Textorah

II Kings 1

1
וַיִּפְשַׁע מוֹאָב בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל אַחֲרֵי מוֹת אַחְאָב
AND MOAB rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab.
ΚΑΙ ἠθέτησε Μωὰβ ἐν Ἰσραὴλ μετὰ τὸ ἀποθανεῖν Ἀχαάβ.
And Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab.
2
וַיִּפֹּל אֲחַזְיָה בְּעַד הַשְּׂבָכָה בַּעֲלִיָּתוֹ אֲשֶׁר בְּשֹׁמְרוֹן וַיָּחַל וַיִּשְׁלַח מַלְאָכִים וַיֹּאמֶר אֲלֵהֶם לְכוּ דִרְשׁוּ בְּבַעַל זְבוּב אֱלֹהֵי עֶקְרוֹן אִם־אֶחְיֶה מֵחֳלִי זֶה
And Ahaziah fell down through the lattice in his upper chamber that was in Samaria, and was sick; and he sent messengers, and said unto them: 'Go, inquire of Baal-zebub the god of Ekron whether I shall recover of this sickness.'
Καὶ ἔπεσεν Ὀχοζίας διὰ τοῦ δικτυωτοῦ τοῦ ἐν τῷ ὑπερῴῳ αὐτοῦ τῷ ἐν Σαμαρείᾳ, καὶ ἠῤῥώστησε· καὶ ἀπέστειλεν ἀγγέλους, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς αὐτοὺς, δεῦτε καὶ ἐπιζητήσατε ἐν τῷ Βάαλ μυΐαν θεὸν Ἀκκαρὼν, εἰ ζήσομαι ἐκ τῆς ἀῤῥωστίας μου ταύτης· καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν ἐπερωτῆσαι διʼ αὐτοῦ.
And Ahaziah fell through the lattice that was in his upper chamber in Samaria, and was sick; and he sent messengers, and said to them, Go and inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover of this my sickness. And they went to inquire of him.
3
וּמַלְאַךְ יְהוָה דִּבֶּר אֶל־אֵלִיָּה הַתִּשְׁבִּי קוּם עֲלֵה לִקְרַאת מַלְאֲכֵי מֶלֶךְ־שֹׁמְרוֹן וְדַבֵּר אֲלֵהֶם הַמִבְּלִי אֵין־אֱלֹהִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל אַתֶּם הֹלְכִים לִדְרֹשׁ בְּבַעַל זְבוּב אֱלֹהֵי עֶקְרוֹן
But an angel of HaShem said to Elijah the Tishbite: 'Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria, and say unto them: Is it because there is no G-d in Israel, that ye go to inquire of Baal-zebub the god of Ekron?
Καὶ ἄγγελος Κυρίου ἐκάλεσεν Ἠλιοὺ τὸν Θεσβίτην, λέγων, ἀναστὰς δεῦρο εἰς συνάντησιν τῶν ἀγγέλων Ὀχοζίου βασιλέως Σαμαρείας, καὶ λαλήσεις πρὸς αὐτοὺς, εἰ παρὰ τὸ μὴ εἶναι Θεὸν ἐν Ἰσραὴλ, ὑμεῖς πορεύεσθε ἐπιζητῆσαι ἐν τῷ Βάαλ μυΐαν θεὸν Ἀκκαρών; καὶ οὐχ οὕτως·
And an angel of the Lord called Elijah the Tishbite, saying, Arise, and go to meet the messengers of Ahaziah king of Samaria, and thou shalt say to them, [Is it] because there is no God in Israel, [that] ye go to inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron? but [it shall] not [be] so.
4
וְלָכֵן כֹּה־אָמַר יְהוָה הַמִּטָּה אֲשֶׁר־עָלִיתָ שָּׁם לֹא־תֵרֵד מִמֶּנָּה כִּי מוֹת תָּמוּת וַיֵּלֶךְ אֵלִיָּה
Now therefore thus saith HaShem: Thou shalt not come down from the bed whither thou art gone up, but shalt surely die.' And Elijah departed.
Ὅτι τάδε λέγει Κύριος, ἡ κλίνη ἐφʼ ἧς ἀνέβης ἐκεῖ, οὐ καταβήσῃ ἀπʼ αὐτῆς, ὅτι θανάτῳ ἀποθανῇ· καὶ ἐπορεύθη Ἠλιοὺ, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς αὐτούς.
For thus saith the Lord, The bed on which thou art gone up, thou shalt not come down from it, for thou shalt surely die. And Elijah went, and said [so] to them.
5
וַיָּשׁוּבוּ הַמַּלְאָכִים אֵלָיו וַיֹּאמֶר אֲלֵיהֶם מַה־זֶּה שַׁבְתֶּם
And the messengers returned unto him, and he said unto them: 'Why is it that ye are returned?'
Καὶ ἐπεστράφησαν οἱ ἄγγελοι πρὸς αὐτόν· καὶ εἶπε πρὸς αὐτοὺς, τί ὅτι ἐπεστρέψατε;
And the messengers returned to him, and he said to them, Why have ye returned?
6
וַיֹּאמְרוּ אֵלָיו אִישׁ עָלָה לִקְרָאתֵנוּ וַיֹּאמֶר אֵלֵינוּ לְכוּ שׁוּבוּ אֶל־הַמֶּלֶךְ אֲשֶׁר־שָׁלַח אֶתְכֶם וְדִבַּרְתֶּם אֵלָיו כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה הַמִבְּלִי אֵין־אֱלֹהִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל אַתָּה שֹׁלֵחַ לִדְרֹשׁ בְּבַעַל זְבוּב אֱלֹהֵי עֶקְרוֹן לָכֵן הַמִּטָּה אֲשֶׁר־עָלִיתָ שָּׁם לֹא־תֵרֵד מִמֶּנָּה כִּי־מוֹת תָּמוּת
