Hebrew word · H3624

כֶּ֫לַח

kalach

vigor

Firm or mature strength, full vigor, ripeness. It occurs only twice in the Hebrew Bible, so its exact shade has to be worked out from context and from the old translations. BDB gives "firm or rugged strength." Other lexicons and commentators lean toward "full vigor" or "ripe age."

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. · Updated October 23, 2026

What it means

full strength, firm or rugged strength, vigour

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 Job 5:26

Range of meaning: Firm or mature strength, full vigor, ripeness. It occurs only twice in the Hebrew Bible, so its exact shade has to be worked out from context and from the old translations. BDB gives "firm or rugged strength." Other lexicons and commentators lean toward "full vigor" or "ripe age."
Against the English: KJV/WEB "full age" and ESV/NLT "ripe old age" put the stress on old age. BSB/NIV/NASB "full vigor" put it on strength that has not faded. The Hebrew probably holds both ideas: ripe maturity, like grain that is fully grown but not yet spoiled.
Used elsewhere in the period: Job 30:2 describes worthless men "whose kelaḥ has perished": their strength or vitality is gone. That fits "vigor." The Greek Septuagint drops the word and paraphrases with "like ripe grain," and the Latin Vulgate has "in abundance" (in abundantia). The Babylonian Talmud (Moed Katan 28a) works out the numerical value of the letters of be-khelaḥ as 60 and treats it as a hint that dying at sixty or later is not a premature death.

Similar words

Where it appears

Job · 2

Job 5:26 בְכֶ֣לַח in full strength

You will come to the grave in full vigor, like a sheaf of grain gathered in season.

Here: A rare word, found only here and in Job 30:2. It means firm, mature strength: the person reaches the grave fully ripe, neither cut off young nor wasted away. Ancient and modern readers argue over whether the stress falls on vigor or on old age (see Debates).
Job 30:2 כָּֽלַח׃ vigor

What use to me was the strength of their hands, since their vigor had left them?

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