תָּלָה
ta.lah (H8518)
to hang
AI Word Study
# The Hebrew Word תָּלָה (talah): "To Hang" The Hebrew verb תָּלָה (talah) carries the fundamental meaning "to hang," appearing 27 times throughout the biblical text. This relatively modest frequency suggests the word served a specific rather than general communicative function in ancient Hebrew, reserved for particular contexts where the action of suspension or attachment was relevant to the narrative or law being recorded. Without access to the specific contextual examples from these 27 occurrences, the lexical data provided establishes only the core semantic range: the physical act of hanging or suspending something. The word's presence across 27 biblical passages indicates it was important enough to preserve in multiple genres and time periods of Hebrew scripture, though its limited frequency compared to more common verbs suggests it was not central to everyday discourse. The persistence of this term across the biblical corpus demonstrates that acts of hanging—whether literal, ceremonial, or figurative—held significance for biblical authors and their audiences. To understand the full theological or legal weight this word may have carried in specific passages (such as its potential use in capital punishment contexts or ceremonial descriptions), one would need to examine the individual verses where תָּלָה appears, as the lexical definition alone provides only the basic semantic foundation.
AI synthesis uses only provided lexicon data -- never training knowledge.
Within three more days, Pharaoh will lift up your head from off you, and will hang you on a tree; and the birds will eat your flesh from off you.”
As he interpreted to us, so it was. He restored me to my office, and he hanged him.”
If a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree,
his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him the same day; for he who is hanged is accursed of God. Don’t defile your land which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance.
He hanged the king of Ai on a tree until the evening. At sundown, Joshua commanded, and they took his body down from the tree and threw it at the entrance of the gate of the city, and raised a great heap of stones on it that remains to this day.
Afterward Joshua struck them, put them to death, and hanged them on five trees. They were hanging on the trees until the evening.
David commanded his young men, and they killed them, cut off their hands and their feet, and hanged them up beside the pool in Hebron. But they took the head of Ishbosheth, and buried it in Abner’s grave in Hebron.
A certain man saw it, and told Joab, and said, “Behold, I saw Absalom hanging in an oak.”
When this matter was investigated, and it was found to be so, they were both hanged on a gallows; and it was written in the book of the chronicles in the king’s presence.
Then Zeresh his wife and all his friends said to him, “Let a gallows be made fifty cubits high, and in the morning speak to the king about hanging Mordecai on it. Then go in merrily with the king to the banquet.” This pleased Haman, so he had the gallows made.
The king said, “Who is in the court?” Now Haman had come into the outer court of the king’s house, to speak to the king about hanging Mordecai on the gallows that he had prepared for him.
Then Harbonah, one of the eunuchs who were with the king said, “Behold, the gallows fifty cubits high, which Haman has made for Mordecai, who spoke good for the king, is standing at Haman’s house.” The king said, “Hang him on it!”
So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king’s wrath was pacified.
Then King Ahasuerus said to Esther the queen and to Mordecai the Jew, “See, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and they have hanged him on the gallows, because he laid his hand on the Jews.
Then Esther said, “If it pleases the king, let it be granted to the Jews who are in Susa to do tomorrow also according to today’s decree, and let Haman’s ten sons be hanged on the gallows.”
The king commanded this to be done. A decree was given out in Susa; and they hanged Haman’s ten sons.
but when this became known to the king, he commanded by letters that his wicked plan, which he had planned against the Jews, should return on his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows.
He stretches out the north over empty space, and hangs the earth on nothing.
On the willows in that land, we hung up our harps.
Your neck is like David’s tower built for an armory, on which a thousand shields hang, all the shields of the mighty men.
They will hang on him all the glory of his father’s house, the offspring and the issue, every small vessel, from the cups even to all the pitchers.
Princes were hanged up by their hands. The faces of elders were not honored.
Will wood be taken of it to make anything? Will men take a pin of it to hang any vessel on it?
“ ‘ “Persia, Lud, and Put were in your army, your men of war. They hung the shield and helmet in you. They showed your beauty.
The men of Arvad with your army were on your walls all around, and valiant men were in your towers. They hung their shields on your walls all around. They have perfected your beauty.