קְטֹ֫רֶת
incense
also: smoke, odour of sacrifice fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
See every Absolute-state word in the Hebrew Bible →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Common
- A common noun — a general class of person, place, or thing (“king,” “city,” “water”), not a specific name.
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
- Construct
- A noun bound to a following noun in a possessive / “of” relationship (the construct chain).
Gender
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms
- Noun, Common, Feminine, Singular, Absolute 42 times (70%)
- Noun, Common, Feminine, Singular, Construct 18 times (30%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 60 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H7004 appears — 58 distinct verses across 10 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 18 verses
- Exodus 25:6 וְ/לִ/קְטֹ֖רֶת conj + prep + n c fs cs oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense,
- Exodus 30:1 קְטֹ֑רֶת n c fs "You shall make an altar to burn incense on. You shall make it of acacia wood.
- Exodus 30:7 קְטֹ֣רֶת n c fs cs Aaron shall burn incense of sweet spices on it every morning. When he tends the lamps, he shall burn it.
- Exodus 30:8 קְטֹ֧רֶת n c fs cs When Aaron lights the lamps at evening, he shall burn it, a perpetual incense before Yahweh throughout your generations.
- Exodus 30:9 קְטֹ֥רֶת n c fs You shall offer no strange incense on it, nor burnt offering, nor meal-offering; and you shall pour no drink-offering on it.
- Exodus 30:27 הַ/קְּטֹֽרֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs the table and all its articles, the lampstand and its accessories, the altar of incense,
- Exodus 30:35 קְטֹ֔רֶת n c fs and you shall make incense of it, a perfume after the art of the perfumer, seasoned with salt, pure and holy:
- Exodus 30:37 וְ/הַ/קְּטֹ֨רֶת֙ conj + ptcl def.art + n c fs The incense which you shall make, according to its composition you shall not make for yourselves: it shall be to you holy for Yahweh.
- Exodus 31:8 הַ/קְּטֹֽרֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs the table and its vessels, the pure lampstand with all its vessels, the altar of incense,
- Exodus 31:11 קְטֹ֥רֶת n c fs cs the anointing oil, and the incense of sweet spices for the holy place: according to all that I have commanded you they shall do."
- Exodus 35:8 וְ/לִ/קְטֹ֖רֶת conj + prep + n c fs cs oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense,
- Exodus 35:15 הַ/קְּטֹ֨רֶת֙ קְטֹ֣רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs n c fs cs and the altar of incense with its poles, the anointing oil, the sweet incense, the screen for the door, at the door of the tent;
- Exodus 35:28 וְ/לִ/קְטֹ֖רֶת conj + prep + n c fs cs and the spice, and the oil for the light, for the anointing oil, and for the sweet incense.
- Exodus 37:25 הַ/קְּטֹ֖רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs He made the altar of incense of acacia wood. It was square: its length was a cubit, and its breadth a cubit. Its height was two cubits. Its horns were of one piece with it.
- Exodus 37:29 קְטֹ֥רֶת n c fs cs He made the holy anointing oil and the pure incense of sweet spices, after the art of the perfumer.
- Exodus 39:38 קְטֹ֣רֶת n c fs cs the golden altar, the anointing oil, the sweet incense, the screen for the door of the Tent,
- Exodus 40:5 לִ/קְטֹ֔רֶת prep + n c fs You shall set the golden altar for incense before the ark of the testimony, and put the screen of the door to the tent.
- Exodus 40:27 קְטֹ֣רֶת n c fs cs and he burnt incense of sweet spices on it, as Yahweh commanded Moses.
Leviticus 4 verses
- Leviticus 4:7 קְטֹ֤רֶת n c fs cs The priest shall put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of sweet incense before Yahweh, which is in the tent of meeting; and he shall pour out all the blood of the bull out at the base of the altar of burnt offering, which is at the door of the Tent of Meeting.
- Leviticus 10:1 קְטֹ֑רֶת n c fs Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer, and put fire in it, and laid incense on it, and offered strange fire before Yahweh, which he had not commanded them.
- Leviticus 16:12 קְטֹ֥רֶת n c fs cs He shall take a censer full of coals of fire from off the altar before Yahweh, and two handfuls of sweet incense beaten small, and bring it within the veil:
- Leviticus 16:13 הַ/קְּטֹ֛רֶת הַ/קְּטֹ֗רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs ptcl def.art + n c fs and he shall put the incense on the fire before Yahweh, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is on the testimony, so that he will not die.
