Hebrew word · H4917

מִשְׁלַ֫חַת

mishlachat

deputation

A noun from shalach, 'to send (away), release'. It can mean a sending, a dispatch, or a release. The only other occurrence is Ps 78:49, 'a mishlachat of evil messengers', a sent band of destroyers. Here most lexicons (BDB, HALOT) give 'discharge, release' from military service.

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament.

What it means

1) discharge, sending, sending away, deputation

1a) discharge

1b) deputation

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 Ecclesiastes 8:8

Range of meaning

A noun from shalach, 'to send (away), release'. It can mean a sending, a dispatch, or a release. The only other occurrence is Ps 78:49, 'a mishlachat of evil messengers', a sent band of destroyers. Here most lexicons (BDB, HALOT) give 'discharge, release' from military service.

Against the English

KJV/WEB/YLT/NASB/ESV: 'discharge'. BSB/NIV: 'no one can be discharged in wartime'. NLT turns it into a metaphor ('no escaping that obligation'). KJV's added '[that] war' takes the war to be death itself.

Used elsewhere in the period

Israelite law allowed exemptions from war before a campaign began (Deut 20:5–8: a new house, a new vineyard, a betrothal, fear). Herodotus tells two Persian stories that show how ruthless refusals could be. Oeobazus asked Darius to leave one of his three sons at home, and Darius killed all three (Histories 4.84). Pythius the Lydian asked Xerxes to release his eldest son, and Xerxes had the son cut in two (7.38–39). The Septuagint translates apostolē, 'sending (away)'. The Vulgate paraphrases: 'nor is one allowed to rest when war presses on'.

Similar words

Where it appears

Psalms · 1

  1. Psalm 78:49 מִ֝שְׁלַ֗חַת a band of

    He unleashed His fury against them, wrath, indignation, and calamity—a band of destroying angels.

Ecclesiastes · 1

  1. Ecclesiastes 8:8 מִשְׁלַ֖חַת [is] discharge

    As no man has power over the wind to contain it, so no one has authority over his day of death. As no one can be discharged in wartime, so wickedness will not release those who practice it.

    Here: Built on the verb 'to send'. Here it most likely means being sent home or released from military service, or possibly sending someone else in your place. It occurs only here and in Ps 78:49.

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