Hebrew word · H6878
צֹ֫רֶךְ
tzarekekha
need
Need, requirement, what is necessary. It occurs only here in the Hebrew Bible. In later Hebrew, such as the Mishnah, it is a common word, as in the phrase letsorekh, "for the need of".
Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
need
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 2 Chronicles 2:16
- Range of meaning
Need, requirement, what is necessary. It occurs only here in the Hebrew Bible. In later Hebrew, such as the Mishnah, it is a common word, as in the phrase letsorekh, "for the need of".
- Against the English
"As much as you need" (KJV, WEB), "as many as you need" (BSB) and "according to all thy need" (YLT) are all accurate.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Where 1 Kings 5:8–9 has Hiram offer to do "all your desire (חֵפֶץ, chefets)", Chronicles uses this later word. Scholars count this among the features of later Biblical Hebrew in Chronicles. It fits the book's date in the Persian or early Hellenistic period.
Where it appears
2 Chronicles · 1
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2 Chronicles 2:16 צָרְכֶּ֔ךָ need your
We will cut logs from Lebanon, as many as you need, and we will float them to you as rafts by sea down to Joppa. Then you can take them up to Jerusalem.”
Here: "Your need": the amount actually required. The noun appears only here in the Hebrew Bible, though it is common in later Hebrew. The parallel in 1 Kings 5:8 has "all your desire" instead.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.