אוֹ
o (H0176A)
or
AI Word Study
# The Hebrew Word אוֹ (O): Biblical Disjunction The Hebrew word אוֹ (transliterated as "o") functions as a disjunctive conjunction meaning "or" in English. With 321 occurrences throughout the Hebrew Bible, it represents one of the language's fundamental logical operators, enabling speakers and writers to present alternatives, uncertainties, or multiple possibilities within a single utterance or thought. The prevalence of this word—appearing in over three hundred biblical passages—demonstrates its structural importance in Hebrew discourse. As a basic conjunctive particle, אוֹ serves essential grammatical and rhetorical purposes: it can introduce alternative choices ("do this or do that"), express uncertainty about which of several options applies ("it may be this or that"), or present mutually exclusive scenarios. This flexibility makes it a critical building block in biblical Hebrew syntax, allowing authors to construct complex conditional statements, legal stipulations, and narrative descriptions that require the expression of alternatives. The word's significance lies not in theological content but in its fundamental role as a linguistic tool. By enabling the expression of alternatives and conditional relationships, אוֹ allowed biblical authors to articulate laws with multiple applications, describe uncertain situations, and explore hypothetical scenarios. Its widespread use underscores how basic logical operations—the ability to express "or"—are as essential to ancient Hebrew communication as they are to modern language.
AI synthesis uses only provided lexicon data -- never training knowledge.
Now if you will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me. If not, tell me, that I may turn to the right hand, or to the left.”
Then Laban and Bethuel answered, “The thing proceeds from Yahweh. We can’t speak to you bad or good.
Her brother and her mother said, “Let the young lady stay with us a few days, at least ten. After that she will go.”
Laban answered Jacob, “The daughters are my daughters, the children are my children, the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine! What can I do today to these my daughters, or to their children whom they have borne?
Behold, the money, which we found in our sacks’ mouths, we brought again to you out of the land of Canaan. How then should we steal silver or gold out of your lord’s house?
My lord asked his servants, saying, ‘Have you a father, or a brother?’
Yahweh said to him, “Who made man’s mouth? Or who makes one mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Isn’t it I, Yahweh?
They said, “The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Please let us go three days’ journey into the wilderness, and sacrifice to Yahweh, our God, lest he fall on us with pestilence, or with the sword.”
No hand shall touch him, but he shall surely be stoned or shot through; whether it is animal or man, he shall not live.’ When the trumpet sounds long, they shall come up to the mountain.”
If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself.
then his master shall bring him to God, and shall bring him to the door or to the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever.
“If men quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone, or with his fist, and he doesn’t die, but is confined to bed;
“If a man strikes his servant or his maid with a rod, and he dies under his hand, the man shall surely be punished.
Notwithstanding, if his servant gets up after a day or two, he shall not be punished, for the servant is his property.
“If a man strikes his servant’s eye, or his maid’s eye, and destroys it, he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake.
If he strikes out his male servant’s tooth, or his female servant’s tooth, he shall let the servant go free for his tooth’s sake.
“If a bull gores a man or a woman to death, the bull shall surely be stoned, and its meat shall not be eaten; but the owner of the bull shall not be held responsible.
But if the bull had a habit of goring in the past, and this has been testified to its owner, and he has not kept it in, but it has killed a man or a woman, the bull shall be stoned, and its owner shall also be put to death.
Whether it has gored a son or has gored a daughter, according to this judgment it shall be done to him.
If the bull gores a male servant or a female servant, thirty shekels of silver shall be given to their master, and the ox shall be stoned.
“If a man opens a pit, or if a man digs a pit and doesn’t cover it, and a bull or a donkey falls into it,
Or if it is known that the bull was in the habit of goring in the past, and its owner has not kept it in, he shall surely pay bull for bull, and the dead animal shall be his own.
“If a man steals an ox or a sheep, and kills it or sells it, he shall pay five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a sheep.
“If a man causes a field or vineyard to be eaten by letting his animal loose, and it grazes in another man’s field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field, and from the best of his own vineyard.
