chen · favor

What it means

chen (חֵן) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “favor”.

Someone's good disposition toward another. "Find favor in someone's eyes" is to be looked on with kindness. Also grace, charm.

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. Someone's goodwill toward another: looking on them kindly.
2. Attractive charm, the grace of a person or of their words.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

Word study

Favor: the good disposition with which someone looks on another; also the charm or grace that makes someone pleasing. It is of the root חָנַן (show favor, H2603).

• “Find favor in the eyes of” someone Genesis 6:8Genesis 39:4Ruth 2:2
• Asking YHWH for his favor Exodus 33:13
• Favor God gives to the humble Proverbs 3:34
• Grace, charm Psalms 45:2Proverbs 31:30
• The shout “Favor, favor” Zechariah 4:7Zechariah 12:10

How we translate it

“Favor” 64 times, above all in the formula “found favor in the eyes of”, which is kept (Genesis 6:8). “Grace” 3 when the word names the charm of a person or of their words (Psalm 45:2; Proverbs 31:30); “gracious” in Proverbs 11:16.

How it is translated

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

• favor ×64
• grace ×3
• graceful ×1
• gracious ×1

Related words

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

Where it appears

• Genesis×14
• Exodus×9
• Numbers×3
• Deuteronomy×1
• Judges×1
• Ruth×3
• 1 Samuel×6
• 2 Samuel×3
• 1 Kings×1
• Esther×6
• Psalms×2
• Proverbs×13
• Ecclesiastes×2
• Jeremiah×1
• Nahum×1
• Zechariah×3

• Genesis 6:8

  But Noah found favor in the eyes of YHWH.

• Genesis 18:3

  He said, “Adonai, if I have found favor in your eyes, please do not pass by your servant.

• Genesis 19:19

  Look, your servant has found favor in your eyes, and you have made great your loyal love that you have shown me by keeping me alive; but I cannot escape to the mountain, lest the evil overtake me and I die.

• Genesis 30:27

  Laban said to him, “If, please, I have found favor in your eyes— I have learned by divination that YHWH has blessed me because of you.”

• Genesis 32:5

  I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male slaves, and slave women; and I have sent to tell my lord, to find favor in your eyes.’”

• Genesis 33:8

  He said, “What do you mean by all this camp that I met?” He said, “To find favor in the eyes of my lord.”

• Genesis 33:10

  And Jacob said, “No, please! If indeed I have found favor in your eyes, then take my gift from my hand, since I have seen your face as one sees the face of Elohim, and you have received me favorably.

• Genesis 33:15

  Esau said, “Let me leave, please, with you some of the people who are with me.” But he said, “Why this? Let me find favor in the eyes of my lord.”

• Genesis 34:11

  Shechem said to her father and to her brothers, “Let me find favor in your eyes, and whatever you say to me I will give.

• Genesis 39:4

  So Joseph found favor in his eyes, and he served him; and he appointed him over his house, and all that he had he put in his hand.

• Genesis 39:21

  But YHWH was with Joseph and extended to him loyal love, and gave him favor in the eyes of the chief of the prison.

• Genesis 47:25

  They said, “You have kept us alive! May we find favor in the eyes of my lord, and we will be slaves to Pharaoh.”

• Genesis 47:29

  The days of Israel drew near to die, and he called his son Joseph and said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please put your hand under my thigh, and deal with me in loyal love and faithfulness: please do not bury me in Egypt.

• Genesis 50:4

  When the days of weeping for him had passed, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying,

• Exodus 3:21

  And I will give this people favor in the eyes of the Egyptians, and it will be that when you go, you will not go empty-handed.

• Exodus 11:3

  YHWH gave the people favor in the eyes of the Egyptians. Moreover, the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt, in the eyes of Pharaoh’s servants and in the eyes of the people.

• Exodus 12:36

  And YHWH gave the people favor in the eyes of the Egyptians, and they gave them what they asked. So they plundered the Egyptians.

