to cut, divide, or cut off: to sever something by a decisive stroke, and so to separate or remove it
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintyStrong
The core picture is a clean, decisive cut. A sword divides a living child (1 Kings 3:25), an axe fells timber (2 Kings 6:4), and God splits the Red Sea into two walls of water (Psalm 136:13). The action is always sharp and final, not a gradual coming-apart.
From that literal cutting the word reaches naturally into loss and death. When the passive form is used, a person or thing is "cut off": removed from the place, the community, or the life it belonged to. This runs across the darkest verses in the range:
A leprous king is cut off from the temple, barred for life (2 Chronicles 26:21).
The Servant is cut off from the land of the living, a violent death (Isaiah 53:8).
Exiles cry that they are cut off, their hope gone and themselves as good as dead (Ezekiel 37:11).
The dead lie in the grave, cut off from God's care (Psalm 88:5).
So a single verb spans an ordinary chop of wood and the sense of being severed from life itself. English "cut off" carries the metaphor unusually well, which is why most translations reach for it; what is easy to miss is how absolute the severing is. To be cut off is not merely to be set apart but to be finished.
Nuances
1ato cut or split in two: to divide one thing into parts by a stroke
TranslatabilityDirect
1Ki 3:251Ki 3:26Psa 136:13
1bto cut down or cut off: to sever and remove, as felling timber or tearing off flesh
2Ki 6:4Isa 9:20(19)*Hab 3:17
1cto be cut off: to be excluded, severed from life or community, and so doomed or destroyed
2Ch 26:21Psa 88:5(6)Isa 53:8Lam 3:54Ezk 37:11
2
to decree, decide: to settle a matter firmly by an authoritative word
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintyStrong
A decision, once made, is as fixed as something cut clean through, so the same verb comes to mean settling a matter by a binding word. In Job 22:28 a righteous person will "decree a thing, and it will be established," the word taking effect the moment it is spoken. In Esther 2:1 the king recalls Vashti and what had been decreed against her, a ruling that could not simply be undone.
This meaning keeps the flavor of the cutting image: a decree is a determination cut firm, not a mere suggestion. The two occurrences are few, but the sense is well attested for the wider family, including the related noun for a "decree" and the matching word in Aramaic. A near-parallel is חָתַךְ, which likewise moves from "cut" to "determine" (as in the seventy weeks "decreed" in Daniel).
the dividing is a sharp cut into distinct parts, not a sorting or apportioning1Ki 3:25Psa 136:13
Both
both split one thing into two1Ki 3:26
Only divide
English "divide" can suggest splitting up shares or fractions, which this word does not carry
“decree”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
How gazar differs from similar Hebrew words
כָּרַתthe ordinary, far more common verb for cutting off, and the standard verb for cutting a covenant; this word is rarer and leans toward cutting or dividing in two, and in its passive toward being cut off from life
Names the ceremonial dividing of sacrificial animals in half, laying the two halves opposite each other so a covenant can be formally cut between the parties.Gen 15:10
חָלַקto divide in order to share out or apportion something among people; this word divides by severing or cutting through, not by allotment
Names being cut off as removal: severed from life, from God's care, or from the community, with no thought of sharing anything out.Isa 53:8Psa 88:5Ezk 37:11
Extends to deciding or decreeing a matter, settling it as firmly as a clean cut.Job 22:28Est 2:1
Both
Both split a single whole into parts, which is why English Bibles render each one "divide."1Ki 3:25Num 26:53
Divides land or property to hand it over as a lasting inheritance, assigning each owner a portion to keep.Num 26:53Jos 13:7
Shares out spoil, food, or goods among a group so that each person receives a portion.Exo 15:91Sa 30:242Sa 6:19
חָתַךְanother verb that runs from cutting to determining or decreeing (the seventy weeks are decreed in Daniel), a close parallel to this word's own decree sense
Names the literal act of cutting or dividing a physical thing in two, from splitting a living child to felling timber to parting the sea.1Ki 3:252Ki 6:4Psa 136:13
Carries the sense of being cut off, that is severed from life, land, or community and left to perish or be shut out.Isa 53:8Lam 3:542Ch 26:21
Both
Both draw on the picture of cutting to express a settled, irreversible decision that is fixed and cannot be undone.Job 22:28Dan 9:24
Severs one thing into parts or cuts it clean off, so the stroke separates and removes: splitting a living child in two, parting the sea into halves, or cutting a man off from the land of the living.1Ki 3:25Psa 136:13Isa 53:8
Turns figurative for being torn away from life or community, and so left doomed, forgotten, or destroyed.Psa 88:5Ezk 37:11Lam 3:54
Both
Both reach a sense of issuing an authoritative ruling, settling a matter by a word that then stands binding.Job 22:28Est 2:1Isa 10:1Pro 8:15
Cuts marks into a hard surface so they last: engraving a name on the palms, scratching a city onto a clay tile, or writing words to endure in a book.Isa 49:16Ezk 4:1Job 19:23