“If fire breaks out, and catches in thorns so that the shocks of grain, or the standing grain, or the field are consumed; he who kindled the fire shall surely make restitution.
“If a man delivers to his neighbor money or stuff to keep, and it is stolen out of the man’s house, if the thief is found, he shall pay double.
“If a man delivers to his neighbor a donkey, an ox, a sheep, or any animal to keep, and it dies or is injured, or driven away, no man seeing it;
“If a man borrows anything of his neighbor’s, and it is injured, or dies, its owner not being with it, he shall surely make restitution.
“If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely bring it back to him again.
They shall be on Aaron and on his sons, when they go in to the Tent of Meeting, or when they come near to the altar to minister in the holy place, that they don’t bear iniquity, and die. This shall be a statute forever to him and to his offspring after him.
When they go into the Tent of Meeting, they shall wash with water, that they not die; or when they come near to the altar to minister, to burn an offering made by fire to Yahweh.
“ ‘If his offering is from the flock, from the sheep or from the goats, for a burnt offering, he shall offer a male without defect.
“ ‘If his offering to Yahweh is a burnt offering of birds, then he shall offer his offering from turtledoves or of young pigeons.
“ ‘If his offering for a sacrifice of peace offerings to Yahweh is from the flock, either male or female, he shall offer it without defect.
if his sin in which he has sinned is made known to him, he shall bring as his offering a goat, a male without defect.
if his sin which he has sinned is made known to him, then he shall bring for his offering a goat, a female without defect, for his sin which he has sinned.
“ ‘If anyone sins, in that he hears a public adjuration to testify, he being a witness, whether he has seen or known, if he doesn’t report it, then he shall bear his iniquity.
“ ‘Or if anyone touches any unclean thing, whether it is the carcass of an unclean animal, or the carcass of unclean livestock, or the carcass of unclean creeping things, and it is hidden from him, and he is unclean, then he shall be guilty.
“ ‘Or if he touches the uncleanness of man, whatever his uncleanness is with which he is unclean, and it is hidden from him; when he knows of it, then he shall be guilty.
“ ‘Or if anyone swears rashly with his lips to do evil or to do good—whatever it is that a man might utter rashly with an oath, and it is hidden from him—when he knows of it, then he will be guilty of one of these.
and he shall bring his trespass offering to Yahweh for his sin which he has sinned: a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat, for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for him concerning his sin.
“ ‘If he can’t afford a lamb, then he shall bring his trespass offering for that in which he has sinned, two turtledoves, or two young pigeons, to Yahweh; one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering.
“ ‘But if he can’t afford two turtledoves or two young pigeons, then he shall bring as his offering for that in which he has sinned, one tenth of an ephah of fine flour for a sin offering. He shall put no oil on it, and he shall not put any frankincense on it, for it is a sin offering.
“If anyone sins, and commits a trespass against Yahweh, and deals falsely with his neighbor in a matter of deposit, or of bargain, or of robbery, or has oppressed his neighbor,
or has found that which was lost, and lied about it, and swearing to a lie—in any of these things that a man sins in his actions—
then it shall be, if he has sinned, and is guilty, he shall restore that which he took by robbery, or the thing which he has gotten by oppression, or the deposit which was committed to him, or the lost thing which he found,
or any thing about which he has sworn falsely: he shall restore it in full, and shall add a fifth part more to it. He shall return it to him to whom it belongs in the day of his being found guilty.
“ ‘But if the sacrifice of his offering is a vow, or a free will offering, it shall be eaten on the day that he offers his sacrifice. On the next day what remains of it shall be eaten,
When anyone touches any unclean thing, the uncleanness of man, or an unclean animal, or any unclean abomination, and eats some of the meat of the sacrifice of peace offerings which belong to Yahweh, that soul shall be cut off from his people.’ ”
Anything they fall on when they are dead shall be unclean; whether it is any vessel of wood, or clothing, or skin, or sack, whatever vessel it is, with which any work is done, it must be put into water, and it shall be unclean until the evening. Then it will be clean.
Showing 1--50 of 218 occurrences