שָׁלָל

From the study of Proverbs 1:13

Range of meaning

Booty, spoil, plunder: goods, livestock and people seized from a defeated enemy after battle. Sometimes, more broadly, 'gain'.

Against the English

KJV 'spoil' now usually means 'ruin' or 'go bad' to a modern ear. 'Plunder' (BSB, WEB, NIV, ESV) is clear.

How it drifted

The English noun 'spoil(s)' = booty is now mostly limited to set phrases ('the spoils of war'). As a verb, 'spoil' = ruin is dominant.

Used elsewhere in the period

War-booty contexts: Gen 49:27; Judg 5:30 (Sisera's mother imagining the spoil); Isa 9:3 ('as men rejoice when they divide the spoil'). In Proverbs: 'better to be lowly in spirit with the poor than to divide spoil with the proud' (16:19). It is also used positively in 31:11: the husband of the strong woman 'will have no lack of shalal'. That is the book's closing, legitimate version of 'gain'.

From the study of Isaiah 9:3

Range of meaning

Spoil or booty: goods, livestock and valuables taken from a defeated enemy. 'Dividing the spoil' was a regulated custom that included shares for those who stayed behind with the baggage (1 Sam 30:24–25; Num 31:27).

Against the English

'Plunder' can sound like lawless looting to a modern ear. In this setting, sharing out the spoil was the lawful, communal end of a war that had been won.

Used elsewhere in the period

Judg 5:30 and Judg 8:24–26 (Gideon's victory over Midian, which 9:4 names directly). Ps 68:12 and Prov 16:19 also use 'dividing the spoil.' Isa 53:12 uses the same phrase of the Servant.

From the study of Isaiah 10:6

Range of meaning

šālāl: 'spoil, booty,' everything carried off after a victory, including goods, cattle and captives. baz (H0957): 'plunder, prey,' from bāzaz, 'to despoil.' The two are near-synonyms and often appear together.

Against the English

KJV, WEB: 'take the spoil… take the prey.' BSB: 'take spoils and seize plunder.' YLT keeps the doubled sound: 'to spoil spoil.' Most versions lose the sound-echo of verb and noun from the same root.

Used elsewhere in the period

Isaiah 8:1–4: the sign-name Maher-shalal-hash-baz ('Swift is the spoil, speedy the plunder'), given while Assyria was about to plunder Damascus and Samaria. Assyrian royal inscriptions list booty and deportees from conquered cities in exact numbers. Sargon II, for example, counts the people of Samaria carried off as spoil.