Numbers 21 verses
- Numbers 4:16 וּ/קְטֹ֣רֶת conj + n c fs cs "The charge of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest shall be the oil for the light, the sweet incense, the continual meal offering, and the anointing oil, the charge of all the tabernacle, and of all that is in it, the sanctuary, and its furnishings."
- Numbers 7:14 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:20 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:26 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:32 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:38 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:44 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:50 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:56 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:62 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:68 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:74 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden ladle of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:80 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs one golden spoon of ten shekels, full of incense;
- Numbers 7:86 קְטֹ֔רֶת n c fs the twelve golden ladles, full of incense, weighing ten shekels apiece, after the shekel of the sanctuary; all the gold of the ladles weighed one hundred twenty shekels;
- Numbers 16:7 קְטֹ֜רֶת n c fs and put fire in them, and put incense on them before Yahweh tomorrow: and it shall be that the man whom Yahweh does choose, he [shall be] holy: you take too much on you, you sons of Levi.
- Numbers 16:17 קְטֹ֔רֶת n c fs and take every man his censer, and put incense on them, and bring you before Yahweh every man his censer, two hundred fifty censers; you also, and Aaron, each his censer.
- Numbers 16:18 קְטֹ֑רֶת n c fs They took every man his censer, and put fire in them, and laid incense thereon, and stood at the door of the tent of meeting with Moses and Aaron.
- Numbers 16:35 הַ/קְּטֹֽרֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs Fire came forth from Yahweh, and devoured the two hundred fifty men who offered the incense.
- Numbers 16:40 קְטֹ֖רֶת n c fs to be a memorial to the children of Israel, to the end that no stranger, who isn't of the seed of Aaron, comes near to burn incense before Yahweh; that he not be as Korah, and as his company: as Yahweh spoke to him by Moses.
- Numbers 16:46 קְטֹ֔רֶת n c fs Moses said to Aaron, Take your censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and lay incense thereon, and carry it quickly to the congregation, and make atonement for them: for there is wrath gone out from Yahweh; the plague is begun.
- Numbers 16:47 הַ/קְּטֹ֔רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs Aaron took as Moses spoke, and ran into the midst of the assembly; and, behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on the incense, and made atonement for the people.
1 Samuel 1 verse
1 Chronicles 2 verses
- 1 Chronicles 6:49 הַ/קְּטֹ֔רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs But Aaron and his sons offered on the altar of burnt offering, and on the altar of incense, for all the work of the most holy place, and to make atonement for Israel, according to all that Moses the servant of God had commanded.
- 1 Chronicles 28:18 הַ/קְּטֹ֛רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs and for the altar of incense refined gold by weight; and gold for the pattern of the chariot, [even] the cherubim, that spread out [their wings], and covered the ark of the covenant of Yahweh.
2 Chronicles 5 verses
- 2 Chronicles 2:4 קְטֹֽרֶת n c fs cs Behold, I am about to build a house for the name of Yahweh my God, to dedicate it to him, and to burn before him incense of sweet spices, and for the continual show bread, and for the burnt offerings morning and evening, on the Sabbaths, and on the new moons, and on the set feasts of Yahweh our God. This is [an ordinance] forever to Israel.
- 2 Chronicles 13:11 וּ/קְטֹֽרֶת conj + n c fs cs and they burn to Yahweh every morning and every evening burnt offerings and sweet incense: the show bread also [set they] in order on the pure table; and the lampstand of gold with the lamps of it, to burn every evening: for we keep the charge of Yahweh our God; but you have forsaken him.
- 2 Chronicles 26:16 הַ/קְּטֹֽרֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up, so that he did corruptly, and he trespassed against Yahweh his God; for he went into the temple of Yahweh to burn incense on the altar of incense.
- 2 Chronicles 26:19 הַ/קְּטֹֽרֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs Then Uzziah was angry; and he had a censer in his hand to burn incense; and while he was angry with the priests, the leprosy broke forth in his forehead before the priests in the house of Yahweh, beside the altar of incense.
- 2 Chronicles 29:7 וּ/קְטֹ֖רֶת conj + n c fs Also they have shut up the doors of the porch, and put out the lamps, and have not burned incense nor offered burnt offerings in the holy place to the God of Israel.
