אַיֵּה

Genesis 18:9 אַיֵּ֖ה where?

“Where is your wife Sarah?” they asked. “There, in the tent,” he replied.

Here: A plain question word asking where someone is. On the lips of a divine visitor it echoes earlier questions God asks when he already knows the answer: 'Where are you?' (Gen 3:9, a related form) and 'Where is Abel your brother?' (Gen 4:9, this same word).

Genesis 19:5 אַיֵּ֧ה where?

They called out to Lot, saying, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Send them out to us so we can have relations with them!”

Here: A pretend question. They surround the very house where they know the visitors are (v. 4), so 'Where are they?' works as a demand to hand them over.

Genesis 22:7 וְאַיֵּ֥ה and where?

Then Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” “Here I am, my son,” he replied. “The fire and the wood are here,” said Isaac, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

Genesis 38:21 אַיֵּ֧ה where?

He asked the men of that place, “Where is the shrine prostitute who was beside the road at Enaim?” “No shrine prostitute has been here,” they answered.

Judges 6:13 וְאַיֵּ֣ה and where?

“Please, my Lord,” Gideon replied, “if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? And where are all His wonders of which our fathers told us, saying, ‘Has not the LORD brought us up out of Egypt?’ But now the LORD has forsaken us and delivered us into the hand of Midian.”

Here: 'Where is…?' In laments and in the taunts of enemies this asks where an absent God is (Ps 42:3; 79:10; Mic 7:10).

Judges 9:38 אַיֵּ֨ה where?

“Where is your gloating now?” Zebul replied. “You said, ‘Who is Abimelech that we should serve him?’ Are these not the people you ridiculed? Go out now and fight them!”

Here: A question asked to mock, not to get information. Compare 'Where is your God?' (Psalm 42:3). It means: what you boasted of is nowhere to be seen now.

2 Samuel 16:3 וְאַיֵּ֖ה and where?

“Where is your master’s grandson?” asked the king. And Ziba answered, “Indeed, he is staying in Jerusalem, for he has said, ‘Today, the house of Israel will restore to me the kingdom of my grandfather.’”

2 Samuel 17:20 אַיֵּ֗ה where?

When Absalom’s servants came to the woman at the house, they asked, “Where are Ahimaaz and Jonathan?” “They have crossed over the brook,” she replied. The men searched but did not find them, so they returned to Jerusalem.

2 Kings 2:14 אַיֵּ֕ה where?

Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the waters. “Where now is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” he asked. And when he had struck the waters, they parted to the right and to the left, and Elisha crossed over.

Here: The question word used in laments, in enemy taunts and in the search for God's presence. Here it asks whether the God who acted for Elijah will act now that Elijah has gone.

2 Kings 18:34 אַיֵּה֩ אַיֵּ֛ה where?

Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria from my hand?

Job 15:23 אַיֵּ֑ה where?

He wanders about as food for vultures; he knows the day of darkness is at hand.

Here: As vowelled in the Hebrew text, this is a desperate question: "Where is it?" The same consonants spell ʾayyāh, a bird of prey (kite or falcon), which gives "food for the vulture." Both readings picture a man who is ruined.

Job 17:15 וְ֭אַיֵּה and where?

where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me?

Here: A question asking where something is. Here it is rhetorical, and the expected answer is 'nowhere'. The 'and' ties it back to verses 13–14: if all I can wait for is Sheol and the worm, then where is my hope?

Job 21:28 אַיֵּ֥ה וְ֝אַיֵּ֗ה where?, and where?

For you say, ‘Where now is the nobleman’s house, and where are the tents in which the wicked dwell?’

Job 35:10 אַ֭יֵּה where?

But no one asks, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives us songs in the night,

Here: In the Psalms this 'where?' is often a mocker's taunt ('Where is your God?'). Here it is the seeker's question, the same one Jeremiah says Israel failed to ask (Jer 2:6, 8). It is a search for God, not doubt that he exists.

Psalm 42:3 אַיֵּ֥ה where?

My tears have been my food both day and night, while men ask me all day long, “Where is your God?”

Here: 'Where?' In this setting it is not a request for information but a jeer: your God is nowhere to be seen, so he must be absent, uncaring, or powerless.

Psalm 42:10 אַיֵּ֥ה where?

Like the crushing of my bones, my enemies taunt me, while they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”

Here: "Where?" A rhetorical question that carries the answer "nowhere," i.e. "your God is absent, or he can't do anything."

Psalm 79:10 אַיֵּ֪ה where?

Why should the nations ask, “Where is their God?” Before our eyes, make known among the nations Your vengeance for the bloodshed of Your servants.

Here: The opening of a stock taunt. It mocks rather than asks: a god who could not keep his city and temple safe is either powerless or gone.

Psalm 89:49 אַיֵּ֤ה׀ where?

Where, O Lord, is Your loving devotion of old, which You faithfully swore to David?

Psalm 115:2 אַיֵּה־ where?

Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?”

Here: An ordinary word for asking location, here turned into a jeer. It means "show me him," implying that no one can point to this God or to anything he has done for his people.

Isaiah 33:18 אַיֵּ֤ה אַיֵּ֣ה אַיֵּ֖ה where?

