שֵׂעָר
hair
‘hair’ is one of 3 main senses 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
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 14 times (50%)
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Construct 14 times (50%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 28 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H8181 appears — 27 distinct verses across 12 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 1 verse
Leviticus 14 verses
- Leviticus 13:3 וְ/שֵׂעָ֨ר conj + n c ms and the priest shall examine the plague in the skin of the body: and if the hair in the plague has turned white, and the appearance of the plague is deeper than the body's skin, it is the plague of leprosy; and the priest shall examine him, and pronounce him unclean.
- Leviticus 13:4 וּ/שְׂעָרָ֖/ה conj + n c ms cs + sfx pers 3fs If the bright spot is white in the skin of his body, and the appearance of it isn't deeper than the skin, and the hair of it hasn't turned white, then the priest shall isolate the infected person for seven days.
- Leviticus 13:10 שֵׂעָ֣ר n c ms and the priest shall examine him. Behold, if there is a white rising in the skin, and it has turned the hair white, and there is raw flesh in the rising,
- Leviticus 13:20 וּ/שְׂעָרָ֖/הּ conj + n c ms cs + sfx pers 3fs and the priest shall examine it; and, behold, if the appearance of it is lower than the skin, and the hair of it has turned white, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean. It is the plague of leprosy. It has broken out in the boil.
- Leviticus 13:21 שֵׂעָ֣ר n c ms But if the priest examines it, and, behold, there are no white hairs in it, and it isn't deeper than the skin, but is dim, then the priest shall isolate him seven days.
- Leviticus 13:25 שֵׂעָ֨ר n c ms then the priest shall examine it; and, behold, if the hair in the bright spot has turned white, and the appearance of it is deeper than the skin; it is leprosy. It has broken out in the burning, and the priest shall pronounce him unclean. It is the plague of leprosy.
- Leviticus 13:26 שֵׂעָ֣ר n c ms But if the priest examines it, and, behold, there is no white hair in the bright spot, and it isn't lower than the skin, but is faded; then the priest shall isolate him seven days.
- Leviticus 13:30 שֵׂעָ֥ר n c ms then the priest shall examine the plague; and, behold, if the appearance of it is deeper than the skin, and the hair in it is yellow and thin, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is an itch, it is leprosy of the head or of the beard.
- Leviticus 13:31 וְ/שֵׂעָ֥ר conj + n c ms If the priest examines the plague of itching, and, behold, its appearance isn't deeper than the skin, and there is no black hair in it, then the priest shall isolate him the person infected with itching seven days.
- Leviticus 13:32 שֵׂעָ֣ר n c ms On the seventh day the priest shall examine the plague; and, behold, if the itch hasn't spread, and there is no yellow hair in it, and the appearance of the itch isn't deeper than the skin,
- Leviticus 13:36 לַ/שֵּׂעָ֥ר prep det + n c ms then the priest shall examine him; and, behold, if the itch has spread in the skin, the priest shall not look for the yellow hair; he is unclean.
- Leviticus 13:37 וְ/שֵׂעָ֨ר conj + n c ms But if in his eyes the itch is arrested, and black hair has grown in it; the itch is healed, he is clean. The priest shall pronounce him clean.
- Leviticus 14:8 שְׂעָר֗/וֹ n c ms cs + sfx pers 3ms "He who is to be cleansed shall wash his clothes, and shave off all his hair, and bathe himself in water; and he shall be clean. After that he shall come into the camp, but shall dwell outside his tent seven days.
- Leviticus 14:9 שְׂעָר֗/וֹ שְׂעָר֖/וֹ n c ms cs + sfx pers 3ms n c ms cs + sfx pers 3ms It shall be on the seventh day, that he shall shave all his hair off his head and his beard and his eyebrows, even all his hair he shall shave off. He shall wash his clothes, and he shall bathe his body in water, then he shall be clean.
Numbers 2 verses
- Numbers 6:5 שְׂעַ֥ר n c ms cs "All the days of his vow of separation there shall no razor come on his head, until the days are fulfilled, in which he separates himself to Yahweh. He shall be holy. He shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow long.
