חָלַם
cha.lam (H2492B)
to dream
AI Word Study
# H2492B חָלַם (cha.lam): "To Dream" The Hebrew verb חָלַם appears 27 times throughout the Hebrew Bible with the straightforward meaning "to dream." This is a relatively common word, suggesting that dreams held notable importance in biblical narrative and experience. The verb functions as a standard way to describe the act of experiencing a dream—the internal mental phenomena that occurs during sleep or altered states of consciousness. The frequency of this term across 27 biblical occurrences indicates that dreaming was treated as a significant enough phenomenon to warrant consistent linguistic marking. Rather than being a peripheral or rare experience, dreams appear to have been integrated into the biblical worldview as events worth recording and discussing. The availability of a dedicated verb for this action suggests that ancient Hebrew speakers needed to distinguish between dreaming and waking states regularly enough to have developed specific vocabulary for it. Without access to the specific contexts where this word appears, we cannot determine from the lexical data alone whether dreams were understood as divine communication, psychological phenomena, or something else. The word itself is semantically neutral—it simply marks the action of dreaming. However, the word's presence and frequency alone testify that biblical literature engaged with dreams as part of the human experience worthy of narration.
AI synthesis uses only provided lexicon data -- never training knowledge.
He dreamed and saw a stairway set upon the earth, and its top reached to heaven. Behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.
Joseph dreamed a dream, and he told it to his brothers, and they hated him all the more.
He said to them, “Please hear this dream which I have dreamed:
He dreamed yet another dream, and told it to his brothers, and said, “Behold, I have dreamed yet another dream: and behold, the sun and the moon and eleven stars bowed down to me.”
He told it to his father and to his brothers. His father rebuked him, and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Will I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves down to you to the earth?”
They both dreamed a dream, each man his dream, in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the cup bearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were bound in the prison.
They said to him, “We have dreamed a dream, and there is no one who can interpret it.” Joseph said to them, “Don’t interpretations belong to God? Please tell it to me.”
At the end of two full years, Pharaoh dreamed, and behold, he stood by the river.
He slept and dreamed a second time; and behold, seven heads of grain came up on one stalk, healthy and good.
We dreamed a dream in one night, he and I. Each man dreamed according to the interpretation of his dream.
Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I have dreamed a dream, and there is no one who can interpret it. I have heard it said of you, that when you hear a dream you can interpret it.”
Joseph remembered the dreams which he dreamed about them, and said to them, “You are spies! You have come to see the nakedness of the land.”
If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you, and he gives you a sign or a wonder,
you shall not listen to the words of that prophet, or to that dreamer of dreams; for Yahweh your God is testing you, to know whether you love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
That prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death, because he has spoken rebellion against Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to draw you aside out of the way which Yahweh your God commanded you to walk in. So you shall remove the evil from among you.
When Gideon had come, behold, there was a man telling a dream to his fellow. He said, “Behold, I dreamed a dream; and behold, a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian, came to the tent, and struck it so that it fell, and turned it upside down, so that the tent lay flat.”
When Yahweh brought back those who returned to Zion, we were like those who dream.
It will be like when a hungry man dreams, and behold, he eats; but he awakes, and his hunger isn’t satisfied; or like when a thirsty man dreams, and behold, he drinks; but he awakes, and behold, he is faint, and he is still thirsty. The multitude of all the nations that fight against Mount Zion will be like that.
“I have heard what the prophets have said, who prophesy lies in my name, saying, ‘I had a dream! I had a dream!’
For Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel says: “Don’t let your prophets who are among you and your diviners deceive you. Don’t listen to your dreams which you cause to be dreamed.
In the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams; and his spirit was troubled, and his sleep went from him.
The king said to them, “I have dreamed a dream, and my spirit is troubled to know the dream.”
“It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions.