StrongerBible

kol

כֹּל

AramaicH3606all, any, ...

Appears 82 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Ezr 4:20Ezr 5:7Ezr 6:11Ezr 6:12Ezr 6:17Ezr 7:13Ezr 7:16 (2×)Ezr 7:21 (2×)Ezr 7:23Ezr 7:24Ezr 7:25 (2×)Ezr 7:26Dan 2:10 (2×)Dan 2:12Dan 2:30Dan 2:35 (2×)Dan 2:38 (2×)Dan 2:39Dan 2:40 (2×)Dan 2:44Dan 3:2Dan 3:3Dan 3:5Dan 3:7Dan 3:10Dan 3:15Dan 4:6(3)Dan 4:12(9)Dan 4:21(18)Dan 4:28(25)Dan 6:7(8)Dan 7:19
Word studykohlnoun

What kol means

the totality of something: the whole of it, or each and every one of its members

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

This is the Aramaic word for totality, and it does exactly the same work in Daniel and Ezra that its close Hebrew twin does across the rest of the Old Testament. At its core it is a noun meaning "the whole, the entirety." From that one idea flow all of its everyday uses: whole, all, every, each, any, everything. Which English word fits best depends on what the word is attached to, not on any change in the word itself.

Applied to a single thing, it gathers that thing into a whole ("the whole earth," "complete peace"). Applied to a group you could count, it means "all of them" ("all the wise men of Babylon," "all peoples, nations, and languages"). Applied to one unnamed item, it fans out to "every" or "each" ("every kind of music"). Standing on its own it means "everything" ("all this came upon the king"). And inside a command, a threat, or a negative, it shifts toward "any," so that "any fault could not be found" comes out as "no fault at all was found."

That negative pattern is the one real trap. When a "not" is in the sentence, the word usually drives toward "none" rather than the loose English "any," and reading it the casual English way can weaken or reverse the point. Everywhere else a plain English word carries it cleanly, which is why translations of Daniel and Ezra rarely leave a reader misled here.

Nuances

1athe whole of one thing gathered as a single undivided totality: the whole of it, all of it
TranslatabilityDirect
Ezr 4:20Ezr 5:7Ezr 7:16 (2×)Dan 2:35 (2×)Dan 2:39Dan 2:48Dan 4:1Dan 4:11Dan 4:20Dan 6:1Dan 6:3Dan 7:23
1bevery one, each in turn: taken one by one across each member of a kind
TranslatabilityDirect
Dan 3:5Dan 3:7Dan 3:10Dan 3:15
1call the members of a countable group taken together: the entire set of them
TranslatabilityDirect
Ezr 6:17Ezr 7:21 (2×)Ezr 7:24Ezr 7:25 (2×)Dan 2:12Dan 2:38 (2×)Dan 3:2Dan 3:3Dan 4:35Dan 5:19Dan 7:14Dan 7:19
1deverything, standing on its own without naming what it totals: the sum of it all
TranslatabilityDirect
Dan 2:40 (2×)Dan 4:9Dan 4:12(9)Dan 4:18Dan 4:21(18)Dan 4:28(25)Dan 5:22Dan 7:16
1ein commands, conditions, and negatives, a single member taken at random: "any," and with a negative, "none, not a single one"
TranslatabilityPartial
Ezr 6:11Ezr 6:12Ezr 7:13Ezr 7:21 (2×)Ezr 7:23Ezr 7:26Dan 2:10 (2×)Dan 3:29Dan 6:4Dan 6:7(8)Dan 6:12Dan 6:23

What scholars say about kol

The lexica of Biblical Aramaic (HALOT's Aramaic volume, the BDB Aramaic section, and Vogt's Lexicon of Biblical Aramaic) treat כֹּל as a primitive substantive meaning "totality, entirety," the exact counterpart of Hebrew כֹּל and reflecting the same Proto-Semitic geminate noun *kull- (Akkadian kullatu, Ugaritic /kullu/, Arabic kull); the gemination resurfaces in the determined form כֹּלָּא and the suffixed כֻּלְּהוֹן / כֻּלְּהֵין attested in Daniel. The quantifying senses (all, every, each, any) are analyzed by the Aramaic grammars (Rosenthal, Bauer-Leander) as construals conditioned by the definiteness and number of the governed noun, precisely as in Hebrew. The negated construction, where כֹּל under the scope of לָא yields "none," is a shared Northwest Semitic idiom documented for the epigraphic material in Hoftijzer and Jongeling's dictionary. No live debate touches the word's core sense; the philosophical reading of the articular הַכֹּל argued for Qohelet has no counterpart in the Aramaic corpus, which uses the word only in ordinary administrative and narrative registers.

Sources

  • HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), Aramaic volume, s.v. כֹּלlexicon
  • BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), Biblical Aramaic section, s.v. כֹּל, 1002lexicon
  • Ernst Vogt, A Lexicon of Biblical Aramaic (rev. and trans. J. A. Fitzmyer, 2011), s.v. כלlexicon
  • Franz Rosenthal, A Grammar of Biblical Aramaic, 7th ed. (2006), §§35, 46grammar
  • Hans Bauer and Pontus Leander, Grammatik des Biblisch-Aramäischen (1927)grammar
  • Helmer Ringgren, "כֹּל kōl," TDOT VIItheological dictionary
  • Jacob Hoftijzer and Karel Jongeling, Dictionary of the North-West Semitic Inscriptions, s.v. kllexicon

All attested forms of כֹּל

c s construct

כָּל, כֹּל

Ezr 6:11, Ezr 6:12, Ezr 6:17, Ezr 7:24, Ezr 7:25, Dan 2:10, Dan 2:10, Dan 2:30

c s absolute

כָּל

Ezr 7:13, Ezr 7:21, Ezr 7:23, Ezr 7:25, Ezr 7:26, Dan 2:38, Dan 2:40, Dan 6:7

c s determined

כֹּלָּא

Ezr 5:7, Dan 2:40, Dan 4:12, Dan 4:21, Dan 4:28

c s construct

כָּלְּהֵין

Dan 7:19

c s construct

כָלְּהוֹן

Dan 2:38