אַרְבַּע
four
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
- Adjective
- A word that describes or qualifies a noun.
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.
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
1 verse where H702 appears in the Construct state in the Book of Numbers. Filtered view — show all forms. 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.
Numbers
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 word ארבע centers on the idea of “four.” Its earliest occurrence is Genesis 2:10. It appears 278 verses across 25 books of the Hebrew Bible, among its common vocabulary. It clusters with רבע, רביעי and רבע under a shared root. 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 H702 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 →
- 278
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 278 distinct verses.
- 25 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 25 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #154
- by frequency
- Top 250 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 154 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 278 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Ezekiel 37 verses 13%
- Numbers 34 verses 12%
- 1 Chronicles 34 verses 12%
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 278 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 112 verses · 40%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 83 verses · 30%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 83 verses · 30%
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 3 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†: Four 195×, Fourteenth 16×, Fourteen 15×
- American Standard Version†: Four 180×, Fourteenth 16×, Fourteen 15×
- Berean Standard Bible†: Four 132×, Fourteenth 20×, Fourteen 17×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: Four 117×, Were 38×, And 10×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H702 across 312† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 36 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 4 further occurrences.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H702 across 313† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 47 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 H702 across 225† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 21 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 93 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H702 across 264† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 25 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 66 further occurrences.
9 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 9 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.
ארבע I f. four (NH = BH
- 1. without other num.:
- a. אַרְבַּע (1) before n.fpl. Je 15:3; Ex 25:12 (P) + 101 times, incl. א׳ אַמּוֹת Dt 3:11 + 5 times (but also †א׳ בַּאַמָּה four (in) cubit(s) Ex 26:2, 8; 36:9 1 K 7:27(×2), 38), and א׳ מֵאוֹת = 400 Gn 11:13 + 55 times (2) א׳ bef. du. רַנְלָ֑יִם Lv 11:23, רַגְלָיו Ex 25:26. †(3) bef. collective, א׳ צֹאן Ex 21:37 (E); א׳ רִבּוֹא = 40,000 Ezr 2:64 = Ne 7:66. †(4) rare and late, after n.fpl. עָרִים א׳ Jos 19:7 (P); after n. fs. cstr. בִּשְׁנַת א׳ לְ 1 K 22:41; Zc 7:1; 2 Ch 3:2.—קִרְיַת א׳, v. this, and ii. אַרְבַּע infr. †(5) n. om. Ez 43:15b Pr 30:15, 18 (Kt, v. supr.), v 21 Dn 8:8, 22; עַל־אַרְבַּ֑ע (sc. רגלים) = on all fours Lv 11:20, 21, 27, 42. e.g. Jeremiah 15:3
