To throw out, down or away (literally or figuratively)
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H7993 describes forcefully throwing, casting, hurling, dropping, or discarding someone or something, with literal and figurative uses shaped by direction and object. Its objects include stones, objects, bodies, idols, peoples, and persons in danger, while divine or human subjects can cast down, cast out, or throw away; the verb itself describes forceful removal without declaring every act just.
Reader summary
Full entry for שָׁלַךְ (H7993) · Open the biblical lexicon
H7993 describes forcefully throwing, casting, hurling, dropping, or discarding someone or something, with literal and figurative uses shaped by direction and object. Its objects include stones, objects, bodies, idols, peoples, and persons in danger, while divine or human subjects can cast down, cast out, or throw away; the verb itself describes forceful.
The BSB source-word alignment has 125 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include and threw (9), cast (4), threw (4), Throw (4), and thrown (3).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 21:15. Its strongest book concentrations include 2 Kings (15), Jeremiah (15), Exodus (10), Ezekiel (10).
H7993 describes forcefully throwing, casting, hurling, dropping, or discarding someone or something, with literal and figurative uses shaped by direction and object. Its objects include stones, objects, bodies, idols, peoples, and persons in danger, while divine or human subjects can cast down, cast out, or throw away; the verb itself describes forceful removal without declaring every act just.
In Exod. 1. 22, pharaoh commands his people to throw every newborn Hebrew son into the Nile as the regimes escalating assault on Israelite life. In Isa. 2. 20, in the day when human pride is humbled, people cast their handmade silver and gold idols away to moles and bats. H7993 opens teaching on what people violently discard, what repentance must cast away, and how biblical lament speaks when a sufferer feels hurled into depths beyond control.
It corrects casual cast-away language that treats people as disposable and prevents divine-judgment texts from being borrowed to justify abandonment, expulsion, humiliation, or violence by human authorities. H7993 can expose radically different acts of casting: Pharaoh commands Hebrew sons to be thrown into the Nile, Isaiah pictures worshipers casting away the idols they made, and Jonah laments that God cast him into the deep.
The same forceful motion can serve genocidal oppression, repentant renunciation, or a sufferers account of judgment and helplessness. Responsible teaching must preserve the moral agency and narrative outcome of each scene. For H7993, responsible teaching keeps lexical meaning, passage context, canonical synthesis, and present application distinguishable. H7993 does not make discarded people worthless, authorize congregations to cast out inconvenient members, prove that every catastrophe is direct punishment, or reduce repentance to destroying objects without turning to the living God.
H7993 appears across passages that develop violent disposal, oppression, judgment, renunciation of idols, lament, rescue, human worth, and restoration. For H7993, the immediate setting decides which part of the range is active, so the witnesses must remain distinct rather than being merged into one formula.
Then Pharaoh commanded all his people: “Every son born to the Hebrews you must throw into the Nile, but every daughter you may allow to live.”
Pharaoh commands his people to throw every newborn Hebrew son into the Nile as the regimes escalating assault on Israelite life.
In that day men will cast away to the moles and bats their idols of silver and gold—the idols they made to worship.
In the day when human pride is humbled, people cast their handmade silver and gold idols away to moles and bats.
For You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the current swirled about me; all Your breakers and waves swept over me.
From the fish, Jonah addresses God as the one who cast him into the deep while the sea and waves overwhelmed him.
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.
Hebrew word. Forceful rejection or expulsion from a place or relationship, often signaling divine displeasure or judgment
Forceful rejection or expulsion from a place or relationship, often signaling divine displeasure or judgment
to throw out, down or away (literally or figuratively) BDB: throw Usage: adventure, cast (away, down, forth, off, out), hurl, pluck, throw.
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 1 selected witness from 125 lexical occurrence verses.
שָׁלַךְ is a primitive root - no further derivation.
Illustrates the removal of sin through divine mercy.Isaiah 38:9-20
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
H7993 can expose radically different acts of casting: Pharaoh commands Hebrew sons to be thrown into the Nile, Isaiah pictures worshipers casting away the idols they made, and Jonah laments that God cast him into the deep. The same forceful motion can serve genocidal oppression, repentant renunciation, or a sufferers account of judgment and helplessness. Responsible teaching must preserve the moral agency and narrative outcome of each scene.
H7993 describes forcefully throwing, casting, hurling, dropping, or discarding someone or something, with literal and figurative uses shaped by direction and object. The selected witnesses keep the teaching concrete: Exod. 1. 22 shows that pharaoh commands his people to throw every newborn Hebrew son into the Nile as the regimes escalating assault on Israelite life, while Isa.
2. 20 Shows that in the day when human pride is humbled, people cast their handmade silver and gold idols away to moles and bats. Jonah. 2. 3 adds that from the fish, Jonah addresses God as the one who cast him into the deep while the sea and waves overwhelmed him. H7993 opens teaching on what people violently discard, what repentance must cast away, and how biblical lament speaks when a sufferer feels hurled into depths beyond control.
It corrects casual cast-away language that treats people as disposable and prevents divine-judgment texts from being borrowed to justify abandonment, expulsion, humiliation, or violence by human authorities. A church teaching H7993 faithfully will name both the promise and the boundary carried by these contexts, attend to vulnerable hearers, and refuse to make the lexical item prove more than its passages support.
H7993 does not make discarded people worthless, authorize congregations to cast out inconvenient members, prove that every catastrophe is direct punishment, or reduce repentance to destroying objects without turning to the living God.
Exod.1.22
H7993 is a Hebrew verb for throwing, hurling, casting down, casting out, or casting away; its subject, object, preposition, and destination determine whether the motion is physical, political, cultic, or figurative.
The Old Testament condemns rulers who cast vulnerable lives away, calls idolaters to abandon false gods, and gives the overwhelmed words of lament. The New Testament proclaims Jesus rejected by people yet vindicated by God and forms communities that put away idolatry while receiving the vulnerable with honor.