- Numbers 6:18 שְׂעַר֙ n c ms cs The Nazirite shall shave the head of his separation at the door of the Tent of Meeting, and shall take the hair of the head of his separation, and put it on the fire which is under the sacrifice of peace offerings.
Judges 1 verse
2 Samuel 1 verse
2 Kings 1 verse
Ezra 1 verse
Psalms 1 verse
Song of Solomon 2 verses
- Song of Solomon 4:1 שַׂעְרֵ/ךְ֙ n c ms cs + sfx pers 2fs Behold, you are beautiful, my love. Behold, you are beautiful. Your eyes are doves behind your veil. Your hair is as a flock of goats, That descend from Mount Gilead.
- Song of Solomon 6:5 שַׂעְרֵ/ךְ֙ n c ms cs + sfx pers 2fs Turn away your eyes from me, For they have overcome me. Your hair is like a flock of goats, That lie along the side of Gilead.
Isaiah 1 verse
Ezekiel 1 verse
Zechariah 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.
The Hebrew noun שער centers on the idea of “hair.” Leviticus dominates its distribution — 14 of 27 verses. The Hebrew Bible uses it across 27 verses — moderately common. First canonically at Genesis 25:25, it enters the text early. Its meaning spans more than one sense — see its full sense range. Dig into 27-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H8181 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 →
- 27
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 27 distinct verses.
- 12 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 12 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,190
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,190 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 27 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Leviticus 14 verses 52%
- Numbers 2 verses 7%
- Song of Solomon 2 verses 7%
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 27 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 17 verses · 63%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 6 verses · 22%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 4 verses · 15%
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: Hair 18×, All his hair 2×
- American Standard Version: Hair 15×, All his hair 2×, Hairy 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Hair 17×, Hair in it 3×, Hairy 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Hair 22×, Hair of 6×, And 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H8181 across 28 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 8 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 H8181 across 28 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 9 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 H8181 across 27 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 4 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 1 further occurrence.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H8181 across 35 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.
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 2 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. of animals, as material, אַדֶּרֶת שׂ׳ Gn 25:25 (J), Zc 13:4; prob. also אִישׁ בַּעַל שׂ׳ 2 K 1:8 i.e. a man with a garment of skin. e.g. Genesis 25:25
- 2. human: שׂ׳ רֹאשׁוֹ Ju 16:22 2 S 14:26 Nu 6:5 (P), cf. v 18 (P); + beard Ezr 9:3; קָדְקֹד שׂ׳ ψ 68:22; incl. head, beard, eyebrows Lv 14:8, 9, 10 (P); שׂ׳ הָרַגְלַיִם Is 7:20 (i.e. of genitals; + רֹאשׁ, זָקָן; in fig.) long hair of woman Ez 16:7 Ct 4:1; 6:5; hair of skin in (leprosy-) marks Lv 13:3 + 10 times 13 (P). e.g. Judges 16:22
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.m.Lv 13:3 hair;—abs. שׂ׳ Gn 25:25 +, cstr. שְׂעַר Ju 16:22 +, שַׂ֫עַר Is 7:20 (Ges§ 93 hh Köii. 1. 78); sf. שְׂעָרֵךְ Ez 16:7, שַׂעֲרֵךְ Ct 4:1, 6:5 (Köl.c.); שְׂעָרוֹ Lv 14:8 +, שְׂעָרָהּ v 20, שְׂעָרָהֿ v 4 (Ges§ 91 e);—hair:
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from שער (sâʻar) (H8175) — to dread.
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.
שָׁעַר I
- to keep the gate.—V. שׁוֹעֵר.
- same. Arakh. 11ᵇ משורר ששי׳ בשל חבירו a Levite chorister that helped in attending to the gate in his neighbor’s stead.—Part. מְשׁוֹעֵר; pl. מְשׁוֹעֲרִים (formed by analogy to מְשׁוֹרֵר, v. שִׁיר I). Ib. מש׳ ששורר, v. שִׁיר I. Ib. ולא מן המש׳ (Sifré Num. 116; Yalk. ib. 752 השׁוֹעֲרִים), v. שִׁיר I.
