פָּרַד
to divide
‘to divide’ is one of 5 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
See every Niphal verb in the Hebrew Bible →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Stem
- Niphal
- Usually the simple passive or reflexive of the Qal (“he was written”). Here: ‘divide’
- Hithpael
- The reflexive or reciprocal stem (the subject acts on itself).
- Hiphil
- The causative active stem (“he caused / brought about”). Here: ‘divide’
- Pual
- The passive counterpart of the Piel.
- Piel
- An intensive or resultative active stem.
- Qal
- The basic, simple active stem — the plain form of the verb (“he wrote”). Here: ‘divided’
Form
- Perfect
- A completed action or state — Hebrew marks aspect (completeness) more than strict tense (“he wrote”).
- Imperfect
- An incomplete, ongoing, or future action (“he will / would write”).
- Participle Active
- A verbal adjective expressing ongoing or characteristic action (“writing / one who writes”).
- Sequential Imperfect
- An imperfect with prefixed waw — the standard past-narrative form (waw-consecutive imperfect).
- Participle Passive
- A verbal adjective expressing action received (“written”).
- Infinitive Construct
- A bound verbal noun, frequently with prepositions (“to write / in writing”).
- Imperative
- A direct command (“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”).
Gender
- Common
- Either gender — not distinguished for this form.
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms 18 distinct
- Verb, Niphal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Common, Plural 3 times (12%)
- Verb, Hithpael, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural 3 times (12%)
- Verb, Niphal, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 2 times (8%)
- Verb, Niphal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 2 times (8%)
- Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 2 times (8%)
- Verb, Hiphil, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 2 times (8%)
- Verb, Niphal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural 1 time (4%)
- Verb, Pual, Participle Passive, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 1 time (4%)
+10 more forms (10 occurrences)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 26 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H6504 appears — 26 distinct verses across 13 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 8 verses
- Genesis 2:10 יִפָּרֵ֔ד Niphal impf 3ms A river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from there it was parted, and became four heads.
- Genesis 10:5 נִפְרְד֞וּ Niphal pf 3cp Of these were the isles of the nations divided in their lands, everyone after his language, after their families, in their nations.
- Genesis 10:32 נִפְרְד֧וּ Niphal pf 3cp These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations, in their nations. Of these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood.
- Genesis 13:9 הִפָּ֥רֶד Niphal impv 2ms Isn't the whole land before you? Please separate yourself from me. If you go to the left hand, then I will go to the right. Or if you go to the right hand, then I will go to the left."
- Genesis 13:11 וַ/יִּפָּ֣רְד֔וּ conj + Niphal wimpf 3mp So Lot chose the Plain of the Jordan for himself. Lot traveled east, and they separated themselves the one from the other.
- Genesis 13:14 הִפָּֽרֶד Niphal inf.cs Yahweh said to Abram, after Lot was separated from him, "Now, lift up your eyes, and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward,
- Genesis 25:23 יִפָּרֵ֑דוּ Niphal impf 3mp Yahweh said to her, Two nations are in your womb, Two peoples will be separated from your body. The one people will be stronger than the other people. The elder will serve the younger.
- Genesis 30:40 הִפְרִ֣יד Hiphil pf 3ms Jacob separated the lambs, and set the faces of the flocks toward the streaked and all the black in the flock of Laban: and he put his own droves apart, and didn't put them into Laban's flock.
Deuteronomy 1 verse
Judges 1 verse
Ruth 1 verse
2 Samuel 1 verse
2 Kings 1 verse
Nehemiah 1 verse
Esther 1 verse
Job 2 verses
Psalms 2 verses
- Psalms 22:14 וְ/הִתְפָּֽרְד֗וּ conj + Hithpael pf 3cp I am poured out like water. All my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax; It is melted within me.
- Psalms 92:9 יִ֝תְפָּרְד֗וּ Hithpael impf 3mp For, behold, your enemies, Yahweh, For, behold, your enemies shall perish. All the evil-doers will be scattered.
Proverbs 5 verses
- Proverbs 16:28 מַפְרִ֥יד Hiphil ptcp.act ms A perverse man stirs up strife. A whisperer separates close friends.
- Proverbs 17:9 מַפְרִ֥יד Hiphil ptcp.act ms He who covers an offense promotes love; But he who repeats a matter separates best friends.