Your mind will ponder the former terror: “Where is he who tallies? Where is he who weighs? Where is he who counts the towers?”

Isaiah 36:19 אַיֵּ֞ה אַיֵּ֖ה where?

Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they delivered Samaria from my hand?

Here: A sneering question, not a request for information. In the Bible "Where is your God?" is the standard taunt of enemies (Ps 42:3; 79:10; Joel 2:17). The answer the speaker expects is: gone, captured, nowhere.

Isaiah 37:13 אַיֵּ֤ה where?

Where are the kings of Hamath, Arpad, Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?’”

Isaiah 51:13 וְאַיֵּ֖ה and where?

But you have forgotten the LORD, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. You live in terror all day long because of the fury of the oppressor who is bent on destruction. But where is the fury of the oppressor?

Here: A taunting 'where is…?'. Enemies used it to mock Israel ('Where is your God?', Ps 42:3; 79:10). Here the question is turned on the oppressor: where has his fury gone?

Isaiah 63:11 אַיֵּ֣ה׀ אַיֵּ֛ה where?

Then His people remembered the days of old, the days of Moses. Where is He who brought them through the sea with the shepherds of His flock? Where is the One who set His Holy Spirit among them,

Here: The 'where is…?' of lament. It does not doubt that God exists. It complains that he seems absent and asks him to act as he once did.

Isaiah 63:15 אַיֵּ֤ה where?

Look down from heaven and see, from Your holy and glorious habitation. Where are Your zeal and might? Your yearning and compassion for me are restrained.

Here: 'Where?' This is the cry of lament, not a calm question. The same word comes twice in 63:11 ('Where is he who brought them up out of the sea?'), so the prayer is asking where the God of the Exodus has gone.

Jeremiah 2:6 אַיֵּ֣ה where?

They did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD who brought us up from the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and pits, a land of drought and darkness, a land where no one travels and no one lives?’

Here: 'Where is…?' Here it is the question of someone looking for God, the opposite of a sceptic's taunt. It means reaching for the God who acted in the past and asking for him to act again. Not asking it amounts to forgetting him.

Jeremiah 2:8 אַיֵּ֣ה where?

The priests did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD?’ The experts in the law no longer knew Me, and the leaders rebelled against Me. The prophets prophesied by Baal and followed useless idols.

Here: 'Where?' Here it is the question of someone looking for God, the question that brings back his saving acts and turns people toward him. It is not a sceptic's taunt.

Jeremiah 2:28 וְאַיֵּ֤ה and where?

But where are the gods you made for yourselves? Let them rise up in your time of trouble and save you if they can; for your gods are as numerous as your cities, O Judah.

Here: A question asked as a taunt, not a request for information. The 'and' (often 'but') turns sharply from the people's cry to YHWH at the end of v.27 to God's reply: so where are the others?

Jeremiah 13:20 אַיֵּ֗ה where?

Lift up your eyes and see those coming from the north. Where is the flock entrusted to you, the sheep that were your pride?

Here: 'Where?' This is a lament-style question that implies an answer: the flock is gone. It is also an accounting question, of the kind a shepherd's employer asks.

Jeremiah 17:15 אַיֵּ֥ה where?

Behold, they keep saying to me, “Where is the word of the LORD? Let it come now!”

Jeremiah 37:19 וְאַיֵּה֙ and where?

Where are your prophets who prophesied to you, claiming, ‘The king of Babylon will not come against you or this land’?

Lamentations 2:12 אַיֵּ֖ה where?

They cry out to their mothers: “Where is the grain and wine?” as they faint like the wounded in the streets of the city, as their lives fade away in the arms of their mothers.

Ezekiel 13:12 אַיֵּ֥ה where?

Surely when the wall has fallen, you will not be asked, ‘Where is the whitewash with which you covered it?’

Joel 2:17 אַיֵּ֖ה where?

Let the priests who minister before the LORD weep between the portico and the altar, saying, “Spare Your people, O LORD, and do not make Your heritage a reproach, an object of scorn among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’”

Here: The opening word of a stock taunt in Israel's laments: 'Where is...?' implies 'nowhere', meaning absent, powerless, or unwilling to help.

Nahum 2:11 אַיֵּה֙ where?

Where is the lions’ lair or the feeding ground of the young lions, where the lion and lioness prowled with their cubs, with nothing to frighten them away?

Zechariah 1:5 אַיֵּה־ where?

Where are your fathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever?

Malachi 1:6 אַיֵּ֣ה אַיֵּ֨ה where?

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. But if I am a father, where is My honor? And if I am a master, where is your fear of Me?” says the LORD of Hosts to you priests who despise My name. “But you ask, ‘How have we despised Your name?’

Here: 'Where is it?' A demand to see the honor, as if it were something you could point to, and it is missing.

Malachi 2:17 אַיֵּ֖ה where?

You have wearied the LORD with your words; yet you ask, “How have we wearied Him?” By saying, “All who do evil are good in the sight of the LORD, and in them He delights,” or, “Where is the God of justice?”

Here: 'Where is...?' In the Psalms and prophets this is the taunt enemies throw at Israel ('Where is their God?'). Here Israel says it about its own God.