Batei

Batei is a Hebrew word meaning houses, and it functions as the plural form of beit (house) in Hebrew. In both biblical and modern Hebrew, batei appears in compound expressions to designate buildings or institutions associated with a particular function. The pattern is common for naming places by describing their purpose, such as batei midrash (houses of study) and batei din (courts of Jewish law). In such expressions, batei serves as a plural construct before the following noun, indicating the type of house or the activity housed there.

Beyond religious or scholarly contexts, batei occurs in various naming traditions and, to some extent, in modern toponyms and architectural terminology. It signals that a site is associated with a specific function or community, even when the physical building is not merely a residence.

Etymology and grammar: batei derives from the root B-Y-T, meaning house. The form batei is used in phrases where multiple houses or a set of buildings share a common function, typically translated into English as “houses of X.” In transliteration, the word is commonly rendered as batei, though historical or foreign spellings may appear.

See also: Beit (Hebrew for house), Beit Din, Beit Midrash, and other compound formations using beit to name institutions or buildings.

Notes: The distinction between biblical and modern uses is mainly contextual, but the underlying idea remains the same—batim or batei refer to places designated by their purpose, especially within religious, educational, or communal settings.