To strike (lightly or severely, literally or figuratively)
Reading a lexicon entry
What this page is: Each lexicon entry shows the original Hebrew or Greek word behind the English translation: its meaning, its range of use, and where it appears in Scripture.
Strong's number: The Strong's code (H- or G-) is the standard reference number for this word. It connects this entry to chapter and passage language tabs.
Where it appears: The witness passages show where this word is used in context. Click any to open the study page for that passage.
This lexicon entry is part of our ongoing editorial review. If you notice missing content, unclear wording, or a possible correction, please send us a note through the Connect page. Screenshots are helpful.
נָכָה (nakah) is the Hebrew verb for striking — one of the OT's most frequent violent verbs, currently indexed about 502 times in the local Hebrew index and appearing chiefly in the Hiphil stem (hikah, to cause to be struck). It covers Moses striking the Egyptian, YHWH striking the Egyptians in the plagues, armies defeating enemies, and — most theologically — YHWH striking the Servant in Isaiah 53.
Reader summary
Full entry for נָכָה (H5221) · Open the biblical lexicon
נָכָה (nakah) is the Hebrew verb for striking — one of the OT's most frequent violent verbs, currently indexed about 502 times in the local Hebrew index and appearing chiefly in the Hiphil stem (hikah, to cause to be struck). It covers Moses striking the Egyptian, YHWH striking the Egyptians in the plagues, armies defeating enemies, and — most theologically.
The BSB source-word alignment has 499 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include struck down (18), and struck down (11), he struck down (10), killed (10), struck (10).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 4:15. Its strongest book concentrations include 2 Kings (55), 1 Samuel (52), 2 Samuel (47), Joshua (38).
This entry includes 2 verse guides that explain exact original-language forms in context.
נָכָה (nakah) is the Hebrew verb for striking — one of the OT's most frequent violent verbs, currently indexed about 502 times in the local Hebrew index and appearing chiefly in the Hiphil stem (hikah, to cause to be struck). It covers Moses striking the Egyptian, YHWH striking the Egyptians in the plagues, armies defeating enemies, and — most theologically — YHWH striking the Servant in Isaiah 53. The nakah-logic of the OT is that the one struck is under the power of the one striking, that judgment comes in the form of nakah, and that the most astonishing theological reversal in the OT is the nakah that falls on the innocent Servant in place of those who deserved it.
Exodus 12:12-13 is the foundational divine nakah: 'I will strike (hikah) all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and animal.' The Passover lamb's blood is the protection against the nakah — the striker passes over the marked houses. The nakah of the firstborn is the culminating plague judgment, concentrated and total. The Passover's protection from the nakah is the template for every subsequent blood-atonement: the nakah that should fall on the guilty is diverted by the substitutionary blood.
Isaiah 53:4 is the theological pivot of the entire OT's nakah theology: 'Yet we considered him struck (nakah) by God and afflicted.' The nakah the Servant receives is interpreted by the watching community as divine judgment on the Servant himself — a reasonable interpretation (the nakah of Exodus 12 was divine judgment). But the passage corrects this: 'surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows' (v. 4a). The nakah falls on the Servant for the many. The nakah of judgment hits the innocent one, and the many who deserved nakah are spared.
Zechariah 13:7 takes the nakah into explicit divine agency over the Servant-Shepherd: 'Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me, declares YHWH of hosts. Strike (hikah) the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.' YHWH commands the striking of the one who stands beside him — the shepherd and YHWH are in intimate proximity, and still the nakah command is given. Jesus quotes this verse at Gethsemane (Mark 14:27, Matt 26:31) as the interpretive frame for his arrest and the disciples' scattering.
For the preacher, נָכָה (nakah) makes the substitutionary question explicit: who is struck, and for whom?
נָכָה (nakah) is currently indexed about 502 times in the local Hebrew index. Exodus concentrates the divine nakah in the plagues and the Passover. The historical books use it for military victories and the striking of enemies. Samuel and Kings use it for the nakah of kings and the striking consequences of disobedience. Isaiah 53 gives nakah its most theologically concentrated and redemptive use: the Servant struck in the place of many.
Zechariah 13:7 commands the striking of the Shepherd. The word's theological range moves from judgment-nakah (deserved) to substitutionary-nakah (undeserved, borne for others).
Surely He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted.
The misread nakah: the watching community interprets the Servant's suffering as nakah Elohim (struck by God) — divine punishment for his own sin. This is the same reading that Job's friends apply to Job's suffering. The passage immediately corrects it: he was pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities (v. 5). The nakah is real — God is the agent — but the object is the Servant bearing the penalty owed by others.
The misreading of substitutionary nakah as deserved personal punishment is one of the OT's most important theological corrections.
The blood on the houses where you are staying will be a sign; when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No plague will fall on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
The Passover nakah diverted: the blood is the sign that redirects the striking. YHWH says 'when I see the blood, I will pass over (pasachti) you.' The nakah of the firstborn falls on those without the blood-sign; those behind the blood are passed over. The logic is the nakah-diversion by substitutionary blood — the lamb dies, the blood is applied, the household is spared.
This is the template that every subsequent blood-atonement text presupposes, and the NT's 'Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us' (1 Cor 5:7) names the ultimate nakah-diversion.
Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, against the man who is My Companion, declares the Lord of Hosts. Strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered, and I will turn My hand against the little ones.
The commanded nakah of the Shepherd: YHWH commands the sword to hikah his own shepherd, the man who is close to him (amiti, my associate/fellow). The intimacy between YHWH and the shepherd makes the commanded nakah the most astonishing nakah in the OT — the struck one is not the enemy but the one nearest to YHWH. Jesus applies this to his own arrest (Matt 26:31, Mark 14:27): the scattering of the disciples is the fulfillment of the scattered-sheep prophecy. The nakah of the Shepherd is YHWH's own act.
For by this time I could have stretched out My hand and struck you and your people with a plague to wipe you off the earth.
The YHWH-nakah as restrained judgment: 'I could have stretched out my hand and struck (hikah) you' — the nakah is available but held back for the purpose of divine name-proclamation (v. 16). The plagues are measured, sequential nakah-acts, not the full nakah that would have obliterated immediately. The restrained nakah creates the space for Pharaoh's repeated choice and for the display of divine power.
The logic of measured judgment nakah — severe enough to be real, restrained enough to allow response — is the OT's picture of divine patience in judgment.
Arise, O Lord! Save me, O my God! Strike all my enemies on the jaw; break the teeth of the wicked.
The nakah of enemies as deliverance: 'you have struck (hikah) all my enemies on the cheek.' The psalmist uses the perfect tense as a statement of certainty about what YHWH will do — the nakah of enemies is so sure that it is spoken as already accomplished. The cheek-striking was a formal act of humiliation and defeat in the ancient Near East. YHWH's nakah of the enemy is the positive side of nakah: when YHWH strikes the opponent, the one calling on YHWH is delivered.
The nakah that falls on the enemy in Psalm 3:7 is the nakah that the Servant bears in Isaiah 53 — the same word, opposite objects, both serving divine redemptive purposes.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Verse-level guides showing how this original-language form works in its specific context, including grammar, verse function, and guarded interpretation.
Hebrew word. Strike spans lethal violence to divine punishment; core notion is forceful impact with moral or consequential weight.
How the stem changes the meaning of this verb across the biblical text.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 2 selected witnesses from 502 lexical occurrence verses.
נָכָה is a primitive root - no further derivation.
Describes decisive divine action against Assyria. Isaiah 37:36-38
God’s striking represents disciplinary action intended to call his people to repentance. Isaiah 9:13-17
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
נָכָה (nakah) gives the preacher the OT's most honest reckoning with violence, judgment, and substitution. The nakah-strikes of the plagues are real divine judgment. The nakah of enemies in battle is real divine warfare. But Isaiah 53 redirects all of this: the nakah that judgment required fell on the Servant who did not deserve it. The preacher who avoids the nakah-word avoids the substitutionary exchange that makes the gospel coherent.
Why did Christ die? Because the nakah of judgment — deserved by the many — fell on the one. Zechariah 13:7's 'strike the shepherd' is the most concentrated form: YHWH himself commands the striking of the one who stands closest to him. The nakah is not an accident of history; it is a divine command with a redemptive purpose. For the congregation that struggles with why God would allow the cross, the OT's nakah theology is the necessary framework: the nakah was always the mechanism of substitutionary atonement, and the cross is the definitive nakah.
The Passover connection (Exod 12:13) gives the congregation the pattern: the blood diverts the nakah. Every person who stands behind the blood of the Passover Lamb is spared the nakah they deserved. This is not metaphor for the OT; it is the life-and-death structure of covenant rescue.
Isa.53.4
נָכָה (nakah) appears almost entirely in the Hiphil stem (hikah — to cause to be struck, to strike). The Qal form (to be struck, passive) appears less frequently. The noun form makkah (H4347, blow, wound, plague) is widely used for the plagues of Egypt and for wounds in battle. The word does not distinguish between levels of striking severity — the same verb covers a gentle slap (1 Kgs 22:24, slapping a prophet's cheek) and the annihilation of an army (1 Sam 14:31, striking the Philistines).
Context and object determine severity. Isaiah 53:4's nakah Elohim is grammatically a passive participle of nakah — 'struck of God,' a form that makes divine agency explicit. The NT's passion narrative uses several Greek verbs for striking: tupto (G5180, to beat), rhapisma (G4475, a slap), kolaphizo (G2852, to strike with the fist) — the physical reality of the nakah-nakah of the passion is concrete and total.
The NT's passion narrative is the sustained nakah of the Servant in Isaiah 53 made concrete. Matthew 26:67-68 — 'they struck him with their fists' (ekolaphisan) and 'some slapped him' (errapisan) — is the literal fulfillment of the stricken Servant. Matthew 26:31 quotes Zechariah 13:7 directly: 'Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.' First Peter 2:24 — 'by his wounds (mola, from G3468 molos, a bruise/nakah) you have been healed' — quotes Isaiah 53:5 directly, making the nakah-substitution explicit: he was nakah-d so we would be healed.
First Corinthians 5:7 ('Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed') applies the Exodus 12 nakah-diversion pattern: the nakah of judgment falls on the Lamb so that those behind the blood are passed over. Revelation's scene of the Lamb 'as though slain' (hos esphagmenon, Rev 5:6) is the eternal mark of the nakah — the wounds remain as the permanent sign of the substitutionary act.
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain