Tool Beta
Hebrew and Greek Without Learning Either
A walk through Genesis, the Psalms, and John, plus the key Hebrew and Greek words worth knowing. Each card is a place the English Bibles part company, and what in the Hebrew or Greek made them.
Genesis 18:19
I know him, that he will command his children. Know here names a relationship, not a fact.
Genesis 18:19, in every translation this tool compares.
English I know that fact and I know my spouse both use the same verb, but everyone hears the difference from context. Hebrew yada spans that same range but leans harder toward the relational end, used of covenant partners choosing and being chosen, not only of holding information.
Because God says I know Abraham using the same Hebrew verb used elsewhere of covenant relationship and even of sexual intimacy, a verb that names an entire category of relational, chosen closeness that English know, a verb mostly about facts and information, does not cover.
Every version reads know or have chosen, both reasonable, since English know already covers relational closeness in some contexts, though not as centrally as Hebrew yada does.
יָדַע yada · H3045
Yada covers factual knowledge but also intimate, covenantal, and elective relationship: it is the verb used of a husband knowing his wife at Genesis 4:1, of covenant partners recognizing mutual obligation in ancient treaty language, and here of God's chosen, purposeful relationship with Abraham, entered into precisely so that Abraham will direct his household toward righteousness and justice.
English know defaults to information first and relationship only by context or added words, spouse, friend, personally. Hebrew yada carries the relational, chosen sense as one of its ordinary meanings, so a bare English I know understates the covenant weight the Hebrew verb is carrying here.
When God or a covenant partner is the subject of know in the Hebrew Bible, weight the relational and elective sense at least as heavily as the informational one. The word is regularly doing covenant work, not simply reporting mental content.
Know or have chosen both work as English glosses; neither alone captures the full range, factual awareness, intimate relationship, and covenant recognition, that yada carries as a single word here.
- yada used of sexual intimacy: Genesis 4:1
- yada in ancient Near Eastern treaty language for covenant recognition: standard treatments in Hebrew theological wordbooks
