How to Use Strong's Concordance for Old Testament Hebrew Study

James Strong published his exhaustive concordance in 1890 after 35 years of work with over 100 scholars. The result was a system that assigned a unique number to every Hebrew root in the Old Testament (and every Greek word in the New Testament) -- over 8,000 Hebrew entries and 5,600 Greek entries. Strong's numbers have become the standard reference system for biblical word study, and modern digital tools have made them more accessible than ever. You do not need to know a single word of Hebrew to use Strong's Concordance effectively.

What Strong's Numbers Are and How They Work

Every Hebrew root in the Old Testament has a unique Strong's number (H1 through H8674). The same root, regardless of how it is conjugated, declined, or translated into English, always carries the same Strong's number. This means that if you look up any occurrence of the word "create" in the Old Testament and see it is Strong's H1254 (bara), you can find every other verse where H1254 appears -- every verse where God uses this specific kind of creation, distinct from mere making or forming.

The power of the system is that it groups occurrences by root rather than by English translation. English translators use multiple words for the same Hebrew root (the root "ra'ah" might be translated shepherd, feed, tend, pasture, or rule depending on context), and Strong's numbers let you gather all those occurrences together even when the English hides the connection.

Finding a Strong's Number

In print Strong's Concordance, you look up an English word, find the verse you want, and the concordance shows you the original-language word with its Strong's number. In digital tools -- Bible apps, interlinear readers, and study tools like those at Latter-Day Daily -- the Strong's number is typically shown when you click or tap any word in the original language text.

The entry for each number includes: - The Hebrew word in Hebrew script - The transliteration (pronunciation in Roman characters) - The root derivation and related words - The primary definition and range of meanings - A count of how many times the word appears in the Hebrew Bible

Practical Method: Tracing a Root

Here is a concrete example of how to use Strong's for Come Follow Me 2026 Old Testament study.

Take Isaiah 40:31: "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

Open an interlinear reader and look up the word translated "wait." In Hebrew it is "qavah" -- Strong's H6960. The entry tells you: - Primary meaning: to wait, to hope, to look eagerly toward - Related meaning: to bind together, to collect (as in collecting water in a pool) - Related noun: "tiqvah" (H8615) = hope, expectation, cord (the same word used for Rahab's scarlet cord in Joshua 2:18)

Now search for all occurrences of H6960 in the Old Testament. You find it in: - Psalm 27:14 ("Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart") - Psalm 37:34 ("Wait on the LORD, and keep his way, and he shall exalt thee") - Lamentations 3:25 ("The LORD is good unto them that wait for him") - Isaiah 49:23 ("They shall not be ashamed that wait for me")

The connection between Isaiah 40:31 and Rahab's scarlet cord (using the noun form of the same root) is not visible in English. In Hebrew, the hope that lets the weary rise on eagles' wings is linguistically related to the cord that saved a family in Jericho. Both are acts of binding oneself to a promise that is not yet visible.

Common High-Value Strong's Numbers for Old Testament Study

These roots appear frequently enough that learning their Strong's numbers pays dividends across many passages:

H3068 -- YHWH (the divine name): Appears ~6,800 times. Every time you see it, note whether God is acting as Creator (context of Elohim) or Covenant Partner (context of YHWH).

H2617 -- Hesed (lovingkindness, covenant loyalty): The most theologically loaded word in the Psalms. Appears in "The LORD is good; his mercy (hesed) endureth forever" (Psalm 136, where the phrase appears 26 times) and in God's self-description at Sinai (Exodus 34:6-7).

H7725 -- Shuv (to return, repent): The prophetic call to "return" to God. Appears in every major prophetic book. Understanding shuv as return/movement rather than guilt-transaction changes how you read prophetic calls to repentance.

H1285 -- Berith (covenant): Every covenant God makes with humans uses this word. Tracing H1285 through the Old Testament traces the entire covenant story from Noah through Abraham, Moses, David, and the new covenant promised in Jeremiah 31.

H3045 -- Yada (to know): Not intellectual knowing but experiential, relational knowing. "Adam knew his wife Eve" (Genesis 4:1) uses yada. "I never knew you" (Matthew 7:23 in the Greek equivalent) is relational rejection, not lack of information. Tracing yada reveals what the Bible means by "knowing God."

H6662 -- Tsaddiq (righteous): Appears in "the righteous shall live by faith" (Habakkuk 2:4, quoted three times in the New Testament). Understanding what Hebrew righteousness means -- relational rightness, not merely moral niceness -- transforms how you read Paul's theology of justification.

Using Strong's with the [Hebrew Alphabet](/blog/hebrew-alphabet-learn-letters-scripture-study)

Knowing the Hebrew alphabet deepens Strong's study in one important way: you can recognize the root consonants of related words and begin to intuit connections. When you see H7965 (shalom) and H8003 (shalem) are both Shin-Lamed-Mem roots, you start to feel the root structure of the language, even without formal Hebrew training.

The most powerful combination for scripture study is: Strong's Concordance + an interlinear reader + an etymology explorer. Strong's gives you the numbers. The interlinear shows you the words in context. The etymology explorer shows you how roots relate across the whole language. Together, they give you access to the Hebrew Bible without requiring formal language training.

A Note on Strong's Limitations

Strong's was published in 1890, and biblical scholarship has advanced significantly since then. Some of Strong's etymological derivations are outdated, and some definitions have been refined by later scholarship and by the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and other ancient texts. For serious study, Strong's is a starting point -- a way to identify and locate words -- not the final word on what they mean. Always supplement with a modern Hebrew lexicon (HALOT or BDB) for detailed theological study.

That said, for the Come Follow Me student who wants to go deeper than a surface reading without formal language training, Strong's Concordance remains the most accessible entry point into original-language Old Testament study after 135 years.