StrongerBible

gadad

גָּדַד

HebrewH1413“cut oneself, gash oneself, ...”

Appears 8 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Deu 14:11Ki 18:28Psa 94:21Jer 5:7Jer 16:6Jer 41:5Jer 47:5Mic 5:1(4:14)
Root family
Word studygah-DAHDverb

What gadad means

1

to slash one's own skin on purpose as a religious act: in grief for someone who has died, or to force a god to answer

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

Wherever this word means cutting, someone is opening his own skin deliberately. It never describes an accident, a wound taken in a fight, or an injury inflicted by anyone else. The cutting is always an act with a religious point to it, and the Bible reports it as something people really did, inside Israel as well as outside it.

Most often it belongs to grief. Mourning in the ancient world was worn on the body: clothes torn, dust on the head, food refused, a patch of the head shaved bare (קׇרְחָה), and the arms or cheeks or chest cut open. The word keeps turning up in that setting:

  • Israel is told not to do it for its dead, on the grounds that the people belong to God as his children.
  • Jeremiah says a day is coming when the dead will lie unburied and nobody will cut himself for them at all.
  • Eighty men walk to the ruined temple with their beards shaved, their clothes torn, and their bodies already cut.
  • Philistine Gaza, stripped bare by an invading army, is asked how long it will go on cutting itself.

One verse steps outside grief entirely. On Mount Carmel the prophets of Baal cut themselves with swords and spears, working up from shouting to bleeding, trying to force a silent god to respond. The act is the same; the aim is to get a hearing rather than to show loss.

Hebrew has neighboring words in this area. One names the cut itself (שֶׂרֶט), the mark left in the skin, and another names the act of slashing without tying it to a funeral (שָׂרַט). This is the word the storytellers and the prophets reach for when they describe people in the act.

Nuances

1ato cut the skin in mourning, the recognized way of showing grief over the dead
Deu 14:1Jer 16:6Jer 41:5Jer 47:5Mic 5:1(4:14)
Mic 5:1

Whether the verb in Micah 5:1 (Hebrew 4:14) means "gash yourself in mourning" or "muster yourselves as a troop", in a line addressed to a "daughter of troops" under siege.

  • majorityIt means to gash oneself in mourning: every other occurrence of this verb in this same form means self-laceration, and no clear instance of a mustering sense in that form exists, so the line is a sarcastic order to perform the mourning rite, punning on the city's own title.; Delbert R. Hillers, Micah (Hermeneia, 1984), 65-67; Francis I. Andersen and David Noel Freedman, Micah (Anchor Bible 24E, 2000), 469-473; Hans Walter Wolff, Micah (Continental Commentary, 1990), 137-140
  • minorityIt means to muster in troops, a call to arms that suits the surrounding oracle of deliverance and the address to a "daughter of troops".; Bruce K. Waltke, A Commentary on Micah (Eerdmans, 2007), 263-267; BDB, s.v. גדד
  • minorityThe ancient Greek translators worked from a different root, גדר "to wall up", rendering the line "now the daughter of Ephraim shall be walled in with a wall", and the Latin went its own way again with "now you shall be devastated, daughter of the robber".; Septuagint, Micah 4:14 (νῦν ἐμφραχθήσεται θυγάτηρ Εφραιμ ἐν φραγμῷ); Vulgate, Micah 5:1 (nunc vastaberis, filia latronis)
1bto slash the body to rouse a god, cutting deeper until the blood runs
1Ki 18:28
2

to mass together in a body, the way a band of armed men does: to close in on someone, or to crowd to a place

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintyContested

This second meaning has no cutting in it at all. It pictures people forming up and moving as one body, which is why English versions reach for "band together" or "troop". It sits right against the Hebrew noun for a raiding party (גְּדוּד), a fast, mobile company of armed men, and most scholars think the verb was drawn out of that noun rather than the other way around.

Only two verses clearly carry it, and both are unflattering. In Psalm 94:21 corrupt judges band together against the life of an innocent person, so that a court behaves like a hunting pack. In Jeremiah 5:7 well fed men troop to the prostitutes' houses, and the word makes their appetite look like a raiding party heading out.

Because the examples are so few, this meaning leans on the noun beside it and on how the ancient translators handled the verses. Scholars who treat the cutting sense and the massing sense as two separate words put these verses in the second one. Scholars who keep a single word explain both from one old idea, a body that cuts into something, so that a raiding band is a piece cut off from a larger force.

