לַ֫עַג
mocking
also: derision, stammering fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
See every Absolute-state word in the Hebrew Bible →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Common
- A common noun — a general class of person, place, or thing (“king,” “city,” “water”), not a specific name.
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
- Construct
- A noun bound to a following noun in a possessive / “of” relationship (the construct chain).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 6 times (86%)
- Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Construct 1 time (14%)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 7 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H3933 appears — 7 distinct verses across 4 books. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Hebrew form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Hebrew Bible; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences are not indexed here.
Job 1 verse
Psalms 3 verses
- Psalms 44:13 לַ֥עַג n c ms You make us a reproach to our neighbors, A scoffing and a derision to those who are around us.
- Psalms 79:4 לַ֥עַג n c ms We have become a reproach to our neighbors, A scoffing and derision to those who are around us.
- Psalms 123:4 הַ/לַּ֥עַג ptcl def.art + n c ms Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scoffing of those who are at ease, With the contempt of the proud.
Ezekiel 2 verses
- Ezekiel 23:32 וּ/לְ/לַ֖עַג conj + prep + n c ms Thus says the Lord Yahweh: You shall drink of your sister's cup, which is deep and large; you shall ridiculed and had in derision; it contains much.
- Ezekiel 36:4 וּ/לְ/לַ֔עַג conj + prep + n c ms therefore, you mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Yahweh: Thus says the Lord Yahweh to the mountains and to the hills, to the watercourses and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes and to the cities that are forsaken, which are become a prey and derision to the residue of the nations that are round about;
Hosea 1 verse
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
“mocking” is the headline sense of the Hebrew noun לעג (laʻag). Scripture first uses it in Job 34:7. With 7 verses in 4 books, it is an uncommon word in the Hebrew Bible. It concentrates in Psalms, which alone accounts for 43% of its uses. Not a single-sense word: its full sense range also takes in “derision” and “stammering”. The sections below give every sense, occurrence, and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H3933 catalogs a Hebrew word from the Hebrew Old Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Hebrew Old Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 7
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 7 distinct verses.
- 4 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 4 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #2,835
- by frequency
- Top 5000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 2,835 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 7 occurrences in the concordance →
By section of the Old Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Each share is this word’s portion of its verses in that division of the Hebrew canon. Each figure is a share of the word’s 7 distinct verses.
- Writings (Ketuvim) 4 verses · 57%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 3 verses · 43%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
- King James Version: Scorn 2×, Scorning 2×
- American Standard Version: Scoffing 4×
- Berean Standard Bible: Derision 2×, Mockery 2×, Scorn 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Scorn 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H3933 across 7 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H3933 across 7 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H3933 across 7 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 1 rendering that appears only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H3933 across 7 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 4 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in the full BDB
What do BDB’s symbols mean?
BDB uses these scholarly abbreviations:
| Symbol | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 𝔊 | the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation, LXX) |
| 𝔙 | the Vulgate (the Latin translation) |
| 𝔖 | the Syriac version (the Peshitta) |
| 𝔗 | the Targum (the Aramaic translation) |
| ψ | the Psalms |
| √ | root (the underlying root or stem) |
| ‖ | parallel passage (a synonymous or contrasted parallel) |
| † | the dagger: every passage where the word occurs is cited |
The 3 senses and sub-senses the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency), with BDB’s own verbatim wording and sub-sense lettering. Shown in Hebrew script with BDB’s own scholarly abbreviations. The condensed entry is in the Lexicon Entry tab. See also the Forms in the corpus table below.
- 1.
- a. mocking, derision, ψ 123:4 (‖ בוז); so appar. c. sf. as gen. obj. Ho 7:16 (but very dub., probably corrupt, cf. We Now); nearly = blasphemy Jb 34:7. e.g. Psalms 123:4
- b. = obj. of derision ψ 44:14 = 79:4 (‖ חֶרְפָּה, קֶלֶס); so also Ez 23:32 (‖ צחק; si vera l., v. supr.), 36:4. e.g. Psalms 44:14
- 2. stammerings (of barbarous language), ל׳ שָׂפָה Is 28:11 (‖ לָשׁוֹן אַחֶרֶת; so Ew Brd Di Hup-Now ψ 35:16, De al. sub לָעֵג); but GrMonatsschr. 1884, 45 reads עלגי, √ עלג. e.g. Isaiah 28:11
Senses from the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon (Brown, Driver, Briggs; Oxford 1906 — public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). Full attribution on Sources.
