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שבת

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Etymology and origin of the Biblical Hebrew word שבת

שבת1 sabbath

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Derivation
First attested
Hebrew Bible

Pronunciation

  • Tiberian: šabbāṯ[1]
  • Samaritan reading tradition: šåbbåt[2]

Forms

שַׁבָּת (šabbāṯ) noun, feminine, plural שַׁבָּתוֹת[1][3] Construct שַׁבַּת, with suffix שַׁבַּתּוֹ, plural שַׁבָּתוֹת, construct plural שַׁבְּתֹת.[4][5] Mostly feminine (Exodus 31:14), but masculine in Isaiah 56:2, 6 and 58:13, which BDB puts down to the influence of the frequent phrase yôm haššabbāṯ “the sabbath day”.[4][5]

Etymology

The sabbath is usually derived from the root of שָׁבַת (šāḇaṯ, “to cease, rest”), as “the day of rest”;[6][7][8] BDB analyses it as the root with a feminine ending.[4] HALOT reports that the direction is disputed: some scholars derive the noun from the verb, others take the noun as primary and the verb as denominal, and many leave the question open.[9]

An etymological link with Akkadian šapattu, also spelled šabattu, the fifteenth day of the month, is widely accepted;[5][10][11] HALOT notes that Landsberger derived the Akkadian noun from the same root, but stresses that the Hebrew sabbath has no functional link with it, being a weekly day of rest independent of the phases of the moon.[5] BDB lists the Akkadian word only as a possible comparison, and Wiktionary suggests the Hebrew word may be borrowed from it.[4][3] Klein takes the opposite view, that the day-name was borrowed into Akkadian from Hebrew.[6]

The word passed from Hebrew into the neighbouring languages: Aramaic שַׁבְּתָא (šabbəṯā), Classical Syriac ܫܲܒ݁ܬ݂ܵܐ (šabbṯā), Arabic سَبْت (sabt) and Ge'ez ሰንበት (sanbat) are loans from Hebrew.[5][6][7] Von Soden's dictionary also derives the Aramaic, Arabic and Ge'ez words from the Hebrew.[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The noun occurs 111 times in the Hebrew Bible, never in the archaic poems.[1] Among the uses BDB groups as the oldest are passages that pair the sabbath with the new moon as a day when ordinary business stopped: the merchants of Amos 8:5 ask māṯay yaʿăḇōr haḥōḏeš … wəhaššabbāṯ “when will the new moon be over … and the sabbath?”, so that they can sell grain again, and in 2 Kings 4:23 a husband asks why his wife should visit the prophet when it is “neither new moon nor sabbath”.[4][5][1] The commandment of Exodus 20:10 makes the seventh day “a sabbath to the Lord your God”, on which no work is done.[4][1] Outside the Bible, Davies lists šbt in line 5 of the reaper's letter from Meṣad Ḥashavyahu, near Yavneh-Yam, in the phrase lpny šbt, “before šbt”.[12] Sáenz-Badillos counts the six ostraca from this site among the Hebrew inscriptions of the monarchy.[13]

Semantic evolution

Beside the weekly day of rest, the Priestly laws and the Holiness Code extend the word: the Day of Atonement is a šabbaṯ šabbāṯôn, a “sabbath of complete rest” (Leviticus 16:31), and every seventh year is a sabbath for the land, when it is neither sown nor pruned (Leviticus 25:4).[4][5] In šeḇaʿ šabbāṯôṯ (Leviticus 23:15) the plural may already mean “weeks”, as BDB and Gesenius suggest, comparing the later Syriac and Greek usage.[4][14] HALOT counts 41 occurrences in the Priestly source; in Ezekiel, Jeremiah 17 and Nehemiah 13 the keeping and profaning of the sabbath become a central theme.[5][4]

The Septuagint transcribes rather than translates it, as Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton) and the plural σάββατα (sábbata), which it also uses for a single sabbath.[1][5] The Dead Sea Scrolls use the noun 356 times, most of them in non-biblical texts such as the Damascus Document and the calendrical scrolls.[15] In Rabbinic Hebrew it also means “week” and names the first tractate of the order Moʿed, and these senses continue in Modern Hebrew שבת (shabát).[6]