And they said unto him: 'There came up a man to meet us, and said unto us: Go, return unto the king that sent you, and say unto him: Thus saith HaShem: Is it because there is no G-d in Israel, that thou sendest to inquire of Baal-zebub the god of Ekron? therefore thou shalt not come down from the bed whither thou art gone up, but shalt surely die.'
Καὶ εἶπαν πρὸς αὐτὸν, ἀνὴρ ἀνέβη εἰς συνάντησιν ἡμῶν, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς ἡμᾶς, δεῦτε, ἐπιστράφητε πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα τὸν ἀποστείλαντα ὑμᾶς, καὶ λαλήσατε πρὸς αὐτὸν, τάδε λέγει Κύριος, εἰ παρὰ τὸ μὴ εἶναιι Θεὸν ἐν Ἰσραὴλ, σὺ πορεύῃ ἐπιζητῆσαι ἐν τῷ Βάαλ μυΐαν θεὸν Ἀκκαρών; οὐχ οὕτως· ἡ κλίνη ἐφʼ ἧς ἀνέβης ἐκεῖ, οὐ καταβήσῃ ἀπʼ αὐτῆς, ὅτι θανάτῳ ἀποθανῇ. Καὶ ἐπιστρέψαντες ἀπήγγειλαν τῷ βασιλεῖ καθὰ ἐλάλησεν Ἠλιού·
And they said to him, A man came up to meet us, and said to us, Go, return to the king that sent you, and say to him, Thus saith the Lord, [Is it] because there is no God in Israel, [that] thou goest to inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron? [it shall] not [be] so: the bed on which thou art gone up, thou shalt not come down from it, for thou shalt surely die.
7
וַיְדַבֵּר אֲלֵהֶם מֶה מִשְׁפַּט הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר עָלָה לִקְרַאתְכֶם וַיְדַבֵּר אֲלֵיכֶם אֶת־הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה
And he said unto them: 'What manner of man was he that came up to meet you, and told you these words?'
καὶ ἐλάλησε πρὸς αὐτοὺς, τίς ἡ κρίσις τοῦ ἀνδρὸς τοῦ ἀναβάντος εἰς συνάντησιν ὑμῖν καὶ λαλήσαντος πρὸς ὑμᾶς τοὺς λόγους τούτους;
So they returned and reported to the king as Elijah said: and he said to them, What [was] the manner of the man who went up to meet you, and spoke to you these words?
8
וַיֹּאמְרוּ אֵלָיו אִישׁ בַּעַל שֵׂעָר וְאֵזוֹר עוֹר אָזוּר בְּמָתְנָיו וַיֹּאמַר אֵלִיָּה הַתִּשְׁבִּי הוּא
And they answered him: 'He was a hairy man, and girt with a girdle of leather about his loins.' And he said: 'It is Elijah the Tishbite.'
Καὶ εἶπον πρὸς αὐτὸν, ἀνὴρ δασὺς, καὶ ζώνην δερματίνην περιεζωσμένος τὴν ὀσφῦν αὐτοῦ· καὶ εἶπεν, Ἠλιοὺ ὁ Θεσβίτης οὗτός ἐστι.
And they said to him, [He was] a hairy man, and girded with a leathern girdle about his loins. And he said, This is Elijah the Tishbite.
9
וַיִּשְׁלַח אֵלָיו שַׂר־חֲמִשִּׁים וַחֲמִשָּׁיו וַיַּעַל אֵלָיו וְהִנֵּה יֹשֵׁב עַל־רֹאשׁ הָהָר וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים הַמֶּלֶךְ דִּבֶּר רֵדָה
Then the king sent unto him a captain of fifty with his fifty. And he went up to him; and, behold, he sat on the top of the hill. And he spoke unto him: `O man of G-d, the king hath said: Come down.'
Καὶ ἀπέστειλε πρὸς αὐτὸν πεντηκόνταρχον καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντα αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἀνέβη πρὸς αὐτόν· καὶ ἰδοὺ Ἠλιοὺ ἐκάθητο ἐπὶ τῆς κορυφῆς τοῦ ὄρους· καὶ ἐλάλησεν ὁ πεντηκόνταρχος πρὸς αὐτὸν, καὶ εἶπεν, ἄνθρωπε τοῦ Θεοῦ, ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐκάλεσέ σε, κατάβηθι.
And he sent to him a captain of fifty and his fifty; and he went up to him: and, behold, Elijah sat on the top of a mountain. And the captain of fifty spoke to him, and said, O man of God, the king has called thee, come down.
10
וַיַּעֲנֶה אֵלִיָּהוּ וַיְדַבֵּר אֶל־שַׂר הַחֲמִשִּׁים וְאִם־אִישׁ אֱלֹהִים אָנִי תֵּרֶד אֵשׁ מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וְתֹאכַל אֹתְךָ וְאֶת־חֲמִשֶּׁיךָ וַתֵּרֶד אֵשׁ מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וַתֹּאכַל אֹתוֹ וְאֶת־חֲמִשָּׁיו
And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty: 'If I be a man of G-d, let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty.' And there came down fire from heaven, and consumed him and his fifty.
