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Hebrew

To live

חֲיָאStrong’s H2421

chaya (cha-ya)

Appears in 257 verses of the Old Testament

In short

Chaya is the Hebrew word usually translated “lived”, “live” and “certainly”. It appears in 257 verses of the Old Testament.

“Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?”
Zechariah 1:5 KJV
Meaning
  1. To live(P'al) to live · (Aphel) to let live, keep alive
How it's translated
  • and he lived 42
  • and he will live 22
  • he will live 20
  • and live 11
  • certainly 11
  • may he live 10
  • preserve alive me 9
  • you will live 8

Word-by-word English from the STEPBible tagged text.

Where it's used most
  • Genesis 59
  • Ezekiel 35
  • Psalms 31
  • Deuteronomy 17
  • 2 Kings 17
  • Isaiah 9

27 books in all.

Related words
Explore in Scripture
All 257 verses, by book
Leviticus 3
18:525:3525:36
1 Chronicles 1
11:8
2 Chronicles 2
23:1125:25
Esther 1
4:11
Proverbs 4
4:47:29:615:27
Ecclesiastes 4
6:36:67:1211:8
Lamentations 1
4:20
Hosea 2
6:214:7
Habakkuk 2
2:43:2
Zechariah 3
1:510:913:3
Hebrew dictionary

חֲיָא chaya · to live

1) to live 1a) (P'al) to live 1b) (Aphel) to let live, keep alive

From STEPBible’s Hebrew lexicon (based on Brown-Driver-Briggs).

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

How the English word “live” was understood when the King James Version was still the common Bible of English readers.

LIVE, verb intransitive

liv.

  1. To abide; to dwell; to have settled residence in any place.
  2. To continue; to be permanent; not to perish.
  3. To be animated; to have the vital principle; to have the bodily functions in operation, or in a capacity to operate, as respiration, circulation of blood, secretions, etc.; applied to animals.“I am Joseph; doth my father yet live?” Genesis 45:3
  4. To have the principles of vegetable life; to be in a state in which the organs do or may perform their functions in the circulation of sap and in growth; applied to plants.
All definitions and other forms of “live”
  1. To pass life or time in a particular manner, with regard to habits or condition.
  2. To continue in life.
  3. To live emphatically; to enjoy life; to be in a state of happiness.
  4. To feed; to subsist; to be nourished and supported in life; as, horses live on grass or grain; fowls live on seeds or insects; some kinds of fish live on others; carnivorous animals live on flesh.
  5. To subsist; to be maintained in life; to be supported.
  6. To remain undestroyed; to float; not to sink or founder.
  7. To exist; to have being.“As I live saith the Lord -” Ezekiel 5:11
  8. In Scripture, to be exempt from death, temporal or spiritual.“Ye shall therefore keep my statutes and judgments, which if a man do, he shall live in them” Leviticus 18:5
  9. To recover from sickness; to have life prolonged.“Thy son liveth” John 4:50
  10. To be inwardly quickened, nourished and actuated by divine influence or faith. Galatians 2:14
  11. To be greatly refreshed, comforted and animated.“For now we live if ye stand fast in the Lord” 1 Thessalonians 3:8
  12. To appear as in life or reality; to be manifest in real character.
  13. To live with, to dwell or to be a lodger with.
  14. To cohabit; to have intercourse, as male and female.

LIVE, verb transitive

liv.

  1. To continue in constantly or habitually; as, to live a life of ease.
  2. To act habitually in conformity to.

LIVE, adjective

  1. Having life; having respiration and other organic functions in operation, or in a capacity to operate; not dead; as a live ox.
  2. Having vegetable life; as a live plant.
  3. Containing fire; ignited; not extinct; as a live coal.
  4. Vivid, as color.

Noah Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828). Verse references are checked against the KJV. Read the full entry.

Verses are from the King James Version. Word meanings come from the original Hebrew, not from any one translation.