שָׁעַר II
- v. שַׁעַר) to divide, distribute. [Midr. Till. to Ps. XIV שיערו, v. infra.]
- 1. to apportion, estimate, measure, calculate. Ḥull. VII, 4 כיצד מְשׁעֲרִין אותה וכ׳ how do we define the proportions of the mixture (to find out whether the forbidden admixture is large enough to impart its taste to the permitted portion)? As if it were an admixture of meat in a vegetable dish. Ib. 97ᵇ כשהן משערין משערין וכ׳ when we define the proportions, we include in the calculation the broth &c. Ib. כל איסורין … מְשַׁעֲרִינָן וכ׳ in all admixtures of Biblically forbidden matter we assume for calculation that the forbidden matter was onions or porret. Ib. שִׁיעֲרוּ חכמים וכ׳ the scholars have calculated that of all forbidden substances none give a stronger taste than onions &c. Lev. R. s. 37 מְשָׁעֵר את … באיטלקית (some ed. מְשָׁעֵיר) do you estimate that in all I drank at my meal there would have been a quarter of a Log of Italian (unmixed) wine? Koh. R. to V, 8 שיערו אותה, v. next w.; a. fr.—Midr. Till. to Ps. CXIV (expl. סֹלּוּ, Ps. LXVIII, 5) שַׁעֲרוּ לפניו דרכיכם (not שיע׳; ed. Bub. שפרו, a glossator’s emendation) measure your ways before the Lord (cmp. שׁוּם I). Pesik. Zutr. Haaz. (ed. Bub. p. 114) (ref. to שערום, Deut. XXXII, 17) לא שִׁיעֲרוּם וכ׳ whom your fathers never appraised, to find out whether or not they are of use; Yalk. Deut. 545 לא שערום. e.g. Psalms 68:5
- 2. (v. שַׁעַר) to superintend the market, v. מְשָׁעֵר.
- to be estimated, measured. Ukts. II, 8 מִשְׁתַּעֲרִין בכמות שהן are measured as they are (not compressed); מִשְׁתַּעֶרֶת בכמות שהיא is measured as it is.
שְׁעַר
- Pa. שַׁעֵיר same, to measure, calculate. Targ. O. Gen. XXVI, 12 בדשַׁעֲרוּהִי ed. Berl. (oth. ed. בדשַׁעֲרוֹהִי; Y. בדשַׁעֲרוֹי; h. text שערים).—Ḥull. 97ᵇ ולִישַׁעֲרִינְהוּ בפלפלין וכ׳ why not use as a standard (for calculation in the case of admixtures of forbidden substances) pepper or spices which are not neutralized in a mass of a thousand times their quantity? Ib. בדידיה מְשַׁעֲרִינָן או בדנפיק מיניה משערינן do we calculate the proportions by the actual size of the admixture, or by the quantity that has come out of it (has been absorbed in the dish)? Y. Kil. IX, 32ᵈ top שַׁעֲרוּנָהּ רבנין וכ׳ the Rabbis made the calculation, and it (the well of Miriam) was exactly opposite the middle gate &c.; Lev. R. s. 22 שערותא (corr. acc.); Koh. R. to V, 8 שיערו אותה וכ׳ (Hebr.).
שָׂעַר
- to be rough, denom. שֵׂעָר; to shudder, fear. Sifré Deut. 318 (expl. שערום, Deut. XXXII, 17) שלא עמדה שערת וכ׳ your fathers’ hair did not stand on end before them (v. שָׁעַר II); Yalk. ib. 545. e.g. Deuteronomy 32:17
- (denom. of שֵׂעָר) to grow hair, be hairy. Ḥull. 44ᵃ עד מקום שיַשְׂעִיר Ms. M. a Rashi (ed. כדי, corr. acc.) to the place (of the stomach) where it becomes covered with hair. Ib. (Chald. diction) תורא דמַשְׂעִיר טפי an ox, which is more hairy (on the stomach). Nidd. 25ᵇ עד שישעיר until the embryo has hair.
שְׂעַר
- , Af. אַשְׂעִיר, v. preced.