Psa 94:21Jer 5:7

What scholars say about gadad

The verb is attested 8 times: seven in the reflexive-intensive stem (Deut 14:1; 1 Kgs 18:28; Jer 5:7; 16:6; 41:5; 47:5; Mic 4:14 [Eng 5:1]) and once in the simple stem (Ps 94:21). The lexicographical question is whether these represent one root or two. BDB (151-152) lists a single root גדד "penetrate, cut," deriving from it both גְּדוּד "band, troop" (as making inroads) and II גְּדוּד "incision, furrow," and treating the verbal "throng, gather together" of Mic 4:14 and Jer 5:7 as denominative from the noun; Gesenius-Tregelles (1857) made the same move, comparing Latin acies, "edge" giving "battle line." The modern lexica split the root: HALOT distinguishes גדד I "to cut" (cognate Arabic جدّ, Aramaic גְּדַד, Akkadian gadādu) from גדד II "to band together," denominative from the primary noun גְּדוּד, with Akkadian gudūdu "raiding party, detachment" (CAD G; AHw I 296) as the closest cognate; Gesenius 18 separates גדד I "(ab)schneiden" from גדד II "sich rotten, sich in Scharen sammeln"; TDOT II 198-203 (G. Mayer) treats גְּדוּד as a qutūl-pattern primary substantive whose relation to גדד I is probably independent; NIDOTTE (1518-1521) and Klein follow HALOT. DCH orders the material by attested usage and declines to adjudicate the root question, in line with Barr's and Greenfield's warnings against deriving distinct lexemes from a posited root meaning. The comparative evidence (Akkadian gadādu "cut, chop" alongside gudūdu; Arabic جدّ "cut, sever" with جُدَّة "cut-off strip," Lane I/2 384-388; Aramaic and Syriac גדד and ܓܘܕܳܐ handled under one root by Jastrow, Sokoloff, Payne Smith and Brockelmann; Geʿez gädädä; Lipiński, Semitic Languages, 2nd ed. 2001, §29) points diachronically to a single Proto-Semitic √gdd "cut, sever, incise," the military noun being a metonymic "cut-off detachment," even where the synchronic split is retained. On the verses: Deut 14:1 pairs the prohibition with קׇרְחָה and grounds it in Israel's filial status; 1 Kgs 18:28 sets the laceration in an escalating ecstatic sequence with the swords and lances of the Baal prophets; Jer 16:6 and 41:5 report the rite as current Judean practice and 47:5 extends it to Philistia, which together with Jer 48:37 (גְּדֻדֹת, of Moab) and Lev 19:28; 21:5 (שֶׂרֶט / שָׂרֶטֶת) underlies Olyan's argument that mourning laceration was native Israelite practice only partly suppressed, and Lewis's placement of it within West Semitic mortuary religion; Kedar-Kopfstein's TDOT treatment groups גדד with שׂרט, קרח and קרע as the standard prohibited mourning acts. Mic 4:14 is the crux: Hillers (Micah, Hermeneia, 1984, 65-67) argues that every other occurrence of the verb in this stem means "gash oneself" and that no mustering sense is otherwise attested for it; Andersen and Freedman (Micah, AB 24E, 2000, 469-473) and Wolff (Micah, Continental Commentary, 1990, 137-140) concur, reading a bitter pun on בַּת־גְּדוּד, while Waltke (A Commentary on Micah, 2007, 263-267) defends "muster in troops" on contextual grounds; the Septuagint read a third root, גדר "wall up" (νῦν ἐμφραχθήσεται θυγάτηρ Εφραιμ ἐν φραγμῷ), and the Vulgate has nunc vastaberis, filia latronis. Jer 5:7 (וּבֵית זוֹנָה יִתְגֹּדָדוּ) is generally taken as "they troop," so BDB and HALOT, though the argument that pushes Mic 4:14 toward laceration bears on it too (McKane, Jeremiah I, ICC, 1986). Ps 94:21 יָגוֹדּוּ is the sole simple-stem form and is formally ambiguous with גּוּד "attack" (Gen 49:19; Hab 3:16), which modern commentators treat as a by-form of the same root, but it is standardly rendered "they band together against" (Kraus, Psalmen 60-150, BKAT XV/2).