Its participle names the person who lays down law, the ruler or commander who holds the staff of office.Gen 49:10Num 21:18Jdg 5:14
Describes an actual physical cut: a sword ordered to split a living child in two, timber felled beside the Jordan, the sea divided into parts.1Ki 3:252Ki 6:4Psa 136:13
Carries the sense of being "cut off": severed from the land of the living, from God's care, from the worshipping community, from the flock in the fold.Isa 53:8Psa 88:52Ch 26:21Hab 3:17
Voices the despair of people who feel themselves finished and beyond reach, saying they are cut off and their hope is gone.Lam 3:54Ezk 37:11
Both
Both can mean to settle a matter by a binding decision, so that a person's word stands: what was decided against Vashti, and the king who pronounces his own sentence.Est 2:1Job 22:281Ki 20:40
Both reach that sense of deciding through the picture of cutting, where settling a case means separating it cleanly from every other possible outcome.1Ki 3:26Job 14:5
Is the standard word for what God has already fixed in advance and will not revise: a set span of days, a full end settled upon the land, desolations already appointed.Job 14:5Isa 10:23Isa 28:22Dan 9:26Dan 11:36
Pairs the settled verdict with a measured quantity, so that even a remnant that survives is part of what was decided beforehand.Isa 10:22Dan 9:27
Pictures a sharp, decisive movement rather than a division: no dog sharpens its tongue against Israel, and David is told to move quickly at the sound in the treetops.Exo 11:7Jos 10:212Sa 5:24
Splitting one whole into two parts rather than lopping a piece off, as when Solomon orders the living child divided or the sea is parted into sections.1Ki 3:251Ki 3:26Psa 136:13
A figurative sense of decreeing or fixing a matter, as if the decision were settled by a decisive cut.Est 2:1Job 22:28
Being severed from life, from God's care, or from one's people, an abstract removal that never touches a blade.Psa 88:5Isa 53:8Lam 3:54Ezk 37:11
Both
Both name a literal, forceful cutting through a physical object with a tool, whether beams hewn from timber or a spear snapped in two.2Ki 6:4Psa 46:9
Chopping a body part clean off as mutilation or punishment, such as severing hands, feet, thumbs, or toes.Deu 25:12Jdg 1:6Jdg 1:72Sa 4:12
Stripping fixtures off a larger structure or hacking vessels apart, cutting the gold from temple doors, the panels from the stands, or the sacred vessels into pieces.2Ki 16:172Ki 18:162Ki 24:132Ch 28:24
Trimming off the edges or corners of a thing, used of clipping the corners of the hair as a marked practice.Jer 9:26Jer 25:23Jer 49:32
gazar in the other biblical languages
ἐκκόπτωGreek“to prevent”the Greek verb for cutting off or cutting down (an axe to the tree), the closest counterpart to the physical severing sense
Means to cut clean in two, dividing one thing into parts, as in Solomon's order to divide the living child or the sea split into portions.1Ki 3:251Ki 3:26Psa 136:13
Extends from cutting to deciding: to settle or decree a matter, cutting a question short so the outcome is fixed and stands.Job 22:28Est 2:1
Both
Both name the plain physical act of felling a tree or cutting down wood.2Ki 6:4Mat 3:10
Both stretch "cut off" into a figure for a person or group being severed from life or from the community they belonged to.Isa 53:8Rom 11:22
Turns the cutting inward as a call to self-denial: cut off your own hand or foot that leads you into sin and throw it away.Mat 5:30Mat 18:8
Reaches into the abstract, cutting off an opportunity or pretext so that someone is denied any chance to act, close to "to prevent".2Co 11:12
Carries a horticultural picture: branches cut out of an olive tree so that others can be grafted in, an image of who is severed from or joined to God's people.Rom 11:24
ὁρίζωGreek“to determine”the Greek verb for determining, appointing, or decreeing, the closest counterpart to the decree sense
It carries the literal, physical act of cutting or dividing something into pieces.1Ki 3:25Psa 136:132Ki 6:4
From that cutting it pictures being "cut off": severed from life, from a community, or from God's care, a vivid image of ruin.Isa 53:8Ezk 37:112Ch 26:21
Both
Both reach the sense of a decision fixed by supreme authority in advance, a settled decree that then stands: English Bibles render each as "decree" or "determine."Job 22:28Est 2:1Act 2:23Luk 22:22
Its root picture is marking out a boundary in space, so it fixes the set limits and appointed seasons within which things happen.Act 17:26
It designates a person to an office or identity, formally appointing or declaring who someone is.Act 10:42Rom 1:4Act 17:31
It can name an ordinary human resolve to act, not only a decree handed down from above.Act 11:29
What scholars say about gazar
Standard lexica (BDB, HALOT, DCH) treat the occurrences under a single root meaning "to cut, divide," with the sense "to decide, decree" (Job 22:28;Esther 2:1) as a semantic development from cutting a firm determination, paralleled by the noun gezerah "decree" and the cognate Aramaic gezar. The niphal is regularly glossed "to be cut off, separated," shading into "to be excluded" (2 Chronicles 26:21) and "to perish" (Isaiah 53:8;Ezekiel 37:11;Psalm 88:6 in the Hebrew numbering; Lamentations 3:54).Isaiah 9:19 (English 9:20) is read by most as "to snatch, tear off" flesh to devour, an extension of the cutting sense. The overall sense is well established across the lexica.