etsem · bone

What it means

etsem (עֶצֶם) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “bone”.

"Bone of my bones" is the Hebrew way of saying "of my own family", "like me". It also means "very", "self" ("that very day").

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. Each hard piece of the skeleton; also the body itself, of the dead or the living.
2. "Bone of my bones": of my family.
3. With "day", it means "that very day", stressing that it happened right then.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

Word study

Bone; by extension, the body; and figuratively, the substance of something, “the very same”.

• “Bone of my bones”: kinship Genesis 2:23Genesis 29:14
• Joseph's bones carried up from Egypt Genesis 50:25Exodus 13:19
• The valley of the dry bones Ezekiel 37:1Ezekiel 37:4
• “All my bones have come apart” Psalms 22:14
• “On that very day”; “on this very day” Genesis 7:13Exodus 12:17

Historical and cultural background

Joseph made the sons of Israel swear that they would carry his bones up from Egypt (Genesis 50:25), and Moses took them with him at the exodus (Exodus 13:19).

How we translate it

“Bones” 88 times, “bone” 17, “very” 20, “body” 1. עֶצֶם הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה is “this very day”, by the sense.

How it is translated

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

• bones ×88
• very ×20
• bone ×17
• body ×1

Related words

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

Where it appears

• Genesis×7
• Exodus×7
• Leviticus×5
• Numbers×4
• Deuteronomy×1
• Joshua×3
• Judges×2
• 1 Samuel×1
• 2 Samuel×9
• 1 Kings×3
• 2 Kings×7
• 1 Chronicles×2
• 2 Chronicles×1
• Job×13
• Psalms×15
• Proverbs×5
• Ecclesiastes×1
• Isaiah×3
• Jeremiah×7
• Lamentations×4
• Ezekiel×21
• Amos×2
• Micah×2
• Habakkuk×1

• Genesis 2:23

  And the man said, “This one, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one will be called Woman, because from Man this one was taken.”

• Genesis 7:13

  On that very day Noah went into the ark, and Shem and Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and the wife of Noah and the three wives of his sons with them,

• Genesis 17:23

  Then Abraham took Ishmael his son and all those born in his house and all those bought with his silver, every male among the men of Abraham’s house, and he circumcised the flesh of their foreskin on that very day, as Elohim had told him.

• Genesis 17:26

  On that very day Abraham was circumcised, and Ishmael his son;

• Genesis 29:14

  Laban said to him, “Surely you are my bone and my flesh.” And he stayed with him a month.

• Genesis 50:25

  Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “Elohim will surely attend to you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.”

• Exodus 12:17

  You shall keep the festival of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought out your armies from the land of Egypt; and you shall keep this day throughout your generations as a statute forever.

• Exodus 12:41

  At the end of the four hundred and thirty years, on that very day, all the armies of YHWH went out from the land of Egypt.

• Exodus 12:46

  In one house it shall be eaten; you shall not take any of the meat out of the house outside, and you shall not break a bone of it.

• Exodus 12:51

  And on that very day YHWH brought out the sons of Israel from the land of Egypt by their armies.

• Exodus 13:19

  Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for he had solemnly made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “Elohim will surely attend to you, and you shall carry up my bones from here with you.”

• Exodus 24:10

  and they saw the Elohim of Israel. Under his feet there was something like a work of pavement of sapphire, and like the very heavens for clearness.

• Leviticus 23:14

  And bread or roasted grain or fresh grain you shall not eat until this very day, until you have brought the offering of your Elohim; it is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.

• Leviticus 23:21

  And on this very day you shall proclaim: there shall be a holy convocation for you; you shall do no laborious work at all; it is a statute forever in all your dwellings throughout your generations.

• Leviticus 23:28

  And you shall do no work at all on this very day, for it is a day of expiation, to make expiation for you before YHWH your Elohim.

• Leviticus 23:29

  For any person who is not afflicted on this very day shall be cut off from their people.