Καὶ ἀπεκρίθη Ἠλιοὺ, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς τὸν πεντηκόνταρχον, καὶ εἰ ἄνθρωπος Θεοῦ ἐγὼ, καταβήσεται πῦρ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ καταφάγεταί σε καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντά σου· καὶ κατέβη πῦρ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ κατέφαγεν αὐτὸν καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντα αὐτοῦ.
And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, And if I [am] a man of God, fire shall come down out of heaven, and devour thee and thy fifty. And fire came down out of heaven, and devoured him and his fifty.
11
וַיָּשָׁב וַיִּשְׁלַח אֵלָיו שַׂר־חֲמִשִּׁים אַחֵר וַחֲמִשָּׁיו וַיַּעַן וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים כֹּה־אָמַר הַמֶּלֶךְ מְהֵרָה רֵדָה
And again he sent unto him another captain of fifty with his fifty. And he answered and said unto him: 'O man of G-d, thus hath the king said: Come down quickly.'
Καὶ προσέθετο ὁ βασιλεὺς, καὶ ἀπέστειλε πρὸς αὐτὸν ἄλλον πεντηκόνταρχον καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντα αὐτοῦ· καὶ ἐλάλησεν ὁ πεντηκόνταρχος πρὸς αὐτὸν, καὶ εἶπεν, ἄνθρωπε τοῦ Θεοῦ, τάδε λέγει ὁ βασιλεὺς, ταχέως κατάβηθι.
And the king sent a second time to him another captain of fifty, and his fifty. And the captain of fifty spoke to him, and said, O man of God, thus says the king, Come down quickly.
12
וַיַּעַן אֵלִיָּה וַיְדַבֵּר אֲלֵיהֶם אִם־אִישׁ ה͏ָאֱלֹהִים אָנִי תֵּרֶד אֵשׁ מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וְתֹאכַל אֹתְךָ וְאֶת־חֲמִשֶּׁיךָ וַתֵּרֶד אֵשׁ־אֱלֹהִים מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וַתֹּאכַל אֹתוֹ וְאֶת־חֲמִשָּׁיו
And Elijah answered and said unto them: 'If I be a man of G-d, let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty.' And the fire of G-d came down from heaven, and consumed him and his fifty.
Καὶ ἀπεκρίθη Ἠλιοὺ καὶ ἐλάλησε πρὸς αὐτὸν, καὶ εἶπεν, εἰ ἄνθρωπος Θεοῦ ἐγὼ, καταβήσεται πῦρ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ καταφάγεταί σε καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντά σου· καὶ κατέβη πῦρ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ κατέφαγεν αὐτὸν καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντα αὐτοῦ.
And Elijah answered and spoke to him, and said, If I [am] a man of God, fire shall come down out of heaven, and devour thee and thy fifty. And fire came down out of heaven, and devoured him and his fifty.
13
וַיָּשָׁב וַיִּשְׁלַח שַׂר־חֲמִשִּׁים שְׁלִשִׁים וַחֲמִשָּׁיו וַיַּעַל וַיָּבֹא שַׂר־הַחֲמִשִּׁים הַשְּׁלִישִׁי וַיִּכְרַע עַל־בִּרְכָּיו לְנֶגֶד אֵלִיָּהוּ וַיִּתְחַנֵּן אֵלָיו וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים תִּיקַר־נָא נַפְשִׁי וְנֶפֶשׁ עֲבָדֶיךָ אֵלֶּה חֲמִשִּׁים בְּעֵינֶיךָ
And again he sent the captain of a third fifty with his fifty. And the third captain of fifty went up, and came and fell on his knees before Elijah, and besought him, and said unto him: 'O man of G-d, I pray thee, let my life, and the life of these fifty thy servants, be precious in thy sight.
Καὶ προσέθετο ὁ βασιλεὺς ἔτι ἀποστεῖλαι ἡγούμενον καὶ τοὺς πεντήκοντα αὐτοῦ· καὶ ἦλθεν ὁ πεντηκόνταρχος ὁ τρίτος, καὶ ἔκαμψεν ἐπὶ τὰ γόνατα αὐτοῦ κατέναντι Ἠλιοὺ, καὶ ἐδεήθη αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἐλάλησε πρὸς αὐτὸν, καὶ εἶπεν, ἄνθρωπε τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἐντιμωθήτω ἡ ψυχή μου, καὶ ἡ ψυχὴ τῶν δούλων σου τούτων τῶν πεντήκοντα ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖς σου.
And the king sent yet again a captain and his fifty. And the third captain of fifty came, and knelt on his knees before Elijah, and entreated him, and spoke to him and said, O man of God, let my life, and the life of these fifty thy servants, be precious in thine eyes.
14
הִנֵּה יָרְדָה אֵשׁ מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וַתֹּאכַל אֶת־שְׁנֵי שָׂרֵי הַחֲמִשִּׁים הָרִאשֹׁנִים וְאֶת־חֲמִשֵּׁיהֶם וְעַתָּה תִּיקַר נַפְשִׁי בְּעֵינֶיךָ