- Proverbs 18:1 נִפְרָ֑ד Niphal ptcp.act ms An unfriendly man pursues selfishness, And defies all sound judgment.
- Proverbs 18:18 יַפְרִֽיד Hiphil impf 3ms The lot settles disputes, And keeps strong ones apart.
- Proverbs 19:4 יִפָּרֵֽד Niphal impf 3ms Wealth adds many friends, But the poor is separated from his friend.
Ezekiel 1 verse
Hosea 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.
At its core, פרד (pârad) means “to divide.” As a verb its force shifts by stem, across 6 stems (Qal, Niphal, and more). With 26 verses in 13 books, it is a moderately common word in the Hebrew Bible. Its uses concentrate in Genesis (31% of all occurrences). Scripture first uses it in Genesis 2:10. Dig into 26-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H6504 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 →
- 26
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 26 distinct verses.
- 13 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 13 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,251
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,251 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 26 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 26 distinct verses.
- Writings (Ketuvim) 12 verses · 46%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 9 verses · 35%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 5 verses · 19%
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: Separateth 2×
- American Standard Version: Separateth 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Separates 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Separates 3×, Spread out 2×, They separated 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H6504 across 26 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 24 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 H6504 across 26 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 24 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 H6504 across 26 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 23 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 H6504 across 29 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 22 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
8 senses and sub-senses in the full BDB
Hebrew verbs can shift meaning by stem (binyan): Qal is the basic action, Niphal is often passive or reflexive, Piel often intensifies or makes it factitive, and Hiphil is typically causative. The senses below are grouped under the stem BDB assigns to each. This entry also uses Pual (the passive of Piel) and Hithpael (reflexive or reciprocal).
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.
Qal
- Pt. pass. divided
Niphal
- 1. divide, separate (intrans.)
- 2. be divided, separated
Piel
- . make a separation
Pual
- . Pt. divided
Hiphil
- 1. divide, separate
- 2. make a division, separation, between
Hithpael
- . be divided, separated, from each other
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
Origin: a primitive root
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.
פָּרַד
- (b. h.)
- 1. [to break through, run, v. פֶּרֶד II]
- 2. to break apart; to separate. Ukts. II, 6 הרמון שפְּרָדוֹ a pomegranate which one has cut in two (leaving the seeds in their sheathes; Maim.: שפֵּרְדוֹ, Pi., the grains of which one loosened by drying).—Part. pass. פָּרוּד; f. פְּרוּדָה; pl. פְּרוּדִים, פְּרוּדִין; פְּרוּדוֹת. Succ. 32ᵃ אם היה פ׳ וכ׳, v. כָּפַת; Lev. R. s. 30. Toh. VIII, 8 אוכל פ׳ אינו וכ׳ eatables divided into pieces are not counted together (to make up the required size for levitical cleanness). Ib. IX, 9 נמצא על גבי פ׳ (Maim. פֵּירוּדִים) if the creeping thing is found on broken olives. Ib. פ׳ על גבי פ׳ pieces on top of pieces; a. fr.
- to be separated, spread. Succ. III, 1 נִפְרְדוּ עליו if its leaves are spread, opp. to נפרצו. Hor. 10ᵇ (ref. to Prov. XVIII, 1) זה לוט שנ׳ וכ׳ that means Lot, who separated himself from Abraham; a. fr. e.g. Proverbs 18:1
- to separate, loosen. Ukts. II, 6, v. supra. Tosef. Shebi. VI, 29 מְפָרְדִין (ed. Zuck. a. oth. מְפָרְרִין), v. פֶּרֶד I. Y. B. Mets. II, 11ᵇ bot. המְפָרֵד בגרוגרות who separates dried figs; a. e.
- 1. to separate, estrange. Gen. R. s. 20 (ref. to Prov. XVI, 28) שה׳ אלופו של עולם he (the serpent) caused the friend of the world (the Divine Presence) to withdraw; [Matt. K.; estranged the prince of the world (Adam, from God)]. e.g. Proverbs 16:28
- 2. (neut. verb) to branch off. Gen. R. s. 16 מפְרִיד ‘Rashi’; Yalk. Deut. 801, v. פְּרָת.
