גּוֹרָלgôwrâl

properly, a pebble, i.e. a lot (small stones being used for that purpose); figuratively, a portion or destiny (as if determined by lot)

Pronunciation: go-rawl' · Hebrew/Aramaic (Old Testament) · H1486

Meanings

a lot

1. lot, for dividing land, especially that which Joshua cast at Shiloh (Joshua 18:6; Joshua 18:8; Joshua 18:10)

2. lot, for assigning to service, duty or punishment

c. cast lots (Nehemiah 1:11)

f. to determine guilty persons (Jonah 1:7; Jonah 1:17; Ezekiel 24:6)

3. thing assigned, apportioned, allotted, especially of land assigned by lot (Joshua 15:1; Joshua 17:1; Joshua 21:38)

4. portion, = recompence, retribution (Isaiah 17:14; Jeremiah 13:25)

Same root

Where it appears

Appears 77 times in the Bible.

  • Leviticus 16:8 He is to cast sacred lots to determine which goat will be reserved as an offering to the Lord and which will carry the sins of the people to the wilderness of Azazel.
  • Leviticus 16:9 Aaron will then present as a sin offering the goat chosen by lot for the Lord.
  • Leviticus 16:10 The other goat, the scapegoat chosen by lot to be sent away, will be kept alive, standing before the Lord. When it is sent away to Azazel in the wilderness, the people will be purified and made right with the Lord.
  • Numbers 26:55 But you must assign the land by lot, and give land to each ancestral tribe according to the number of names on the list.
  • Numbers 26:56 Each grant of land must be assigned by lot among the larger and smaller tribal groups.”
  • Numbers 33:54 You must distribute the land among the clans by sacred lot and in proportion to their size. A larger portion of land will be allotted to each of the larger clans, and a smaller portion will be allotted to each of the smaller clans. The decision of the sacred lot is final. In this way, the portions of land will be divided among your ancestral tribes.
See every passage

Source: Brown, Driver and Briggs, Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), public domain; markup by unfoldingWord, CC BY (github.com/unfoldingWord/Brown-Driver-Briggs-Enhanced).