Hebrew word · H7811
שָׂחָה
'ascheh
to swim
To swim. It is rare: the basic form occurs in Isa 25:11 ('as a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim'), and a related noun means 'swimming water' (Ezek 47:5). The causative 'make swim' occurs only here.
Appears 3 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
1) to swim
1a) (Qal) swim (participle)
1b) (Hiphil) to make to swim
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
- Range of meaning
To swim. It is rare: the basic form occurs in Isa 25:11 ('as a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim'), and a related noun means 'swimming water' (Ezek 47:5). The causative 'make swim' occurs only here.
- Against the English
KJV 'make I my bed to swim' and NASB 'make my bed swim' keep the actual Hebrew picture. BSB, NIV, ESV and WEB 'flood' keep the overflow but lose the strange image of a bed afloat. YLT's 'I meditate' takes the word from a different, similar-looking root (śîaḥ, 'muse, complain'). Almost no one else reads it that way.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Isa 25:11 (swimmer). Ezek 47:5 ('waters to swim in'). Ancient translations treated it as an image of washing or wetting: the Greek Septuagint has louō 'wash', and the Vulgate has lavabo 'I will wash'.
From the study of Isaiah 25:11
- Range of meaning
To swim. Outside this verse the root shows up only in Ezekiel 47:5, 'water to swim in' (śāḥû), and possibly Psalm 6:6. Most Israelites lived inland, and swimming was not an everyday activity for them.
- Against the English
'Swimmer' may call up sport or leisure for a modern reader. In Isaiah it is a picture of struggling to survive, and given verse 10, it is struggling in a pool of manure.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Ezekiel 47:5. Assyrian palace reliefs show soldiers swimming across rivers, sometimes on inflated skins, so the motion was a known image of effort in water.
Where it appears
Psalms · 1
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Psalm 6:6 אַשְׂחֶ֣ה I make swim
I am weary from groaning; all night I flood my bed with weeping and drench my couch with tears.
Here: 'I make [it] swim.' This causative use of 'swim' occurs only here. The bed floats in his tears. The verb form points to something that happens over and over, night after night.
Isaiah · 2
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Isaiah 25:11 הַשֹּׂחֶ֖ה לִשְׂח֑וֹת <the> swimmer, to swim
He will spread out his hands within it, as a swimmer spreads his arms to swim. His pride will be brought low, despite the skill of his hands.
Here: 'The swimmer', a participle meaning 'one who swims'. Swimming is almost never mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. Inland Moab would not have pictured a sport here. They would have pictured someone flailing so as not to go under.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.