Aramaic word · H1547

גָּלוּ

galuta'

captivity

Exile or deportation, and by extension the body of people deported. In the phrase 'sons of the exile' it names a community.

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

Appears 4 times in 4 verses of the Aramaic of the Old Testament. ·

What it means

exile

Aramaic of ga.lut (גָּלוּת "captivity" H1546)

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 Ezra 6:16

Range of meaning

Exile or deportation, and by extension the body of people deported. In the phrase 'sons of the exile' it names a community.

Against the English

KJV and WEB's 'children of the captivity' suggests prisoners or young children. BSB and NIV's 'exiles' is closer but could imply they are still abroad. ESV's 'returned exiles' makes the situation clear by adding a word the Aramaic does not have.

How it drifted

'Captivity' was a normal word for deportation in older English, but today it suggests confinement. Exile also often now suggests a person living away from home, whereas these people have come back.

Used elsewhere in the period

Daniel 2:25, 5:13 and 6:13 use the same Aramaic word for 'the exiles of Judah'. The Hebrew phrase benei haggolah, 'sons of the exile', recurs in Ezra 4:1, 6:19–20, 8:35 and 10:7, 16. Cuneiform tablets from a Babylonian town called Al-Yahudu ('Judah-town'), dating from about 572 to 477 BC, show deported Judeans farming, paying taxes and doing business rather than living in prison.

Where it appears

Ezra · 1

  1. Ezra 6:16 גָלוּתָ֗א exile the

    Then the people of Israel—the priests, the Levites, and the rest of the exiles—celebrated the dedication of the house of God with joy.

    Here: The mass deportation to Babylonia, used here as a group's identity. These people are already home, and many were probably born abroad, yet they are still named by the exile.

Daniel · 3

  1. Daniel 2:25 גָֽלוּתָא֙ exile the

    Arioch hastily brought Daniel before the king and said to him, “I have found a man among the exiles from Judah who will tell the king the interpretation.”

  2. Daniel 5:13 גָלוּתָא֙ exile the

    So Daniel was brought before the king, who asked him, “Are you Daniel, one of the exiles my father the king brought from Judah?

  3. Daniel 6:13 גָלוּתָ֜א exile the

    Then they told the king, “Daniel, one of the exiles from Judah, shows no regard for you, O king, or for the decree that you have signed. He still makes his petition three times a day.”

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