רָדָה
to rule
also: have dominion, dominate, tread down fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
See every Qal verb in the Hebrew Bible →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Stem
- Qal
- The basic, simple active stem — the plain form of the verb (“he wrote”).
- Hiphil
- The causative active stem (“he caused / brought about”).
Form
- Participle Active
- A verbal adjective expressing ongoing or characteristic action (“writing / one who writes”).
- Perfect
- A completed action or state — Hebrew marks aspect (completeness) more than strict tense (“he wrote”).
- Jussive
- A third- or second-person volitional form expressing wish or command (“let him write”).
- Sequential Perfect
- A perfect with prefixed waw continuing a preceding imperfect or command (waw-consecutive perfect).
- Sequential Imperfect
- An imperfect with prefixed waw — the standard past-narrative form (waw-consecutive imperfect).
- Imperfect
- An incomplete, ongoing, or future action (“he will / would write”).
- Imperative
- A direct command (“write!”).
- Infinitive Construct
- A bound verbal noun, frequently with prepositions (“to write / in writing”).
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).
Person
- 3rd Person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 2nd Person
- The one addressed (“you”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Common
- Either gender — not distinguished for this form.
Number
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms 17 distinct
- Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute 3 times (11%)
- Verb, Qal, Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 3 times (11%)
- Verb, Qal, Jussive, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 2 times (7%)
- Verb, Qal, Sequential Perfect, 3rd Person, Common, Plural 2 times (7%)
- Verb, Qal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural 2 times (7%)
- Verb, Qal, Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular 2 times (7%)
- Verb, Qal, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute 2 times (7%)
- Verb, Qal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 2 times (7%)
+9 more forms (9 occurrences)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (morphhb / Westminster Leningrad Codex — WLC text public domain, morphhb tagging CC BY 4.0), counted across 27 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where H7287 appears — 25 distinct verses across 12 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.
Genesis 2 verses
- Genesis 1:26 וְ/יִרְדּוּ֩ conj + Qal juss 3mp God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
- Genesis 1:28 וּ/רְד֞וּ conj + Qal impv 2mp God blessed them. God said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
Leviticus 4 verses
- Leviticus 25:43 תִרְדֶּ֥ה Qal impf 2ms You shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God.
- Leviticus 25:46 תִרְדֶּ֥ה Qal impf 2ms You may make them an inheritance for your children after you, to hold for a possession; of them may you take your slaves forever: but over your brothers the children of Israel you shall not rule, one over another, with harshness.
- Leviticus 25:53 יִרְדֶּ֥/נּֽוּ Qal impf 3ms + sfx pers 3ms As a servant hired year by year shall he be with him: he shall not rule with harshness over him in your sight.
- Leviticus 26:17 וְ/רָד֤וּ conj + Qal wpf 3cp I will set my face against you, and you will be struck before your enemies. Those who hate you will rule over you; and you will flee when no one pursues you.
Numbers 1 verse
Judges 2 verses
- Judges 5:13 יְרַ֣ד יְרַד Qal pf 3ms Qal pf 3ms Then came down a remnant of the nobles [and] the people; Yahweh came down for me against the mighty.
- Judges 14:9 וַ/יִּרְדֵּ֣/הוּ רָדָ֥ה conj + Qal wimpf 3ms + sfx pers 3ms Qal pf 3ms He took it into his hands, and went on, eating as he went; and he came to his father and mother, and gave to them, and they ate: but he didn't tell them that he had taken the honey out of the body of the lion.
1 Kings 3 verses
- 1 Kings 4:24 רֹדֶ֣ה Qal ptcp.act ms For he had dominion over all [the region] on this side the River, from Tiphsah even to Gaza, over all the kings on this side the River: and he had peace on all sides round about him.
- 1 Kings 5:16 הָ/רֹדִ֣ים ptcl def.art + Qal ptcp.act mp besides Solomon's chief officers who were over the work, three thousand and three hundred, who bore rule over the people who labored in the work.
