Hebrew word · H4646

מַפָּח

mapach-

exhalation

Mappach occurs only here. It comes from naphach, 'to blow, breathe (out)'. With nefesh ('breath, life, self') it means 'a breathing-out of life', the dying breath. In later Hebrew mappach nefesh came to mean bitter disappointment or heartbreak.

Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

breathing out, expiring, exhaling (of life)

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 Job 11:20

Range of meaning

Mappach occurs only here. It comes from naphach, 'to blow, breathe (out)'. With nefesh ('breath, life, self') it means 'a breathing-out of life', the dying breath. Related phrases: Jer 15:9, where the mother of seven 'breathes out her nefesh' (she faints or dies), and Job 31:39, 'caused its owners to breathe out their life' (made them perish, or made them despair). In later Hebrew mappach nefesh came to mean bitter disappointment or heartbreak.

Against the English

KJV and WEB: 'the giving up of the ghost / spirit'. YLT: 'a breathing out of soul'. BSB: 'they will hope for their last breath'. Other modern versions have 'a dying gasp', 'to breathe their last', or 'their only hope is death'. They differ on whether death is the end of their hope or the thing they hope for.

How it drifted

KJV 'ghost' and YLT 'soul' were literal enough in their own day ('ghost' then meant breath or spirit), but modern readers hear an apparition, or an immortal soul departing.

Used elsewhere in the period

Jer 15:9 napchah nafshah; Job 31:39 hippachti nefesh. Later Hebrew uses mappach nefesh for grief or despair. The Vulgate's spes illorum abominatio animae shows that Jerome understood or derived the word differently.

Where it appears

Job · 1

  1. Job 11:20 מַֽפַּח־ [will be] a gasp of

    But the eyes of the wicked will fail, and escape will elude them; they will hope for their last breath.”

    Here: From naphach, 'to blow, breathe'. This noun appears only here in the Hebrew Bible. A 'breathing-out' means the last breath, life leaving the body. There is no verb in this clause: 'their hope = a breathing-out'.

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