StrongerBible

raḥav

רָחַב

HebrewH7337“enlarge, make room, ...”

Appears 25 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Gen 26:22Exo 34:24Deu 12:20Deu 19:8Deu 33:201Sa 2:12Sa 22:37Psa 4:1(2)Psa 18:36(37)Psa 25:17Psa 35:21Psa 81:10(11)Psa 119:32Pro 18:16Isa 5:14Isa 30:23Isa 30:33Isa 54:2Isa 57:4Isa 57:8Isa 60:5Ezk 41:7Amo 1:13Mic 1:16Hab 2:5
Root family
Names & words formed with this
Word studyResearch-graderah-KHAHVverb

What raḥav means

to be wide or spacious, and to make wide: to enlarge, broaden, or make room.

TranslatabilityPartialCertaintySettled

At its root this word is about width. Something is wide, or someone makes it wider: a plaza, a border, a tent, a bald patch, a mouth stretched open. Ancient Israel pictured trouble as being penned into a tight, narrow place and rescue as being brought out into open space, so widening became one of the Bible's main images for relief and blessing.

The striking thing is that the same word carries opposite moral weight depending on who does the widening. When God is the one who enlarges, it is always gift: he widens Israel's land, makes room for a person in distress, opens the heart to understand and obey, and swells it with joy. When people or death widen things for themselves, the same word turns dark: a mouth opened wide in mockery, a throat or appetite that can never be filled, a bed spread wide in unfaithfulness, a border seized by violence. The prophet Amos sharpens this by putting the very verb of God's covenant blessing into the mouth of a neighboring nation's cruelty, and the book of Isaiah sets a restored Jerusalem told to widen her tent only a few chapters away from an unfaithful Jerusalem widening her bed.

So the various English words translators reach for (enlarge, broaden, make room, open wide) all circle a single idea: making space. Whether that space is a blessing or a sin is decided by who is acting and in what setting, not by the word itself.

Nuances

1ato be or become physically wide, or to make a thing wider: a space, a structure, or a mark on the body.
TranslatabilityDirect
Isa 30:23Isa 30:33Isa 54:2Ezk 41:7Mic 1:16
1bwith God as the one acting, to enlarge Israel's land or extend its borders, a standard promise of covenant blessing.
Gen 26:22Exo 34:24Deu 12:20Deu 19:8Deu 33:20Amo 1:13
1cto make room for someone: to give relief from distress, or free scope and opportunity.
2Sa 22:37Psa 4:1(2)Psa 18:36(37)Psa 25:17Pro 18:16
1dto enlarge the heart or mind: to widen a person's capacity to understand, to obey, or to rejoice, given as a gift.
Psa 119:32Isa 60:5
1eto open the mouth wide: in triumph over enemies, in eager expectation, or in scornful mockery.
1Sa 2:1Psa 35:21Psa 81:10(11)Isa 57:4
1fto widen the throat or appetite: the picture of greed that is never satisfied, and of death swallowing without limit.
Isa 5:14Hab 2:5
1gto widen the bed: an image of unfaithfulness and idolatry.
Isa 57:8

What scholars say about raḥav

The classical lexica (BDB, HALOT, DCH, Gesenius 18th ed.) and the theological dictionaries (TDOT, TWOT, NIDOTTE) converge on a stable spatial-to-figurative map for the root: a literal core of physical breadth that extends to territory, mouth, heart, appetite, and, above all, to deliverance. R. Bartelmus (TDOT XIII) treats the antonymic pairing of narrowness (tsar, metsar) and breadth (merchav) as the classical soteriological formula of Israelite psalmody, and Philip D. King (Surrounded by Bitterness, 2012) analyzes it within the Lakoff-Johnson framework of conceptual metaphor as an elaborated constraint-and-container schema in which distress is constriction and salvation is spaciousness. Moshe Weinfeld identifies the causative to enlarge the border as a signature Deuteronomic covenant formula with YHWH, never Israel's prowess, as subject; Shalom Paul reads Amos 1:13 as a deliberate ironic reuse of that blessing formula for Ammonite atrocity, and Blenkinsopp reads the polarity of Isaiah 54:2 (tent) against 57:8 (bed) as an intentional authorial device within Third Isaiah. The negative extensions are well documented: Fox and Waltke on the fixed wisdom condemnation of the wide or proud heart and the wide throat of greed, and Wildberger on Isaiah 5:14 and Habakkuk 2:5, where the widened throat of Sheol draws on Canaanite death imagery. Sara Japhet notes that the prayer of Jabez (1 Chronicles 4:10) pointedly substitutes the verb for increase or multiply, a small datum in the diachronic profile of Late Biblical Hebrew developed by Hurvitz, Joosten, and Hendel. The word must not be confused with the sea-dragon Rahab, which is written with a different consonant and belongs to an unrelated root. One genuine philological question, discussed below in the disputes, concerns whether the Akkadian verb rapashu is a true cognate; recent Semitists (Huehnergard, Kogan) treat it as an independent parallel rather than a phonologically regular relative.

