Hebrew word · H5537

סָלָא

hamsula'im

to weigh

From a root meaning 'to weigh, to balance against', and so 'to value or price by weighing'. The passive form here means 'those who were weighed out against' something, i.e. priced in it. It appears only here.

Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

1) to weigh, compare

1a) (Pual)

1a1) to be weighed

1a2) weighed (participle)

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 Lamentations 4:2

Range of meaning

From a root meaning 'to weigh, to balance against', and so 'to value or price by weighing'. The passive form here means 'those who were weighed out against' something, i.e. priced in it. It appears only here. Its near-twin סָלָה (sālâ) is used the same way in Job 28:16, 19: wisdom 'cannot be valued (weighed) against the gold of Ophir.'

Against the English

KJV and WEB say 'comparable to fine gold', which sounds like a resemblance. BSB (and NIV-style versions) say 'worth their weight in gold', which keeps the weighing. NASB-style 'weighed against fine gold' is the most literal.

How it drifted

'Comparable' once meant 'fit to be set beside, equal in worth'. Today it tends to mean 'similar', which loses the picture of a merchant's scales.

Used elsewhere in the period

Job 28:15–19 puts the same weighing verb in a cluster of gold-and-jewel valuation terms (paz, ketem, Ophir gold). The Greek Septuagint appears to have taken the word differently, as 'lifted up / exalted in gold'. The Latin Vulgate has 'clothed in the best gold' (amicti auro primo). Both show that early translators found this rare word difficult.

Where it appears

Lamentations · 1

  1. Lamentations 4:2 הַמְסֻלָּאִ֖ים who were weighed

    How the precious sons of Zion, once worth their weight in pure gold, are now esteemed as jars of clay, the work of a potter’s hands!

    Here: A passive verb form meaning 'those who were weighed out against', that is, priced in gold. This is the only use of this spelling of the root in the Bible. It matches Job 28:16, 19, where wisdom 'cannot be weighed against' the gold of Ophir. It is the language of the scales in a marketplace.

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