צָמֵא
thirsty
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
- Adjective
- A word that describes or qualifies a noun.
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Grammatical forms
- Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 7 times (78%)
- Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Plural, Absolute 1 time (11%)
- Adjective, Adjective, Feminine, Singular, Absolute 1 time (11%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 9 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H6771 appears — 9 distinct verses across 5 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.
Deuteronomy 1 verse
2 Samuel 1 verse
Psalms 1 verse
Proverbs 1 verse
Isaiah 5 verses
- Isaiah 21:14 צָמֵ֖א adj Adjective ms To him who was thirsty they brought water; the inhabitants of the land of Tema did meet the fugitives with their bread.
- Isaiah 29:8 הַ/צָּמֵא֙ ptcl def.art + Adjective Adjective ms It shall be as when a hungry man dreams, and, behold, he eats; but he awakes, and his soul is empty: or as when a thirsty man dreams, and, behold, he drinks; but he awakes, and, behold, he is faint, and his soul has appetite: so shall the multitude of all the nations be, that fight against Mount Zion.
- Isaiah 32:6 צָמֵ֖א adj Adjective ms For the fool will speak folly, and his heart will work iniquity, to practice profanity, and to utter error against Yahweh, to make empty the soul of the hungry, and to cause the drink of the thirsty to fail.
- Isaiah 44:3 צָמֵ֔א adj Adjective ms For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit on your seed, and my blessing on your offspring:
- Isaiah 55:1 צָמֵא֙ adj Adjective ms Ho, everyone who thirsts, come you to the waters, and he who has no money; come you, buy, and eat; yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.
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.
צמא — transliterated tsâmêʼ — is a Hebrew adjective carrying the sense “thirsty.” Its uses cluster heavily in Isaiah (56% of all occurrences). With 9 verses in 5 books, it is an uncommon word in the Hebrew Bible. Debuting at Deuteronomy 29:19, it then recurs through the corpus. Sharing its root, it stands alongside צמא, צמא and צמאון. See the sense tree, 9-verse concordance, and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H6771 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 →
- 9
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 9 distinct verses.
- 5 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 5 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #2,481
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 2,481 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 9 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Isaiah 5 verses 56%
- Deuteronomy 1 verse 11%
- 2 Samuel 1 verse 11%
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 9 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 6 verses · 67%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 2 verses · 22%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 1 verse · 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).
BDB lists this Strong’s number as 2 distinct words (homographs). Each count above pools all of them and is not split by sense — see the Senses section below. A low-frequency rendering may belong to a different one of those words, not the primary meaning.
- King James Version†: Thirsty 3×
- American Standard Version†: Thirsty 3×
- Berean Standard Bible†: Thirsty 4×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: Thirsty 7×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H6771 across 9† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 6 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 H6771 across 9† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 6 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 H6771 across 9† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 5 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 H6771 across 10† 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.
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 1 sense 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.
צמא I be thirsty (NH = BH (rare)
Qal
- Pf. 3 fs. צָֽמְאָה ψ 42:3; 63:2; 2 fs. וְצָמִת consec. Ru 2:9 (Ges§ 75 qq); 1 s. צָמֵתִי Ju 4:19 (Ges§ 74k); 3 pl. צָֽמְאוּ Is 28:21; Impf. 3 ms. וַיִּצְמָא Ex 17:3; Ju 15:18; 3 mpl. יִצְמָ֑אוּ Is 49:10, וַיִּצ׳ Jb 24:11; 2 mpl. תִּצְמָ֑אוּ Is 65:13;—be thirsty Ju 4:19; 15:18; Ru 2:9; Is 48:21; 49:10 (‖ יִרְעָ֑בוּ), 65:13 (‖ תִּרְעָ֑בוּ) Jb 24:11; c. ל rei, Ex 17:3 (E); fig. צָֽמְאָה נַפְשִׁי לֵאלֹהִים ψ 42:3 my soul thirsteth for God, cf. 63:2. e.g. Psalms 42:3
צמא II thirsty
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
I. vb. be thirsty (NH = BH (rare); so Arabic ظَمِىَٔ, Ethiopic ጸምአ Assyrian ṣûmu, thirst, etc.);—
II. adj. thirsty;—abs. צ׳ Is 21:14 +; fs. צְמֵאָה Dt 29:18; pl. צְמֵאִים ψ 107:5;—thirsty, usually + (or ‖) רָעֵב: 2 S 17:29; Pr 25:21 ψ 107:5, as subst. thirsty one Is 29:8; 32:6; so also 21:14, and (fig. of thirst for י׳’s favour) 55:1; צָמֵא 44:3 = thirsty place (Gunkl.c. proposes צְמֵאָה); הָרָוָה אֶת־הַצְּמֵאָה Dt 29:18 the watered (plant, herbage) with the thirsty, fig. of entire people.
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from צמא (tsâmêʼ) (H6770) — to be thirsty.
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.
צָמֵא I
- (b. h.) [shrunk,] parched, thirsty. Taan. 22ᵇ לא שכורה ולא צ׳ that the ground be neither drunk (oversated) nor thirsty; a. e.—Pl. צְמֵאִים, צְמֵאִין; צְמֵאוֹת. Midr. Till. to Ps. CXVIII, 19 משקה צ׳ הייתי I used to give drink to the thirsty; והם אומרים לו זה השער לה׳ משקה צ׳ הכנס בו ed. Bub. and they (in heaven) say to him, ‘this is the gate of the Lord’, thou, who hast been a giver of drink to the thirsty, enter thereby. Midr. Till. to Ps. XXII וכשצ׳ כל החיות וכ׳ and when they are thirsty, all the beasts gather around her (the hind) &c.; a. e.
צָמֵא II
- preced.) to be thirsty.
- to cause to perish from thirst. Sifré Deut. 199 (ref. to Deut. XX, 10 להלחם עליה … ולא להַצְמִיאָהּ וכ׳ ‘to wage war against it’, but not to let it perish from famine or thirst, or cause it to die from pestilence; a. e. e.g. Deuteronomy 20:10
צָמָא
- preced.) thirst. Ex. R. s. 2 (Moses said to the lamb) לא … מפני צ׳ וכ׳ I did not know that thou didst run off on account of thirst; thou must be tired &c. Ber. VI, 8 השותה מים לִצְמָאוֹ he who drinks water to satisfy his thirst. Pirké d’R. El. ch. XXX מיתת הצ׳ death from thirst; a. e.
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 8 distinct written forms H6771 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| צָמֵ֖א | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Isaiah 21:14 | 2 |
| הַ/צְּמֵאָֽה | Adjective, Adjective, Feminine, Singular, Absolute | Deuteronomy 29:19 | 1 |
| הַ/צָּמֵא֙ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Isaiah 29:8 | 1 |
| וְ/צָמֵ֖א | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | 2 Samuel 17:29 | 1 |
| צְמֵאִ֑ים | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | Psalms 107:5 | 1 |
| צָ֝מֵ֗א | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Proverbs 25:21 | 1 |
| צָמֵ֔א | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Isaiah 44:3 | 1 |
| צָמֵא֙ | Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Isaiah 55:1 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H6771, 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
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 9 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 9 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.
