Hebrew word · H1811

דָּלַף

dalfah

to drip

To drip, leak, trickle. Used of a roof leaking from neglect (Eccl 10:18) and of an eye shedding tears (Job 16:20). The related noun delef means 'a steady drip' (Prov 19:13; 27:15, the quarrelsome wife compared to a dripping roof on a rainy day).

Appears 3 times in 3 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

1) to drop, drip

1a) (Qal)

1a1) to leak

1a2) to weep (of tears)

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 Psalm 119:28

Range of meaning

To drip, leak, trickle. Used of a roof leaking from neglect (Eccl 10:18) and of an eye shedding tears (Job 16:20). The related noun delef means 'a steady drip' (Prov 19:13; 27:15, the quarrelsome wife compared to a dripping roof on a rainy day). Some lexicographers also list a possible second sense, 'to be sleepless, restless,' based on the Akkadian verb dalāpu.

Against the English

KJV/BSB/ESV 'melts'; NASB 'weeps'; NIV/WEB 'is weary'; YLT 'hath dropped.' 'Melts' keeps the idea of something liquefying, but loses the slow drip-by-drip leak. 'Weary' gives the result and drops the picture. 'Weeps' keeps the tears but loses the sense of the self itself draining away.

How it drifted

'Melt' was a natural older English way to put dissolving with fear or grief (as in 'their hearts melted'). In modern English 'my heart melts' usually means being touched or charmed, which pulls readers away from the Hebrew image of a slow, steady loss.

Used elsewhere in the period

Job 16:20 has the exact form dalfah: 'to God my eye drips (with tears).' Eccl 10:18: 'through idle hands the house leaks.' The Septuagint renders it enystaxen, 'dozed, nodded off,' and the Latin Vulgate (made from the Greek) follows with dormitavit, 'has slumbered.' That suggests the early translators either read the word differently or took it as exhaustion.

Where it appears

Job · 1

  1. Job 16:20 דָּלְפָ֥ה it has wept

    My friends are my scoffers as my eyes pour out tears to God.

Psalms · 1

  1. Psalm 119:28 דָּלְפָ֣ה it weeps

    My soul melts with sorrow; strengthen me according to Your word.

    Here: The verb for water leaking through a roof or tears running from an eye (Job 16:20 uses this same form of 'my eye'). It opens the line, so the first picture is of the self slowly leaking away. The past-tense form describes a condition already reached: 'my soul has been dripping away.'

Ecclesiastes · 1

  1. Ecclesiastes 10:18 יִדְלֹ֥ף it leaks

    Through laziness the roof caves in, and in the hands of the idle, the house leaks.

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