- 1 Kings 9:23 הָ/רֹדִ֣ים ptcl def.art + Qal ptcp.act mp These were the chief officers who were over Solomon's work, five hundred fifty, who bore rule over the people who labored in the work.
2 Chronicles 1 verse
Nehemiah 1 verse
Psalms 4 verses
- Psalms 49:14 וַ/יִּרְדּ֘וּ conj + Qal wimpf 3mp They are appointed as a flock for Sheol. Death shall be their shepherd. The upright shall have dominion over them in the morning. Their beauty shall decay in Sheol, Far from their mansion.
- Psalms 68:27 רֹדֵ֗/ם Qal ptcp.act ms cs + sfx pers 3mp There is little Benjamin, their ruler, The princes of Judah, their council, The princes of Zebulun, and the princes of Naphtali.
- Psalms 72:8 וְ֭/יֵרְדְּ conj + Qal juss 3ms He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, From the River to the ends of the earth.
- Psalms 110:2 רְ֝דֵ֗ה Qal impv 2ms Yahweh will send forth the rod of your strength out of Zion. Rule in the midst of your enemies.
Isaiah 3 verses
- Isaiah 14:2 וְ/רָד֖וּ conj + Qal wpf 3cp The peoples shall take them, and bring them to their place; and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of Yahweh for servants and for handmaids: and they shall take them captive whose captives they were; and they shall rule over their oppressors.
- Isaiah 14:6 רֹדֶ֤ה Qal ptcp.act ms who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained.
- Isaiah 41:2 יַ֔רְדְּ Hiphil impf 3ms Who has raised up one from the east, whom he calls in righteousness to his foot? he gives nations before him, and makes him rule over kings; he gives them as the dust to his sword, as the driven stubble to his bow.
Jeremiah 1 verse
Lamentations 1 verse
Ezekiel 2 verses
- Ezekiel 29:15 רְד֥וֹת Qal inf.cs It shall be the base of the kingdoms; neither shall it any more lift itself up above the nations: and I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations.
- Ezekiel 34:4 רְדִיתֶ֥ם Qal pf 2mp You haven't strengthened the diseased, neither have you healed that which was sick, neither have you bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought back that which was driven away, neither have you sought that which was lost; but with force and with rigor have you ruled over them.
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.
רדה — transliterated râdâh — is a Hebrew verb carrying the sense “to rule.” Its earliest occurrence is Genesis 1:26. Spanning 25 verses in 12 books, it ranks among the uncommon words of the Hebrew Bible. The verb spans 2 stems, from Qal to Hiphil. Sharing its root, it stands alongside רדי. Each statement above links to its evidence; the full detail follows below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H7287 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 →
- 25
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 25 distinct verses.
- 12 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 12 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,226
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,226 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 25 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 25 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 11 verses · 44%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 7 verses · 28%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 7 verses · 28%
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).
BDB lists this Strong’s number as 2 distinct words (homographs). Each count above pools all of them and is not split by sense — see the Senses section below. A low-frequency rendering may belong to a different one of those words, not the primary meaning.
- King James Version†: Bare rule 2×, Have dominion 2×
- American Standard Version†: Bare rule 3×
- Berean Standard Bible†: Rule 7×, Had dominion 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: Rule 5×, And 2×, Came down 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H7287 across 27† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 23 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 H7287 across 26† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 23 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 H7287 across 26† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 17 renderings that appear 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 H7287 across 32† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 21 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
Hebrew verbs can shift meaning by stem (binyan): Qal is the basic action, Niphal is often passive or reflexive, Piel often intensifies or makes it factitive, and Hiphil is typically causative. The senses below are grouped under the stem BDB assigns to each.
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.
