What does שָׁכַח (šāḵaḥ) mean in the Bible?
The Hebrew verb šākaḥ is a warning word — one of the Old Testament's most urgent. To forget, in the biblical vocabulary, is not a cognitive failure like misplacing a name; it is a covenantal catastrophe.
Hebrew · H7911
שָׁכַח
To mislay , i.e. to be oblivious of, from want of memory or attention
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שָׁכַח H7911
Pronunciation šāḵaḥ
What does שָׁכַח (šāḵaḥ) mean in the Bible?
The Hebrew verb šākaḥ is a warning word — one of the Old Testament's most urgent. To forget, in the biblical vocabulary, is not a cognitive failure like misplacing a name; it is a covenantal catastrophe.
Reader summary
Full entry for שָׁכַח (H7911) · Open the biblical lexicon
Questions this entry answers
How does the BSB render H7911?
The BSB source-word alignment has 102 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include forget (25), and forget (4), be forgotten (4), will be forgotten (4), forgotten (3).
Where does שָׁכַח (šāḵaḥ) appear in Scripture?
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 27:45. Its strongest book concentrations include Psalms (33), Deuteronomy (14), Jeremiah (13), Isaiah (10).
What This Word Actually Means
The Hebrew verb šākaḥ is a warning word — one of the Old Testament's most urgent. To forget, in the biblical vocabulary, is not a cognitive failure like misplacing a name; it is a covenantal catastrophe. Across Deuteronomy, the Psalms, and the prophets, forgetting God is presented as the root of Israel's idolatry, injustice, and exile. The logic is consistent: prosperity loosens the grip of memory, and memory is what holds Israel to Yahweh when circumstances would pull toward other allegiances.
Hosea 13:6 crystallizes the pattern: 'They were filled, and their heart was exalted. Therefore they have forgotten me.' Deuteronomy returns to the danger of šākaḥ more than any other book, precisely because Moses is preparing Israel for the abundance of Canaan — the very context in which forgetting is most seductive. The counterpart of šākaḥ in the OT is zākar (to remember), and together they define a fundamental axis of covenant fidelity.
To remember God's acts is to trust him; to forget them is to drift toward the idols that fill the vacuum. But the word also operates in the direction of divine forgetting: God promises not to forget his people even when they feel abandoned (Isa. 49:15), and his forgiveness is described as not remembering sin — which is a gift the creature cannot manufacture for themselves.
source_lexicon
How the Bible Uses It
šākaḥ is locally indexed at about 102 H7911 occurrences in the Hebrew Bible, with its most theologically significant concentration in Deuteronomy (warning Israel not to forget Yahweh in prosperity), the Psalms (both the warning against forgetting and the resolve to remember), and the prophets (diagnosing Israel's idolatry as spiritual amnesia). The word also appears in the wisdom literature as a caution about the forgotten poor.
- Deut.6.12
Be careful not to forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
The Deuteronomy pattern in its clearest form: the warning immediately follows the promise of abundance (6:10-11). Canaan's blessing is the precise moment of maximum forgetting-risk. Moses understands that comfort is more spiritually dangerous than affliction, because affliction drives Israel to remember who delivered them. The imperative 'beware' (hiššāmer) shows that šākaḥ is not an involuntary process but a neglect that requires active resistance.
- Deut.8.14
Then your heart will become proud, and you will forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
Deuteronomy 8 is the fullest treatment: the full goodness of the land (8:7-10), the warning about a lifted heart (8:14), and the diagnosis that forgetting leads to the illusion of self-sufficiency ('My power and the might of my hand has gotten me this wealth,' 8:17). Forgetting God produces an inflated self — a theological observation with piercing contemporary relevance.
- Hosea.13.6
According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted. Therefore they have forgotten me.
