Hebrew word · H2115

זוּר

tezureha

to crush

To press, squeeze, or crush. It is a rare verb, used of pressing out a wound (Isaiah 1:6), of crushing eggs (Job 39:15; compare Isaiah 59:5), and here of compressing wet wool.

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

What it means

1) (Qal) to press, squeeze, crush, press down and out

1a) to close up (of a wound)

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 Judges 6:38

Range of meaning

To press, squeeze, or crush. It is a rare verb, used of pressing out a wound (Isaiah 1:6), of crushing eggs (Job 39:15; compare Isaiah 59:5), and here of compressing wet wool.

Against the English

KJV's 'thrust the fleece together' is archaic but faithful: Gideon squeezes the mass of wool together. Modern 'squeezed' or 'pressed' is accurate.

Used elsewhere in the period

Lexicons (BDB, HALOT) treat this as a separate root from the more common zur meaning 'to be a stranger'. The Strong's entry H2115 reflects that.

Where it appears

Judges · 1

  1. Judges 6:38 וַיָּ֖זַר and he squeezed out

    And that is what happened. When Gideon arose the next morning, he squeezed the fleece and wrung out the dew—a bowlful of water.

    Here: A rare verb for pressing or squeezing something. Elsewhere it is used of wounds that were never pressed out (Isaiah 1:6) and of eggs crushed underfoot (Job 39:15). Gideon compresses the soaked wool with his hands. KJV's 'thrust together' is an older way of saying the same thing.

Job · 1

  1. Job 39:15 תְּזוּרֶ֑הָ it will crush it

    She forgets that a foot may crush them, or a wild animal may trample them.

Isaiah · 1

  1. Isaiah 1:6 זֹ֙רוּ֙ they have been pressed out

    From the sole of your foot to the top of your head, there is no soundness—only wounds and welts and festering sores neither cleansed nor bandaged nor soothed with oil.

    Here: 'They have not been pressed.' The verb is used of Gideon wringing dew out of a fleece (Judges 6:38). Here it is the first step of wound care: squeezing out blood and pus, or pressing the edges shut. KJV 'closed' and BSB 'cleansed' each catch one side of that.

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