- b. אַרְבַּעַה (1) bef. n. mpl. Gn 2:10 (J), 14:9 Ex 25:34 + 21 times, + יָמִים (וְ)א׳ חֳדשִׁים Ju 19:2; 1 S 27:7; also א׳ א׳ פָנִים distrib. Ez 10:21. †(2) late, after n. mpl. 1 Ch 23:10. (3) n. om., Am 1:3, 6, 9 + 15 times, + (as pred. of n. mpl.) †Ex 27:16(×2); 38:19(×2); also בְּא׳, (sc. יוֹם) †Zc 7:1 = ordinal, on the fourth (day). e.g. Genesis 2:10
- c. אַרְבַּ֫עַת (1) bef. n. mpl. Ju 11:40 1 K 7:32 + 11 times (not Ez 7:2, v. supr.), + א׳ אֲלָפִים = 4000, 1 S 4:2 + 14 times †(2) bef. coll. הַבָּקָר Nu 7:7. †(3) n. om. 2 S 21:22. †(4) c. sf., after n. pl., = the four of them, Ez 1:8, 10(×3) + 6 times Ez, Dn 1:17 these boys, the four of them. e.g. Judges 11:40
- d. adv. אַרְבַּעְתָּ֑יִם 2 S 12:6 = four-fold Ges§ 97 h Köii. 1, 227, but read שִׁבְעָתָ֑יִם 𝔊 Th We Klo Dr Kmp Bu HPS. e.g. 2 Samuel 12:6
- 2. with other num.:
- a. (I) אַרְבַּע עֶשְׂרֵה = 14, (α) before n. fs., א׳ ע׳ שָׁנָה Gn 31:41, + (as ordinal, = 14th) 14:5; 2 K 18:13 = Is 36:1, Ez 40:1. (β) after n. fpl. עָרִים א׳ ע׳ Jos 15:36 + 8 times, נָשִׁים א׳ ע׳ 2 Ch 13:21. (2) אַרְבָּעָה עָשָׂר = 14, (α) before n. ms. Nu 17:14 (14 × 1000), Jb 42:12; especially. (as ord.) א׳ ע׳ יוֹם 14th day Ex 12:6, 18 + 7 times (β) bef. n. mpl. Nu 29:15. (γ) after n. mpl. Nu 29:13, 17 + 6 times (δ) after n. ms. Est 9:15, 19, 21, all = 14th. (ε) א׳ ע׳ pred. of נֶפֶשׁ Gn 46:22. (ζ) א׳ ע׳ = 14th (sc. day) Lv 23:15; 2 Ch 30:15 + 6 times e.g. Genesis 31:41
- b. 20 + (וְ) 4 + n. s. 1 K 15:33; 1 Ch 23:4 + 13 times 1 Ch 27; + n. pl. †Nu 7:88; n. om. 2 S 21:20, pred. ‖ 1 Ch 20:6; Ne 7:23; 4 + 20 + n. s. Nu 25:9; = 24th, יוֹם ע׳ וְא׳ Hg 1:15; 2:18; Zc 1:7; Ne 9:1; Dn 10:4, יוֹם om. Hg 2:10, 20, and (א׳ וְע׳) 1 Ch 24:18; 25:31†. e.g. 1 Kings 15:33
- c. other tens + 4, 1 Ch 7:7; 5:18 (+ n. s.), Ezr 2:15 + 7 times; 4 + tens + שָׁנָה Gn 11:16, + אֶלֶף 1000 Nu 1:27, 29; 2:4, 6; 26:25, 43.—Vid. Köii. 1, § 106. e.g. 1 Chronicles 7:7
ארבע II m. (called הָאָדָם הַגָּדוֹל בָּעֲנָקִים Jos 14
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
II. n.m. et f. four (NH = BH; MI8 ארבען = 40; Ph. ארבע, Pun. ארבעת, four; so Assyrian arbaʾu (rarely irbaʾ), irbitti; Arabic أَرْبَعٌ, أَرْبَعَةٌ; Sab. ארבעת CISiv, no. 232. 2 HomChrest. 47; Ethiopic አርባዕ, አርባዕቱ Aramaic אַרְבַּע, אַרְבְּעָה, ܐܰܪܒܰܥ, ܐܰܪܒܥܳܐ; Nab. ארבע, Palm. ארבע, ארבעא, Lzb367);—m.148 (c. n.f.) אַרְבַּע (abs. vel cstr.) Ex 21:37 +; also אַרְבַּ֑ע Lv 11:20 +; note (Baer Gi) Jos 21:18 + 6 times Jos 21 (van d. H. אַרְבָּ֑ע); in Pr 30:18 read f. with Qr; f. (c. n.m.) abs. אַרְבָּעָה Gn 2:10 + 125 times + Pr 30:18 (v. supr.); cstr. אַרְבַּעַת 1 S 4:2 + 29 times, incl. Ez 7:2 (but read m. Kt); sf. אַרְבַּעְתָּם Ez 1:8 + 5 times Ez, אַרְבַּעְתָּן 1:10, 10 (but read prob. -תָּם, Krae), v 16, 18; du. אַרְּבַּעְתָּ֑יִם 2 S 12:6, v. 1 d; pl. אַרְבָּעִים = 40, v. infr.;—four (in Hex 108 times, chiefly P, 98 times; Ez 52 times, Ch 47 times):—
III. n.pr.m. (called הָאָדָם הַגָּדוֹל בָּעֲנָקִים Jos 14:15, אֲבִי הָעֲנָק 15:13 cf. 21:11), inferred (erron.) from n.pr.loc. קִרְיַת א׳ (q.v.).
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from רבע (râbaʻ) (H7251) — to square.
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.
אַרְבַּע
- four, v. אַרְבָּעָא I a. אַרְבְּעָה.
