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צֹאן

flock

also: small cattle, sheep, sheep and goats, flocks fuller range ↓

H6629 Strong's Hebrew
tsôʼn Transliteration
/tsone/ Pronunciation
Usage in the Hebrew Bible 274 appearances

Compare with another word →

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, צאן (tsôʼn) means “flock.” Not a single-sense word: its full sense range also takes in “small cattle”, “sheep”, and “sheep and goats”. With 247 verses in 30 books, it is a common word in the Hebrew Bible. First canonically at Genesis 4:2, it enters the text early. From the same root come צנא and צאנן. Dig into 247-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.

Gloss history

Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship

Strong's · 1890
cattle
Modern gloss
flock
Strong's 1890 sometimes compressed multiple senses — or homonymous roots — under one number, and used 19th-century English phrasing that no longer carries the same connotation. The modern gloss reflects current BDB scholarship; open the Lexicon Entry tab for the full sense breakdown. Download share card

About this word

Strong's H6629 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 →

247
distinct verses
The word appears in 247 distinct verses.
30 / 39
OT books
The word appears in 30 of 39 Old Testament books.
Genesis 4:2
first appearance
The earliest occurrence is in Genesis 4:2.
Zechariah 13:7
last appearance
The latest occurrence is in Zechariah 13:7.
#180
by frequency
Top 250 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 180 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).

View all 247 occurrences in the concordance →


Most concentrated in

By section of the Old Testament

  • Pentateuch 103 · 42%
  • Historical 58 · 23%
  • Wisdom 24 · 10%
  • Prophets 62 · 25%

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 247 distinct verses.

  • Torah (Pentateuch) 103 verses · 42%
  • Prophets (Nevi'im) 95 verses · 38%
  • Writings (Ketuvim) 49 verses · 20%

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: Sheep 97×, Flock 68×, Flocks 43×
  • American Standard Version: Sheep 88×, Flock 63×, Flocks 40×
  • Berean Standard Bible: Sheep 85×, Flock 70×, Flocks 62×
  • unfoldingWord Literal Text: Flock 95×, Sheep 69×, Flock s 32×

King James Version Public Domain

Renders H6629 across 264 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Sheep” 97×
  • “Flock” 68×
  • “Flocks” 43×
  • “Cattle” 11×
  • “Like a flock” 5×
  • “Like sheep” 4×
  • “All the cattle” 2×
  • “All the flocks” 2×
  • “Or of the flock” 2×
  • “Shall the flocks” 2×

Plus 28 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 10 further occurrences.

American Standard Version Public Domain

Renders H6629 across 265 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Sheep” 88×
  • “Flock” 63×
  • “Flocks” 40×
  • “Like a flock” 5×
  • “'s flock” 3×
  • “'s sheep” 3×
  • “All the flocks” 3×
  • “All the flock” 2×
  • “Be of the flock” 2×
  • “Like sheep” 2×
  • “Ones of the flock” 2×
  • “Or of the flock” 2×

Plus 50 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 H6629 across 259 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Sheep” 85×
  • “Flock” 70×
  • “Flocks” 62×
  • “Like sheep” 8×
  • “Animals” 4×
  • “Like a flock” 4×
  • “Or flock” 4×

Plus 22 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 15 further occurrences.

unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0

Renders H6629 across 277 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Flock” 95×
  • “Sheep” 69×
  • “Flock s” 32×
  • “Flocks” 22×
  • “And” 6×
  • “Like a flock” 6×
  • “Like sheep” 6×
  • “Flock of” 5×
  • “The” 4×
  • “Flock s of” 3×
  • “Like sheep of” 3×
  • “Sheep of” 3×

Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 19 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 5 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. lit.
    • a. small cattle, usually of sheep and goats in one flock (RobBR i. 477) Gn 30:31, 32 +; sheep specified also 21:28 (כִּבְשׂת הַצּ׳), 31:38 (אֵילֵי צ׳) +; sheep only 1 S 25:2 (+ עִזִּים); goats specified Gn 27:9; Je 50:8; צ׳ as yielding (1) animals for food Am 6:4 (כָּרִים), 1 S 14:32; 2 S 12:4; Ne 5:18 +; צ׳ מַאֲכָל ψ 44:12 (in sim.); (2) wool Gn 31:19 + (v. [גָּזַז], גֵּז); (3) milk, חֲלֵב צ׳ Dt 32:14 (? goats’ milk, cf. Pr 27:27); (4) sacrif. victims Gn 4:4 (J), Lv 1:2, 10; 3:6; Nu 15:3 (all P), 22:40 (E), Dt 12:6, 17, 21 + often; so צֹאן קָדָשִׁים Ez 36:38a, cf. בְּכוֹרֵי בְקָרֵינוּ וְצֹאנֵינוּ Ne 10:37; in gen. as property (often + בָּקָר, etc.) Gn 12:16; 13:5; 24:35 Jb 1:3; 42:12 + often (v. also ii. [עַשְׁתָּרוֹת]); gift Gn 20:14; 21:27; 38:17 (goat), Dt 15:14; 2 Ch 17:11; booty 1 S 15:9, 15 +. e.g. Genesis 30:31
    • b. צ׳ sometimes of a definite number of animals (i.e. as pl. of שֶׂה, etc.): two Is 7:21, four Ex 21:37 (larger numbers v. 1 S 25:2, 5, 18; Nu 31:32, 36; Ne 5:18; Jb 1:3; 42:12 supr.).—Vid. also בֵּן 7 b; גְּדֵרָה, מִכְלָה, מַרְבֵּץ, נָוֶה, עֵדֶר; כֶּלֶב, רֹעֶה, שַׁעַר. e.g. Isaiah 7:21
  • 2. sim. of multitude Ez 36:37, 38, cf. ψ 107:41; of children Jb 21:11; of dead, with death as shepherd ψ 49:15; of (shepherdless) Isr. Nu 27:17; 1 K 22:17 = 2 Ch 18:16; Zc 10:2; 13:7, wandering in sin Is 53:6; of Isr. led by י׳ ψ 77:21; 78:52; 80:2, cf. Zc 9:16 (on text v. We Now); Ez 34:12; of Isr. in distress, כְּצ׳ טִבְחָה ψ 44:23, cf. (of wicked) צ׳ לְטִבְחָה Je 12:3; of scattered Bab. Is 13:14. e.g. Ezekiel 36:37
  • 3. metaph. of multitude, צ׳ אָדָם Ez 36:38; of Isr. 2 S 24:17 = 1 Ch 21:17; Je 23:1, 2, 3; Ez 24:5, and especially sustained fig. 34:2, 3 + 17 times 34, also Zc 11:7, 17; צ׳ אֹבְדוֹת Je 50:6, צ׳ תִּפְאַרְתֵּךְ 13:20; of Isr. under י׳’s care, (-וֹ, י—ִ) צ׳ מַרְעִיתֶ֑ךָ ψ 74:1; 79:13; 100:3; Ez 34:31, also צ׳ יָדוֹ ψ 95:7 (‖ עַם־מַרְעִיתוֹ; read perhaps צ׳ מַרְעִיתוֹ, עַם יָדוֹ, so Che al.); צ׳ נַחֲלָתֶ֑ךָ Mi 7:14; also in combinations: אַדִּירֵי הַצּ׳ Je 25:34, 35, 36, צ׳ חַהֲרֵגָה Zc 11:4, 7 (cf. ψ 44:23), עֲנִיֵּי הַצּ׳ v 7, 11 (all of Isr.); of Edom צְעִירֵי הַצּ׳ Je 49:20; 50:45. e.g. Ezekiel 36:38

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

n.coll.f. Gn 30:36 (poss. m. v 39a +, KöSynt. § 247 g, but dub., v 39b c. vb. fpl., as usually; in 1 S 15:14 join הַזֶּה with קוֹל; v. further Albr ZAW xv (1895), 316 ff.) small cattle, sheep and goats, flock, flocks;—צ׳ abs. Gn 4:2 +, cstr. 29:9 +; sf. צֹאנוֹ 4:4 +; צֹאנֵנוּ Ex 10:9, צֹאונֵנוּ ψ 144:13; as pl. צֹאנֵינוּ Ne 10:37 van d. H. Gi (not Baer); s. [צֹנֶא] צֹנֶה p. 856, etc.;—

— 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 migrate

Part of speech: Noun Feminine TWOT: 1864a


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.

