Hebrew word · H4916

מִשְׁלַח

mishlach

sending

'The sending or stretching out of the hand': what you put your hand to. It covers your undertakings, your labour and enterprise, and sometimes what that labour produces.

Appears 10 times in 10 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

outstretching

Also means: mish.lo.ach (מִשְׁלוֹחַ "sending" H4916B)

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 Deuteronomy 12:7

Range of meaning

'The sending or stretching out of the hand': what you put your hand to. It covers your undertakings, your labour and enterprise, and sometimes what that labour produces.

Against the English

KJV and WEB: 'all that ye put your hand unto' (close to the picture). YLT: 'every putting forth of your hand' (fully literal). BSB: 'all you do' (clear but generic, and it loses the sense of work and its yield). Some modern versions use 'undertakings' or 'what you have accomplished'.

Used elsewhere in the period

Within the Bible the phrase is almost limited to Deuteronomy: 12:7, 18; 15:10; 23:20 (Eng. 23:20/21); 28:8, 20. In each case it refers to the farmer's work that God either blesses or curses (28:8 'the blessing on your barns and in all that you put your hand to'; 28:20 'curse … in all that you put your hand to'). Isaiah 11:14 uses a related form for seizing territory.

From the study of Deuteronomy 12:18

Range of meaning

Literally 'a sending-out of the hand'. BDB gives 'outstretching, i.e. undertaking'; HALOT gives 'undertaking, enterprise'. It means whatever you reach out to do, especially work that produces wealth. Apart from one use in Isaiah, it occurs only in Deuteronomy.

Against the English

KJV/WEB 'all that you put your hand to' keeps the image. ESV/NASB-type 'undertakings' are accurate but abstract. BSB 'in all you do' reads like a general motto for life and loses the link to the harvest on the table.

How it drifted

Generalised renderings remove the concrete farming context. The phrase looks back to the produce of v. 17 that has been brought to the feast.

Used elsewhere in the period

Deuteronomy 12:7 ('in all your undertaking, in which the LORD your God has blessed you'); 15:10; 23:20 (Eng. 23:21); 28:8, 20. Isaiah 11:14 uses it for 'reaching out' against Edom and Moab.

From the study of Deuteronomy 15:10

Range of meaning

Literally 'the sending forth of your hand': whatever you put your hand to, any undertaking or enterprise. It is close in meaning to maʿăśeh, 'work, deed, produce'.

Against the English

KJV and WEB have 'all that you put your hand to' and BSB 'everything to which you put your hand'. All of these are accurate. YLT's 'every putting forth of thy hand' keeps the image most literally.

Used elsewhere in the period

The phrase is almost unique to Deuteronomy: 12:7 and 12:18 (rejoicing 'in all your undertakings'), 15:10, 23:20 (Eng. 23:20/21), 28:8 (blessing), and 28:20 (curse 'in all the sending forth of your hand').

Similar words

Where it appears

Deuteronomy · 6
  1. Deuteronomy 12:7 מִשְׁלַ֣ח <the> undertaking of

    There, in the presence of the LORD your God, you and your households shall eat and rejoice in all you do, because the LORD your God has blessed you.

    Here: A noun from the verb 'to send, stretch out'. Joined with 'hand', it means whatever you stretch your hand out to: your work and enterprise. Here that means the farming and herding whose yield is now on the table.

  2. Deuteronomy 12:18 מִשְׁלַ֥ח <the> undertaking of

    Instead, you must eat them in the presence of the LORD your God at the place the LORD your God will choose—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates. Rejoice before the LORD your God in all you do,

    Here: Literally 'a sending-out (of the hand)', meaning whatever one reaches out to work at. Here it refers to the farm labour whose produce lies on the table: grain, wine, oil and livestock.

  3. Deuteronomy 15:10 מִשְׁלַ֥ח <the> undertaking of

    Give generously to him, and do not let your heart be grieved when you do so. And because of this the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in everything to which you put your hand.

    Here: From šālaḥ, 'send, stretch out'. The 'sending forth' of the hand is any undertaking or enterprise, whatever you reach out to do. The hand that opens to the poor (v. 8, 11) is the hand God blesses in its work.

  4. Deuteronomy 23:20 מִשְׁלַ֣ח <the> undertaking of

    You may charge a foreigner interest, but not your brother, so that the LORD your God may bless you in everything to which you put your hand in the land that you are entering to possess.

  5. Deuteronomy 28:8 מִשְׁלַ֣ח <the> undertaking of

    The LORD will decree a blessing on your barns and on everything to which you put your hand; the LORD your God will bless you in the land He is giving you.

    Here: Literally 'the sending-out (of the hand)'. Together with 'hand' it is a set phrase meaning an undertaking or enterprise: whatever you reach out and put your hand to.

  6. Deuteronomy 28:20 מִשְׁלַ֥ח <the> undertaking of

    The LORD will send curses upon you, confusion and reproof in all to which you put your hand, until you are destroyed and quickly perish because of the wickedness you have committed in forsaking Him.

Esther · 2
  1. Esther 9:19 וּמִשְׁל֥וֹחַ and [the] sending of

    This is why the rural Jews, who live in the villages, observe the fourteenth day of the month of Adar as a day of joy and feasting. It is a holiday for sending gifts to one another.

    Here: 'And the sending of'. A noun made from šālaḥ, 'send'. In this sense it appears only here and in 9:22, and it later became the name of the Purim custom (mishloach manot).

  2. Esther 9:22 וּמִשְׁל֤וֹחַ and [the] sending of

    as the days on which the Jews gained rest from their enemies and the month in which their sorrow turned to joy and their mourning into a holiday. He wrote that these were to be days of feasting and joy, of sending gifts to one another and to the poor.

    Here: The act of sending something off. Here it means delivering food to others' homes. The phrase gave the later custom its name, mishloach manot.

Isaiah · 2
  1. Isaiah 7:25 לְמִשְׁלַ֣ח <into> pastureland of

    For fear of the briers and thorns, you will no longer traverse the hills once tilled by the hoe; they will become places for oxen to graze and sheep to trample.

  2. Isaiah 11:14 מִשְׁל֣וֹח [will be] [the] stretching out of

    They will swoop down on the slopes of the Philistines to the west; together they will plunder the sons of the east. They will lay their hands on Edom and Moab, and the Ammonites will be subject to them.

    Here: A noun from 'to send, stretch out'. Edom and Moab will be 'the reach of their hand': the territory they can put their hand on and take. Hebrew needs no verb 'will be' here.

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