שֵׂעָר
- preced.) hair. Meg. 18ᵃ, a. e. מסלסל בשׂעַרְךָ, v. סִלְסֵל. Naz. I, 2 הכביד שַׂעֲרוֹ, v. כָּבֵד I. Ib. 4ᵇ לשחת ש׳ וכ׳ to ruin such fine hair; Tosef. ib. IV, 7. Yoma 47ᵃ קלעי שַׂעֲרִי, v. קֶלַע II; a. fr.—Trnsf. crown, ramification of a tree; panicle, stem and pod of leguminous plants. Peah II, 3, a. e. ש׳ כותש, v. כָּתַשׁ; Y. ib. 17ᵃ top סֵעָר. Kil. IV, 9 היה הופך ש׳ שתי וכ׳ he turned the branches of two rows of vines towards one side; B. Bath. 82ᵇ. Sabb. XXI, 3 ש׳ של אפונין וש׳ וכ׳ the panicles (pods) of beans and of lentils. Tosef. Ukts. I, 8 סֵיאָר ed. Zuck. (Var. שיע, read as ed. T’bul Yom III: שיער) the panicle of a pomegranate; a. fr.—Pl., v. שַׂעֲרָה
שְׂעַר ²
- ch., v. שַׂעֲרָא
שַׁעַר
- שער to divide, break open)
- 1. gate, open place for public and private transactions. Sifré Deut. 242 (ref. to Deut. XXII, 24 ש׳ שנמצאת בו וכ׳ the gate (of the place) where she was found, and not the gate where she was judged. Keth. 45ᵇ (ref. to Deut. XVII, 5) ש׳ שעבד בו the gate (of the place) where he worshipped the idol. Midd. I, 3 ש׳ המזרחי the eastern Temple gate; a. v. fr.—Pl. שְׁעָרִים, שְׁעָרִין; constr. שַׁעֲרֵי. Ib. חמשה ש׳ היו וכ׳ the Temple mount had five gates; שני ש׳ חולדה two ḥuldah gates, v. חוּלְדָּה II. Ib. 4; a. v. fr. e.g. Deuteronomy 22:24
- 2. market, market price. B. Mets. V, 7 שיצא הש׳, v. פָּסַק. Ib. (72ᵇ) כש׳ הגבוה (Bab. ed. בש׳) according to the price at the height of the market, i.e. the lowest price. Ib. 8 כש׳ הזול according to the lowest market price. Ib. 1 לקח … וכן הש׳ if he bought wheat of him, at a gold Denar a Kor, and such was the market price. Gitt. 57ᵃ נחסר הש׳ מודיא אחת the price went down one Modius, i.e. from forty Modii to thirty-nine for a Denar; וחזר הש׳ למקומו the price went back to its former figure; a. fr.—Pl. as ab. B. Bath. 89ᵃ לש׳ for the regulation of market prices, v. אֲגַרְדְּמִיס; Y. ib. V, end, 15ᵇ שִׁיעוּרִין, a. שִׁיעוּרַיָּיא.
שַׁעַר II
- estimation, proportion. — Pl. שְׁעָרִים. Gen. R. s. 64 (ref. to Gen. XXVI, 12) מאה כורים מאה ש׳ מאה מניינים מאה ש׳ וכ׳ one hundred Kor; one hundred proportions, one hundred quantities; one hundred sh’ʿarim, this shows that they had made an estimate of it (the crop of the field), and it brought a hundred times the estimated quantity; Yalk. ib. 111 (corr. acc.); Pirké d’R. El. ch. XXXIII וכל דבר … מאה ש׳ של ממון וכ׳ and for every thing that he gave tithes of, the Lord sent him one hundred times the value, and he blessed him. e.g. Genesis 26:12
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 21 distinct written forms H8181 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 H8181, 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 → Showing 4 of 7 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 27 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 27 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 25:25
- Leviticus 13:3
- Numbers 6:5
- Judges 16:22
- 2 Samuel 14:26
- 2 Kings 1:8
- Ezra 9:3
- Psalms 68:21
- Song of Solomon 4:1
- Isaiah 7:20
- Ezekiel 16:7
- Zechariah 13:4
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.