- 1. to separate one’s self; to be scattered. Midr. Till. to Ps. XCII, 10 יִתְפָּרְדוּ כמוץ וכ׳ let them be scattered like chaff before the wind; a. e.
- 2. (of pomegranates) to be cut apart. Orl. III, 8 נִתְפָּרְדוּ וכ׳ if the pomegranates are cut; Tosef. Ter. V, 10.
פְּרַד
- , to separate, scatter. Targ. Prov. XI, 24 (ed. Wil. פָּרֵר, corr. acc.; h. text מפזר). Targ. Is. LVIII, 6.—Part. pass. פָּרִיד; f. פָּרִידָא driven off. Targ. Prov. IV, 16.—V. פְּרִידְתָּא.
- same. Part. pass. מְפָרַד driven off, chased. Targ. Is. XIII, 14.
- to make unsteady, bewilder. Targ. Prov. VII, 10.
- 1. to be chased off; to flee. Targ. Y. Gen. XXXI, 40.—Men. 43ᵃ איפרד חזותיה (read אִיפְרְדָא) its color fled (faded).
- 2. to be scattered, spread. Targ. Job XLI, 9 (Ms. מתפרש׳).—Succ. 32ᵃ (expl. נפרדו, v. preced.) דאִיפְּרוּד אִפָּרוּדֵי the leaves are spread.
פֶּרֶד I
- (preced.) a part, esp. (collect. noun) split and dried pomegranates. Maasr. I, 6 הפ׳ והצימוקין וכ׳ dried pomegranates and raisins &c. Tosef. Shebi. VI, 29 מפרדין רימונים לעשותן פ׳ (ed. Zuck. מְפָרְרִין … פֶּרֶר; Var. פרך; some ed. פריך, corr. acc.) you may (in the Sabbatical year) cut pomegranates to make them pered. Tosef. Ter. III, 16 רימונים ועתיד לעשותן פ׳ Var. ed. Zuck. (ed. Zuck. פראנר; oth. ed. כרי, corr. acc.) if one gives T’rumah of pomegranates (intended for sale), with the intention eventually to cut and store them as pered; a. e.
פֶּרֶד II
- preced. wds.) [runner, wild; v. Del. Proleg. p. 94] mule. Pes. 54ᵃ אף האור והפ׳ also fire and the mule (were created on the sixth day at twilight). Ib. הביא שתי … ויצא מהן פ׳ Adam took two (heterogeneous) animals … and from them came forth a mule. Tosef. Kil. V, 5 לא יקשור סוס לפ׳ ופ׳ וכ׳ one must not tie a horse to a mule or a mule to an ass; a. e.—Fem. פִּרְדָּה, פִּי׳ (also for the male). Y. Ber. VIII, 12ᵇ ויצא מהן פ׳, v. supra; Gen. R. s. 82 end ויצאת … פ׳. Ib. פ׳ לבנה a white mule. Tosef. Kil. V, 6 אסור לרכוב ע"ג פי׳ it is forbidden to ride on the back of a mule. Meg. 13ᵇ (play on מפרד, Esth. III, 8) כפְּרִידָה וכ׳ (the Jews are) like the mule that is unproductive. Gen. R. s. 41 (play on הפרד, Gen. XIII, 9) מה הפ׳ הזו אינה קולטת זרע וכ׳ as the mule does not breed the semen she receives, so it is impossible for this man (Lot) to mix with the seed of Abraham. Ib. אברהם פ׳ עקרה, v. עָקָר; a. e.—Pl. פִּרְדּוֹת, פִּירְ׳. Tosef. Kil. V, 5 כל הפ׳ כולן וכ׳ all mules (whether the sire be a horse or an ass) are considered one genus (may be harnessed together); Ḥull. 79ᵃ. Gen. R. s. 64; a. e. e.g. Esther 3:8
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 24 distinct written forms H6504 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.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H6504, 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 → Showing 4 of 5 — not the complete family. 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 23 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 26 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 2:10
- Deuteronomy 32:8
- Judges 4:11
- Ruth 1:17
- 2 Samuel 1:23
- 2 Kings 2:11
- Esther 3:8
- Job 4:11
- Proverbs 16:28
- Ezekiel 1:11
- Hosea 4:14
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.
