1 Samuel 8:17

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

He will take the tenth of your flocks: and you shall be his servants.

World English Bible · Public Domain

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יַעְשֹׂ֑ר

ʻâsar

H6237

“to tithe”

Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular

Appears 9× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Genesis 28:22

Full BDB Definition

Origin: a primitive root (ident. with H6238 )

TWOT: 1711c

to tithe, take the tenth part of, give a tithe, take a tithe - (Qal) to tithe - (Piel) to give a tithe - (Hiphil) to take a tithe

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

6: words
5: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is יַעְשֹׂ֑ר to tithe H6237 — appearing just 9 times in the whole Hebrew Bible.

Shared distinctive vocabulary

יַעְשֹׂ֑ר to tithe H6237 occurs in 7 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

2 verbs
2 nouns
1 pronoun
1 preposition

Verb forms

יַעְשֹׂ֑ר Qal · Imperfect
תִּֽהְיוּ Qal · Imperfect

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 14 words from the Hebrew and 12 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 6 Hebrew tokens and 10 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew 1 Samuel 8:17 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

צֹאנְכֶ֖ם יַעְשֹׂ֑ר וְאַתֶּ֖ם תִּֽהְיוּ ל֥וֹ לַעֲבָדִֽים

He will take the tenth of your flocks: and you shall be his servants.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX 1 Samuel 8:17 Septuagint · lemma form

καί ὁ ποίμνιον σύ ἀποδεκατόω καί σύ εἰμί αὐτός δοῦλος

And he will tithe your flocks; and you⌃ shall be his servants.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

עַנְכוֹן יִסַב חָד מִן עַסְרָא וְאַתּוּן תְּהוֹן לֵיהּ לְעַבְדִין:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on 1 Samuel 8:17 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

1Sa 8:17 He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants.

Ver. 17. And ye shall be his servants.] His slaves to do his drudgery, more like peasants of France than yeomen of Kent, as he said.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tyndale Open Study Notes

Tyndale Open Resources

8:17 you will be his slaves: By demanding a king, the people whose ancestors had once been slaves in Egypt were risking a new enslavement (cp. 1 Kgs 12:1-20).

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(17) And ye shall be his servants.—This statement generally includes all that has gone before. In other words, “Ye elders and chiefs of the people must make up your minds, in the event of electing a king, to the loss of all political and social freedom.” How bitterly the nation, even in the successful and glorious reign of King Solomon, felt the pressure of the royal yoke, so truly foretold by their last judge, is shown in the history of the times which followed the death of Solomon, when the public discontent at the brilliant but despotic rule of the great king led to the revolution which split up the people into two nations. (See 1Ki_12:4.) “This whole passage bears internal evidence of having been written before the establishment of the monarchy.”—Speaker’s Commentary.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

17. and ye shall be his servants] To sum up all briefly, ye will be slaves to the king ye have chosen.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

He will take the tenth of your sheep,.... As well as of their seed and vineyards; and not the tithe of their flocks only, but of their herds also, which are here included, as Kimchi observes:

and ye shall be his servants: made slaves of by him, even as the Canaanitish servants were, according to Abarbinel; though others interpret it more mildly of their being obliged to pay tribute and taxes, for the support of his government.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

CHAPTER VIII.

Servants, or slaves. The Hebrews enjoyed greater liberty than any of the nations in the East, yet they are styled slaves, chap. xvii. 8. They were nearly on the same footing as the ancient Germans. "Each governed in his own place of abode. The Lord requires of them a quantity of corn, cattle, or clothing, and so far the slave obeys;" servus hactenus paret. (Tacitus, Germ.) The Hebrews were also bound to follow the king to battle. The Egyptians, Persians, &c., were under greater oppression. Herodotus (iii. 31,) informs us, that when Cambyses designed to marry his own sister, his counsellors replied, that they found no express law to this effect; but there was another, "that the king of Persia may do whatever he please." The highest officers, and even his brothers, were styled, "slaves, Greek: Douloi, of the great king." (Aristotle, Mund.)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Matthew Poole's English Annotations

i.e. He shall use you like slaves, and deprive you of that liberty which you now enjoy.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Pulpit Commentary

His servants. Literally, "his slaves." Under an absolute monarchy no one is flee.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Wesley's Explanatory Notes

His servants - That is, he will use you like slaves, and deprive you of that liberty which now you enjoy.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

1 Samuel, in the Historical, opens this verse with 6 words (5 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is ʻâsar (“to tithe”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “to tithe” (ʻâsar) shape what this verse is saying?
Genesis 28:22 shares the word «to tithe» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «יַעְשֹׂ֑ר» is Qal Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Trapp's Complete Commentary and Tyndale Open Study Notes read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 6 Hebrew ↔ 10 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 10 words in this verse.
5 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 6 words in this verse.