nasakh

At its core this word is about pouring, and its most common use is a specific act of worship: tipping out wine or another liquid before a god as a gift. Israel did this for the LORD at the altar, but the prophets use the same word again and again for the drink offerings people poured out to other gods, which is why it so often carries the smell of disloyalty.

The same physical picture, liquid running out of a vessel, stretches in two further directions. Metalworkers poured molten metal into a mold, so the word also means to cast or found an image, the shining idol a craftsman makes. And once, in a striking image, God is said to pour out over people a spirit of deep sleep, as if drowsiness were a liquid poured over them.

Because English has no single word that covers pouring a libation, casting a statue, and pouring out a spirit, translators reach for whatever fits the scene: pour out, offer, cast. The one steady thread is the act of pouring itself.

In a small number of places the word does not seem to mean pouring at all, but installing: putting someone in an office or setting them firmly in place. The clearest case is God's own declaration that he has set his king on Zion, his holy hill.

Most modern dictionaries treat this as a separate word that only happens to be spelled like the verb for pouring, and it may lie behind the picture of wisdom being set up or appointed before the world was made. Others have connected it back to pouring, since a king was installed by having oil poured over him to anoint him, which would make the sense grow out of that ceremony. The two verses involved are also read in more than one way, so this is the least settled part of the word's range and a good place for a careful reader to check the options.