StrongerBible

gil

גִּיל

HebrewH1523“rejoice, be glad, ...”

Appears 45 times · tap a cell to see the verses

1Ch 16:31Psa 2:11Psa 9:14(15)Psa 13:4(5)Psa 13:5(6)Psa 14:7Psa 16:9Psa 21:1(2)Psa 31:7(8)Psa 32:11Psa 35:9Psa 48:11(12)Psa 51:8(10)Psa 53:6(7)Psa 89:16(17)Psa 96:11Psa 97:1Psa 97:8Psa 118:24Psa 149:2Pro 2:14Pro 23:24 (2×)Pro 23:25Pro 24:17Sng 1:4Isa 9:3(2)Isa 25:9Isa 29:19Isa 35:1Isa 35:2Isa 41:16Isa 49:13Isa 61:10Isa 65:18Isa 65:19Isa 66:10Hos 10:5Jol 2:21Jol 2:23Hab 1:15Hab 3:18Zep 3:17Zec 9:9Zec 10:7
Root family
Word studyResearch-gradegeelverb

What gil means

to rejoice, to exult: to break out in loud, festive joy, the kind that shows itself rather than staying quiet inside.

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

This is joy at full volume. English Bibles usually smooth it to "rejoice," but it points to gladness that spills over into shouting and celebration. It is one of the strongest joy words in the Hebrew Bible, and the writers save it for the biggest moments: rescue, the arrival of a king, the day God acts, the new world he promises. Tellingly, it never once appears in the books of the Law or in the long histories from Joshua through Kings. It belongs to worship, to the Psalms, and above all to the prophets. It is a word for the festival, not for quiet contentment at home.

Almost every time, the joy has a reason or an object attached, and that object is almost always God: people rejoice in the LORD, in his saving help, in his faithful love. Wider still, the whole created order can be summoned to rejoice when God takes up his reign, and in two striking lines God himself is the one rejoicing, celebrating over his rescued people like a bridegroom. Once in a while the word simply names glad human delight, a father's pride in a good son or the joy of lovers.

Because the word is so tied to right and worthy joy, it jars when the Bible aims it at the wrong target. People who take delight in doing evil, or who gloat over an enemy brought low, are borrowing the language of the festival for something it was never meant to celebrate. These are all shades of one action, not separate words: the verb names the outburst of joy itself, and that outburst can be pointed at almost anything.

Nuances

1ato rejoice in God, in his saving help, or in his faithful love.
Psa 9:14(15)Psa 13:5(6)Psa 16:9Psa 21:1(2)Psa 31:7(8)Psa 32:11Psa 35:9Psa 51:8(10)Psa 89:16(17)Isa 25:9Isa 29:19Isa 41:16
1ba call for people, nations, or the created world to rejoice over what God has done or is about to do.
1Ch 16:31Psa 2:11Psa 14:7Psa 48:11(12)Psa 53:6(7)Psa 96:11Psa 97:1Psa 97:8Psa 118:24Psa 149:2Isa 9:3(2)Isa 35:1
1cGod's own rejoicing over his people.
Isa 65:19Zep 3:17
1dto rejoice over the wrong thing: to take delight in evil, or to gloat over someone's downfall.
Psa 13:4(5)Pro 2:14Pro 24:17Hos 10:5Hab 1:15
Hos 10:5

Whether the verb in Hosea 10:5 is the ordinary "to rejoice" (describing the priests' now-ended joy over the calf idol's glory) or a separate, otherwise unattested homonym meaning "to tremble," proposed to fit the verse's surrounding mourning.

  • majorityThe verb is the ordinary "rejoice," read as the priests' joy over the idol that is over now that its glory has departed; no separate root need be posited, and no current lexicon accepts one.; HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. גיל, 1:189-190; DCH (Clines, ed.), vol. 2, s.v. גיל
  • minorityA separate homonym "to tremble," compared to an Arabic root, should be recognized here so the priests tremble alongside the people's mourning rather than rejoice.; BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), s.v. גיל, p. 162
1eordinary human gladness: a parent's joy over a worthy child, or the delight of lovers in each other.
Pro 23:24 (2×)Pro 23:25Sng 1:4