Behold, there came fire down from heaven, and consumed the two former captains of fifty with their fifties; but now let my life be precious in thy sight'
Ἰδοὺ κατέβη πῦρ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ κατέφαγε τοὺς δύο πεντηκοντάρχους τοὺς πρώτους· καὶ νῦν ἐντιμωθήτω δὴ ἡ ψυχή μου ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖς σου.
Behold, fire came down from heaven, and devoured the two first captains of fifty: and now, I pray, let my life be precious in thine eyes.
15
וַיְדַבֵּר מַלְאַךְ יְהוָה אֶל־אֵלִיָּהוּ רֵד אוֹתוֹ אַל־תִּירָא מִפָּנָיו וַיָּקָם וַיֵּרֶד אוֹתוֹ אֶל־הַמֶּלֶךְ
And the angel of HaShem said unto Elijah: 'Go down with him; be not afraid of him.' And he arose, and went down with him unto the king.
Καὶ ἐλάλησεν ἄγγελος Κυρίου πρὸς Ἠλιοὺ, καὶ εἶπε, κατάβηθι μετʼ αὐτοῦ, μὴ φοβηθῇς ἀπὸ προσώπου αὐτῶν· καὶ ἀνέστη Ἠλιοὺ καὶ κατέβη μετʼ αὐτοῦ πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα.
And the angel of the Lord spoke to Elijah, and said, Go down with him, be not afraid of them. And Elijah rose up, and went down with him to the king.
16
וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו כֹּה־אָמַר יְהוָה יַעַן אֲשֶׁר־שָׁלַחְתָּ מַלְאָכִים לִדְרֹשׁ בְּבַעַל זְבוּב אֱלֹהֵי עֶקְרוֹן הַמִבְּלִי אֵין־אֱלֹהִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל לִדְרֹשׁ בִּדְבָרוֹ לָכֵן הַמִּטָּה אֲשֶׁר־עָלִיתָ שָּׁם לֹא־תֵרֵד מִמֶּנָּה כִּי־מוֹת תָּמוּת
And he said unto him: 'Thus saith HaShem: Forasmuch as thou hast sent messengers to inquire of Baal-zebub the god of Ekron, is it because there is no G-d in Israel to inquire of His word? therefore thou shalt not come down from the bed whether thou art gone up, but shalt surely die.'
Καὶ ἐλάλησε πρὸς αὐτὸν, καὶ εἶπεν Ἠλιού, τάδε λέγει Κύριος, τί ὅτι ἀπέστειλας ἀγγέλους ἐκζητῆσαι ἐν τῷ Βάαλ μυΐαν θεὸν Ἀκκαρών; οὐχ οὕτως· ἡ κλίνη ἐφʼ ἧς ἀνέβης ἐκεῖ, οὐ καταβήσῃ ἀπʼ αὐτῆς, ὅτι θανάτῳ ἀποθανῇ.
And Elijah spoke to him, and said, Thus saith the Lord, Why hast thou sent messengers to inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron? [it shall] not [be] so: the bed on which thou art gone up, thou shalt not come down from it, for thou shalt surely die.
17
וַיָּמָת כִּדְבַר יְהוָה אֲשֶׁר־דִּבֶּר אֵלִיָּהוּ וַיִּמְלֹךְ יְהוֹרָם תַּחְתָּיו בִּשְׁנַת שְׁתַּיִם לִיהוֹרָם בֶּן־יְהוֹשָׁפָט מֶלֶךְ יְהוּדָה כִּי לֹא־הָיָה לוֹ בֵּן
So he died according to the word of HaShem which Elijah had spoken. And Jehoram began to reign in his stead in the second year of Jehoram the son of Jehoshaphat king of Judah; because he had no son.
Καὶ ἀπέθανε κατὰ τὸ ῥῆμα Κυρίου ὃ ἐλάλησεν Ἠλιού.
So he died according to the word of the Lord which Elijah had spoken.
18
וְיֶתֶר דִּבְרֵי אֲחַזְיָהוּ אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה הֲלוֹא־הֵמָּה כְתוּבִים עַל־סֵפֶר דִּבְרֵי הַיָּמִים לְמַלְכֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל
Now the rest of the acts of Ahaziah which he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel?
Καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ τῶν λόγων Ὀχοζίου ἃ ἐποίησεν, οὐκ ἰδοὺ ταῦτα γεγραμμένα ἐν βιβλίῳ λόγων τῶν ἡμερῶν τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν Ἰσραήλ; 18aκαὶ Ἰωρὰμ υἱὸς Ἀχαὰβ βασιλεύει ἐπὶ Ἰσραὴλ ἐν Σαμαρείᾳ ἔτη δεκαδύο, ἐν ἔτει ὀκτωκαιδεκάτῳ Ἰωσαφὰτ βασιλέως Ἰούδα· 18bκαὶ ἐποίησε τὸ πονηρὸν ἐνώπιον Κυρίου· πλὴν οὐχ ὡς οἱ ἀδελφοὶ αὐτοῦ, οὐδὲ ὡς ἡ μήτηρ αὐτοῦ· 18cκαὶ ἀπέστησε τὰς στήλας τοῦ Βάαλ ἃς ἐποίησεν ὁ πατὴρ αὐτοῦ, καὶ συνέτριψεν αὐτάς· πλὴν ἐν ταῖς ἁμαρτίαις οἴκου Ἰεροβοὰμ, ὃς ἐξήμαρτε τὸν Ἰσραὴλ, ἐκολλήθη, οὐκ ἀπέστη ἀπʼ αὐτῶν· 18dκαὶ ἐθυμώθη ὀργῇ Κύριος εἰς τὸν οἶκον Ἀχαάβ.
And the rest of the acts of Ahaziah which he did, behold, [are] they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel?