Where scholars disagree about gadad

Whether the self-laceration sense and the banding-together sense belong to one Hebrew root or to two homonymous roots that merely look alike.

  • minorityOne root meaning "penetrate, cut", from which the noun גְּדוּד "raiding band" arises as a force that cuts into enemy territory (or is cut off from a larger body), with the verbal sense "to throng, band together" derived from that noun.; BDB, 151-152, s.v. גדד; Gesenius, Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon, trans. S. P. Tregelles (1857), s.v. גדוד
  • majorityTwo roots: גדד I "to cut" (with cognates in Arabic, Aramaic and Akkadian), and a separate גדד II "to band together" derived from the primary noun גְּדוּד, itself cognate with Akkadian gudūdu "raiding party".; HALOT, s.v. גדד I and גדד II; Gesenius, Hebräisches und Aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 18th ed., s.v. גדד; G. Mayer, "גדד / גְּדוּד", TDOT vol. II (Eerdmans, 1975), 198-203; NIDOTTE, nos. 1518-1521 (ed. VanGemeren, 1997)
  • contestedThe root question should not be adjudicated at all: senses are listed by attested usage, since deriving distinct words from a posited root meaning outruns the philological evidence.; DCH, vol. II, s.v. גדד; Jonas C. Greenfield, "Etymological Semantics", Zeitschrift für Althebraistik 6 (1993), 26-37

Sources

  • HALOT, s.v. גדד I and גדד IIlexicon
  • BDB, 151-152, s.v. גדדlexicon
  • DCH, vol. II, s.v. גדדlexicon
  • Gesenius, Hebräisches und Aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 18th ed., s.v. גדדlexicon
  • G. Mayer, "גדד / גְּדוּד", TDOT vol. II (Eerdmans, 1975), 198-203theological dictionary
  • B. Kedar-Kopfstein, "גדד", TDOTtheological dictionary
  • NIDOTTE, nos. 1518-1521 (ed. VanGemeren, 1997)theological dictionary
  • Ernest Klein, A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language (Carta/Macmillan, 1987), s.v. גדדlexicon
  • Delbert R. Hillers, Micah (Hermeneia, 1984), 65-67commentary
  • Francis I. Andersen and David Noel Freedman, Micah (Anchor Bible 24E, 2000), 469-473commentary
  • Hans Walter Wolff, Micah (Continental Commentary, 1990), 137-140commentary
  • Bruce K. Waltke, A Commentary on Micah (Eerdmans, 2007), 263-267commentary
  • William McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah, vol. I (ICC, 1986)commentary
  • Hans-Joachim Kraus, Psalmen 60-150 (BKAT XV/2, 5th ed. 1978)commentary
  • Saul M. Olyan, Biblical Mourning: Ritual and Social Dimensions (Oxford, 2004)monograph
  • Theodore J. Lewis, Cults of the Dead in Ancient Israel and Ugarit (HSM 39, 1989)monograph
  • Edward Lipiński, Semitic Languages: Outline of a Comparative Grammar (OLA 80, 2nd ed. 2001), §29monograph
  • Jonas C. Greenfield, "Etymological Semantics", Zeitschrift für Althebraistik 6 (1993), 26-37journal article
  • James Barr, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament (Oxford, 1968)monograph
  • Edward W. Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon, I/2, 384-388, s.v. جدّlexicon
  • The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (CAD), G, s.v. gadādu and gudūdulexicon
  • Septuagint, Micah 4:14 (νῦν ἐμφραχθήσεται θυγάτηρ Εφραιμ ἐν φραγμῷ)ancient version

AI-generated word study · claude-opus-4-8

All attested forms of גָּדַד

hithpael imperfect 2fs

תִּתְגֹּדְדִי, תִּתְגּוֹדָדִי

Mic 5:1, Jer 47:5

hithpael consecutive-imperfect 3mp

וַיִּתְגֹּדְדוּ

1Ki 18:28

hithpael imperfect 2mp

תִתְגֹּדְדוּ

Deu 14:1

hithpael imperfect 3mp

יִתְגֹּדָדוּ

Jer 5:7

hithpael imperfect 3ms

יִתְגֹּדַד

Jer 16:6

hithpael participle m p absolute

מִתְגֹּדְדִים

Jer 41:5

qal imperfect 3mp

יָגוֹדּוּ

Psa 94:21