yashar · be right, be straight

What it means

yashar (יָשַׁר) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “be right, be straight”.

Be right: be straight or level; with "in the eyes of," seem right to someone.

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 keep a true course, or level the way.
2. To seem good to someone.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

How it is translated

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

• right ×7
• make straight ×5
• was right ×5
• makes straight ×2
• be directed straight ×1
• directed them ×1
• fitted ×1
• he lets it loose ×1
• upright ×1
• went straight ×1
• others ×1

Related words

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

Where it appears

• Numbers×1
• Judges×2
• 1 Samuel×3
• 2 Samuel×1
• 1 Kings×2
• 1 Chronicles×1
• 2 Chronicles×2
• Job×1
• Psalms×2
• Proverbs×5
• Isaiah×3
• Jeremiah×2
• Habakkuk×1

• Numbers 23:27

  And Balak said to Balaam, “Come, please, I will take you to another place; perhaps it will be right in the eyes of Elohim that you curse them for me from there.”

• Judges 14:3

  But his father and his mother said to him, “Is there no woman among the daughters of your brothers, or among all my people, that you go to take a wife from the Philistines, the uncircumcised?” And Samson said to his father, “Take her for me, for she is right in my eyes.”

• Judges 14:7

  Then he went down and spoke to the woman, and she was right in the eyes of Samson.

• 1 Samuel 6:12

  And the cows went straight on the road, on the road to Beth-shemesh; along one highway they went, going and lowing, and they did not turn aside to the right or to the left; and the lords of the Philistines were walking after them as far as the border of Beth-shemesh.

• 1 Samuel 18:20

  Michal, daughter of Saul, loved David; and they told Saul, and the thing was right in his eyes.

• 1 Samuel 18:26

  His servants told David these words, and the thing was right in the eyes of David to become son-in-law to the king. And the days had not yet been fulfilled,

• 2 Samuel 17:4

  The thing was right in the eyes of Absalom and in the eyes of all the elders of Israel.

• 1 Kings 6:35

  And he carved cherubim and palm trees and open flowers, and overlaid them with gold fitted over what was incised.

• 1 Kings 9:12

  And Hiram came out from Tyre to see the cities that Solomon had given him, and they were not right in his eyes.

• 1 Chronicles 13:4

  All the assembly said to do so, for the thing seemed right in the eyes of all the people.

• 2 Chronicles 30:4

  The thing was right in the eyes of the king and in the eyes of all the assembly.

• 2 Chronicles 32:30

  This same Hezekiah stopped up the upper outlet of the waters of Gihon and directed them down to the west of the city of David. And Hezekiah prospered in all his work.

• Job 37:3

  Under all the heavens he lets it loose, and his light to the edges of the earth.

• Psalms 5:8

  YHWH, guide me in your righteousness because of those who lie in wait for me; make straight before me your way.

• Psalms 119:128

  Therefore I count right all your precepts in everything; every path of lying I hate.

• Proverbs 3:6

  In all your ways know him, and he will make straight your paths.

• Proverbs 4:25

  Let your eyes look straight ahead, and let your eyelids be directed straight before you.

• Proverbs 9:15

  to call to those who pass by the way, who are making straight their paths:

• Proverbs 11:5

  The righteousness of the blameless makes his way straight, but by his wickedness the wicked will fall.

• Proverbs 15:21

  Folly is joy to one who is lacking in sense, but a man of insight makes straight his going.

• Isaiah 40:3

  A voice calls out: “In the wilderness clear the way of YHWH; make straight in the Arabah a highway for our Elohim.

• Isaiah 45:2

  “I will go before you and make straight the twisted places; doors of bronze I will break, and bars of iron I will cut through;

• Isaiah 45:13

  I have stirred him up in righteousness, and all his ways I will make straight; he will build my city and let my exiles go, not for a price nor for a bribe,” says YHWH Tsevaot.

• Jeremiah 18:4

  And the vessel that he was making of clay was ruined in the hand of the potter; and he went back and made it another vessel, as seemed right in the eyes of the potter to make.

• Jeremiah 27:5

  I made the earth, the human beings and the animals that are on the face of the earth, by my great power and by my outstretched arm, and I give it to whomever it seems right in my eyes.

• Habakkuk 2:4

  Look, the one who is puffed up, his soul is not upright in him; but the righteous by his faithfulness will live.