Hosea's diagnosis of Israel's spiritual state in a single verse: satiation leads to pride, and pride leads to šākaḥ. The sequence is pastoral and practical — this is not a sudden apostasy but a gradual drift enabled by prosperity. Hosea names the mechanism that Deuteronomy's warnings were designed to prevent.
- Ps.103.2
Bless the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all His kind deeds—
Psalm 103's opening is a counterweight to šākaḥ: it commands the soul not to forget. The list of benefits that follows (forgiveness, healing, redemption, loving-kindness, satisfaction) is the content of what Israel must hold in memory. The psalm suggests that praise is the primary practice by which šākaḥ is resisted — to praise is to recite what God has done, which is to remember it.
- Isa.49.15
“Can a woman forget her nursing child, or lack compassion for the son of her womb? Even if she could forget, I will not forget you!
The divine šākaḥ statement, deployed in reverse: God uses the most powerful human image of unforgetting (a nursing mother who cannot ignore her infant) and then transcends it. Even this most tenacious human memory can fail; God's memory of his people cannot. This is the pastoral consolation at the bottom of Israel's exile experience — the God who commands Israel not to forget him is himself unable to forget them.
Passage contextBook contextCanonical parallel
Source Word Evidence
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders It forget 25× Deuteronomy 4:9, Deuteronomy 4:23, Deuteronomy 4:31, Deuteronomy 9:7
and forget 4× Deuteronomy 24:19, Psalms 44:24, Proverbs 31:5, Proverbs 31:7
be forgotten 4× Psalms 9:18, Jeremiah 20:11, Jeremiah 23:40, Jeremiah 50:5
will be forgotten 4× Genesis 41:30, Ecclesiastes 2:16, Isaiah 23:15, Isaiah 65:16
forgotten 3× Psalms 77:9, Psalms 119:153, Psalms 119:176
have forgotten me 3× Job 19:14, Jeremiah 2:32, Jeremiah 18:15
they forgot 3× Judges 3:7, Psalms 78:11, Psalms 106:21
you have forgotten 3× Isaiah 17:10, Ezekiel 22:12, Ezekiel 23:35
forgot 2× Psalms 106:13, Jeremiah 23:27
has forgotten 2× Psalms 10:11, Hosea 8:14
to forget 2× Deuteronomy 6:12, Deuteronomy 8:11
will forget 2× Job 11:16, Psalms 59:11
. . . 1× Deuteronomy 8:19
[and] forgotten 1× Jeremiah 3:21
and forgets 1× Proverbs 2:17
and he forgets 1× Genesis 27:45
and they were praised 1× Ecclesiastes 8:10
and you will forget 1× Deuteronomy 8:14
But they forgot 1× 1 Samuel 12:9
But you have forgotten 1× Isaiah 51:13
cease to function 1× Psalms 137:5
could forget 1× Isaiah 49:15
disregard 1× Psalms 74:23
forget you 1× Isaiah 49:15
forgets them 1× Job 24:20
forgetting 1× Psalms 78:7
forgetting [Your maidservant] 1× 1 Samuel 1:11
forgotten You 1× Psalms 44:17
has forgotten me 1× Isaiah 49:14
has made Zion forget 1× Lamentations 2:6
have forgotten 1× Jeremiah 30:14
Have you forgotten 1× Jeremiah 44:9
have You forgotten me 1× Psalms 42:9
have You forgotten us 1× Lamentations 5:20
He does not ignore 1× Psalms 9:12
he forgot all about him 1× Genesis 40:23
I am forgotten 1× Psalms 31:12
I forget you 1× Psalms 137:5
I will forget 1× Job 9:27
in places forgotten 1× Job 28:4
it will not be forgotten 1× Deuteronomy 31:21
O forgotten 1× Isaiah 23:16
of them is forgotten 1× Ecclesiastes 9:5
or forgotten 1× Deuteronomy 26:13
She forgets 1× Job 39:15
she forgot 1× Hosea 2:13
Since you have forgotten 1× Hosea 4:6
they forgot Me 1× Hosea 13:6
