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.
qadosh
Holy. Set apart for a purpose, before it is anything about moral purity.
Leviticus 19:2, in every translation this tool compares.
The good china. Not morally better china. Set aside for something.
Because days, vessels and ground are called holy, none of which has a character, and the moral sense follows from whose purpose something serves.
Every version reads holy.
קָדוֹשׁ qadosh · H6918
Qadosh carries separation and otherness. The seventh day, the tabernacle furniture and the ground at the burning bush are all qadosh. The command to be holy is a command about belonging before it is about behaviour.
English holy implies attained goodness, which reverses the direction of the idea.
Status words become merit words very easily in English. Check whether the original describes a designation or an achievement.
Holy is universal.
- qadosh of the seventh day: Genesis 2:3
- of ground: Exodus 3:5
- of vessels: Exodus 30:29
