רֵיקָם
rêyqâm · H7387 · Hebrew · 16 occurrences
Meanings
-
empty
State in which a container does not contain anything
ExamplesJeremiah 14:3 “Their nobles have sent their servants for water; They have come to the cisterns and found no water. They have returned with their containers empty; They have been put to shame and humiliated, And they cover their heads,
-
Literally: empty; hence: state in which an object is returned without an accompanying gift (empty, without (a gift))
Examples1 Samuel 6:3 And they said, “If you are going to send the ark of the God of Israel away, do not send it empty; but you shall certainly return to Him a guilt offering. Then you will be healed, and it will be revealed to you why His hand does not leave you.”
-
without cause
Literally: empty; hence: action by which someone performs an event without any argument, cause, or reason that could possibly explain or justify it
ExamplesPsalm 7:4 If I have done evil to my friend, Or have plundered my enemy for no reason,
Psalm 25:3 Indeed, none of those who wait for You will be ashamed; Those who deal treacherously without cause will be ashamed.
-
empty, without success, unfulfilled
Literally: empty; process by which people, tools, and events fail to reach their intended goal
Examples2 Samuel 1:22 “From the blood of those slaughtered, from the fat of the mighty, The bow of Jonathan did not turn back, And the sword of Saul did not return unstained.
Isaiah 55:11 So will My word be which goes out of My mouth; It will not return to Me empty, Without accomplishing what I desire, And without succeeding in the purpose for which I sent it.
Jeremiah 50:9 “For behold, I am going to rouse and bring up against Babylon A contingent of great nations from the land of the north, And they will draw up their battle lines against her; From there she will be taken captive. Their arrows will be like an expert warrior Who does not return empty-handed.
-
empty-handed
Literally: empty; hence: state in which humans have lost their possessions
ExamplesGenesis 31:42 “If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the fear of Isaac, had not been for me, surely now you would have sent me away empty-handed. God has seen my affliction and the labor of my hands, so He rendered judgment last night.”
Exodus 3:21 “I will grant this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and it shall be that when you go, you will not go empty-handed.
Exodus 23:15 “You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread; for seven days you are to eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the appointed time in the month of Abib, for in that month you came out of Egypt. And no one is to appear before Me empty-handed.
How it’s used
Every occurrence, grouped by the words it is grammatically related to.
When two words share a role, as in “Paul and Barnabas said”, the verse appears under each, so a section’s counts can add up to more than the number of occurrences.
MACULA Greek Linguistic Datasets, available at https://github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-greek/, licensed CC BY 4.0; MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets © 2022-2024 by Biblica, Inc., CC BY 4.0. Westminster Leningrad Codex (tanach.us). OpenScriptures Hebrew Bible morphology (hb.openscriptures.org), CC BY 4.0.
Near synonyms 1 word
- חִנָּם chinnâm · H2600 · without payment, for free, gratis
- Both words express groundlessness and fruitlessness: lacking ground or reason (causeless) and lacking result or purpose (in vain).
In the other Testament 1 word
- κενός kenós · G2756 · without anything, empty, empty-handed
- Greek κενός renders Hebrew רֵיקָם in contexts denoting emptiness or vanity, representing the direct lexical equivalent across both literal (empty-handed) and figurative (vain, futile) senses.
Semantic domains 5 entries
- Non-Contain002002001004
- This adverb's repeated idiom of leaving or arriving "empty-handed" (Genesis 31:42; Exodus 3:21; 23:15; 34:20; Deuteronomy 15:13) directly attests the sense of emptiness.
- Non-Whole002003001021
- The idea of emptiness this word conveys can shade toward incompleteness or lack, though the sampled empty-handed citations attest emptiness of possession rather than incompleteness specifically.
- Cause002004002002
- This word's separate sense of acting "without cause" is part of its broader range, though the sampled citations here attest the empty-handed idiom rather than this causeless-action sense.
- Fail002003003013
- Leaving or sending someone away empty-handed, as in the sampled citations, carries an implication of a transaction or effort yielding nothing, attesting a sense bordering on futility.
- Non-Possess002003002018
- The repeated "empty-handed" idiom (Genesis 31:42; Exodus 3:21; 23:15; 34:20; Deuteronomy 15:13) directly attests a state of having nothing in hand, i.e., lacking possession.
Word family 4 words
Words formed from the same root. They share a form, not always a meaning.
Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon H7387. reqam רֵיקָם adverb emptily, vainly; — 1 in empty condition, empty = with empty…
רֵיקָם adverb emptily, vainly; —
1 in empty condition, empty = with empty hands; with verb of sending Gen 31:42 (E), Deu 15:13; 1Sa 6:3; Job 22:9; of going forth Exo 3:21, returning Rth 1:21; Rth 3:17; = without an offering, ד פָנַי יֵרָאוּ ׳לֹא Exo 23:15 (E) = Exo 34:20 (J), more fully Deu 16:16 (compare [פָנֶה] II.
2 ראה
Niph`al 1 b).
2 in vain, without effect : with שׁוּב 2Sa 1:22 (poem), Isa 55:11; Jer 14:3 (but see רֵיק
1), Jer 50:9; probably also ר ׳צוֺרֲרִי Psa 7:5 those who were my adversaries in vain (without success); ר ׳הַבּוֺגְדִים Psa 25:3 that deal treacherously in vain <in both most without cause).
Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), public domain
Topical studies with this word 5 entries
Meanings adapted from the UBS Dictionary of the Greek New Testament, © United Bible Societies, CC BY-SA 4.0 and the UBS Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew (from the Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew), © United Bible Societies, CC BY-SA 4.0; MACULA Greek Linguistic Datasets, available at https://github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-greek/, licensed CC BY 4.0; MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets © 2022-2024 by Biblica, Inc., CC BY 4.0. Westminster Leningrad Codex (tanach.us). OpenScriptures Hebrew Bible morphology (hb.openscriptures.org), CC BY 4.0.
Sources
eRhema lexical overview, based on the UBS Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew and the UBS Dictionary of the Greek New Testament (© United Bible Societies, CC BY-SA 4.0) and Macula Hebrew and Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0); released under CC BY-SA 4.0
New American Standard Bible Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, Calif. All rights reserved. For Permission to Quote Information visit http://www.lockman.org.