• Leviticus 23:30

  And any person who does any work on this very day, I will destroy that person from among their people.

• Numbers 9:12

  They shall not leave any of it until morning, and they shall not break a bone of it; according to all the statute of the Passover they shall keep it.

• Numbers 19:16

  And everyone who touches, in the open field, one slain by the sword or a dead body or a human bone or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.

• Numbers 19:18

  And a clean man shall take hyssop and dip it in the water and sprinkle it on the tent and on all the vessels and on the persons who were there, and on the one who touched the bone or the slain or the dead or the grave.

• Numbers 24:8

  El brings him out of Egypt; he has as it were the horns of the wild ox. He shall devour the nations, his adversaries, and break their bones, and with his arrows shatter them.

• Deuteronomy 32:48

  And YHWH spoke to Moses on that very day, saying,

• Joshua 5:11

  They ate of the produce of the land on the day after the Passover, unleavened bread and roasted grain, on this very day.

• Joshua 10:27

  And it came about, at the time of the going down of the sun, that Joshua gave command, and they took them down from the trees and threw them into the cave where they had hidden, and they put great stones on the mouth of the cave, which are there until this very day.

• Joshua 24:32

  And the bones of Joseph, which the sons of Israel had brought up from Egypt, they buried at Shechem, in the plot of the field that Jacob had bought from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for a hundred qesitahs; and it became the inheritance of the sons of Joseph.

• Judges 9:2

  “Speak, please, in the ears of all the lords of Shechem: ‘Which is better for you, that seventy men, all the sons of Jerubbaal, rule over you, or that one man rule over you?’ And remember that I am your bone and your flesh.”

• Judges 19:29

  And he came to his house and took the knife, and took hold of his concubine and cut her into pieces by her bones into twelve pieces, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel.

• 1 Samuel 31:13

  They took their bones and buried them under the tamarisk in Jabesh, and fasted seven days.

• 2 Samuel 5:1

  All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, “Look at us: we are your bone and your flesh.

• 2 Samuel 19:12

  You are my brothers; you are my bone and my flesh. Why then should you be the last to bring back the king?’

• 2 Samuel 19:13

  And to Amasa say, ‘Are you not my bone and my flesh? So may Elohim do to me, and so may he add, if you do not become commander of the army before me all the days in place of Joab.’”

• 2 Samuel 21:12

  David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the lords of Jabesh-gilead, who had stolen them from the square of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them on the day the Philistines struck Saul on Gilboa.

• 2 Samuel 21:13

  He brought up from there the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son, and they gathered the bones of those who had been hanged.

• 2 Samuel 21:14

  They buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the land of Benjamin, in Zela, in the tomb of Kish his father; and they did all that the king commanded. And after that Elohim heeded the plea for the land.

• 1 Kings 13:2

  And he cried out against the altar by the word of YHWH, and said, “Altar, altar! Thus says YHWH: ‘Look, a son will be born to the house of David, Josiah will be his name; and he will sacrifice on you the priests of the high places who offer up in smoke on you, and human bones they will burn on you.’”

• 1 Kings 13:31

  And it happened after he had buried him, that he said to his sons, saying, “When I die, bury me in the tomb in which the man of Elohim is buried; beside his bones lay my bones.

• 2 Kings 13:21

  And it happened, as they were burying a man, that, look, they saw the band; and they threw the man into the tomb of Elisha. And the man went down and touched the bones of Elisha, and he came to life and stood up on his feet.

• 2 Kings 23:14

  He broke the standing stones, cut down the Asherahs, and filled their places with human bones.

• 2 Kings 23:16

  Josiah turned and saw the tombs that were there on the mountain; and he sent and took the bones from the tombs and burned them on the altar and made it unclean, according to the word of YHWH that the man of Elohim cried out, who had cried out these things.

• 2 Kings 23:18

  He said, “Let him alone; let no one disturb his bones.” So they left his bones safe, with the bones of the prophet who came from Samaria.

And 86 more times.