How it works

A parallel reader for the Hebrew Bible and its oldest witnesses: the Masoretic text, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Septuagint, each with an English translation where one is available.

Reading a chapter

Choose a book and chapter at the top, or type a reference into Go to (Isa 53:11, 1 Sam 3, sam 3:4, ii kgs 2, ben sira 51). Book names can be abbreviated; a name shared by numbered books (sam, kings, chr, macc) opens the first of them unless you add the number. The arrow keys move between chapters, and the address bar keeps a link to the verse you clicked, so you can bookmark or share a place.

Each row is one verse. Rows follow the Masoretic verse numbering, so the Hebrew, JPS and Samaritan columns line up exactly. The Septuagint is numbered differently in many places (Psalms, Jeremiah, Exodus 35–40, parts of Kings, Proverbs, Daniel, and dozens of chapter boundaries). Its verses are placed against their Masoretic counterparts, and a small tag such as 50:3 shows the Septuagint's own number when it differs. Greek verses that have no Masoretic counterpart (for example the Prayer of Azariah in Daniel 3) appear in reading order as separate rows marked LXX.

Columns

The chips at the top switch columns on and off. Drag a chip (or a column heading) to reorder; with a chip focused, the ← → keys move it. Your choice is remembered. The Samaritan columns appear only in Genesis–Deuteronomy; the scrolls column appears wherever a manuscript survives, including Ben Sira. Columns marked † are licensed for non-commercial use only.

Words: lexicon and concordance

Hover over any Hebrew word (Masoretic, Samaritan or scroll) or any Greek word to see its dictionary form, Strong's number, a short gloss and its grammar. Click the word to open the concordance on the right: the full lexicon entry, then every occurrence, grouped by book — for Hebrew, separately for the Masoretic text, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the scrolls (with the manuscript named). Click a reference to go there; every form of the word in the chapter is highlighted. You can also type a word or a Strong's number into Lexicon at the top.

In the Masoretic text, a Ketiv (the written form, unpointed) is shown in grey immediately before its Qere (the form read aloud); both carry the Qere's dictionary entry.

