Aramaic word · H1414

גְּדַד

godu

to chop

Gədad: to hew down, fell. Qəṣaṣ: to cut off, lop (in this doubled-letter form, to hack away repeatedly). Nətar: in this causative form, to make fall off or shake off. Bədar: to scatter or disperse.

A Biblical Aramaic word, from the parts of the Old Testament written in Aramaic. Why Aramaic?

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Aramaic of the Old Testament. ·

What it means

to cut down, hew down

Aramaic of ga.dad (גָּדַד "to cut" H1413)

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Daniel 4:14

Range of meaning

Gədad: to hew down, fell. Qəṣaṣ: to cut off, lop (in this doubled-letter form, to hack away repeatedly). Nətar: in this causative form, to make fall off or shake off. Bədar: to scatter or disperse.

Against the English

English versions handle these well. The thing English cannot show is that all four are plural commands in a row. The rhythm sounds like a work crew receiving rapid-fire orders: fell, lop, shake off, scatter.

Used elsewhere in the period

The Hebrew relative of gādad means to cut or gash. Bədar is the ordinary Aramaic verb for scattering, and the Targums (later Aramaic translations of Hebrew Scripture) use it for scattering seed and peoples. Ancient Near Eastern kings boasted of felling trees: Nebuchadnezzar's own Wadi Brisa inscription celebrates cutting the cedars of Lebanon.

Where it appears

Daniel · 2

  1. Daniel 4:14 גֹּ֤דּוּ cut down!

    He called out in a loud voice: ‘Cut down the tree and chop off its branches; strip off its leaves and scatter its fruit. Let the beasts flee from under it, and the birds from its branches.

    Here: A plural command: 'Fell!' The tree is cut through at the trunk. The plural shows the watcher is giving orders to others, presumably heavenly agents who carry out the sentence.

  2. Daniel 4:23 גֹּ֨דּוּ cut down!

    And you, O king, saw a watcher, a holy one, coming down from heaven and saying: ‘Cut down the tree and destroy it, but leave the stump with its roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze around it, in the tender grass of the field. Let him be drenched with the dew of heaven, and graze with the beasts of the field till seven times pass him by.’

    Here: A plural command, 'Chop down!' It is addressed to unnamed agents, presumably other heavenly servants. The verb is the woodsman's verb for felling with blows.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.