• Exodus 33:12

  And Moses said to YHWH, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and also you have found favor in my eyes.’

• Exodus 33:13

  Now if, please, I have found favor in your eyes, let me know, please, your ways, so that I may know you, in order that I may find favor in your eyes. And see that this nation is your people.”

• Exodus 33:16

  For how then shall it be known that I have found favor in your eyes, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinguished, I and your people, from all the people that are on the face of the ground?”

• Exodus 33:17

  And YHWH said to Moses, “Also this thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my eyes, and I know you by name.”

• Exodus 34:9

  And he said, “If, please, I have found favor in your eyes, Adonai, let Adonai go, please, in our midst; although it is a stubborn people, forgive our iniquity and our sin, and take us as your inheritance.”

• Numbers 11:11

  And Moses said to YHWH, “Why have you done evil to your servant? And why have I not found favor in your eyes, that you put the burden of all this people on me?

• Numbers 11:15

  And if you deal thus with me, kill me, please, kill me outright, if I have found favor in your eyes, and let me not see my misery.”

• Numbers 32:5

  They said, “If we have found favor in your eyes, let this land be given to your servants as a possession; do not make us cross the Jordan.”

• Deuteronomy 24:1

  When a man takes a woman and becomes her husband, and it happens, if she does not find favor in his eyes because he has found in her a nakedness of something, and he writes for her a document of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her away from his house,

• Judges 6:17

  He said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please make for me a sign that it is you who are speaking with me.

• Ruth 2:2

  And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go, please, to the field and glean among the ears of grain behind the one in whose eyes I find favor.” She said to her, “Go, my daughter.”

• Ruth 2:10

  Then she fell on her face and bowed down to the ground and said to him, “Why have I found favor in your eyes that you should take notice of me, when I am a foreigner?”

• Ruth 2:13

  And she said, “May I find favor in your eyes, my lord, for you have comforted me and because you have spoken to the heart of your servant, though I am not like one of your servants.”

• 1 Samuel 1:18

  And she said, “May your servant find favor in your eyes.” So the woman went on her way and ate, and her face was no longer sad.

• 1 Samuel 16:22

  Saul sent to Jesse, saying, “Please let David stand before me, for he has found favor in my eyes.”

• 1 Samuel 20:3

  David swore again and said, “Your father knows well that I have found favor in your eyes, and he has said, ‘Let not Jonathan know this, lest he be grieved.’ But truly, as YHWH lives and as your soul lives, there is but as it were a step between me and death.”

• 1 Samuel 20:29

  He said, ‘Let me go, please, for we have a family sacrifice in the city, and my brother himself has commanded me; and now, if I have found favor in your eyes, let me escape, please, and see my brothers.’ Therefore he has not come to the table of the king.”

• 1 Samuel 25:8

  Ask your young men, and they will tell you. So let the young men find favor in your eyes, for we have come on a good day. Give, please, whatever your hand finds to your servants and to your son, to David.’”

• 1 Samuel 27:5

  David said to Achish, “If please I have found favor in your eyes, let them give me a place in one of the towns of the open country, and I will stay there. For why should your servant stay in the royal city with you?”

• 2 Samuel 14:22

  Joab fell on his face to the ground and bowed down and blessed the king, and Joab said, “Today your servant knows that I have found favor in your eyes, my lord the king, in that the king has done the word of your servant.”

• 2 Samuel 15:25

  The king said to Zadok, “Take back the ark of Elohim to the city. If I find favor in the eyes of YHWH, he will bring me back and let me see it and his dwelling.

• 2 Samuel 16:4

  The king said to Ziba, “Look, yours is all that belonged to Mephibosheth.” Ziba said, “I bow down; may I find favor in your eyes, my lord the king.”

• 1 Kings 11:19

  And Hadad found great favor in the eyes of Pharaoh, and he gave him a wife: the sister of his own wife, the sister of Tahpenes the lady.

And 29 more times.