Variants

The Samaritan Pentateuch and every scroll are compared word by word with the Masoretic text of the same verse:

In the scrolls, letters in brackets are a modern editor's reconstruction and are never counted as variants; letters with a dotted overline are uncertain; ◦ is a trace of an unreadable letter. Manuscripts written in paleo-Hebrew script, and divine names that square-script scrolls write in paleo-Hebrew, are shown in paleo-Hebrew letters (switchable under Display). Hover a manuscript to see its edition. Display → Dead Sea Scrolls can hide the manuscripts that agree with the Masoretic text, or strip the reconstructions to show only what survives.

The comparison is automatic. It aligns words by spelling, so a transposition or a long rewritten passage can be marked imperfectly, and the spelling rule cannot tell a suffix from a vowel letter. Treat the colours as a finding aid and check a critical edition before building an argument on a reading.

Books outside the Hebrew Bible

Besides the Septuagint-only books, the book list has 1 Enoch and Jubilees (“Other ancient books”), shown in R. H. Charles's English with the Qumran copies beside them, and Psalms has a chapter 151. Their scroll copies — like those of Tobit and Ben Sira — have no verse numbers in the data: each fragment is placed by its published identification, and its lines are spread over those verses, so treat the exact verse boundaries as approximate. Aramaic copies (Tobit 4Q196–199 and all of Enoch) are marked “Aramaic” and have no word lookups.

Rabbinic citations

The small ❝ under a verse number opens the passages of rabbinic literature that cite that verse — Mishnah, Tosefta, both Talmuds, Midrash, Targum and Kabbalah (and, if you tick the box, later halakhah, liturgy and thought) — fetched live from Sefaria, so it needs an internet connection. Each passage is listed with Sefaria's date for the work it comes from and a link to read it there. Sefaria's links include allusions and discussions as well as quotations; those it classes as quotations are marked. It works for the Hebrew Bible, Ben Sira (by Kahana's numbering, e.g. the Talmud's quotations of Ben Sira), Tobit and Jubilees. For 1 Enoch, which the rabbis do not quote, it lists instead the Zohar's passages about a “Book of Enoch”.

How the Septuagint is aligned

Each Greek verse is placed by combining three things: the standard table of Septuagint–Masoretic verse correspondences (SIL's lxx.vrs), the table of Masoretic–English numbering differences, and a comparison of the English of Brenton's Septuagint with the JPS English, which confirms each pairing and catches displaced verses. Where no Masoretic verse is similar enough, the Greek verse stands on its own row.

The Greek word data

No openly licensed word-by-word analysis of Brenton's Greek exists, so each Greek word is matched to the most frequent analysis of the same form in the openly licensed Swete Septuagint (Morpheus parser), then to a lexicon entry. About 95% of words are identified. Parses of ambiguous forms (e.g. αὐτοῦ, τοῦ) can be wrong; the card says "automatic parse" as a reminder.

Building and updating

The page reads prepared data from the data folder; python3 build.py (in the app folder) downloads the sources into sources and rebuilds it in a few minutes. Two files must be added by hand: eng-Brenton_vpl.zip from ebible.org and SPE.zip from CrossWire. python3 build.py --public-domain-only leaves out the three non-commercially-licensed layers; --download-only just fetches the sources. Licences and required credits are listed in SOURCES.md.

About the texts

What each column is, where it comes from, and what to keep in mind when reading it.

Masoretic Text — Westminster Leningrad Codex

The Masoretic text is the Hebrew Bible as transmitted by the Masoretes, scribal scholars active in Tiberias and elsewhere roughly from the 7th to the 10th century, who fixed its vowel points, accents and marginal notes (the Masorah) around a consonantal text that was already essentially stable by the 1st–2nd century CE. The Leningrad Codex (St Petersburg, Firkovich I B 19 A), copied in 1008/1009 CE in the Ben Asher tradition, is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible; the slightly older Aleppo Codex lost most of the Torah in 1947. It is the base of the standard critical editions (BHK, BHS, BHQ).

The Westminster Leningrad Codex is the public-domain digital transcription of it maintained by the J. Alan Groves Center at Westminster Theological Seminary. In this edition a Ketiv appears as its own unpointed word before the pointed Qere.

JPS 1917 — The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text

The first English Bible translation produced by a committee of Jewish scholars for the Jewish Publication Society of America, under Max L. Margolis as editor-in-chief, published in 1917. Its language deliberately follows the cadence of the King James and Revised Versions, but its renderings follow the Masoretic text and Jewish exegetical tradition, and it keeps the Hebrew chapter and verse numbering. It is in the public domain; its successor, the New JPS (Tanakh, 1985), is not. The electronic edition used here writes the divine names as “HaShem” and “G-d”.