Psalms 2 verses
Proverbs 1 verse
Isaiah 1 verse
Ezekiel 3 verses
- Ezekiel 8:11 הַ/קְּטֹ֖רֶת ptcl def.art + n c fs There stood before them seventy men of the elders of the house of Israel; and in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan, every man with his censer in his hand; and the odor of the cloud of incense went up.
- Ezekiel 16:18 וּ/קְטָרְתִּ֔/י conj + n c fs cs + sfx pers 1cs and you took your embroidered garments, and covered them, and did set my oil and my incense before them.
- Ezekiel 23:41 וּ/קְטָרְתִּ֥/י conj + n c fs cs + sfx pers 1cs and sit on a stately bed, with a table prepared before it, whereupon you did set my incense and my oil.
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.
The Hebrew noun קטרת centers on the idea of “incense.” Alongside “incense” the lexicon also lists “smoke” and “odour of sacrifice” — part of its full sense range. Spanning 58 verses in 10 books, it ranks among the moderately common words of the Hebrew Bible. Numbers dominates its distribution — 21 of 58 verses. Debuting at Exodus 25:6, it then recurs through the corpus. 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 H7004 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 →
- 58
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 58 distinct verses.
- 10 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 10 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #639
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 639 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 58 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Numbers 21 verses 36%
- Exodus 18 verses 31%
- 2 Chronicles 5 verses 9%
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 58 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 43 verses · 74%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 10 verses · 17%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 5 verses · 9%
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: Incense 55×, Perfume 3×
- American Standard Version: Incense 40×, Full of incense 12×, Perfume 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Incense 55×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Incense 45×, Incense of 12×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H7004 across 60 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 H7004 across 59 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.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H7004 across 60 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 H7004 across 62 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.
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 3 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. sweet smoke of sacrifice, ‖ מנחה Is 1:13 ψ 141:2, קְ׳ אֵילִים 66:15, לְהַקְטִיר ק׳ 1 S 2:28 (?). e.g. Isaiah 1:13
- 2. incense, ק׳ (ה)סמים Ex 25:6; 30:7; 31:11; 40:27 + 9 times; ק׳ תמיד Ex 30:8, ק׳ רֹקַח v 35, הק׳ alone v 37 Lv 16:13; Nu 16:35; 17:12; so ק׳ 16:7, 17, 18; 17:5, 11; 2 Ch 29:7, ק׳ זָרָה Ex 30:9, ענן הק׳ Lv 16:13; Ez 8:11, also of אשׁ זרה Lv 10:1 (illegal worship); in offering of the princes Nu 7:14 + 11 times 7, cf. v 86. Altar of incense is מזבח מקטר ק׳ Ex 30:1, מ׳ הק׳ זהב 1 Ch 28:18, מ׳ הזהב לק׳ Ex 40:5, מ׳ ק׳ הסמים Lv 4:7, מ׳ הק׳ Ex 30:27 + 6 times e.g. Exodus 25:6
- 3. perfume, ‖ שֶׁמֶן Ez 16:18; 23:41 Pr 27:9. e.g. Ezekiel 16:18
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.f. smoke, odour of (burning) sacrifice, incense;—ק׳ abs. Ex 30:1 +; cstr. 25:6 +; sf. קְטָרְתִּי Ez 16:18; 23:41;—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from קטר (qâṭar) (H6999) — to burn incense.
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.
קְטֹרֶת
- incense. Ker. 6ᵃ, v. פִּיטּוּם. Ib. 6ᵇ מה לשון ק׳, v. קָטַר I. Shek. IV, 5 מותר הק׳ the remaining supply of incense (in the Temple, not used during the year); a. fr.
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 25 distinct written forms H7004 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.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H7004, 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
- מקטר miqṭâr H4729 altar
- קטורה qᵉṭôwrâh H6988 incense
- קטר qiṭṭêr H7002 incense
- קיטור qîyṭôwr H7008 thick smoke
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 8 — not the complete family. 2 of the same-root words are proper names (people or places). They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 48 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 58 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
- Exodus 30:1
- Leviticus 4:7
- Numbers 4:16
- 1 Samuel 2:28
- 1 Chronicles 6:49
- 2 Chronicles 2:4
- Psalms 141:2
- Proverbs 27:9
- Isaiah 1:13
- Ezekiel 8:11
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.
