Hebrew word · H7452

רֵעַ

rea'

shouting

A loud cry, shout or roar. It is related to the verb רוּעַ, "to shout, raise a war-cry or alarm" (used of the battle-shout and the trumpet blast).

Appears 3 times in 3 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. · Updated November 07, 2026

What it means

1) shouting, roar

1a) meaning uncertain

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

Range of meaning: A loud cry, shout or roar. It is related to the verb רוּעַ, "to shout, raise a war-cry or alarm" (used of the battle-shout and the trumpet blast).
Against the English: KJV "noise", BSB "thunder", ESV "crashing", and WEB "noise" all follow this sense. YLT and the ancient versions read the homonym רֵעַ "friend" instead.
Used elsewhere in the period: Exod 32:17 ("the noise of the people as they shouted", בְּרֵעֹה); Mic 4:9 ("why do you cry aloud?", תָּרִיעִי רֵעַ). The Septuagint and Vulgate both understood "friend" here, which shows the ambiguity is very old.

Exodus · 1

Exodus 32:17 בְּרֵע֑וֹ in shouting its

When Joshua heard the sound of the people shouting, he said to Moses, “The sound of war is in the camp.”

Job · 1

Job 36:33 רֵע֑וֹ roar his

The thunder declares His presence; even the cattle regard the rising storm.

Here: "His roar", the crash of thunder heard as God's voice. The word is rare (compare Exod 32:17; Mic 4:9). The same consonants spell the common word "his friend" (H7453). Ancient translators and the YLT took that route, but the storm setting of vv. 29–37:5 favours "roar".

Micah · 1

Micah 4:9 רֵ֑עַ shouting

Why do you now cry aloud? Is there no king among you? Has your counselor perished so that anguish grips you like a woman in labor?

Here: A rare noun from the same root as the verb, so the Hebrew says "shout a shout." The doubling intensifies the noise and makes an audible sound-play: tārîʿî rēaʿ.

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