The need of a new Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament has been so long felt that no elaborate explanation of the appearance of the present work seems called for. Wilhelm Gesenius, the father of modern Hebrew Lexicography, died in 1842. His Lexicon Manual Hebraicum et Chaldaicum in V. T. Libros, representing a much riper stage of his lexicographical work than his earlier Hebrew dictionaries, was published in 1833.

A trio of eminent Old Testament scholars--Francis Brown, R. Driver, and Charles Briggs--spent over twenty years researching, writing, and preparing "The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon." Since it first appeared in the early part of the twentieth century, BDB has been considered the finest and most comprehensive Hebrew lexicon available to the English-speaking student. Based upon the classic work of Wilhelm Gesenius, the "father of modern Hebrew lexicography," BDB gives not only dictionary definitions for each word, but relates each word to its Old Testament usage and...