Hebrew word · H4855

מַשָּׁא

masha'

interest

Mashsha belongs with the verb nasha, 'to lend, be a creditor', and refers to lending on security or the claim that arises from it. Older lexicons such as BDB gloss it 'usury', while context points to the loan or the demand for repayment more generally.

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

What it means

1) lending on interest, usury

1a) in Ne 5:11, the rate of "usury" was only one per cent

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 Nehemiah 10:31

Range of meaning

Mashsha belongs with the verb nasha, 'to lend, be a creditor', and refers to lending on security or the claim that arises from it. Older lexicons such as BDB gloss it 'usury', while context points to the loan or the demand for repayment more generally. Yad, 'hand', stands for the person acting, and in lending language for the lender's power over what is owed.

Against the English

KJV and ESV 'the exaction of every debt' is close to the sense of pressing for payment. BSB, NIV and NLT 'cancel every debt' or 'all debts' are clearer but take a position on what happens to the debt. YLT's 'usury on every hand' misreads the phrase: 'every hand' here is not an idiom for 'all around'.

How it drifted

English 'usury' now means extortionate interest, and 'cancel' now suggests a clean legal write-off. The Hebrew phrase is built from older lending language and is less precise than either.

Used elsewhere in the period

Nehemiah 5:7 and 5:10, where Nehemiah accuses the nobles and then says 'let us give up this mashsha'. Deuteronomy 15:2-3 gives the source idea: every creditor releases 'the loan of his hand' (mashsheh yado), and 'your hand' shall release what your brother owes. A related noun appears at Deuteronomy 24:10 and Proverbs 22:26. Do not confuse it with the similar-sounding massa, 'load', used for the Sabbath loads of Nehemiah 13:15, 19.

From the study of Nehemiah 5:7

Range of meaning

A loan or debt seen from the creditor's side: a claim against someone, often secured by a pledge (collateral). Related nouns: מַשָּׁאָה / מַשַּׁאת 'loan, debt' (Deut 24:10; Prov 22:26). In Nehemiah 10:31 (Heb. 10:32) the community promises to forgo 'maššāʾ of every hand' in the seventh year, i.e. to cancel debt claims.

Against the English

KJV, NASB 1995 and BSB say 'usury'; ESV, NIV and NLT say 'interest'. Both render it as the price charged for a loan. Lexicons such as HALOT and many commentators (e.g. Williamson) take it more broadly as 'loan on pledge, credit claim', which puts the weight on seizing the collateral, not only on the interest rate.

How it drifted

'Usury' in 1611 meant any interest at all. Today it means excessive or illegal interest. And the concentration on interest, in both 'usury' and 'interest', comes partly from the Latin tradition (Vulgate 'usuras') and from later church debates about lending at interest.

Used elsewhere in the period

Deut 24:10–13 uses the same idiom ('when you lend your neighbour a loan of any kind…') and goes on to regulate taking pledges. Exod 22:25 (Heb. 22:24) forbids being 'a creditor (nōšeh)' to a poor fellow Israelite and charging interest (nešek). The Greek Septuagint (2 Esdras 15:7) renders it with words for demanding repayment, not with a technical word for interest.

Where it appears

Nehemiah · 3

  1. Nehemiah 5:7 מַשָּׁ֥א usury

    and after serious thought I rebuked the nobles and officials, saying, “You are exacting usury from your own brothers!” So I called a large assembly against them

    Here: The key word: a creditor's loan or claim, secured by pledges (fields, houses, even children, vv. 3–5). It echoes Deuteronomy 24:10, which regulates such pledged loans. Whether it means 'interest' itself is debated (see debates); v. 11 shows interest was also being charged.

  2. Nehemiah 5:10 הַמַּשָּׁ֥א the usury

    I, as well as my brothers and my servants, have been lending the people money and grain. Please, let us stop this usury.

  3. Nehemiah 10:31 וּמַשָּׁ֥א and usury of

    When the people of the land bring merchandise or any kind of grain to sell on the Sabbath day, we will not buy from them on a Sabbath or holy day. Every seventh year we will let the fields lie fallow and will cancel every debt.

    Here: The claim a lender holds on a loan. It is the same word Nehemiah used when confronting the nobles over their lending (Nehemiah 5:7, 10), so it carries that crisis with it.

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