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שָׁקָה

to water

‘to water’ is one of 3 main senses fuller range ↓

H8248 Strong's Hebrew
shâqâh Transliteration
/shaw-kaw'/ Pronunciation
Usage in the Hebrew Bible 62 appearances

Compare with another word →

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.

The Hebrew verb שקה centers on the idea of “to water.” Its earliest occurrence is Genesis 2:6. It turns up in 60 verses across 21 books, a moderately common footprint. The word gravitates to Genesis (30%), then Psalms and Jeremiah. The verb spans 3 stems, from Hiphil to Qal. Dig into 60-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.

Gloss history

Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship

Strong's · 1890
cause to drink
Modern gloss
to water
Strong's 1890 sometimes compressed multiple senses — or homonymous roots — under one number, and used 19th-century English phrasing that no longer carries the same connotation. The modern gloss reflects current BDB scholarship; open the Lexicon Entry tab for the full sense breakdown. Download share card

About this word

Strong's H8248 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 →

60
distinct verses
The word appears in 60 distinct verses.
21 / 39
OT books
The word appears in 21 of 39 Old Testament books.
Genesis 2:6
first appearance
The earliest occurrence is in Genesis 2:6.
Habakkuk 2:15
last appearance
The latest occurrence is in Habakkuk 2:15.
#623
by frequency
Top 1000 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 623 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).

View all 60 occurrences in the concordance →


Most concentrated in

By section of the Old Testament

  • Pentateuch 27 · 45%
  • Historical 6 · 10%
  • Wisdom 12 · 20%
  • Prophets 15 · 25%

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 60 distinct verses.

  • Torah (Pentateuch) 27 verses · 45%
  • Prophets (Nevi'im) 18 verses · 30%
  • Writings (Ketuvim) 15 verses · 25%

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: Drink 25×, Butler 7×, Watered 5×
  • American Standard Version: Drink 24×, Butler 7×, Water 4×
  • Berean Standard Bible: Drink 15×, Water 6×, Watered 5×
  • unfoldingWord Literal Text: Drink 16×, Water 6×, Watered 5×

King James Version Public Domain

Renders H8248 across 82 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Drink” 25×
  • “Butler” 7×
  • “Watered” 5×
  • “Water” 4×
  • “Cupbearers” 2×
  • “Gave him drink” 2×
  • “I will give” 2×
  • “Oh that one would give me drink” 2×
  • “They made” 2×

Plus 31 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 H8248 across 82 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Drink” 24×
  • “Butler” 7×
  • “Water” 4×
  • “Watered” 3×
  • “Cupbearers” 2×
  • “Gave him drink” 2×
  • “I will give” 2×
  • “They made” 2×

Plus 36 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 H8248 across 62 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Drink” 15×
  • “Water” 6×
  • “Watered” 5×
  • “Drunk” 3×
  • “Gave him a drink” 2×
  • “I will water” 2×
  • “Would get me a drink” 2×

Plus 27 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 H8248 across 87 tagged occurrences — most commonly:

  • “Drink” 16×
  • “Water” 6×
  • “Watered” 5×
  • “Caused” 3×
  • “Drink water” 3×
  • “Give me” 2×
  • “He shall make” 2×
  • “I will” 2×
  • “Making them drink” 2×
  • “They got” 2×
  • “Will give me” 2×

Plus 42 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 5 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.

Hiphil

  • cause to drink water, give to drink (NH Hiph. id.; Arabic سَقَى i. give to drink; Sab. סקי be irrigated Fell ZMG liv (1900), 246, מסקי drinks Hom Chr 124, מסתקין id. DHM Hofmus., No. 1, 1.7; Ethiopic ሰቀየ: water, irrigate; Assyrian šaḳû i. = Heb. Hiph., Aramaic שְׁקָא, ܫܩܳܐ Aph.);—for

