Hebrew word · H5595
סָפָה
sefot
to snatch
To sweep away, snatch away, carry off. In the passive: be swept away, perish, be carried off together with others in a disaster (BDB, HALOT).
Appears 19 times in 19 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
1) to sweep or snatch away, catch up, destroy, consume
1a) (Qal)
1a1) to be snatched away
1a2) to sweep or snatch away
1b) (Niphal)
1b1) to be swept away, be destroyed
1b2) to be caught up, be captured
1c) (Hiphil) to catch up, gather
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 Genesis 19:17
- Range of meaning
To sweep away, snatch away, carry off. In the passive: be swept away, perish, be carried off together with others in a disaster (BDB, HALOT).
- Against the English
KJV, WEB and YLT have 'consumed'. BSB, ESV, NIV, NASB and NLT have 'swept away'. 'Swept away' is closer.
- How it drifted
'Consume' in 1611 English meant 'destroy, bring to an end'. With fire raining down in the next verses, modern readers hear 'burned up', which is not what the verb pictures.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Gen 18:23–24: Abraham asks, 'Will you indeed sweep away (tispeh) the righteous with the wicked?' Gen 19:15: 'lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city'. Num 16:26: 'lest you be swept away in all their sins'. 1 Sam 12:25: 'you shall be swept away, you and your king'.
From the study of Numbers 16:26
- Range of meaning
Active: to sweep away, snatch away, wipe out. Passive (Niphal, as here): to be swept away, to perish suddenly, often of people caught up in a judgment aimed at others.
- Against the English
BSB, NIV, ESV, NASB: 'swept away' (close). KJV, WEB, YLT: 'consumed', which suggests fire or being eaten up and loses the picture of being swept off together with others.
- How it drifted
KJV-era 'consume' meant broadly 'destroy', but readers now hear burning. Numbers 16:35, where fire does 'consume' the 250 men (a different Hebrew verb, 'akal), strengthens the confusion.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Gen 18:23–24: 'Will you indeed sweep away (tispeh) the righteous with the wicked (rasha')?'; Gen 19:15: 'lest you be swept away (pen-tissafeh) in the iniquity of the city', almost the same wording as here; 1 Sam 12:25: 'you shall be swept away, you and your king'.
From the study of Genesis 18:23
- Range of meaning
Sweep away, snatch away, carry off, destroy wholesale. HALOT and BDB treat it separately from a similar-sounding root meaning 'add'. It describes sudden collective ruin.
- Against the English
KJV 'destroy' is accurate but general. WEB and YLT 'consume' suggest fire or devouring, which suits the later fire on Sodom but is not quite the word's picture. 'Sweep away' (BSB, and most modern versions) keeps the sense of everyone taken off together in one stroke.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Gen 19:15, 17: 'lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city'. Num 16:26: 'lest you be swept away with all their sins' (Korah). 1 Sam 12:25: 'you will be swept away, you and your king'. In every case the danger is being caught up in someone else's judgment.
Where it appears
Genesis · 4
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Genesis 18:23 תִּסְפֶּ֔ה will you sweep away
Abraham stepped forward and said, “Will You really sweep away the righteous with the wicked?
Here: Second-person imperfect: 'will you sweep away'. It pictures everyone carried off together in one blow, the way the angels later warn Lot 'lest you be swept away' (19:15, 17).
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Genesis 18:24 תִּסְפֶּה֙ will you sweep [it] away
What if there are fifty righteous ones in the city? Will You really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous ones who are there?
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Genesis 19:15 תִּסָּפֶ֖ה you should be swept away
At daybreak the angels hurried Lot along, saying, “Get up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away in the punishment of the city.”
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Genesis 19:17 תִּסָּפֶֽה׃ you should be swept away
As soon as the men had brought them out, one of them said, “Run for your lives! Do not look back, and do not stop anywhere on the plain! Flee to the mountains, or you will be swept away!”
Here: 'You will be swept away, carried off along with the rest.' It is the same verb Abraham used when he pleaded, 'Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?' (18:23–24), and the angels used in 19:15.
Numbers · 2
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Numbers 16:26 תִּסָּפ֖וּ you should be swept away
And he warned the congregation, “Move away now from the tents of these wicked men. Do not touch anything that belongs to them, or you will be swept away because of all their sins.”
Here: Passive: 'be swept away, be snatched off, be wiped out.' It is the same verb Abraham used asking whether God would 'sweep away the righteous with the wicked' (Gen 18:23), and the angels used warning Lot (Gen 19:15).
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Numbers 32:14 לִסְפּ֣וֹת to add
Now behold, you, a brood of sinners, have risen up in place of your fathers to further stoke the burning anger of the LORD against Israel.
