רָצַח
to murder
also: slay, kill fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
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”).
- Piel
- An intensive or resultative active stem.
- Niphal
- Usually the simple passive or reflexive of the Qal (“he was written”).
Form
- Participle Active
- A verbal adjective expressing ongoing or characteristic action (“writing / one who writes”).
- Imperfect
- An incomplete, ongoing, or future action (“he will / would write”).
- Infinitive Absolute
- An unbound verbal noun, often intensifying or standing in for a finite verb.
- Sequential Perfect
- A perfect with prefixed waw continuing a preceding imperfect or command (waw-consecutive perfect).
- Perfect
- A completed action or state — Hebrew marks aspect (completeness) more than strict tense (“he wrote”).
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
Person
- 3rd Person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 2nd Person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 1st Person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
- Common
- Either gender — not distinguished for this form.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Every verse where H7523 appears in the Book of Psalms — 2 distinct verses. 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.
Psalms
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.
“to murder” is the headline sense of the Hebrew verb רצח (râtsach). Its English rendering has broadened — “slayer” classically, “manslayer” (Berean Standard Bible) and “one who kills” (unfoldingWord Literal Text) in modern versions; see the renderings breakdown. The Hebrew Bible uses it across 40 verses — moderately common. More than a third of its appearances fall in Numbers. Different stems carry different senses — BDB groups them under 4 stems, among them Qal and Niphal. See the sense tree, 40-verse concordance, and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H7523 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 →
- 40
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 40 distinct verses.
- 13 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 13 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #783
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 783 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 40 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Numbers 14 verses 35%
- Joshua 8 verses 20%
- Deuteronomy 6 verses 15%
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 40 distinct verses.
- Torah (Pentateuch) 21 verses · 53%
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 15 verses · 38%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 4 verses · 10%
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: Slayer 13×, Murderer 9×, He is a murderer 4×
- American Standard Version: Manslayer 14×, Murderer 7×, He is a murderer 4×
- Berean Standard Bible: Manslayer 14×, Murderer 7×, Murder 4×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: One who kills 9×, One having killed 7×, One who murders 5×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H7523 across 46 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 13 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 1 further occurrence.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H7523 across 46 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 16 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 H7523 across 45 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 14 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 2 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H7523 across 50 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.
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. This entry also uses Pual (the passive of Piel).
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 4 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.
Qal
- Pf. 3 ms. consec. זְר׳ Nu 35:27, וּרְצָחוֹ Dt 22:26; 2 ms. (הֲ)רָצַחְתָּ 1 K 21:19; Impf. 3 ms. יִרְצַח Nu 35:30; Dt 4:42; 2 ms. (-צַח) תִּרְצָ֑ח Ex 20:13 = Dt 5:17; inf. abs. רָצֹחַ Ho 4:2; Je 7:9; Pt. act. רֹצֵחַ Dt 19:3 +, רוֹ׳ 4:42 +;—murder, slay, with premeditation, Ex 20:13 (E) = Dt 5:17; Ho 4:2; Je 7:9; 1 K 21:19 (all abs.); c. acc. pers. Dt 22:26, unawares Dt 4:42; slay as avenger Nu 35:27, 30 (P; ‖ הֵמִית v 19, 21); especially pt. as subst. = slayer, manslayer, without intent, Dt 4:42; 19:3, 4, 6; also in P: Nu 35:6, 11, 12, 25, 26, 27, 28; Jos 20:3, 5, 6; 21:13, 21, 27, 32, 26 (van d. H., Baer, v 33 Gi; all P); murderer, with intent, Nu 35:16(×2), 17(×2), 18(×2), 19, 21(×2), 30, 31; also Jb 24:14. e.g. Numbers 35:27
Niphal
- Impf. 1 s. אֵרָצֵחַ Pr 22:13 I shall be slain; Pt. fs. as adj. אִשָּׁה הַנִּרְצָחָה Ju 20:4 the murdered woman. e.g. Proverbs 22:13
Piel
- (intens.) murder, assassinate: 3 mpl. יְרַצְּחוּ Ho 6:9 (abs.), יְרַצֵּ֑חוּ ψ 94:6 (acc. pers., ‖ הָרַג); ψ 62:4 v. infr.; Pt. מְרַצֵּחַ, as subst. 2 K 6:32 murderer, assassin; pl. מְרַצְּחִים Is 1:21 assassins. e.g. Hosea 6:9
Pual
- Impf., 2 mpl. תְּרָצְּחוּ ψ 62:4, so Baer Gi, van d. H. תְּרָצְהוּ, but Ben Napht. Pi. תְּרַצְּחוּ (Baer 143), so Vrss Hup-Now De Che Bae al. ye murder (or batter, shatter). e.g. Psalms 62:4
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
vb. murder, slay (NH (rare, also in deriv.) = BH; cf. Arabic رَضَحَ, رَضَخَ break, bruise, crush);—
— 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.
רָצַח
- [to perforate, cmp. הרג; חָלָל,] to slay, murder. Midr. Till. to Ps. III (ref. to ארבעתים, II Sam. XII, 6) אתה רָצַחְתָּ אחד שש עשרה נִרְצָחִים יהיו לך thou hast murdered one: there shall be sixteen of thine murdered; Yalk. Sam. 148. Macc. 12ᵃ מי כתיב אם ר׳ it reads not (Num. XXXV, 27), ‘if he slew’ (but, ‘he shall slay’); ib. מי כתיב יִרְצַח it reads not, ‘he shall slay’ (but, if he slays he is not punished); a. e.—Part. רוֹצֵחַ manslayer, murderer. Shebi. X, 8; Macc. II, 8 ר׳ שגלה … ר׳ אני when an involuntary manslayer comes to his place of refuge, and the citizens desire to honor him, he must say, I am a manslayer. Snh. 73ᵃ (ref. to Deut. XXII, 26) מקיש ר׳ … אף ר׳ ניתן להצילו בנפשו the text draws an analogy between the case of one pursued by a murderer and that of the betrothed woman threatened with assault: as it is permitted to save the woman at the cost of the assailant’s life, so it is permitted to save the pursued at the cost of the would-be murderer’s life; Pes. 25ᵇ; a. fr.—[Tosef. Sot. XV, 7, read: רוֹצְעָן.]—Pl. רוֹצְחִים, רוֹצְחִין. Macc. 10ᵃ, v. זָרַח. Ib. 9ᵇ בגלעד שכיחי ר׳ in Gilead cases of manslaughter are frequent; a. fr. e.g. 2 Samuel 12:6
- to be slain, murdered. Midr. Till. to Ps. III; v. supra; a. e.
- to commit suicide(?). Pesik. R. s. 24 (ref. to לא תרצח Ex. XX, 13) לא תִתְרַצֵּחַ thou shalt not murder thyself; [prob. to be read: לא תִצָּרֵחַ לא תעשה הדם צוֹרֵחַ עליך thou shalt not be cried about, make no blood cry out against thee]. e.g. Exodus 20:13
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 29 distinct written forms H7523 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 H7523, 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.
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 40 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 40 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
- Exodus 20:13
- Numbers 35:6
- Deuteronomy 4:42
- Joshua 20:3
- Judges 20:4
- 1 Kings 21:19
- 2 Kings 6:32
- Job 24:14
- Psalms 62:3
- Proverbs 22:13
- Isaiah 1:21
- Jeremiah 7:9
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.
