Midvash

שָׁמַעshâmaʻ

שָׁמַע: hear

Pronunciation: shaw-mah' · Hebrew/Aramaic (Old Testament) · H8085

Meanings

Qal

1. subject human person (or thing personified)

a. hear, (perceive by ear) (Genesis 3:10; Amos 8:11; 1 Kings 5:14)

b. hear one speaking (Genesis 27:6; Jeremiah 26:7; Daniel 8:13)

c. with לֵאמֹר only, hear say = hear it said (1 Samuel 13:4; 2 Samuel 19:3; Deuteronomy 13:13)

d. hear of, concerning (Exodus 18:1; 2 Kings 19:11; 1 Samuel 3:11)

e. = have power to hear (2 Samuel 19:36; Isaiah 21:3; Isaiah 32:3)

f. hear with attention, interest, listen to (sometimes || חֶאֱןין) (Amos 4:1; Numbers 12:6; Isaiah 28:23)

g. understand, (language) (Genesis 11:7; Isaiah 33:19; Deuteronomy 28:49)

h. specifically of hearing a (judicial) case (Deuteronomy 1:17; Deuteronomy 1:16; Judges 11:10)

i. with accusative of person in polite address, hear us (me)! (Genesis 23:6; Genesis 23:8; Genesis 23:11)

j. listen, give heed, (sometimes || הִקְשִׁיב) (Genesis 42:21; Jeremiah 7:13; Ezekiel 2:5)

k. with אֶל person + listen to, yield to (Genesis 49:2; Judges 2:17; Jeremiah 7:26)

l. לְקוֺל ׳ שׁ = id., obey (Genesis 3:17; Judges 2:20; Exodus 15:26)

m. very often, בְּקוֺל ׳ שׁ = obey (1 Samuel 8:7; Deuteronomy 4:30; Jeremiah 3:13)

n. obey (Joshua 1:18; Jeremiah 11:3; 1 Kings 12:24)

o. be obedient, (especially to ׳ י) (Isaiah 1:19; Micah 5:14; Jeremiah 12:17)

2. ׳ י (God) subject

c. hear and foregive, help, hear be angry (Isaiah 59:2; Jeremiah 22:21; 1 Kings 8:30)

d. = be able to hear (Isaiah 59:1; Psalms 94:9)

e. בְּקוֺל ׳ שׁ = hear (and grant) (Genesis 30:6)

f. hear and answer (Genesis 21:7; Genesis 16:11; 1 Kings 8:28)

h. hear (Jeremiah 31:18; Micah 7:7; Genesis 17:20)

Niph`al

1. be heard, of voice, sound, etc. (1 Samuel 1:13; 1 Kings 6:7; Job 26:14)

2. be heard of (Deuteronomy 4:32)

3. be regarded, obeyed (Ecclesiastes 9:17; 2 Samuel 22:45; Psalms 18:45)

4. = (favourable) hearing was granted to their voice (2 Chronicles 30:27)

Pi`el: caused, to hear (1 Samuel 15:4; 1 Samuel 23:8)

Hiph`il

1. of man

a. cause to hear (Deuteronomy 30:12; Deuteronomy 30:13; Song of Solomon 2:14)

b. sound aloud, absolute as musical term (1 Chronicles 15:19; Psalms 67:1-200; 1 Chronicles 16:5)

c. absolute make proclamation (often || הִגִּיד) (Amos 3:9; Amos 4:5; Isaiah 41:26)

d. = summon (Jeremiah 50:29; Jeremiah 51:27)

2. ׳ י subject

a. cause to hear (Deuteronomy 4:10; Deuteronomy 4:36; 2 Kings 7:6)

b. = tell (Judges 13:23; Isaiah 42:9; Isaiah 48:3)

c. absolute, make proclamation (Isaiah 43:12; Isaiah 62:11)

: hear

Pe`al: = have sense of hearing (Daniel 6:15; Daniel 5:14; Daniel 5:16)

Hithpe`el: shew oneself obedient (Daniel 7:27)

Same root

Where it appears

Appears 1,159 times in the Bible.

  • Genesis 3:8 When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees.
  • Genesis 3:10 He replied, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.”
  • Genesis 3:17 And to the man he said, “Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.
  • Genesis 4:23 One day Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, hear my voice; listen to me, you wives of Lamech. I have killed a man who attacked me, a young man who wounded me.
  • Genesis 11:7 Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.”
  • Genesis 14:14 When Abram heard that his nephew Lot had been captured, he mobilized the 318 trained men who had been born into his household. Then he pursued Kedorlaomer’s army until he caught up with them at Dan.
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).