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Bible Dictionaries
Compassion, Merciful
Vine's Expository Dictionary of OT Words
or A. Verb.
Râcham (רָחַם, Strong's #7355), “to have compassion, be merciful, pity.” The words from this root are found 125 times in all parts of the Old Testament. The root is also found in Assyrian, Ethiopic, and Aramaic.The verb is translated “love” once: “I will love thee, O Lord …” (Ps. 18:1). Râcham is also used in God’s promise to declare His name to Moses: “I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy” (Exod. 33:19). So men pray: “Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies and thy loving-kindnesses” (Ps. 25:6); and Isaiah prophesies messianic restoration: “… With great mercies will I gather thee.… But with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer” (Isa. 54:7-8). This is the heart of salvation by the suffering Servant-Messiah.
B. Nouns.
Rechem (רֶחֶם, Strong's #7358), “bowels; womb; mercy.” The first use of rechem is in its primary meaning of “womb”: “The Lord had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech” (Gen. 20:18). The word is personified in Judg. 5:30: “Have they not divided the prey; to every man a damsel or two …?” In another figurative sense, the KJV reads in 1 Kings 3:26: “Her bowels yearned upon her son,” which the NIV translates more idiomatically: "[She] was filled with compassion for her son.” The greatest frequency is in this figurative sense of “tender love,” such as a mother has for the child she has borne.Racham (רַחֲמִים, 7356), “bowels; mercies; compassion.” This noun, always used in the plural intensive, occurs in Gen. 43:14: “And God Almighty give you mercy [NASB, “compassion”].” In Gen. 43:30, it is used of Joseph’s feelings toward Benjamin: “His bowels did yearn upon his brother.” (NIV, “He was deeply moved at the sight of his brother.”) Racham is most often used of God, as by David in 2 Sam. 24:14: “Let us fall now into the hand of the Lord; for his mercies are great.…” We have the equivalent Aramaic word in Daniel’s request to his friends: “That they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret …” (Dan. 2:18).
The Greek version of the Old Testament racham consists chiefly of three groups of words that come into the New Testament. Eleos is the most important, and it is used to translate several Hebrew words. Mary’s song recalls the promise in Ps. 103:11, 17, where eleos translates both rechem and chesed as “mercy”: “His mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation” (Luke 1:50). Racham is probably behind the often-heard plea: “Thou son of David, have mercy on us” (Matt. 9:27).
C. Adjective.
Rachûm (רַחוּם, Strong's #7349), “compassionate; merciful.” The adjective is used in that important proclamation of God’s name to Moses: “The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious …” (Exod. 34:6, NASB, NIV, “compassionate”).
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Vines, W. E., M. A. Entry for 'Compassion, Merciful'. Vine's Expository Dictionary of OT Words. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/vot/c/compassion-merciful.html. 1940.