Word origin
n.[m.] mocking, derision, (barbarous) stammering;—abs. ל׳ Jb 34:7 + 2 times + ψ 123:4 (הַלּ׳ MT cstr. c. art.—so KöSynt.§ 303 e—but prob. insert לְ foll. Hup Now Bae, cf. also Ges§ 127 g), + Ez 23:32 (but del. 𝔊B Hi Co Berthol), + 36:4 (where Co reads בלע, but less prob., cf. Berthol); sf. לַעְגָּם Ho 7:16 (v. infr.); pl. cstr. לַעֲגֵי Is 28:11 (v. infr.);—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from לעג (lâʻag) (H3932) — to mock.
Jastrow Dictionary
A second Hebrew/Aramaic lexicon for comparison, covering Aramaic and post-biblical (Talmudic, Targumic, Midrashic) usage that the biblical-Hebrew BDB does not. Matched by lemma rather than by Strong’s number, so a lemma may carry more than one Jastrow headword (shown separately below), and the entries cover usage well beyond the Bible.
לָעַג
- cmp. preced. wds) to jest, mock. Pesik. R. s. 34 לשוא לָעַגְנוּ על וכ׳ in vain did we deride their words.
- same. Y. Peah I, 15ᵈ top (ref. to Prov. XXX, 17) עין שהִלְעִיגָה על וכ׳ the eye that mocked at the law commanding to honor father and mother and despised the law (Deut. XXII, 6) &c. Erub. 21ᵇ (ref. to להג, Koh. XII, 12) כל המַלְעִיג על וכ׳ whosoever derides the words of the wise, v. לַעַג. Gen. R. s. 94 מַלְעִיגִים בשפתותיהן spoke lasciviously. Esth. R. to III, 9 מַלְעִיגִין אותנו וכ׳ they deride us and our religion. Num. R. s. 16 הִלְעִיגוּ לי they spoke irreverently of me. Y. Naz. I, beg. 51ᵃ [read:] מהו זה מַלְעִיג עליהן או וכ׳ how is this? Does he mean it sarcastically, or does he mean to say, I will be a Nazir like them? Yalk. Ex. 250 ורוה"ק מַלְעֶגֶת עליו and the Spirit of Holiness laughs at him; a. e. e.g. Proverbs 30:17
לְעַג
- , Af. אַלְעֵיג, Pa. לַעֵיג ch. same. Targ. Jer. VIII, 18. Targ. Is. XXVIII, 11.
לַעַג
- preced.) sport, mockery. Erub. 21ᵇ (ref. to Koh. XII, 12, v. לָעַג) מי כתיב ל׳ וכ׳ does the text read laʿag (mockery)? does it not read lahag (thought)?; v. הָגָה. e.g. Ecclesiastes 12:12
לַעַג ²
- Targ. Jer. XX, 8 (ed. Lag. לְעֵיב); v. לְעֵב
A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (Marcus Jastrow; London, Luzac, 1903) — Public Domain. Digitized via Sefaria. Digitized via Sefaria. Full attribution on Sources.
Forms in the corpus
The 6 distinct written forms H3933 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that state’s occurrences in the concordance. Hebrew forms include their vowel points and cantillation, so a single lemma takes many written forms.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| לַ֥עַג | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Psalms 44:13 | 2 |
| הַ/לַּ֥עַג | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Psalms 123:4 | 1 |
| וּ/לְ/לַ֔עַג | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Ezekiel 36:4 | 1 |
| וּ/לְ/לַ֖עַג | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Ezekiel 23:32 | 1 |
| לַעְגָּ֖/ם | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Construct | Hosea 7:16 | 1 |
| לַּ֥עַג | Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Job 34:7 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H3933, grouped by Strong’s listed origin. These share a root / origin per the lexicon — not necessarily a shared meaning. Each links to that word’s own entry.
Derives from
Shares the same root
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 7 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 7 Hebrew verses it occurs in. You can read those verses in Greek by switching the Old Testament edition to the Septuagint.
Read these verses in the Septuagint
This is a verse-level parallel only — the same verses exist in both the Hebrew and Greek Old Testaments. No word-level Hebrew↔Greek correspondence is claimed: the data carries no such alignment, so no Greek word is shown as this Hebrew word’s translation. Coverage is not total — the Septuagint omits the deuterocanon and renumbers the Psalms, so some Hebrew verses have no direct Greek parallel.