Qal

  • v. I. שָׁתָה;—Pf. 3 ms. consec. וְהִשְׁקָה Gn 2:6 +, sf. וְהִשְׁקָהּ Nu 5:27; 2 ms. consec. וְהִשְׁקִיתָ Nu 20:8 +; 1 s. consec. וְהִשְׁקֵיתִי Ez 32:6, etc.; Impf. 3 ms. יַשְׁקֶה Nu 5:26, וַיַּשְׁקְ Gn 29:10 +, etc.; Imv. ms. sf. הַשְׁקֵ֫הוּ Pr 25:21; fs. sf. הַשְׁקִ֫ינִי Gn 24:43 +; Inf. cstr. הַשְׁקוֹת Gn 2:10 +, sf. הַשְׁקֹתוֹ 24:19; Pt. מַשְׁקֶה ψ 104:13, cstr. Hb 2:15 (v. also i., ii. מַשְׁקֶה);— e.g. Genesis 2:6
  • 1. irrigate, ground: subj. man Dt 11:10, mist Gn 2:6, river v 10 (both J), spring Jo 4:18; subj. י׳ Is 27:3 (כֶּרֶם), Ez 17:7 (גֶּפֶן), both in fig., fig. also 32:6 water land מִדָּם; lit. c. מִן of source ψ 104:13 (הָרִים) and (subj. man) Ec 2:6 (יַעַר). e.g. Deuteronomy 11:10
  • 2. water, give drink to, usually human subj., acc. of beast, Gn 24:14, 46(×2); 29:2 (מִן of source), v 3, 7, 8, 10 Ex 2:16, 17, 19 (all J), ψ 104:11 (subj. springs); acc. pers. Gn 21:19 (E), 24:18, 19, 45 (J), Hb 2:15 (fig.), Is 43:20 (י׳ subj.), ψ 78:15 (id.), 2 Ch 28:15, c. ב of vessel Est 1:7; c. acc. pers. et animal. Nu 20:8 (P); give one something to drink, acc. pers. + rei (water, wine, etc.), Am 2:12; Gn 19:32, 33, 34, 35; 24:43; Nu 5:24, 26; Ju 4:19 1 S 30:11; 2 S 23:15 = 1 Ch 11:15; Jb 22:7, cf. Ct 8:2 (מִיַּיִן); fig. Je 8:14; 9:14; 16:7; 23:15; 25:15 ψ 69:22, cf. וְנַחַל עֲדָנֶיךָ תַשְׁקֵם 36:9, and וַתַּשְׁקֵ֫מוֹ בִּדְמָעוֹת 80:6; acc. rei om., lit. Ju 4:19; Ex 32:20 (E), fig. Je 25:17.—Vid. also i. מַשְׁקֶה infra. e.g. Genesis 24:14

Pual

  • Impf. 3 ms. וּמֹחַ עַצְמוֹתָיו יְשֻׁקֶּה Jb 21:24 the marrow of his bones is watered, (refreshed, invigorated).—נשׁקה Am 8:8 v. שׁקע. e.g. Job 21:24

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

Origin: a primitive root

Part of speech: Verb TWOT: 2452


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.

שָׁקָה

  • , v. שקי

שקי

  • [(cmp. שקע) to settle.]
    • cmp. שָׁתָה) to give drink; to water. M. Kat. I, 1 מַשְׁקִין בית וכ׳ you may water a field that depends on irrigation during the festive week &c. Keth. 111ᵇ ממַשְׁקֵהוּ חלב, v. שֵׁן. Cant. R. to I, 12; Num. R. s. 113 ומשה מַשְׁקֶה and Moses gave drink (to those who were being circumcised). Eduy. V, 6 אין משקין וכ׳ we do not give the testing waters to a proselyte (v. סוֹטָה). Ib. דוגמא הִשְׁקוּהָ, v. דּוּגְמָא; Ber. 19ᵃ; a. fr.

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 53 distinct written forms H8248 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.