Timeline

  • Classical Biblical Hebrew – 42 occurrences in Genesis to Kings, among them the sabbath commandment (Exodus 20:8–11) and the sabbath paired with the new moon (2 Kings 4:23).[1][4]
  • Prophets – the sabbath with the new moon in Amos 8:5, Hosea 2:13 and Isaiah 1:13; the sabbath as a sign of the covenant in Ezekiel 20.[5][4]
  • Late Biblical Hebrew – 18 occurrences in Nehemiah and Chronicles, including the ban on trade on the sabbath (Nehemiah 13:15–22).[1][4]
  • 3rd–2nd century BC – the Septuagint transcribes it as Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton).[16][1]
  • 2nd century BC – 2nd century AD – 356 occurrences in the Dead Sea Scrolls.[17][15]
  • Modern Hebrew – Modern Hebrew שבת (shabát), “Sabbath” and “week”.[6][3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. the sabbath, the seventh day of the week, a day of rest on which no work is done; often yôm haššabbāṯ “the sabbath day”.[5][18]
  2. (cultic) a day of solemn rest: the Day of Atonement as šabbaṯ šabbāṯôn.[4]
  3. the sabbatical year, the seventh year in which the land lies fallow.[4][14]
  4. perhaps a week, in šeḇaʿ šabbāṯôṯ “seven weeks” (Leviticus 23:15).[4][14]

Word family

  • שַׁבָּתוֹן (šabbāṯôn)

Descendants

  • Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton)[3]
  • Arabic السَّبْت (as-sabt)[3]
  • Classical Syriac ܫܒܬܐ (šabbəṯā)[3]
  • Yiddish שבת (shabes)[3]
  • Modern Hebrew שבת (shabát)[3]

שבת2 to cease, rest

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Inherited
First attested
Hebrew Bible (Song of Moses)

Pronunciation

  • Tiberian: šāḇaṯ[1]
  • Samaritan reading tradition: šā̊båt, imperfect yišbåt[2]

Forms

שָׁבַת (šāḇaṯ) verb[1] Qal perfect שָׁבַת, imperfect יִשְׁבֹּת and יִשְׁבַּת; niphal נִשְׁבַּת; hiphil הִשְׁבִּית, imperfect יַשְׁבִּית.[19][9]

Etymology

The verb has cognates in the other Northwest Semitic languages: Ugaritic šbt, perhaps “to stop, suspend”,[20] and Phoenician and Punic šbt (“to come to an end”), with a causative “to cause to stop”.[21][9] Huehnergard counts it among the roots of Central Semitic, meaning “to cease, rest”.[8] BDB and Klein compare Arabic سَبَتَ (sabata, “to cut off, interrupt”), and BDB Akkadian šabātu (“to cease”);[19][22] HALOT warns that the Arabic verb in the sense “to rest, keep the sabbath” and Classical Syriac ܫܒܬ (šḇaṯ) “to keep the sabbath” owe at least part of their use to Hebrew, and Sokoloff makes the Syriac verb a denominal of the noun for “sabbath”.[9][23]

Its link with שַׁבָּת (šabbāṯ, “sabbath”) is disputed: HALOT reports scholars who derive the noun from the verb and others who take the verb as denominal.[9] BDB separates a denominal qal “to keep a sabbath”, with the noun as its object (Leviticus 23:32, 25:2), from the ordinary verb.[24] Gesenius thought the basic sense was “to sit still”, comparing יָשַׁב (yāšaḇ, “to sit”);[25][9] HALOT and BDB do not follow this.[25][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb occurs 71 times, once in the archaic poetry: in the Song of Moses God says ʾašbîṯâ mēʾĕnôš zikrām, “I would make their memory cease from among people” (Deuteronomy 32:26), a hiphil.[26][1][19] In prose the qal means “to cease”: day and night “shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22), and the manna stopped when Israel ate the produce of the land (Joshua 5:12).[19][9][1]

Semantic evolution

From “to stop” the qal came to mean “to stop working, rest”, of God on the seventh day (Genesis 2:2–3) and of people and animals in the laws (Exodus 23:12), and of the land left fallow (Leviticus 26:34–35).[19][9] The hiphil “to put an end to” covers making mirth, war or sacrifice cease, removing leaven from houses and, more strongly, destroying or exterminating.[19] The Septuagint renders the verb by Ancient Greek καταπαύω (katapaúō), παύω (paúō) and, for keeping the sabbath, σαββατίζω (sabbatízō).[1] In the Qumran hymns the hiphil appears in lʾyn hšbt “without end”, and Rabbinic Hebrew uses the qal for spending or celebrating the sabbath.[9]

Timeline

  • Archaic Hebrew poetry – the hiphil in the Song of Moses (Deuteronomy 32:26).[26][1]
  • Classical Biblical Hebrew – 19 occurrences in Genesis to Kings, including God's rest on the seventh day (Genesis 2:2).[1][19]
  • Prophets – 31 occurrences, mostly of the hiphil “to put an end to”.[1][19]
  • 2nd century BC – 2nd century AD – in the Thanksgiving Hymns of Qumran, ten times.[17][15]

