — see its full sense range. For the data behind this summary, explore the sense tree and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H640 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 →
- 2
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 2 distinct verses.
- 2 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 2 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #4,807
- by frequency
- Top 5000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 4,807 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 2 occurrences in the concordance →
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 2 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 2 verses · 100%
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: Bound 1×, Gird 1×
- American Standard Version: Bound it unto him therewith 1×, Gird 1×
- Berean Standard Bible: Fasten 1×, Fastened it 1×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Ephod 1×, He fastened 1×, You shall fasten the ephod 1×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H640 across 2 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H640 across 2 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H640 across 2 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H640 across 3 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
8 senses and sub-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 8 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.
- 1. ephod, priestly garment, shoulder-cape or mantle;
- a. as worn by ordinary priest made of white stuff (בַּד) 1 S 22:18; נֹשֵׂא א׳ cf. 2; so Samuel as a temple-servant 2:8, חָגוּר א׳ girt with an eph.; so David when dancing before ark 2 S 6:14 (id.) 1 Ch 15:27 וְעַל דויד א׳; e.g. 1 Samuel 22:18
- b. as prescribed in P for high priest, more costly, woven of gold, blue, purple, scarlet, & linen (? שֵׁשׁ) threads, provided with shoulder-pieces & breast-piece of like material, ornamented with gems and gold, Ex 25:7; 28:4, 6, 12, 15; 29:5; 35:9, 27; 39:2, 7 + 17 times Ex 28, 39, also Lv 8:7; cf. prob. 1 S 2:28 (נֹשֵׂא א׳) 14:3; 21:10 (v. sub 2); חֵשֶׁב הָא׳ Ex 28:27, 28; 29:5; 39:20, 21 Lv 8:7; מְעִיל הָא׳ Ex 29:5; 39:22 (cf. Lv 8:7); with vb. נָתַן אֶת־הָא׳ עַל־ put the ephod on Aaron Lv 8:7. e.g. Exodus 25:7
- 2. ephod used in consulting י׳ 1 S 23:6 א׳ borne in hand (read יָרַד וְהָא׳ בְּיָדוֹ 𝔊 We Dr) v 9 30:7(×2) (all c. הִגִּישׁ) + 14:18a (הגישׁ) & v 18b, in both read הָא׳ for ארון & v 18b also נֹשֵׂא 𝔊 Klo Dr; e.g. 1 Samuel 23:6
- a. according to Thes MV Di Ex 28:6 al. properly sub 1 b; consultation of י׳ in that case by Urim & Thummim in the breast-piece attached to the ephod (cf. Ex 28:28–30 & v. אוּרִים); if so, in view of נשׂא 1 S 2:28; 14:3, 18 (cf. supr.), not used elsewhere = wear except 22:18, & of 23:6, the word might be used by meton. for the breast-piece itself; e.g. Exodus 28:6
- b. others, e.g. StaGesch. i. 466, 471 BuRS 115 al., think of an image representing י׳; cf. following.
- 3.
- a. ephod of gold made by Gideon Ju 8:27 for a local sanctuary, by which Isr. was ensnared; = 2 b according to 𝔖 Thes (‘sine controversia’) Stu al. + Sta Bu l.c.; orig. = gold sheathing of an image (cf. etymol. supr. & Is 30:22 sub אֲפֻדָּה); MV Be KöHauptprobleme 59 think of garment, as sub 1 v. supr. e.g. Judges 8:27
- b. made (material not given) for a private, local sanctuary Ju 17:5; 18:14, 17, 18, 20 (‖ פֶּסֶל, מַסֵּכָה, תְּרָפִים in all, for 𝔊 gives מַסֵּכָה v 20, om. ℌ); cf. Ho 3:4 Isr. shall abide without king, prince, sacrifice, pillar, ephod or teraphim; according to Thes al. + Sta Bu l.c. = 2 b; Stu Be Ry al. regard as sub 1; in view of distinction from פסל, מסכה & תרפים it seems more likely that this is not an image, but some means of consulting deity, perhaps in imitation of Urim & Thummim. e.g. Judges 17:5
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
(28 times) & אֵפֹד (20 times) n.m. Ex 28:7 ephod (Ethiopic ኤፉድ cf. Aramaic ܦܶܕܬܳܐ id. (on meaning v. Lagl.c.), perhaps also Assyrian pid, pittu ZimBP 39; on form v. Ges§ 84 a 12. R. but Lagl.c. comp. وفاد, & thinks אֵפוֹד shortened from חֵשֶׁב הָא׳ ‘robe of approach’ to God)—א׳ abs. Ex 25:7 +; cstr. 1 S 2:18 +;—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from אפוד (ʼêphôwd) (H646) — ephod.
Forms in the corpus
The 2 distinct written forms H640 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/אָפַדְתָּ֣ | Verb, Qal, Sequential Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular | Exodus 29:5 | 1 |
| וַ/יֶּאְפֹּ֥ד | Verb, Qal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular | Leviticus 8:7 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H640, 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
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.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 2 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 2 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.