צֹאן

  • (b. h.) flock, small cattle. Gen. R. s. 73 צֹאנוֹ של לבן Laban’s flock. Gen. R. s. 42 אם אין תישים אין צ׳ אם אין צ׳ וכ׳ where there are no bucks, there is no flock, and where there is no flock, there is no shepherd; Lev. R. s. 11; Esth. R. introd.; a. fr.—צ׳ ברזל, v. בַּרְזֶל.

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 117 distinct written forms H6629 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
הַ/צֹּ֔אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Ezekiel 34:2 16
הַ/צֹּ֖אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Ezekiel 34:3 16
צֹ֥אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Exodus 2:16 14
הַ/צֹּ֑אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Amos 7:15 10
הַ/צֹּֽאן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 2:19 9
צֹֽאן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 46:34 9
צֹ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Deuteronomy 16:2 8
צֹ֤אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 24:35 7
צֹ֔אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Ezekiel 34:10 7
כְּ/צֹ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 36:38 6
הַ/צֹּאן֙ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 3:1 6
צֹ֖אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 22:1 5
הַ/צֹּ֤אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 34:3 5
וְ/צֹ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 12:38 4
הַ/צֹּ֗אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Leviticus 5:15 4
הַ/צֹּ֛אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 47:17 4
וְ/צֹ֖אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Chronicles 12:40 4
צֹאנִ/י֙ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:6 4
צֹאנִ֔/י Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:6 4
צֹ֛אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Exodus 12:21 3
הַ/צֹּ֧אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 30:40 3
כַּ/צֹּ֕אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Kings 22:17 3
כַּ/צֹּ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Isaiah 53:6 3
צֹ֑אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Ezekiel 25:5 3
צֹ֗אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Deuteronomy 32:14 3
צֹאן֙ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 26:14 3
צֹאנֶֽ/ךָ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Deuteronomy 15:19 3
צֹאנֽ/וֹ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Genesis 31:4 3
בְּ/צֹ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Genesis 30:40 2
בַּ/צֹּ֑אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Samuel 16:11 2
הַ/צֹּ֥אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Samuel 15:14 2
וְ/צֹ֕אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Kings 8:63 2
וְ/צֹאן֮ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Kings 1:19 2
וְ/צֹאנֶ֑/ךָ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Deuteronomy 12:17 2
וָ/צֹ֔אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 2 Chronicles 31:6 2
צֹֽאנְ/ךָ֖ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Exodus 20:24 2
צֹאן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 12:16 2
צֹאנ/וֹ֙ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:12 2
צֹאנ֖/וֹ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Genesis 4:4 2
צֹאנְ/ךָ֖ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Deuteronomy 18:4 2
צֹאנִ֑/י Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:8 2
צֹאנִ֖/י Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:8 2
צֹאנִ֣/י Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Ezekiel 34:8 2
צֹאנֶ֑/ךָ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Deuteronomy 28:51 2
בַ/צֹּ֑אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Leviticus 22:21 1
בְּ/צֹאנֵ֤/נוּ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Exodus 10:9 1
בְּ/צֹאנֶ֑/ךָ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Genesis 31:41 1
בְּ/צֹאנָ֣/ם Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Hosea 5:6 1
בַּ/צֹּ֔אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 37:2 1
בַּ/צֹּ֛אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Job 1:16 1
בַּ/צֹּֽאן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Samuel 16:19 1
הֲ/צֹ֧אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Numbers 11:22 1
הַ/צֹּ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 30:41 1
הַ/צֹּ֨אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Leviticus 1:10 1
הַ/צֹּאן֩ Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Samuel 15:9 1
וְ/הַ/צֹּ֗אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Jonah 3:7 1
וְ/הַ/צֹּ֣אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 31:43 1
וְ/הַ/צֹּ֥אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute Genesis 33:13 1
וְ/צֹ֗אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Absolute 1 Chronicles 5:21 1
וְ/צֹ֥אן Noun, Common, Both, Singular, Construct Psalms 79:13 1

The 60 most common forms are shown; 57 rarer forms follow in the full concordance.


Same root — word family

Other BDB entries built from the same root as H6629, 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 → 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 231 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 247 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.

Reading settings

Reading text

Shown beneath each verse's original-language words.

Old Testament
Old Testament edition

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