רדה I have dominion, rule, dominate (NH רָדָה, 𝔗Jon רְדָא, chastise
Qal
- Pf. 3 pl. consec. וְרָדוּ Is 14:2; Lv 26:17; 2 mpl. רְדִיתֶם Ez 34:4; Impf. 3 ms. sf. יִרְדֶּנּוּ Lv 25:53, וַיִּרְדֶּ֑נָּה La 1:13, juss. וְיֵרְדְּ Nu 24:19 ψ 72:8; 2 ms. תִּרְדֶּה Lv 25:43, 46, etc.; Imv. ms. רְדֵה ψ 110:2; mpl. רְדוּ Gn 1:28; (Jo 4:13 v. ירד); Inf. cstr. רְדוֹת Ez 29:15; Pt. רֹדֶה 1 K 5:4; Is 14:6; sf. רִדֵם ψ 68:28; pl. הָרֹרִים 1 K 5:30 + 2 times;—have dominion, rule, over, usually c. ב pers. vel pop. 1 K 5:4, 30; 9:23 = 2 Ch 8:10; Is 14:2; Lv 25:43, 46, 53; 26:17; Ez 29:15; Ne 9:28 ψ 49:15; ב of fish, etc., Gn 1:26, 28; בְּקֶרֶב ψ 110:2; c. acc. pers. Ez 34:4; Is 14:6 (perhaps + acc. cogn., v. [מִרְדָּה] infr.); acc. om. Nu 24:19 (מִיַּעֲקֹב), Je 5:31 (+ עַל־יְדֵיהֶם, v. יָד 5 h (2); vid. also ingenious conj. sub II. רדה; but יוֹרוּ teach), ψ 72:8; for וַיִּרְדֶּנָּה La 1:13 and it (the fire) prevailed against them (my bones), read perhaps יָרָ֑דָה into my bones it descended (Bu).—רֹדֵם ψ 68:28 is dub.; Grill Hup-Now Che Du קִדֵּם. יְרַד Ju 5:13(×2) v. יָרַד. e.g. Isaiah 14:2
Hiphil
- Impf. 3 ms. וּמְלָכִים יַרְדְּ Is 41:2 and kings he causeth (him) to dominate; but apoc. form strange, read יָרֹד (√ רדד q.v.) Ew Di Du; יַחֲרִד 𝔊 Klo Che. e.g. Isaiah 41:2
רדה II scrape out (NH id., scrape or draw off, out (bread from oven))
Qal
- Pf. 3 ms. ר׳ הַדְּבָ֑שׁ Ju 14:9b out of the carcass he scraped the honey (v. GFM); sf. וַיִּרְדֵּהוּ אֶל־בַּפָּיו v 9a he scraped it out into his palms; Buhl Lex Du also ר׳ עַל־יְדֵיהֶם Je 5:31, sc. gifts, money, fig. for making gain (most I. רדה q.v.). e.g. Judges 14:9
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
I. vb. have dominion, rule, dominate (NH רָדָה, 𝔗Jon רְדָא, chastise; Arabic رَدَى tread, trample; Syriac ܪܕܳܐ chastise, also (and so Assyrian radû) go, flow);—
II. vb. scrape out (NH id., scrape or draw off, out (bread from oven));—
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Origin: a primitive root
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.
רָדָה
- , v. רדי
רדי
- [to stamp, tread,]
- 1. (cmp. בָּעַט) to rebel, be contumacious. Yoma 40ᵇ אל … למינין לִרְדּוֹת Ms. M. (ed. לצדוקים) give the heretics no occasion to rebel (to argue in favor of their heresy); Tosef. ib. III (II), 2 לרדות אחריכם ed. Zuck. (Var. לרדותן אחריהם, corr. acc.) to rebel after you are gone; Par. III, 3; Sifra Vayikra, N’dab., ch. II, Par. 2.
- 2. to chastise. Mekh. Mishp. s. 4 הרוֹדֶה בבנו ובתלמידו he who chastises his son or his pupil (and kills him); Macc. II, 2 הרב הרודה את וכ׳ the teacher that punishes his pupil. Gen. R. s. 50, end בקש לִרְדוֹתָן and wanted to punish them; a. fr.
- 3. to subjugate, rule, govern. Gen. R. s. 8 (ref. to ורדו, Gen. I, 28) אם זכה רְדוּ ואם לאו יֵרְדוּ if man is good, (God says,) ‘rule’, if not, (God says,) ‘let them go down’; ib. (ref. to וירדו, ib. 26 את שהוא … יִרְדּוּ את שאינו … יֵרְדוּ (not ורדו) concerning such as are ‘in our image and likeness’ (I say,) ‘they shall rule’ &c. Ib. יבא … ויִרְדֶּה למי וכ׳ let ‘our image and likeness’ (the good man) rule over him who is not &c.; Yalk. ib. 14.—[Tosef. Ter. IX, 12 ed. Zuck. ירדנו, v. עִרְעֵד III.] e.g. Genesis 1:28
- 1. to drive, chase. Ex. R. s. 20 עד שאֲרַדֶּה אותן וכ׳ until I drive them into the sea.
- 2. to chastise. Ex. R. s. 1 לא רִידָּהוּ he did not chastise him. Ib. ולא רידהו ביסורין he did not punish him with sufferings. Ib. (play on ארדון, I Chr. II, 18, as a surname of Caleb) שר׳ את יצרו he chastised (or subjugated, v. supra) his evil inclination. Yalk. Prov. 959 אֲרַדֶּה אותך וכ׳ (or אֶרְדֶּה) I shall punish thee with them; a. e. e.g. 1 Chronicles 2:18
- 3. to stamp. M. Kat. 7ᵃ, v. רָדַד.
- 4. (cmp. כָּבַשׁ) to dam, make passable. Erub. 104ᵃ חצר … תבּן ומְרַדֶּה בה (Alf. מדדה, v. Rabb. D. S. a. l. note 40) if a court has been made impassable through rain, he may bring straw and make a path with it; ib. וכשהוא מרדה אינו מרדה וכ׳ and when he makes the path, he must not do so by carrying the straw in a basket &c.
רדי ²
- to take down; to detach, break off, esp. a) to take honey out of the bee-hive. Ukts. III, 10 כוורת … והרוֹדֶה ממנה וכ׳ a bee-hive … is regarded as landed estate …, and he who breaks honey out of it on the Sabbath &c.; Shebi. X, 7; B. Bath. 66ᵃ; 80ᵇ. B. Mets. 64ᵃ ההולך … לִרְדוֹת את כוורתו if a person goes to take the honey out of his bee-hive; מה שכוורתי רוֹדָה כך וכך וכ׳ whatever my bee-hive may yield shall be thine for such and such an amount; a. fr.—2) ר׳ (פת) to detach bread from where it sticks to the oven, to shovel out. Sabb. 4ᵃ הדביק … התירו לו לִרְדוֹתָהּ וכ׳ if a person stuck a loaf to the wall of an oven (on the Sabbath), would you permit him to take it out (before it is baked) &c.? Makhsh. III, 3. Yoma 38ᵃ; Tosef. ib. II, 5 אינן בקיעין לִרְדוֹתָם they were not skilled in taking them off (without breaking); a. fr.—Y. Pes. III, 30ᵃ bot. יִרְדֶּנָּה let him detach it (the piece dedicated as Ḥallah) from the loaf.
- to be detached, taken out of the oven. Tosef. Yoma l. c. והיה נאפה ונ׳ מבפנים (Var. והיא נִרְדֵּית) it was baked in, and taken out from the interior of the oven; Cant. R. to III, 6 נִרְדִּת.
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 25 distinct written forms H7287 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that stem’s occurrences in the concordance. Hebrew forms include their vowel points and cantillation, so a single lemma takes many written forms.
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H7287, 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.
Proper names from this root
People and places named from this root — a name, not an additional meaning of the word.
Compare all same-root words → 1 of the same-root words is a proper name (a person or place). They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 22 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 25 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
- Genesis 1:26
- Leviticus 25:43
- Numbers 24:19
- Judges 5:13
- 1 Kings 5:16
- 2 Chronicles 8:10
- Psalms 49:14
- Isaiah 14:2
- Jeremiah 5:31
- Lamentations 1:13
- Ezekiel 29:15
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.
