to tear off or pull apart by force: to wrench something loose from what holds it
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintyStrong
The picture behind this word is raw physical force: taking hold of something and pulling until it comes loose. Israel strips the gold rings off their ears to make the calf (Exodus 32:2-3), a coming day lets Esau wrench his brother's yoke off his neck (Genesis 27:40), and a cruel shepherd tears the hoofs off his own sheep (Zechariah 11:16).
From ripping a single object loose, the word stretches to violent tearing on a larger scale: a great wind rips the mountains apart before the LORD (1 Kings 19:11), and a lion rends its prey to pieces (Psalm 7:2).
Its most surprising turn is toward rescue. To pull a captive out of an enemy's clutches is to tear him away, so the same verb becomes a word for deliverance: God "tore us away" from our foes (Psalm 136:24), while a people in bondage cry that no one will wrench them free from their masters' hand (Lamentations 5:8). Where this verb pictures snatching someone loose by force, the ordinary Hebrew word for rescue, נָצַל, simply says "deliver."
Nuances
1ato strip or wrench something off: to pull a thing loose from where it is fastened
Gen 27:40Exo 32:2Exo 32:3Exo 32:24Ezk 19:12Zec 11:16
1bto tear apart, to rip to pieces
1Ki 19:11Psa 7:2(3)*
1cto tear someone away from danger: to rescue by snatching from an enemy's grip
Psa 136:24Lam 5:8
Related words
The English words used to translate paraq
“break off”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
“tear in pieces”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
The core picture is wrenching an object loose from whatever holds it: gold earrings pulled off ears, a yoke snapped off the neck, mountains torn open by a violent wind.Exo 32:3Gen 27:401Ki 19:11
That same tearing-loose reaches all the way to rescue: to tear a person free from an enemy's grip, to deliver them out of a hostile hand.Psa 136:24Lam 5:8
Both
Both can picture tearing a victim to pieces like a lion, and in the single verse where they stand side by side they describe the very same attack: the enemy tearing the soul and ripping it apart with none to rescue.Psa 7:2
This is the predator's word: a wild animal seizes prey and rips it apart to kill it, and that same picture is turned onto violent people and onto God striking in judgment like a lion.Gen 37:33Ezk 22:27Hos 5:14
From the prey a predator secures, it can flip to the food itself, and so to providing someone the exact portion of food they need.Pro 30:8
נָצַלthe ordinary word for rescue or deliverance; this verb pictures the rescue as physically tearing a captive out of an enemy's hand
At root it means to tear or break something off by force, used of stripping off jewelry or throwing off a yoke, with no thought of rescue at all.Exo 32:2Exo 32:24Gen 27:40
It also pictures violent tearing and rending in pieces: a wind ripping mountains apart, a dead branch broken off the vine.1Ki 19:11Ezk 19:12
Both
Both can describe being pulled free from an enemy's grip, though the second word keeps its harsher image of being torn loose.Exo 18:10Psa 136:24Lam 5:8
This is the ordinary, all-purpose word for rescue and deliverance, with no picture of how the rescue happens: God bringing his people out of slavery and out of the reach of their enemies.Exo 6:6Exo 18:4Jdg 6:91Sa 12:11
It reaches all the way down to snatching a single person out of immediate deadly danger, one life pulled back from the edge.1Sa 17:35Gen 37:21
paraq in the other biblical languages
ῥύομαιGreek“to rescue”the standard Greek verb for rescuing or delivering someone from danger, matching this word's rescue sense
The root sense is a physical tearing off or pulling apart, with no thought of rescue at all: stripping gold rings from ears, or breaking a yoke off the neck.Exo 32:2Exo 32:24Gen 27:40
It describes the violent breaking of things rather than the saving of people: wind tearing mountains apart, branches wrenched off and left to wither, hooves torn away.1Ki 19:11Ezk 19:12Zec 11:16
It can name predatory tearing, the ripping of prey, where the word marks destruction rather than deliverance.Psa 7:2
Both
Both picture rescue as pulling a captive free from an enemy's grip, snatching someone out of a hostile hand.Psa 136:24Luk 1:74
Both can voice the helpless cry that no one is able to tear the trapped free from the hand that holds them.Lam 5:82Co 1:10
The whole weight of the word is the rescue itself: drawing a person out of danger and into safety, with no idea of physically tearing anything.Col 1:131Th 1:10
It names rescue from moral and spiritual evil, not only from human foes, as in the prayer "deliver us from evil" and the cry to be freed from a body bound to death.Mat 6:13Luk 11:4Rom 7:24
God is characteristically the rescuer, so much so that the word can title him "the Deliverer" who comes to save.Rom 11:262Pe 2:9
ἁρπάζωGreek“to seize”to snatch or seize by force, close to the violent tearing-away image behind this word
Breaks a piece off from something larger, detaching a part rather than carrying off a whole: earrings pulled from the ears, a yoke snapped off the neck, hoofs torn away.Exo 32:3Gen 27:40Zec 11:16
Rends a solid mass apart by sheer force, as a great wind tearing the mountains open.1Ki 19:11
Both
Both picture a predator violently seizing its prey, whether a wolf snatching the sheep or a lion tearing at its victim.Jhn 10:12Psa 7:2
Both name a forcible snatch that rescues, pulling a person out of a hostile grip or deadly danger so no one can hold them.Jhn 10:28Psa 136:24
Catches a person up and away to heaven or to God, a sudden supernatural transport upward that the Hebrew word never carries.1Th 4:172Co 12:2Rev 12:5Act 8:39
Snatches away something that has no physical shape, like the message already sown in a person's heart.Mat 13:19
What scholars say about paraq
The standard lexica (BDB, HALOT, DCH) treat this as a single root meaning to tear off or pull apart, spread across the qal, piel, and hithpael stems: stripping off jewelry (Exodus 32), wrenching off a yoke (Genesis 27:40), tearing off hoofs (Zechariah 11:16), rending mountains (1 Kings 19:11), and tearing prey (Psalm 7:2). BDB and HALOT recognize a derived sense of tearing away, hence rescuing, in Psalm 136:24 and Lamentations 5:8, where the participle stands for a deliverer. The chief exegetical question is the participle in Psalm 7:2 (Hebrew 7:3), read by most as the predator rending its victim in parallel with the preceding verb, though some connect it instead with the rescue sense attested in Lamentations 5:8.