anan · bring clouds; practice soothsaying

What it means

anan (עָנַן) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “bring clouds; practice soothsaying”.

Bring clouds, cover with clouds. In another form the same verb names a forbidden practice of divination.

How to say it

Approximate pronunciation. Vowels sound as in Spanish (a as in father, e as in bed, i as in machine, o as in note, u as in rule); the syllable in bold is stressed. The voice is your device's.

Its senses in the Bible

1. To seek signs to divine, something forbidden.
2. To cover with clouds.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

How it is translated

The words this translation uses for it, most frequent first.

• soothsayers ×3
• soothsaying ×3
• Meonenim ×1
• fortune-tellers ×1
• soothsayer ×1
• sorceress ×1
• when I bring ×1

Related words

Words of the same family, by Strong’s numbering.

Where it appears

• Genesis×1
• Leviticus×1
• Deuteronomy×2
• Judges×1
• 2 Kings×1
• 2 Chronicles×1
• Isaiah×2
• Jeremiah×1
• Micah×1

• Genesis 9:14

  And it will happen, when I bring clouds over the earth and the bow appears in the cloud,

• Leviticus 19:26

  You shall not eat anything with the blood. You shall not practice divination or soothsaying.

• Deuteronomy 18:10

  There shall not be found among you anyone who makes pass his son or his daughter through the fire, anyone who practices divination, a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer,

• Deuteronomy 18:14

  For these nations that you are dispossessing listen to soothsayers and to diviners; but as for you, YHWH your Elohim has not allowed you to do so.

• Judges 9:37

  Gaal again spoke and said, “Look, people are coming down from the center of the land, and one company is coming by the way of the oak of Meonenim.”

• 2 Kings 21:6

  He made his son pass through the fire, practiced soothsaying and read omens, and appointed those who call up the dead and spiritists; he did much evil in the eyes of YHWH, to provoke him to anger.

• 2 Chronicles 33:6

  He made his sons pass through the fire in the Valley of Ben-hinnom; he practiced soothsaying, read omens, practiced sorcery, and appointed those who call up the dead and spiritists; he multiplied doing evil in the eyes of YHWH, provoking him to anger.

• Isaiah 2:6

  For you have forsaken your people, the house of Jacob, because they are full from the east, and have soothsayers like the Philistines, and with the children of foreigners they clasp hands.

• Isaiah 57:3

  “But you, come near here, sons of a sorceress, offspring of an adulterer and of her who prostitutes herself.

• Jeremiah 27:9

  And you, do not listen to your prophets, or to your diviners, or to your dreams, or to your soothsayers, or to your sorcerers, who are saying to you, saying, ‘You will not serve the king of Babylon.’

• Micah 5:12

  And I will cut off sorceries from your hand, and there will not be for you fortune-tellers.