To hear intelligently (often with implication of attention, obedience, etc.; causatively, to tell , etc.)
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שָׁמַע is among the most theologically important verbs in the Hebrew Bible because it holds together what English separates: hearing and obeying. In Hebrew, to šāmaʿ to someone is not merely to receive audio input; it is to hear in a way that results in a response.
Reader summary
Full entry for שָׁמַע (H8085) · Open the biblical lexicon
שָׁמַע is among the most theologically important verbs in the Hebrew Bible because it holds together what English separates: hearing and obeying. In Hebrew, to šāmaʿ to someone is not merely to receive audio input; it is to hear in a way that results in a response.
The BSB source-word alignment has 1,159 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include Listen (136), hear (134), heard (100), listened (27), obey (27).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 3:8. Its strongest book concentrations include Jeremiah (184), Isaiah (106), Deuteronomy (91), Psalms (79).
This entry includes 7 verse guides that explain exact original-language forms in context.
שָׁמַע is among the most theologically important verbs in the Hebrew Bible because it holds together what English separates: hearing and obeying. In Hebrew, to šāmaʿ to someone is not merely to receive audio input; it is to hear in a way that results in a response. The same verb describes physical hearing (Gen 3:10: Adam heard the sound of the Lord), understanding (Gen 11:7: so that they may not understand one another's speech), and obedience (Exod 19:5: if you will indeed obey my voice).
The theological weight of this semantic fusion is immense: the God who speaks expects a šāmaʿ that moves, not merely a šāmaʿ that registers. The Shema of Deuteronomy 6:4 — Shĕmaʿ Yiśrāʾēl, YHWH ʾĕlōhênû YHWH ʾeḥād — is one of the most important sentences in the OT. Its imperative is šāmaʿ. Israel is summoned not merely to hear a proposition about divine unity but to hear-and-obey the reality that the Lord alone is God.
Covenant renewal in the OT is repeatedly framed as a call to shama; apostasy is frequently characterized as not hearing, not heeding, refusing to listen. The prophets diagnose Israel's failure in šāmaʿ terms: 'they have ears but do not hear' (Jer 5:21; Ezek 12:2). Jesus takes this language directly: 'he who has ears to hear, let him hear' (Matt 11:15; 13:9) — the repeated call to šāmaʿ that characterizes prophetic address, applied to the hearing of the kingdom.
שָׁמַע is currently counted by the local OT index at about 1,165 uses in the OT, making it one of the most frequent verbs in the Hebrew Bible. Its uses span physical hearing, understanding/comprehension, divine attention to prayer, the covenantal šāmaʿ of obedience, and the prophetic diagnosis of Israel's spiritual deafness.
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is One.
The Shema: šĕmaʿ yiśrāʾēl — hear, O Israel. One of the central imperatives in the OT, called daily by every observant Jew and cited by Jesus as the first commandment (Mark 12:29). The šāmaʿ here is not passive reception but covenantal engagement: hearing the Lord's exclusive identity as the ground of exclusive devotion. The verse that follows (v.5: 'love the Lord your God with all your heart') defines what true šāmaʿ looks like — the hearing that produces total love.
And He replied: “Go and tell this people, ‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’
The terrifying judicial šāmaʿ: keep on hearing but do not understand. Isaiah's commission is to proclaim a message that will harden rather than soften the already-hardening people. The šāmaʿ is present (the sound reaches the ears) but the covenantal dimension (the understanding and obedience) is absent. This is the passage Jesus quotes to explain why he speaks in parables (Matt 13:14-15) and which Paul cites at the end of Acts to characterize those who reject the gospel (Acts 28:26-27).
But Samuel declared: “Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obedience to His voice? Behold, obedience is better than sacrifice, and attentiveness is better than the fat of rams.
Samuel's prophetic verdict on Saul's disobedience: šāmaʿ is better than sacrifice. The entire OT cultic system exists in service of the covenantal relationship, and that relationship is fundamentally a hearing-and-obeying relationship. Saul heard the command, registered the sound, but did not šāmaʿ — did not let the hearing produce the required obedience. The prophetic critique of ritual divorced from šāmaʿ runs from here through Amos, Isaiah, and Micah to Jesus' citation of Hosea 6:6 ('I desire mercy, not sacrifice').
