Basic HTML Version
(
"
, 3789), “to write, inscribe, describe, take dictation, engrave.” This verb
appears in most Semitic languages (not in Akkadian or Ugaritic). Biblical Hebrew attests
around 203 occurrences (in all periods) and biblical Aramaic 7 occurrences.
Basically, this verb represents writing down a message. The judgment (ban) of God
against the Amalekites was to be recorded in the book (scroll): “And the Lord said unto
Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I
will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven” (Exod. 17:14—the
first biblical occurrence of the word).
One may “write” upon a stone or “write” a message upon it. Moses told Israel that
after crossing the Jordan “thou shalt set thee up great stones, and plaster them with
plaster: and thou shalt write upon them all the words of this law …” (Deut. 27:2-3).
This use of the word implies something more than keeping a record of something so
that it will be remembered. This is obvious in the first passage because the memory of
Amalek is “to be recorded” and also blotted out. In such passages “to be recorded,”
therefore, refers to the unchangeableness and binding nature of the Word of God. God
has said it, it is fixed, and it will occur. An extended implication in the case of divine
commands is that man must obey what God “has recorded” (Deut. 27:2-3). Thus, such
uses of the word describe a fixed body of authoritative instruction, or a canon. These 2
passages also show that the word does not tell us anything specific about how the
message was composed. In the first instance Moses seems not to have merely “recorded”
as a secretary but “to have written” creatively what he heard and saw. Certainly in Exod.
32:32 the word is used of creative writing by the author; God was not receiving dictation
from anyone when He “inscribed” the Ten Commandments. In Deut. 27:2-3 the writers
must reproduce exactly what was previously given (as mere secretaries).
Sometimes
appears to mean “to inscribe” and “to cover with inscription.” The
2 tablets of the testimony which were given to Moses by God were “tables of stone,
written [fully inscribed] with the finger of God” (Exod. 31:18). The verb means not only
to write in a book but “to write a book,” not just to record something in a few lines on a
scroll but to complete the writing. Moses prays: “Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin—
;and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written” (Exod. 32:32).
Here “book” probably refers to a scroll rather than a book in the present-day sense.
Among the special uses of
is the meaning “to record a survey.” At Shiloh,
Joshua told Israel to choose three men from each tribe “and they shall arise, and go
through the land, and describe it …” (Josh. 18:4).
A second extended nuance of
is “to receive dictation”: “And Baruch wrote
from the mouth of Jeremiah …” (Jer. 36:4). The word can also be used of signing one’s
signature: “And because of all this we make [are cutting] a sure covenant, and write it;
and our princes, Levites, and priests, seal unto it” (Neh. 9:38). Thus they “cut,” or
completed, the agreement by having the representatives sign it. The cutting was the
signing.
B. Nouns.
(
"
, 3791), “something written; register; scripture.” This noun occurs 17
times in the Old Testament.