Hebrew word · H3304

יְפֵה־פִיָּה

yefeh-

pretty

An adjective built by repeating part of the root יפה (y-p-h, 'beautiful, fair'). Hebrew sometimes repeats a root to make the word stronger, so this means 'very beautiful, exceedingly pretty'. This exact form appears only here.

Appears 2 times in 1 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

1) pretty (reduplication with the force of the diminutive)

1a) fair of mouth (lit.)

2) (CLBL) very beautiful

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Jeremiah 46:20

Range of meaning

An adjective built by repeating part of the root יפה (y-p-h, 'beautiful, fair'). Hebrew sometimes repeats a root to make the word stronger, so this means 'very beautiful, exceedingly pretty'. This exact form appears only here. Psalm 45:2 has a related doubled verb form, yāpyāpîtā, 'you are the most handsome'.

Against the English

BSB has 'beautiful'. KJV and WEB have 'very fair' and 'very beautiful', which keep the doubling. NASB has 'pretty'. NLT adds 'sleek'.

Used elsewhere in the period

Lexicons (BDB, HALOT) treat it as a reduplicated adjective, a word with part of its root repeated, meaning 'very beautiful'. The Septuagint renders it κεκαλλωπισμένη, 'made beautiful, adorned'. The Vulgate expands it to 'elegans atque formosa', 'elegant and shapely'.

Where it appears

Jeremiah · 2

  1. Jeremiah 46:20 יְפֵֽה־ פִיָּ֖ה beautifully, beautiful

    Egypt is a beautiful heifer, but a gadfly from the north is coming against her.

    Here: The first part of a word built by repeating the root for 'beautiful' (yāpeh). The repetition makes it stronger: 'very pretty', 'pretty-pretty'.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.