Where scholars disagree about raḥav

Whether the Akkadian verb rapashu (to be broad) is a genuine relative of this Hebrew word or only a look-alike that developed the same meaning independently. This is a question of derivation, not of what the Hebrew word means, which is not in doubt.

  • minorityIt is a true cognate descended from a shared ancestor, and the two are commonly paired in the standard comparative treatments.; BDB (Brown-Driver-Briggs), s.v. רחב; HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. רחב
  • majorityThe sound correspondences are not regular, so the Akkadian and West Semitic forms are better treated as independent parallel developments of the same meaning rather than as a genetic cognate.; John Huehnergard, "Akkadian ḫ and West Semitic ḥ," Studia Semitica 3 (2003): 102-119; Leonid Kogan, "Proto-Semitic Phonetics and Phonology," in The Semitic Languages, ed. Weninger et al. (2011)
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. רחבlexicon
  • HALOT (Koehler-Baumgartner-Stamm), s.v. רחבlexicon
  • DCH (Clines, ed.), s.v. רחב, vol. 7lexicon
  • Gesenius, Hebräisches und Aramäisches Handwörterbuch, 18th ed. (Donner et al., 1987-2010), s.v. רחבlexicon
  • R. Bartelmus, "רחב," in Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (TDOT) vol. XIIIdictionary
  • Harris, Archer, and Waltke, Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (TWOT) #2143dictionary
  • Philip D. King, Surrounded by Bitterness: Image Schemas and Metaphors for Conceptualising Distress in Classical Hebrew (Pickwick, 2012)monograph
  • Moshe Weinfeld, Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School (Oxford, 1972)monograph
  • Shalom M. Paul, Amos, Hermeneia (1991)commentary
  • Hans Wildberger, Isaiah 1-12, Continental Commentary (1991)commentary
  • Joseph Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56-66, Anchor Bible (2003)commentary
  • Michael V. Fox, Proverbs 10-31, Anchor Yale Bible (2009)commentary
  • Sara Japhet, I & II Chronicles, Old Testament Library (1993)commentary
  • John Huehnergard, "Akkadian ḫ and West Semitic ḥ," Studia Semitica 3 (2003): 102-119article
  • Leonid Kogan, "Proto-Semitic Phonetics and Phonology," in The Semitic Languages, ed. Weninger et al. (2011)article

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

All attested forms of רָחַב

hiphil imperfect 2ms

תַּרְחִיב

2Sa 22:37, Psa 18:36, Psa 119:32

hiphil imperfect 3ms

יַרְחִיב

Deu 12:20, Deu 19:8, Pro 18:16

hiphil perfect 3ms

הִרְחִיב, הִרְחִב

Gen 26:22, Hab 2:5, Isa 30:33

hiphil imperative 2fs

הַרְחִבִי, הַרְחִיבִי

Mic 1:16, Isa 54:2

hiphil consecutive-imperfect 3mp

וַיַּרְחִיבוּ

Psa 35:21

hiphil consecutive-perfect 1cs

וְהִרְחַבְתִּי

Exo 34:24

hiphil imperative 2ms

הַרְחֶב

Psa 81:10

hiphil imperfect 2mp

תַּרְחִיבוּ

Isa 57:4

hiphil infinitive-construct construct

הַרְחִיב

Amo 1:13

hiphil participle m s construct

מַרְחִיב

Deu 33:20

hiphil perfect 2fs

הִרְחַבְתְּ

Isa 57:8

hiphil perfect 2ms

הִרְחַבְתָּ

Psa 4:1

hiphil perfect 3cp

הִרְחִיבוּ

Psa 25:17

hiphil perfect 3fs

הִרְחִיבָה

Isa 5:14

niphal participle m s absolute

נִרְחָב

Isa 30:23

qal consecutive-perfect 3fs

וְרָחֲבָה

Ezk 41:7

qal consecutive-perfect 3ms

וְרָחַב

Isa 60:5

qal perfect 3ms

רָחַב

1Sa 2:1