What scholars say about gil

The standard lexica agree that גיל is a single verb meaning "rejoice, exult, jubilate," and its lexical sense is not in serious doubt. The debate concerns etymology, not meaning. BDB and, behind it, Gesenius and Strong's carried an older reconstruction, given comparative-Semitic muscle by Nöldeke (ZDMG 37 [1883] 537 via Arabic jāla), that the root originally meant "to circle, whirl, dance." The modern field has largely abandoned it: HALOT demotes the kinetic Grundbedeutung to uncertain speculation and keeps גיל II ("circle of life, age," Dan 1:10) as a separate homonym; DCH, by editorial policy excluding cognates, lists only "rejoice, exult, be glad"; Gesenius18 reduces the older gloss to a footnote. James Barr's Semantics of Biblical Language (1961, ch. 6) made the whirl derivation a textbook case of the root fallacy, and DCH's, HALOT's, and Vetter's judgments are post-Barr corrections. The comparative case is thin: no clean cognate in Ugaritic, Akkadian, Syriac, Geez, or Phoenician (all of which use שׂמח/cognates for joy), the only real cognate being Aramaic gwl. On the synchronic profile, Ringgren (TDOT 2:469-475) and especially Vetter (TLOT 1:313-315) argue that גיל is more marked than שׂמח, a festal-cultic exclamation term at home in enthronement psalms, Zion songs, and salvation oracles, regularly paired with שׂמח, שׂושׂ, רנן, and רוע; Westermann treated the two as more interchangeable. BDB also preserved a disputed homonym "tremble" (via Arabic wajila) for Ps 2:11 and Hos 10:5, which HALOT and DCH reject. The Septuagint's near-mechanical choice of the strong, almost neologistic ἀγαλλιάομαι to render גיל (Bultmann, TDNT 1:19-21) shows the Greek translators heard it as more exuberant and cultic than the milder εὐφραίνω used for שׂמח.

Where scholars disagree about gil

Whether the verb originally meant "to whirl, circle, or dance," so that its joy carries an implied dance, or whether it simply means "to rejoice" with no such kinetic background.

  • majorityThe attested biblical meaning is uniformly "to rejoice, exult"; the whirl/dance derivation is nineteenth-century etymological speculation with weak comparative support and no direct evidence in the Hebrew, and it should not color how the word is read.; HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. גיל, 1:189-190; DCH (Clines, ed.), vol. 2, s.v. גיל; D. Vetter, TLOT 1:313-315; James Barr, The Semantics of Biblical Language (Oxford, 1961), ch. 6
  • minorityAn original sense "to circle, dance" may lie behind the verb and fits its festal, bodily, public character, even if the attested meaning is "rejoice."; BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), s.v. גיל, p. 162; J. Bergman and H. Ringgren, TDOT 2:469-475

Whether a separate homonym meaning "to tremble" (fear or grief) should be recognized in a few hard passages such as Psalm 2:11 and Hosea 10:5.

  • majorityThere is only one verb, "to rejoice"; the difficult passages are read as reverent or bitterly ironic joy, not a separate word.; HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. גיל, 1:189-190; DCH (Clines, ed.), vol. 2, s.v. גיל
  • minorityA homonym "to tremble," compared to an Arabic root, should be recognized to ease those passages.; BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), s.v. גיל, p. 162
In-depth research

This is a research paper, so it may be hard to read without scholarly background. It is useful if you want to dig even deeper into this word.

Sources

  • BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), s.v. גיל, p. 162lexicon
  • HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. גיל, 1:189-190lexicon
  • DCH (Clines, ed.), vol. 2, s.v. גילlexicon
  • J. Bergman and H. Ringgren, "גִּיל gîl," in Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (TDOT) 2:469-475dictionary
  • D. Vetter, "גיל gîl to rejoice," in Theological Lexicon of the Old Testament (TLOT) 1:313-315dictionary
  • James Barr, The Semantics of Biblical Language (Oxford, 1961), ch. 6monograph
  • R. Bultmann, "ἀγαλλιάομαι, ἀγαλλίασις," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (TDNT) 1:19-21dictionary

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

All attested forms of גִּיל

qal imperfect 3mp

יָגִילוּ, יְגִילוּ

Psa 13:4, Psa 149:2, Pro 2:14, Isa 9:3, Isa 29:19, Hos 10:5, Psa 89:16

qal jussive 3fs

תָּגֵל

1Ch 16:31, Psa 96:11, Psa 97:1, Pro 23:25, Isa 35:1, Isa 35:2, Isa 61:10

qal imperative 2mp

גִּילוּ

Psa 2:11, Psa 32:11, Isa 65:18, Isa 66:10, Jol 2:23

qal jussive 3ms

יָגֵל

Psa 13:5, Psa 14:7, Psa 53:6, Pro 24:17, Zec 10:7

qal cohortative 1cp

נָגִילָה

Psa 118:24, Sng 1:4, Isa 25:9

qal cohortative 1cs

אָגִילָה

Psa 9:14, Psa 31:7, Hab 3:18

qal imperative 2fs

גִּילִי

Isa 49:13, Jol 2:21, Zec 9:9

qal imperfect 3ms

יָגִיל, יָּגֶל

Pro 23:24, Zep 3:17, Psa 21:1

qal imperfect 2ms

תָּגִיל

Psa 35:9, Isa 41:16

qal imperfect 3fp

תָּגֵלְנָה

Psa 48:11, Psa 51:8

qal conjunctive-imperfect 3ms

וְיָגִיל

Hab 1:15

qal consecutive-imperfect 3fp

וַתָּגֵלְנָה

Psa 97:8

qal consecutive-imperfect 3ms

וַיָּגֶל

Psa 16:9

qal consecutive-perfect 1cs

וְגַלְתִּי

Isa 65:19

qal infinitive-absolute absolute

גִּיל

Pro 23:24