they have forgotten 1× Jeremiah 50:6
we had forgotten 1× Psalms 44:20
who forget 1× Job 8:13
Will You forget 1× Psalms 13:1
you ever forget 1× Deuteronomy 8:19
you forgot 1× Deuteronomy 32:18
you have forgotten Me 1× Jeremiah 13:25
you who forget 1× Psalms 50:22
you will forget 1× Isaiah 54:4
Show sample aligned rows
Genesis 27:45 וְשָׁכַח֙ to and he forgets Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Conjunctive perfect - third person masculine singular Genesis 40:23 וַיִּשְׁכָּחֵֽהוּ׃פ to he forgot all about him Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular | third person masculine singular Genesis 41:30 וְנִשְׁכַּ֥ח to will be forgotten Conjunctive waw | Verb - Nifal - Conjunctive perfect - third person masculine singular Deuteronomy 4:9 תִּשְׁכַּ֨ח to forget Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine singular Deuteronomy 4:23 תִּשְׁכְּחוּ֙ to forget Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine plural Deuteronomy 4:31 יִשְׁכַּח֙ to forget Verb - Qal - Imperfect - third person masculine singular Deuteronomy 6:12 תִּשְׁכַּ֖ח to to forget Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine singular Deuteronomy 8:11 תִּשְׁכַּ֖ח to to forget Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine singular Deuteronomy 8:14 וְשָֽׁכַחְתָּ֙ to and you will forget Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Conjunctive perfect - second person masculine singular Deuteronomy 8:19 שָׁכֹ֤חַ to you ever forget Verb - Qal - Infinitive absolute
Usage map
A compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
First aligned row Genesis 27:45
Aligned rows 102
Books represented 15
Genesis 3 Deuteronomy 14 Judges 1 1 Samuel 2 2 Kings 1 Job 7 Psalms 33 Proverbs 5 Ecclesiastes 3 Isaiah 10 Jeremiah 13 Lamentations 2 Ezekiel 2 Hosea 5 Amos 1
Source forms
שָׁכָֽחְתִּי׃ 7x šā·ḵā·ḥə·tî Deuteronomy 26:13, Psalms 119:61, Psalms 119:83, Psalms 119:109
תִּשְׁכַּ֥ח 4x tiš·kaḥ Psalms 10:12, Psalms 74:19, Psalms 137:5, Proverbs 4:5
שָׁכְח֖וּ 3x šā·ḵə·ḥū Psalms 119:139, Jeremiah 3:21, Jeremiah 50:6
תִּשְׁכַּ֖ח 3x tiš·kaḥ Deuteronomy 6:12, Deuteronomy 8:11, Psalms 44:24
אֶשְׁכַּ֣ח 2x ’eš·kaḥ Psalms 119:16, Psalms 119:93
אֶשְׁכַּ֥ח 2x ’eš·kaḥ Hosea 4:6, Amos 8:7
הֲתִשְׁכַּ֤ח 2x hă·ṯiš·kaḥ Isaiah 49:15, Jeremiah 2:32
וְיִשְׁכַּ֣ח 2x wə·yiš·kaḥ Proverbs 31:5, Proverbs 31:7
Parsing patterns
Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine singular 14x Deuteronomy 4:9, Deuteronomy 6:12, Deuteronomy 8:11, Deuteronomy 8:19
Verb - Qal - Perfect - first person common singular 8x Deuteronomy 26:13, Psalms 102:4, Psalms 119:61, Psalms 119:83
Verb - Qal - Perfect - third person common plural 6x Psalms 106:13, Psalms 106:21, Psalms 119:139, Jeremiah 3:21
Verb - Nifal - Imperfect - third person feminine singular 4x Deuteronomy 31:21, Jeremiah 20:11, Jeremiah 23:40, Jeremiah 50:5
Verb - Qal - Imperfect - first person common singular 4x Psalms 119:16, Psalms 119:93, Hosea 4:6, Amos 8:7
Verb - Qal - Perfect - second person feminine singular 4x Isaiah 17:10, Jeremiah 13:25, Ezekiel 22:12, Ezekiel 23:35
Verb - Qal - Perfect - third person common plural | first person common singular 4x Job 19:14, Jeremiah 2:32, Jeremiah 18:15, Hosea 13:6
Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - second person masculine singular 3x Deuteronomy 32:18, Isaiah 51:13, Hosea 4:6
Using This Word Well
Be careful not to...