Here: "To add, to heap on." The supplied dictionary gloss "snatch" belongs to a different use of these letters; "add" is what fits here. The form can express either aim or result, so it need not mean they intend to anger God.
Deuteronomy · 2
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Deuteronomy 29:19 סְפ֥וֹת to sweep away
because when such a person hears the words of this oath, he invokes a blessing on himself, saying, ‘I will have peace, even though I walk in the stubbornness of my own heart.’ This will bring disaster on the watered land as well as the dry.
Here: 'To sweep away, destroy wholesale.' It is the verb Abraham uses at Sodom: 'Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?' (Gen 18:23). That echo fits, because verse 23 here goes on to name Sodom and Gomorrah.
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Deuteronomy 32:23 אַסְפֶּ֥ה I will catch up
I will heap disasters upon them; I will spend My arrows against them.
Here: God speaks in the first person: "I will pile up / sweep together." The verb is unusual here, and the same consonants may mean "I will add" or "I will gather". Whichever is right, the picture is disaster gathered into a heap and dumped on the people.
1 Samuel · 3
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1 Samuel 12:25 תִּסָּפֽוּ׃ פ you will be swept away
But if you persist in doing evil, both you and your king will be swept away.”
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1 Samuel 26:10 וְנִסְפָּֽה׃ and he will be carried away
David added, “As surely as the LORD lives, the LORD Himself will strike him down; either his day will come and he will die, or he will go into battle and perish.
Here: Passive: 'be swept away, snatched off, perish.' The picture is being carried off by a force bigger than yourself. Samuel used the same verb in his warning to Israel and its king (12:25).
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1 Samuel 27:1 אֶסָּפֶ֥ה I will be swept away
David, however, said to himself, “One of these days now I will be swept away by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than to escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will stop searching for me all over Israel, and I will slip out of his hand.”
Here: A passive form meaning to be carried off, wiped out, or finished. It is the same word David used one chapter earlier about Saul's own end (26:10). Now he turns it on himself.
1 Chronicles · 1
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1 Chronicles 21:12 נִסְפֶּ֥ה being swept away
between three years of famine, three months of being swept away before your enemies and overtaken by their swords, or three days of the sword of the LORD—days of plague upon the land, with the angel of the LORD ravaging every part of Israel.’ Now then, decide how I should reply to Him who sent me.”
Here: A passive participle, 'being swept away'. It describes an ongoing state of being carried off and destroyed. It is the same verb as Abraham's 'Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?' (Gen 18:23). The parallel in Samuel has 'fleeing' instead.
Psalms · 1
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Psalm 40:14 לִסְפּ֫וֹתָ֥הּ to snatch away it
May those who seek my life be ashamed and confounded; may those who wish me harm be repelled and humiliated.
Here: 'To sweep it away' or 'snatch it off.' The 'it' refers back to 'my life.' The picture is of being carried off or wiped out all at once. This states plainly that the enemies mean to kill.
Proverbs · 1
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Proverbs 13:23 נִ֝סְפֶּ֗ה [is what] is swept away
Abundant food is in the fallow ground of the poor, but without justice it is swept away.
Isaiah · 3
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Isaiah 7:20 תִּסְפֶּֽה׃ ס it will sweep away
On that day the Lord will use a razor hired from beyond the Euphrates—the king of Assyria—to shave your head and the hair of your legs, and to remove your beard as well.
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Isaiah 13:15 הַנִּסְפֶּ֖ה <the> [one who] is captured
Whoever is caught will be stabbed, and whoever is captured will die by the sword.
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Isaiah 30:1 סְפ֥וֹת to add
“Woe to the rebellious children,” declares the LORD, “to those who carry out a plan that is not Mine, who form an alliance, but against My will, heaping up sin upon sin.
Here: 'To add on', as in Numbers 32:14. It pictures sin stacked on sin.
Jeremiah · 1
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Jeremiah 12:4 סָפְתָ֤ה it has dwindled away
How long will the land mourn and the grass of every field be withered? Because of the evil of its residents, the animals and birds have been swept away, for the people have said, “He cannot see what our end will be.”
Here: “Has been swept away / has perished”. The perfect form presents the loss of animals as already done. The singular feminine verb treats “beast and bird” as one collective.
Amos · 1
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Amos 3:15 וְסָפ֛וּ and people will snatch away
I will tear down the winter house along with the summer house; the houses of ivory will also perish, and the great houses will come to an end,” declares the LORD.
Here: The houses themselves are the subject: they 'come to an end', or 'are swept away'. The supplied data files the word under ספה, 'sweep away / snatch away', while BDB and the KJV-keyed concordance file it under סוף, 'come to an end'. The meaning is nearly the same either way: the houses cease to exist.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.