Form Parsing Example Uses
וַ/יַּ֖שְׁקְ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Exodus 2:17 3
לְ/הַשְׁק֖וֹת Verb, Hiphil, Infinitive Construct Exodus 2:16 3
אַשְׁקֶ֑ה Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Genesis 24:14 2
וְ/הִשְׁקִיתָ֥ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Jeremiah 35:2 2
וְ/הִשְׁקָ֖ה Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Genesis 2:6 2
יַשְׁקֵ֣/נִי Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular 1 Chronicles 11:17 2
לְ/הַשְׁק֣וֹת Verb, Hiphil, Infinitive Construct Ecclesiastes 2:6 2
אַשְׁקְ/ךָ֙ Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Song of Solomon 8:2 1
אַשְׁקֶ֑/נָּה Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Isaiah 27:3 1
הִ֝שְׁקִיתָ֗/נוּ Verb, Hiphil, Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Psalms 60:3 1
הִשְׁקָֽתָה Verb, Hiphil, Perfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular Genesis 24:46 1
הַשְׁק֥וּ Verb, Hiphil, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Plural Genesis 29:7 1
הַשְׁקִ֥י/נִי Verb, Hiphil, Imperative, 2nd Person, Feminine, Singular Genesis 24:45 1
הַשְׁקִֽי/נִי Verb, Hiphil, Imperative, 2nd Person, Feminine, Singular Genesis 24:43 1
הַשְׁקִי/נִי Verb, Hiphil, Imperative, 2nd Person, Feminine, Singular Judges 4:19 1
הַשְׁקֵ֥/הוּ Verb, Hiphil, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Proverbs 25:21 1
ו/נשקה Verb, Niphal, Sequential Perfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular Amos 8:8 1
וְ/הִשְׁק֖וּ Verb, Hiphil, Perfect, 3rd Person, Common, Plural Genesis 29:3 1
וְ/הִשְׁקִ֖ינוּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Plural Genesis 29:8 1
וְ/הִשְׁקִ֥יתָ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Deuteronomy 11:10 1
וְ/הִשְׁקִיתִ֖י/ם Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Jeremiah 9:15 1
וְ/הִשְׁקִיתָ֤ה Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Jeremiah 25:15 1
וְ/הִשְׁקִתִ֖י/ם Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Jeremiah 23:15 1
וְ/הִשְׁקֵיתִ֨י Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Ezekiel 32:6 1
וְ/הִשְׁקָ֣/הּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Numbers 5:27 1
וְ/הִשְׁקָה֙ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Perfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Numbers 5:24 1
וְ/הַשְׁקוֹת֙ Verb, Hiphil, Infinitive Construct Esther 1:7 1
וַ/יַּ֕שְׁקְ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Genesis 29:10 1
וַ/יַּשְׁק֜וּ/ם Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural 2 Chronicles 28:15 1
וַ/יַּשְׁקֵ֣/נוּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Jeremiah 8:14 1
וַ/יַּשְׁקֻ֖/הוּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural 1 Samuel 30:11 1
וַ/תַּ֖שְׁקְ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular Genesis 21:19 1
וַ/תַּשְׁק֥וּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Plural Amos 2:12 1
וַ/תַּשְׁקֵ֖/הוּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular Judges 4:19 1
וַ/תַּשְׁקֵֽ/הוּ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Singular Genesis 24:18 1
וַ/תַּשְׁקֶ֜יןָ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Plural Genesis 19:35 1
וַ/תַּשְׁקֶ֧יןָ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Feminine, Plural Genesis 19:33 1
וַ֝/יַּ֗שְׁקְ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Psalms 78:15 1
וַ֝/תַּשְׁקֵ֗/מוֹ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Psalms 80:5 1
וָֽ/אַשְׁקֶה֙ Verb, Hiphil, Sequential Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Singular Jeremiah 25:17 1
יְשֻׁקֶּֽה Verb, Pual, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Job 21:24 1
יַ֭שְׁקוּ Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural Psalms 104:11 1
יַשְׁק֖וּ Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural Genesis 29:2 1
יַשְׁק֤וּ Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural Jeremiah 16:7 1
יַשְׁק֥וּ/נִי Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Plural Psalms 69:21 1
יַשְׁקֶ֥ה Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular Numbers 5:26 1
לְ/הַשְׁקֹת֑/וֹ Verb, Hiphil, Infinitive Construct Genesis 24:19 1
מַשְׁקֵ֣ה Verb, Hiphil, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Construct Habakkuk 2:15 1
מַשְׁקֶ֣ה Verb, Hiphil, Participle Active, Masculine, Singular, Absolute Psalms 104:13 1
נַשְׁקֶ֧ה Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 1st Person, Common, Plural Genesis 19:32 1
נַשְׁקֶ֨/נּוּ Verb, Hiphil, Cohortative, 1st Person, Common, Plural Genesis 19:34 1
תַשְׁקֵֽ/ם Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Psalms 36:8 1
תַּשְׁקֶ֑ה Verb, Hiphil, Imperfect, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular Job 22:7 1

Same root — word family

Other BDB entries built from the same root as H8248, 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 → Showing 4 of 5 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.


Septuagint verse parallels

This word appears in 57 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 60 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.

Reading settings

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Shown beneath each verse's original-language words.

Old Testament
Old Testament edition

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