- The biblical warning against 'forgetting God' is not a call to constant anxious introspection about whether one is being sufficiently God-aware. The Deuteronomic strategy against šākaḥ is communal and liturgical — regular recitation of God's acts, celebration of appointed feasts, transmission to children — not private psychological vigilance. Practical structures of memory (worship, scripture reading, the Lord's Supper, Christian community) are the Bible's own prescribed antidote.
Avoid claiming...
- Do not claim that God 'forgets' sin in Isaiah 43:25 in the same way humans forget information — the theological claim is that God chooses not to hold sin against the forgiven, not that he loses access to the information. Divine 'forgetting' of sin is a metaphor for the completeness of forgiveness, not a statement about divine omniscience.
- Do not claim that prosperity is inherently spiritually dangerous in a way that requires Christians to avoid it — Deuteronomy's warning is that prosperity creates conditions in which forgetting is easy, not that prosperity is itself sinful. The command is to build structures of memory, not to flee abundance.
Evidence Summary
Hebrew word. Forgetting as moral negligence, not mere memory loss—inattention to covenant and relationship with God.
Strong's H7911
Lexical occurrences 102 verses Word forms 3 forms 65 references Verse guides 0 guides
Study link Hosea 13:1-8 Source Gloss
to mislay , i.e. to be oblivious of, from want of memory or attention
Extended definition Source: Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon + Brown-Driver-Briggs
Forgetting as moral negligence, not mere memory loss—inattention to covenant and relationship with God.
to mislay, i.e. to be oblivious of, from want of memory or attention BDB: forget Usage: × at all, (cause to) forget.
Grammatical Forms
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.
Form groups 3 Aligned forms 65
Qal basic active stem — the word in its most common, direct sense 54×
Perfect Deut 26:13 · Ps 102:5 · Ps 119:61 · Ps 119:83 · Ps 119:109 · Ps 119:141 · Ps 119:153 · Ps 119:176 · Jer 3:21 · Jer 23:27 · Jer 50:6 · Ps 106:13 · Ps 106:21 · Ps 119:139 · Ezek 22:12 · Ezek 23:35 23×
Imperfect 1Sam 1:11 · Deut 4:9 · Deut 6:12 · Deut 8:11 · Deut 8:19 · Deut 25:19 · Job 11:16 · Ps 44:25 · Amos 8:7 · Hos 4:6 · Ps 119:16 · Ps 119:93 · 2Kgs 17:38 · Deut 4:23 · Ps 59:12 · Ps 78:7 20×
Jussive Deut 9:7 · Prov 3:1 · Prov 4:5 · Ps 10:12 · Ps 74:19 · Ps 74:23 · Ps 103:2 7×
Participle active Job 8:13 · Ps 50:22 2×
Infinitive absolute Deut 8:19 1×
Cohortative Job 9:27 1×
Niphal passive or reflexive — the subject receives or experiences the action 10×
Imperfect Deut 31:21 · Jer 20:11 · Jer 23:40 · Jer 50:5 · Ps 9:19 5×
Perfect Eccl 2:16 · Eccl 9:5 · Isa 65:16 · Ps 31:13 4×
Participle active Isa 23:16 1×
Piel intensive active — emphasizes thoroughness or repeated action 1×
Perfect Lam 2:6 1×
Selected Scripture Witnesses
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Old Testament Witnesses
to forget
to forget
To neglect or disregard intentionally.