For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, the sheep under His care. Today, if you hear His voice,
The Psalm's great šāmaʿ appeal: 'today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as at Meribah.' The urgency of the 'today' shows that šāmaʿ is always a present-tense invitation, not merely a historical event. Hebrews 3:7-4:13 quotes this Psalm extensively to argue that the 'today' remains open, and that the same hardening-of-heart failure is the danger for every generation that hears God's voice.
But this is what I commanded them: Obey Me, and I will be your God, and you will be My people. You must walk in all the ways I have commanded you, so that it may go well with you.
The covenantal definition of the relationship: šĕmĕʿû bĕqôlî — obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you will be my people. The Sinai covenant is at its core a šāmaʿ-covenant: Israel's standing as God's people is tied not to ethnic identity alone but to covenantal šāmaʿ. The verse gives the basic covenant formula in šāmaʿ terms: hear/obey → I will be your God → you will be my people.
And that you may love the Lord your God, obey Him, and hold fast to Him. For He is your life, and He will prolong your life in the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
Moses' final covenant appeal: šāmaʿ as the pivot between life and death. The chapter sets before Israel the choice — life/blessing or death/curse — and the path to life is šāmaʿ combined with love and clinging. This is the theological capstone of the šāmaʿ-covenant: hearing is not merely an intellectual exercise but an existential orientation toward the God whose voice is heard.
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. Hearing that demands obedience: listening as covenantal response, not mere acoustic perception.
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 1,165 lexical occurrence verses.
שָׁמַע is a primitive root - no further derivation.
Affirms God’s attentive response to prayer. Isaiah 38:1-8
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
The Hebrew šāmaʿ refuses to let the congregation separate hearing from responding. In English we can say 'I heard you' and mean only that the sound reached our ears; in Hebrew šāmaʿ, that sentence implies a response was given or withheld. This is the theological grammar of the Shema: 'Hear, O Israel' is not 'note the following proposition' but 'engage this reality with your whole existence.'
The fusion of hearing and obeying in a single word is not a semantic coincidence; it reflects a theology of the word: God's speech is address and summons, calling for response. The prophets diagnose Israel's failure with the phrase lōʾ šāmaʿ — they did not hear — and the context always shows that the sound was present (the prophets preached, the law was read, the covenants were enacted) but the covenantal hearing was absent.
Jesus takes this language directly into his kingdom proclamation: 'he who has ears to hear, let him hear' is not a physical instruction but the prophetic call to šāmaʿ that the disciples recognize and the crowds miss. For the preacher, this means that the goal of proclamation is not merely information transfer — it is the awakening of šāmaʿ. Samuel's verdict remains the standard: to obey is better than sacrifice.
The hearing that does not produce response is not yet the šāmaʿ the covenant requires.
Deut.6.4
The Shema (Deut 6:4) has given šāmaʿ its most famous form in religious history — the prayer called 'the Shema' after its opening word. The verb generates the noun šēmaʿ (sound, report, what is heard, H8088) and šomēaʿ (the one who hears, participle). The Hiphil stem (hišmîaʿ) means to cause to hear, to proclaim, to make a sound — the prophetic proclamation is often described as hišmîaʿ (make heard).
The Niphal is passive: nišmaʿ, it was heard, it became known. The theological weight of šāmaʿ is sharpest in the covenant formulae where it means obey: 'if you will šāmaʿ the voice of the Lord' (Exod 15:26; Deut 28:1) — hearing is the covenantal act that determines blessing or curse.
The NT inherits the šāmaʿ theology in multiple streams. Jesus' repeated 'let him who has ears hear' is the prophetic call to šāmaʿ, now applied to the kingdom proclamation. The parable of the sower (Matt 13) is a šāmaʿ taxonomy: different soils represent different qualities of hearing, and only the good soil produces the fruit of true šāmaʿ. Hebrews 3-4 builds an extended homily on Psalm 95's 'today if you hear his voice' — the 'today' of covenant address is always present, and the hardening of heart is the refusal to šāmaʿ.
Romans 10:14-17 concludes: 'faith comes by hearing (akoē), and hearing by the word (rhēma) of Christ' — the NT gospel is the covenantal speech that calls for šāmaʿ, and the church's task is to ensure the voice is heard so that šāmaʿ is possible. John 10:27 — 'my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me' — is the new-covenant šāmaʿ: hearing-knowing-following as a single covenantal act.
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