Septuagint — Brenton's Greek text and the Updated Brenton English

The Septuagint is the Jewish translation of the Hebrew scriptures into Greek. The Torah was translated in Alexandria in the 3rd century BCE (the Letter of Aristeas tells the legend of 72 translators under Ptolemy II); the other books followed over the next two centuries. Because it was made from Hebrew manuscripts older than the Masoretic text, it often preserves a different Hebrew text: Jeremiah is about one-seventh shorter and differently ordered (a shorter Hebrew text of this type survives at Qumran in 4QJerb,d), Job is about one-sixth shorter, and Esther and Daniel have long additions. It was the Bible of Philo, Josephus and the New Testament writers, and became the Old Testament of the Greek church, which in turn led Jewish translators (Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion) to produce closer revisions.

Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton published an English translation in 1844 and a Greek–English edition in 1851. His Greek is essentially the Sixtine (Roman) edition of 1587, which follows the 4th-century Codex Vaticanus. It is older and less critical than the modern editions of Rahlfs (1935) and Göttingen, which are under copyright. The English column is the Updated Brenton (Adam Boyd, 2020), Brenton's translation with modernised spelling and wording, dedicated to the public domain.

Samaritan Pentateuch †

The Torah as preserved by the Samaritan community of Mount Gerizim (Nablus), written in the Samaritan script, a descendant of the paleo-Hebrew alphabet. It differs from the Masoretic text in about 6,000 places, most of them spelling or grammar; in about 1,900 of them it agrees with the Septuagint. Some readings are distinctively Samaritan, above all the commandment to build an altar on Mount Gerizim added after the Ten Commandments (Exod 20:17; Deut 5:21) and “Gerizim” for “Ebal” in Deut 27:4. Many others — harmonising expansions that copy one passage into its parallel — are shared with “pre-Samaritan” Qumran manuscripts such as 4QpaleoExodm and 4QNumb, showing that the text type is older than the Samaritan schism.

European scholars learned of it in 1616, when Pietro della Valle brought a manuscript from Damascus; it was printed in the Paris (1645) and London (1657) Polyglots, collated by Benjamin Kennicott (1776–80) and edited critically by August von Gall (1914–18). The Hebrew here is Aleksandr Sigalov's digital text, based on Kennicott and checked against von Gall; the English is Sigalov's adaptation of the King James Version to the Samaritan readings. For modern scholarship see Abraham Tal's edition of MS Shechem 6 and Stefan Schorch's critical editio maior.

Dead Sea Scrolls and other Judean Desert manuscripts †

Between 1947 and 1956 the remains of about 950 manuscripts were found in eleven caves near Khirbet Qumran. Some 230 are biblical — every book of the Hebrew Bible except Esther is represented, from tiny fragments to the complete Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa) — dating from about 250 BCE to 68 CE. They are a thousand years older than the Leningrad Codex. Most are close to the ancestor of the Masoretic text (“proto-Masoretic”), but others agree with the Septuagint (4QJerb, 4QSama in places), with the Samaritan text type, or with neither — evidence that several forms of the text circulated side by side before the Masoretic text prevailed.

Manuscripts from other sites fill out the picture: Masada (before its fall in 73/74 CE; excavated by Yigael Yadin, 1963–65) and the Bar Kokhba refuges of Wadi Murabba'at and Naḥal Ḥever (132–135 CE), whose biblical texts are already virtually identical with the Masoretic text, as well as Naḥal Ṣe'elim, Wadi Sdeir and Naḥal Arugot. The official publication is the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert series (Oxford, 1955–2010).

The transcriptions here are those of Martin G. Abegg Jr., James E. Bowley and Edward M. Cook, as converted by the Eep Talstra Centre for Bible and Computer (ETCBC). Each manuscript is labelled with its siglum (e.g. 4QIsad), its DJD number, its find-site and the column or fragment and line. Besides the biblical manuscripts, the copies of Ben Sira, Tobit, 1 Enoch, Jubilees and Psalm 151 are shown under those books. Not every manuscript is in the dataset — notably the Greek scrolls (such as the Greek Minor Prophets from Naḥal Ḥever) are absent, and the Masada Ben Sira scroll is added separately (see Ben Sira).

Ben Sira

The Wisdom of Yeshua ben Eleazar ben Sira, composed in Hebrew in Jerusalem around 190–180 BCE and translated into Greek by his grandson in Egypt after 132 BCE (his prologue explains the difficulty of rendering Hebrew into Greek). It belongs to the Septuagint and to the Catholic and Orthodox canons (Latin Ecclesiasticus) but not to the Jewish one, although the Talmud and midrash quote it. Its Hebrew text was lost to the West until 1896, when Solomon Schechter, Agnes Lewis and Margaret Gibson identified medieval copies in the Cairo Genizah; ancient Hebrew copies then emerged at Qumran and Masada.

