Hebrew word · H4166

מוּצֶ֫קֶת

bemutzakto

casting

From yatsaq, 'to pour, to cast metal.' The noun mutseqet can mean something cast (1 Kings 7:37, the 'casting' of the temple stands; Job 38:38, the clods 'cast' together). Here it means something that pours or through which oil flows: a pipe, channel, spout, or the lip of a lamp.

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. · Updated October 24, 2026

What it means

1) pipe

2) a casting

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 Zechariah 4:2

Range of meaning: From yatsaq, 'to pour, to cast metal.' The noun mutseqet can mean something cast (1 Kings 7:37, the 'casting' of the temple stands; Job 38:38, the clods 'cast' together). Here it means something that pours or through which oil flows: a pipe, channel, spout, or the lip of a lamp.
Against the English: KJV and WEB say 'pipes,' BSB and NASB 'spouts,' NIV 'channels,' and ESV and NRSV 'lips.' 'Pipes' and 'channels' picture plumbing from the bowl to the lamps. 'Lips' pictures the pinched rim of each lamp, where a wick lies.
How it drifted: 'Pipes' was a reasonable guess in 1611, but it suggests a network of tubes that has no known parallel in ancient lamps. Archaeology later found clay lamps with seven pinched spouts, which made the 'lips' reading more likely.
Used elsewhere in the period: The Septuagint uses epharystrides, 'pourers' or 'oil-feeders.' The Vulgate uses infusoria, 'things that pour in.' Both read it as a feeding device. Iron Age and Persian-period lamps with seven spouts (bowls with their rims pinched in seven places, so that seven wicks burn at once) have been found at several sites in Israel. This is the main evidence for the reading 'seven lips on each lamp.'

Where it appears

2 Chronicles · 1

2 Chronicles 4:3 בְּמֻֽצַקְתּֽוֹ׃ in casting its

Below the rim, figures of oxen encircled it, ten per cubit all the way around the Sea, cast in two rows as a part of the Sea.

Zechariah · 1

Zechariah 4:2 מֽוּצָק֔וֹת pipes

“What do you see?” he asked. “I see a solid gold lampstand,” I replied, “with a bowl at the top and seven lamps on it, with seven spouts to the lamps.

Here: From the verb 'to pour.' These are either channels that pour oil from the bowl into the lamps, or the pinched lips of each lamp where a wick sits and burns. The exact meaning is debated (see debates).

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