Hebrew word · H6075

עָפַל

vaiya'pilu

to presume

A rare root meaning 'to swell, bulge, rise up'. Related nouns: ʿōpel, 'mound, hill' (the Ophel hill of Jerusalem), and ʿŏpālîm, 'tumors, swellings' (1 Sam 5–6). As a verb it means 'to be presumptuous, overreach' (Num 14:44: Israel 'presumed' to go up into the hill country against God's word).

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

What it means

1) to lift up, swell, be lifted up

1a) (Pual) to swell

1b) (Hiphil) to be bold, be swelled

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 Habakkuk 2:4

Range of meaning

A rare root meaning 'to swell, bulge, rise up'. Related nouns: ʿōpel, 'mound, hill' (the Ophel hill of Jerusalem), and ʿŏpālîm, 'tumors, swellings' (1 Sam 5–6). As a verb it means 'to be presumptuous, overreach' (Num 14:44: Israel 'presumed' to go up into the hill country against God's word).

Against the English

'Puffed up' (WEB, ESV), 'lifted up' (KJV), 'proud one' (BSB) and 'presumptuous' (YLT) all catch the swelling. BSB turns it into a noun phrase ('the proud one'), which reads smoothly but hides that the swollen thing is the man's nefesh, his appetite or self.

Used elsewhere in the period

Num 14:44 is the closest parallel: overreaching action that defies God. The Septuagint renders the clause 'if he shrinks back', perhaps reading a similar-looking Hebrew word ʿullpāh, 'faint, cowering'. Jerome's Vulgate has 'he who is unbelieving'.

Where it appears

Numbers · 1

  1. Numbers 14:44 וַיַּעְפִּ֕לוּ and they presumed

    But they dared to go up to the ridge of the hill country, though neither Moses nor the ark of the covenant of the LORD moved from the camp.

Habakkuk · 1

  1. Habakkuk 2:4 עֻפְּלָ֔ה it is swollen

    Look at the proud one; his soul is not upright—but the righteous will live by faith—

    Here: 'It is swollen, puffed up.' The subject is the feminine noun nefesh ('appetite, self') later in the clause. The picture is a bulge or swelling: an ego or appetite inflated past its proper size. The verb is rare and its exact form here is debated.

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