Meanings

Verb

  1. qal: to cease, come to an end, stop.[9][19]
  2. qal: to stop working, rest; of the land, to lie fallow.[9][27]
  3. qal: to keep a sabbath, with šabbāṯ as object.[24]
  4. niphal: to be brought to an end, disappear.[27][19]
  5. hiphil: to put an end to, make cease; to remove; to exterminate, destroy.[19][28]

Usage notes

Two rare nouns are spelled שֶׁבֶת: šeḇeṯ “seat, place” (Amos 6:3, 1 Kings 10:19), which BDB and Klein take as the infinitive of יָשַׁב (yāšaḇ, “to sit”) used as a noun,[29][30] and šeḇeṯ “cessation, inaction”, as in Exodus 21:19, where a man who has injured another must pay for his loss of time;[31][32] HALOT leaves open whether this belongs to the verb šāḇaṯ or to yāšaḇ.[31][32] Rabbinic Hebrew uses it for the indemnity for lost working time.[33]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Clear Bible (2023–), MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets (Westminster Leningrad Codex, with Greek alignment), github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-hebrew, CC BY 4.0
  2. ^ a b Højgaard, Christian Canu; Naaijer, Martijn; Schorch, Stefan (2023), Text-Fabric Dataset of the Samaritan Pentateuch, Zenodo, doi:10.5281/zenodo.7734632
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  6. ^ a b c d e Klein, Ernest (1987), A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English, Jerusalem: Carta; Haifa: University of Haifa, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  7. ^ a b Gesenius, Wilhelm; Buhl, Frants (1915), Hebräisches und aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 17th ed., Leipzig: F. C. W. Vogel, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  8. ^ a b Huehnergard, John (2011), "Proto-Semitic Language and Culture" and "Semitic Roots", in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. שׁבת
  10. ^ Black, Jeremy; George, Andrew; Postgate, Nicholas (2000), A Concise Dictionary of Akkadian, 2nd ed., Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, p. s.v. šapattu
  11. ^ a b von Soden, Wolfram (1965–1981), Akkadisches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, p. 1172
  12. ^ Davies, Graham I. (1991), Ancient Hebrew Inscriptions: Corpus and Concordance, vol. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 7.001.5
  13. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 76
  14. ^ a b c Gesenius, Wilhelm (1846), Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament Scriptures, transl. Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, London: Samuel Bagster, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  15. ^ a b c Abegg, Martin G.; Jacobs, Jarod; Roorda, Dirk (2022), The Dead Sea Scrolls, Text-Fabric dataset, version 2.0.2, github.com/ETCBC/dss
  16. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 93
  17. ^ a b Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 143
  18. ^ de Blois, Reinier, ed. (2000–), Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, United Bible Societies, sdbh.org, p. s.v. שַׁבָּת
  19. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. שָׁבַת
  20. ^ del Olmo Lete, Gregorio; Sanmartín, Joaquín (2015), A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition, 3rd ed., transl. W. G. E. Watson, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. šbt
  21. ^ Krahmalkov, Charles R. (2000), Phoenician-Punic Dictionary, Leuven: Peeters (OLA 90), p. s.v. š-b-t
  22. ^ Klein, Ernest (1987), A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English, Jerusalem: Carta; Haifa: University of Haifa, p. s.v. שׁבת
  23. ^ Sokoloff, Michael (2009), A Syriac Lexicon, Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns; Piscataway: Gorgias Press, p. 1506
  24. ^ a b Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. שָׁבַת²
  25. ^ a b Gesenius, Wilhelm (1846), Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament Scriptures, transl. Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, London: Samuel Bagster, p. s.v. שָׁבַת
  26. ^ a b Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 69
  27. ^ a b Holladay, William L. (1971), A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. שָׁבַת
  28. ^ de Blois, Reinier, ed. (2000–), Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, United Bible Societies, sdbh.org, p. s.v. שׁבת
  29. ^ Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. שֶׁבֶת
  30. ^ Klein, Ernest (1987), A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English, Jerusalem: Carta; Haifa: University of Haifa, p. s.v. שֶׁבֶת
  31. ^ a b Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. שֶׁבֶת
  32. ^ a b Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. שֶׁבֶת²
  33. ^ Jastrow, Marcus (1886–1903), A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, London: Luzac; New York: Putnam, p. s.v. שֶׁבֶת II

Borrowed into

Descendants

Cite this entry

“שבת.” Etymologically, 1 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/hbo/%D7%A9%D7%91%D7%AA. Accessed 1 Nov. 2026.

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