About two-thirds of the Hebrew is now known, from six medieval Genizah manuscripts (A–F, 10th–12th century) and three ancient ones: 2QSir (2Q18; Sir 6:14–15, 20–32), the acrostic of Sir 51:13–20, 30 in the Psalms Scroll 11QPsa (columns 21–22), and the Masada scroll (Mas1h), found by Yigael Yadin in 1964 in a casemate room of the fortress and published in 1965: seven columns with Sir 39:27–44:17, copied in the early 1st century BCE, little more than a century after the author. Its agreement with Genizah manuscript B showed that the medieval copies descend from the ancient Hebrew rather than from a translation back from Greek or Syriac.

Here the book is shown in Brenton's Greek and English. The Hebrew column is the Kahana edition, as transcribed on Hebrew Wikisource and distributed by Sefaria (CC BY-SA): a running text built on the Genizah manuscripts, in which words in [brackets] are Kahana's restorations; chapters with no surviving Hebrew are empty. Kahana numbers the verses in the Hebrew order — in the Greek, two blocks of chapters 30–36 are transposed — so his verses have been matched to Brenton's by content for this app, with his own number shown as “Heb.” where it differs. The scrolls column has the three ancient witnesses; the Masada text is Eric Reymond's transcription from bensira.org, which states no licence, so it is only included when you download it yourself. Their placement was made for this app by matching the text; there is no Masoretic text to compare them with, so no variants are marked.

Psalm 151

The Septuagint Psalter ends with a short psalm “outside the number”, in which David recalls tending his father's sheep, his anointing and his victory over Goliath. It belongs to the Greek, Syriac and Ethiopic Bibles but not to the Hebrew one, and was long thought to have been composed in Greek — until the Psalms Scroll from Qumran Cave 11 (11QPsa, published by James Sanders in 1965) turned out to contain a longer Hebrew original in its 28th column, as two poems (151A on David's music and anointing, 151B, broken off, on Goliath). The Greek is a condensed translation of them. The psalm is shown as chapter 151 of Psalms, with the scroll's lines under the Greek verses they correspond to.

Tobit

A Jewish novella of the Eastern diaspora (probably 3rd–2nd century BCE): the pious exile Tobit, blinded in Nineveh, sends his son Tobias to recover money in Media, guided by the angel Raphael in disguise; on the way Tobias marries Sarah and drives off the demon Asmodeus. It is in the Septuagint and the Catholic and Orthodox canons. It survives in two Greek forms — a shorter one (Codices Vaticanus and Alexandrinus, printed by Brenton) and a longer one (Codex Sinaiticus) — and the Qumran copies, four in Aramaic (4Q196–199) and one in Hebrew (4Q200), published by Joseph Fitzmyer in 1995, side with the longer form, which is now generally taken as nearer the original. Their verse placement here follows Fitzmyer's identifications.

1 Enoch

A collection of five works ascribed to Enoch, the seventh from Adam who “walked with God” (Gen 5:24): the Book of the Watchers (ch. 1–36, 3rd century BCE), on the angels who descended to the daughters of men; the Parables (37–71); the Astronomical Book (72–82); the Dream Visions (83–90), with the “Animal Apocalypse” of Israel's history; and the Epistle of Enoch (91–108). It is quoted in the Letter of Jude (1:14–15) and is canonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, whose Ge'ez version is the only complete text; Greek survives for about a third. Józef Milik published the Aramaic fragments from Qumran Cave 4 in 1976: eleven copies, covering every part except the Parables, the oldest from around 200 BCE. The English is R. H. Charles's 1917 translation from the Ethiopic (public domain). The Astronomical scrolls (4Q208–211) contain a much longer calendar than the Ethiopic; only their few passages that match chapters 76–82 are placed.

Jubilees

A retelling of Genesis and Exodus 1–14 as revealed to Moses on Sinai by an “angel of the presence”, dated by a calendar of 49-year jubilees and a 364-day solar year (mid-2nd century BCE). Like 1 Enoch it is canonical only in the Ethiopian church, whose Ge'ez version is the only complete text; parts survive in Latin, Syriac and Greek quotations. Fragments of about fifteen Hebrew copies were found at Qumran, more than of most biblical books, and are published in DJD 13 (VanderKam and Milik, 1994) and DJD 23. The English is R. H. Charles's 1917 translation (public domain).

Lexicon and concordance data

Hebrew words carry the analysis of STEPBible's Translators Amalgamated Hebrew OT (Tyndale House, Cambridge): extended Strong's numbers — James Strong's 1890 numbering, subdivided to follow the Brown–Driver–Briggs lexicon (1906) — with morphology from the ETCBC and an abridged BDB for definitions. Samaritan and scroll words take the analysis of the Masoretic word they correspond to, or, where they differ, of the same written form elsewhere in the Masoretic text. Greek words are matched through the Swete Septuagint and the Morpheus parser to STEPBible's Greek lexicon, which draws on Abbott-Smith (1922) and Liddell–Scott–Jones.

† Licensed for non-commercial use only. Full credits and licences: SOURCES.md.