רְבַע
- 1. to lie, couch. Targ. Num. XXII, 27 (h. text רבץ). Targ. Y. Gen. XLIX, 25; a. fr.—Part. רְבִיעַ; f. רְבִיעָא; pl. רְבִיעִין; רְבִיעָן. Ib. IV, 7. Targ. Deut. XXII, 6 (O. ed. Vien. רְבֵעָא). Targ. Ps. CIV, 22; a. fr.—Y. Ber. VIII, 12ᵇ top לא מיסתך דאת ר׳ וכ׳ is it not not enough that thou art lying (on the dining couch), and he stands and attends thee? Ib. גזירנא דהוא ר׳ וכ׳ (not גזירה) I decree that he lie down, and thou stand &c. Gen. R. s. 7 רביע ואנא וכ׳ lie down (to be lashed), and I will tell thee; Tanḥ. Ḥuck. 6; Pesik. R. s. 14. Koh. R. to I, 8 קם ור׳ ליה על רגלוי he arose and threw himself down at his feet. Shebu. 22ᵇ, a. fr. אריא הוא דר׳ וכ׳, v. אַרְיָא; a. fr.
- 2. to commit buggery. Ab. Zar. 24ᵃ דילמא רַבְעוּהָ לאימא דאימא perhaps they (gentiles) had connection with the grandmother (of the animal, while she was pregnant); a. e.
- 1. to cause to lie down, lay down. Targ. Y. Gen. XXIV, 11 (h. text ויברך). Targ. Y. Deut. XXV, 2 ויַרְבְּעִינֵיה (not ויִרְ׳).—Part. pass. מַרְבַּע. Targ. Y. I Gen. XLIX, 14.—Num. R. s. 19 אַרְבְּעוּנֵיה דילקי lay him down, that he may receive lashes; Tanḥ. l. c. ארבעתיה (corr. acc.); ib. ארבעונהי (corr. acc.). Pesik. R. l. c. אַרְבְּעִינֵיה lay thou him down. Y. Bicc. I, 64ᵃ אַרְבְּעֵיה על וכ׳ he ordered him to be laid on the benches (for punishment). B. Kam. 114ᵃ אַרְבְּעֵית לי אריא וכ׳ thou didst put a lion at my borders, i.e. you forced a violent neighbor upon me; a. e.—Y. Yeb. IV, 6ᵃ bot. ואנא בעי מַרְבַּעְתָּהּ וכ׳ and I want to assist at her lying down (for delivery), before she cools off, v. צְנַן.
- 2. to copulate animals, esp. to hybridize. Targ. Y. Gen. XXXVI, 24. Targ. Y. Lev. XIX, 19.
- 1. to divide into four parts. Targ. Y. Deut. XXXII, 4.
- 2. to make quadrangular. Part. pass. מְרַבַּע (מְרֻבַּע Hebraism); f. מְרַבְּעָא; pl. מְּרַבְּעִין; מְרַבְּעָן, מְרַבְּעָתָא quadrate. Targ. Ex. XXVII, 1. Targ. Ez. XLV, 2. Targ. I Kings VII, 5. Targ. Y. I Num. XXXIII, 7 (not מֵרַבְ׳); Targ. Y. I Ex. XIV, 2 (ed. Vien. מרביעתא, corr. acc.); a. e.—Y. Sot. V, 20ᵇ bot. מאן דמְרַבַּע ארבע וכ׳ he that wants to form four rows of four casks each requires sixteen casks. Erub. 57ᵃ אימור … כמאן דמְרַבְּעָא רַבּוּעֵי ודאי מי מְרַבַּעְנָא we said, we consider it in our calculations as if it were squared; do we, however, really make it a square (by filling the space with buildings)?; 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 93 distinct written forms H702 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.
The 60 most common forms are shown; 33 rarer forms follow in the full concordance.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H702, 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
- רביעי rᵉbîyʻîy H7243 fourth
- רבע rebaʻ H7253 fourth part
- רבע rôbaʻ H7255 fourth part
- רבע ribbêaʻ H7256 fourth
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 10 — 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 259 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 278 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
- Exodus 12:6
- Leviticus 11:20
- Numbers 1:27
- Deuteronomy 3:11
- Joshua 5:10
- Judges 9:34
- 1 Samuel 4:2
- 2 Samuel 21:20
- 1 Kings 6:1
- 2 Kings 7:3
- 1 Chronicles 3:5
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.
