yad · hand, power

What it means

yad (יָד) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “hand, power”.

Hand. Figuratively, power or control ("into the hand of" = into the power of); also side, part, or share. Also a projecting piece, such as a tenon.

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. The part of the body with which one takes, gives and works; also what one does.
2. Literally "the hand": the strength and control someone has.
3. Literally "by the hand of": that person is the one who does it or carries it.
4. Literally "the hand": the side or edge of something.
5. Parts of an object, or a portion.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

Word study

Hand. By extension, power, means and direction; also side or bank.

• The hand of the body Genesis 3:22
• Power: “with a strong hand”, “into your hand” Deuteronomy 26:8Exodus 14:31Genesis 9:2
• “By the hand of”: through someone Exodus 9:35
• Side, bank Numbers 13:29

Historical and cultural background

The formula “with a strong hand and with an outstretched arm” sums up in Deuteronomy the going out from Egypt (Deuteronomy 26:8).

How we translate it

“Hand” 1174 times, “hands” 242. Where the Hebrew uses the hand as an image of power, the image is kept (“with a strong hand”, “into your hand”). In בְּיַד said of persons, this edition writes “through” (52 times: “through Moses”) or “under the direction of” (15), when someone directs a work. As the side of a place, “beside”, “next to” or “along”.

How it is translated

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

• hand ×1174
• hands ×242
• through ×52
• under the direction ×15
• beside ×13
• means ×11
• next to him ×11
• ordained ×9
• next to them ×8
• him ×6
• others ×77

Related words

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

Where it appears

• Genesis×95
• Exodus×109
• Leviticus×50
• Numbers×45
• Deuteronomy×83
• Joshua×36
• Judges×92
• Ruth×3
• 1 Samuel×119
• 2 Samuel×63
• 1 Kings×49
• 2 Kings×73
• 1 Chronicles×45
• 2 Chronicles×82
• Ezra×17
• Nehemiah×41
• Esther×22
• Job×53
• Psalms×94
• Proverbs×31
• Ecclesiastes×13
• Song of Songs×4
• Isaiah×92
• Jeremiah×117
• Lamentations×15
• Ezekiel×108
• Daniel×16
• Hosea×6
• Joel×1
• Amos×4
• Micah×5
• Habakkuk×2
• Zephaniah×4
• Haggai×5
• Zechariah×19
• Malachi×5

• Genesis 3:22

  And YHWH Elohim said, “Look, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, so that he does not reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat and live forever—”

• Genesis 4:11

  And now, cursed are you away from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.

• Genesis 5:29

  And he called his name Noah, saying, “This one will comfort us from our work and from the toil of our hands, from the ground that YHWH has cursed.”

• Genesis 8:9

  But the dove did not find a resting place for the sole of her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were on the face of all the earth. And he reached out his hand and took her and brought her to himself into the ark.

• Genesis 9:2

  And the fear and the dread of you will be on every animal of the earth and on every bird of the sky, on everything that creeps on the ground, and on all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are given.

• Genesis 9:5

  And surely your blood, for your lives, I will require; from the hand of every animal I will require it, and from the hand of the human being, from the hand of each one for his brother, I will require the life of the human being.

• Genesis 14:20

  and blessed be El Elyon, who has delivered your adversaries into your hand.” And he gave him a tenth of everything.

• Genesis 14:22

  But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have raised my hand to YHWH, El Elyon, owner of the heavens and earth,

• Genesis 16:6

  But Abram said to Sarai, “Look, your slave woman is in your hand; do to her what is good in your eyes.” So Sarai afflicted her, and she fled from her presence.

• Genesis 16:9

  The angel of YHWH said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hand.”

• Genesis 16:12

  He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone, and the hand of everyone against him; and facing all his brothers he will dwell.”

• Genesis 19:10

  But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them, and shut the door.

• Genesis 19:16

  But he lingered; so the men seized his hand, his wife’s hand, and the hand of his two daughters, because of YHWH’s compassion for him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city.

• Genesis 21:18

  Get up, lift up the boy, and hold him with your hand, for I will make him a great nation.”

• Genesis 21:30

  He said, “You are to take the seven ewe lambs from my hand so that it may be a witness for me that I dug this well.”

• Genesis 22:6

  Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. And the two of them went together.

• Genesis 22:10

  Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son.

• Genesis 22:12

  He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the boy, and do not do anything to him, for now I know that you fear Elohim, since you have not withheld your son, your only one, from me.”

• Genesis 24:2

  Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his household, who ruled over all that he had, “Put, please, your hand under my thigh,

• Genesis 24:9

  The servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his lord and swore to him concerning this matter.

• Genesis 24:10

  The servant took ten camels from the camels of his lord and went, with all kinds of good things of his lord in his hand. He rose and went to Aram-naharaim, to the city of Nahor.

• Genesis 24:18

  She said, “Drink, my lord.” And she quickly lowered her jar onto her hand and gave him a drink.

• Genesis 24:22

  When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a gold ring of half a shekel in weight, and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels of gold in weight,

• Genesis 24:30

  When he saw the ring and the bracelets on the hands of his sister, and when he heard the words of Rebekah his sister, saying, “Thus the man spoke to me,” he went to the man; and look, he was standing by the camels at the spring.

• Genesis 24:47

  Then I asked her and said, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ She said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel, the son of Nahor, whom Milcah bore to him.’ So I put the ring on her nose and the bracelets on her hands.

• Genesis 25:26

  After that his brother came out, with his hand holding on to the heel of Esau, and he called his name Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them.

• Genesis 27:16

  And the skins of the young goats she put on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck.

• Genesis 27:17

  She gave the tasty food and the bread that she had made into the hand of Jacob her son.

• Genesis 27:22

  Jacob came near to Isaac his father, and he felt him and said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”

• Genesis 27:23

  He did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like the hands of Esau his brother; so he blessed him.

• Genesis 30:35

  On that day he removed the male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white on it, and every dark one among the lambs, and he gave them into the hands of his sons.

• Genesis 31:29

  It is in the power of my hand to do you harm; but the Elohim of your father spoke to me last night, saying, ‘Be careful not to speak with Jacob either good or bad.’

• Genesis 31:39

  What was torn by beasts I did not bring to you; I bore the loss of it; from my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night.

• Genesis 32:11

  Deliver me, please, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, lest he come and strike me, the mothers with the children.

• Genesis 32:13

  He spent the night there that night, and he took from what had come into his hand a gift for Esau his brother:

• Genesis 32:16

  He put them in the hand of his servants, each herd by itself, and said to his servants, “Pass on ahead of me, and put a space between herd and herd.”

• 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 33:19

  He bought the piece of the field where he had pitched his tent from the hand of the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for a hundred qesitah.

• Genesis 34:21

  “These men are at peace with us; let them dwell in the land and trade in it, for the land, look, is spacious enough for them. Their daughters we will take for ourselves as wives, and our daughters we will give to them.

• Genesis 35:4

  So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods that were in their hands, and the rings that were in their ears; and Jacob buried them under the oak that was near Shechem.

And 1578 more times.