To be overlooked or lose prominence.
To forget or neglect.
Showing 5 selected witnesses from 102 lexical occurrence verses.
Word Origins
שָׁכַח is a primitive root - no further derivation.
Why This Word Matters
Spiritual neglect stands at the root of Israel’s coming loss. Hosea 13:1-8
Tyre’s obscurity underscores the humbling effect of divine judgment. Hosea 4:4-10
Contrasts human perception with divine faithfulness. Isaiah 17:9-11
Spiritual amnesia underlying idolatry. Isaiah 23:15-18
Forgetting Torah triggers covenant curse. Isaiah 49:14-21
Canonical Themes
Part of These Phrases
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
For the Preacher and Teacher
šākaḥ teaches the preacher that the opposite of faith is not doubt — it is amnesia. The OT's consistent diagnosis of Israel's spiritual failure is not theological error or deliberate rebellion (though those appear too), but forgetting. They forgot who brought them out of Egypt. They forgot his wonders. They forgot the covenant. The implication for preaching is that one of the most important pastoral tasks is helping people remember: what has God done, what has he promised, who has he shown himself to be?
Deuteronomy's strategy against šākaḥ is relentless liturgical memory: recite it, teach it to your children, write it on your doorposts, repeat it when you sit down and when you rise up. Memory is not automatic — it requires structure, community, and practice. The sermon is, among other things, a counter-amnesia exercise. But šākaḥ also opens the remarkable promise of Isaiah 49:15 — the God who commands memory of himself is the God who cannot forget his people.
That asymmetry is the theological ground of pastoral assurance: even when we forget him, he does not forget us. The gospel moves in that direction.
Anchor passage
Deut.6.12
Doctrinal connections
- H2142 Zākar — to remember; the counterpart verb; zākar and šākaḥ together define the memory-axis of covenant fidelity
- H2617 Chesed — covenant love; the content of what must not be forgotten; God's steadfast love is what šākaḥ erases
- H1285 Bĕrît — covenant; the relational framework within which forgetting is a covenantal failure, not merely a cognitive one
- Deut. 4:9-10 and 8:11-18 — the fullest Deuteronomic warning against šākaḥ and its spiritual consequences
- Ps. 103 — the psalm structured as a counter to šākaḥ through active praise of divine benefits
- Isa. 49:15 — the great reversal: God declares that his memory of his people cannot fail even when theirs fails him
šākaḥ is the counterpart to zākar (H2142, to remember), and the two verbs together define one of the most theologically productive antitheses in the Hebrew Bible. In the covenant framework, to remember is to act faithfully in accordance with relationship; to forget is to neglect that relationship to the point of acting as if it does not exist. This is stronger than cognitive memory/forgetfulness — it is relational presence or absence.
God 'remembers' Noah (Gen. 8:1), meaning he acts on Noah's behalf; Israel 'forgets' God, meaning they live as though he has no claim on them.
From Old to New Testament
The NT counterpart to šākaḥ is not a single word but a pattern of practice. The Lord's Supper is explicitly instituted as a remembrance ('Do this in remembrance of me,' Luke 22:19; 1 Cor. 11:24-25) — a liturgical counter-amnesia for the new covenant community that mirrors Deuteronomy's emphasis on structured memory. The Letter of James warns against the man who looks in a mirror and immediately 'forgets what kind of man he is' (James 1:24) — a NT deployment of the šākaḥ concept applied to the self-knowledge the word produces.
Hebrews 13:2-3 commands not to forget hospitality and the imprisoned — the forgotten poor are another OT dimension of šākaḥ (Prov. 31:5). The Spirit's role in John 14:26 is specifically described as reminding the disciples of everything Jesus said — pneumatological counter-amnesia in the upper room discourse.
Canonical parallel
Sources
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