Hebrew word · H4094
מַדְקָרָה
kemadkerot
thrust
A stab, thrust or piercing. The noun is built from dāqar, 'to pierce through, run through' (with a spear or sword). It occurs only here in the Hebrew Bible.
Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
thrust, stab, piercing
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 Proverbs 12:18
- Range of meaning
A stab, thrust or piercing. The noun is built from dāqar, 'to pierce through, run through' (with a spear or sword). It occurs only here in the Hebrew Bible.
- Against the English
KJV 'piercings', ESV/NASB 'thrusts', WEB 'piercing', BSB 'a piercing sword'. BSB's singular adjective loses the plural, which pictures repeated jabs. NIV's 'pierce like swords' turns the noun into a verb but keeps the violence.
- Used elsewhere in the period
The verb dāqar describes Phinehas driving his spear through the couple (Num 25:8), Saul asking his armor-bearer to run him through (1 Sam 31:4), and 'the one whom they pierced' (Zech 12:10). It always means a deep, often fatal wound, not a scratch.
Where it appears
Proverbs · 1
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Proverbs 12:18 כְּמַדְקְר֣וֹת like thrusts of
Speaking rashly is like a piercing sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.
Here: 'Like stabbings.' The noun occurs only here in the Bible and comes from dāqar, 'to run through, pierce' (Num 25:8; Zech 12:10). It is plural, so the picture is repeated jabs, not one clean cut.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.