StrongerBible

ḥil

חִיל

HebrewH2427“pain, sorrow, ...”

Appears 7 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Exo 15:14Job 6:10Psa 48:6(7)Jer 6:24Jer 22:23Jer 50:43Mic 4:9
Word studyKHEELnoun

What ḥil means

writhing pain: the doubling-over agony of childbirth, used above all for the terror that grips people when God's judgment closes in

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintyStrong

This is the noun for pain that bends a body double. Its home picture is childbirth: pain that arrives in waves, cannot be reasoned with, and leaves the person feeling it no choice but to cry out. The verb behind it (חוּל) describes the twisting itself, and it stretches as far as whirling and dancing; this noun only ever names the pain.

Jeremiah sets it inside a full scene of panic twice over, and the pattern is worth seeing whole:

  • a report arrives that an enemy army is coming
  • the hands of everyone who hears it go slack
  • distress takes hold of them (צָרָה)
  • and then this anguish grips them, like a woman in labor

The closing comparison, anguish like a woman in labor, comes back in Psalm 48:6, Jeremiah 22:23, and Micah 4:9. What the comparison is about is not weakness but helplessness. Nations that were sure of themselves are reduced to someone who cannot stop what is happening to her: the peoples who hear what God did at the sea (Exodus 15:14), the kings who take one look at Zion and run (Psalm 48:6), the king of Babylon when the news reaches him (Jeremiah 50:43). Micah 4:9 then turns the image around and finds hope in it, since labor pain is pain with something waiting on the other side of it.

Job uses a slightly longer form of the same word for his own suffering (Job 6:10): pain that shows no mercy and will not ease off. There no army is coming and nothing is being born. It is simply what he has to live inside.

Nuances

1athe panic that seizes people when disaster from God draws near, gripping the body the way labor pains do
Exo 15:14Psa 48:6(7)Jer 6:24Jer 22:23Jer 50:43Mic 4:9
1bpain in the body that gives no relief
TranslatabilityDirect
Job 6:10

What scholars say about ḥil

BDB and HALOT treat חִיל, with the byform חִילָה in Job 6:10, as a verbal noun of חול/חיל I, glossing it "writhing, anguish" and "labour pains"; DCH lists the same range. Five of its seven occurrences stand in the stereotyped simile כַּיּוֹלֵדָה, "like a woman giving birth" (Psalm 48:6; Jeremiah 6:24; 22:23; 50:43; Micah 4:9), and Jeremiah 6:24 and 50:43 embed it in the fixed panic formula (report heard, hands slackened, צָרָה seizing, then חִיל like a woman in labour), on which see Holladay, Jeremiah 1 (Hermeneia), at 6:24. TDOT's article on חול/חיל places the noun within the root's parturition field and discusses the prophetic use of birth imagery for the terror of the day of judgment. Job 6:10 is the one crux: the colon וַאֲסַלְּדָה בְחִילָה לֹא יַחְמוֹל is difficult, chiefly over the sense of סלד and over whether "unsparing" qualifies the pain or God; Clines (Job 1-20, WBC 17) reviews the options while retaining "pain" for חִילָה. The neighbouring nouns are חַלְחָלָה (H2479) and חֵבֶל (H2256).

Sources

  • HALOT, s.v. חִיל, חִילָהlexicon
  • BDB, s.v. חִילlexicon
  • DCH, s.v. חילlexicon
  • Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (TDOT), s.v. חול/חילdictionary
  • William L. Holladay, Jeremiah 1 (Hermeneia), at Jeremiah 6:24commentary
  • David J. A. Clines, Job 1-20 (Word Biblical Commentary 17), at Job 6:10commentary

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

All attested forms of חִיל

m s absolute

חִיל

Exo 15:14, Psa 48:6, Jer 6:24, Jer 22:23, Jer 50:43, Mic 4:9

f s absolute

חִילָה

Job 6:10