עָיֵף
a.yeph
faint
Lexicon Entry
Lexicon data from STEPBible TIPNR, Tyndale House, Cambridge. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
What Original Readers Understood
Supported# Analysis of עָיֵף (ayeph): "Faint" The Hebrew word עָיֵף (ayeph) appears seventeen times throughout the biblical text with the core meaning of "faint." This term describes a state of physical or mental exhaustion—a condition of weakness where a person's strength has been depleted. The word functions as an adjective in Hebrew, allowing it to characterize individuals or groups as being in this weakened condition. Given its modest frequency of seventeen occurrences, עָיֵף represents a specialized vocabulary item rather than a common term in biblical Hebrew. Its limited distribution suggests that biblical writers employed it in specific contexts where the particular nuance of faintness or exhaustion was important to convey. The word occupies a particular semantic space between general weakness and complete incapacity, describing people who are worn down but not entirely incapacitated. Without access to the specific biblical passages where this term appears, we cannot determine the precise contexts—whether it describes physical exhaustion from labor or travel, emotional weariness from distress, or military fatigue in battle. The seventeen occurrences, however, indicate that describing people as "faint" or "weary" was meaningful enough to biblical writers to warrant this dedicated vocabulary item alongside other words for weakness and fatigue.
Source data & methodology
Occurrences in Scripture
17 total occurrences across the text
You haven’t given water to the weary to drink, and you have withheld bread from the hungry.
Psalms 63:1God, you are my God. I will earnestly seek you. My soul thirsts for you. My flesh longs for you, in a dry and weary land, where there is no water.
Psalms 143:6I spread out my hands to you. My soul thirsts for you, like a parched land.
Proverbs 25:25Like cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.
Isaiah 32:2A man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the storm, as streams of water in a dry place, as the shade of a large rock in a weary land.
Isaiah 5:27No one shall be weary nor stumble among them; no one shall slumber nor sleep, neither shall the belt of their waist be untied, nor the strap of their sandals be broken,
Isaiah 28:12to whom he said, “This is the resting place. Give rest to weary,” and “This is the refreshing;” yet they would not hear.
Isaiah 29:8It will be like when a hungry man dreams, and behold, he eats; but he awakes, and his hunger isn’t satisfied; or like when a thirsty man dreams, and behold, he drinks; but he awakes, and behold, he is faint, and he is still thirsty. The multitude of all the nations that fight against Mount Zion will be like that.
Isaiah 46:1Bel bows down. Nebo stoops. Their idols are carried by animals, and on the livestock. The things that you carried around are heavy loads, a burden for the weary.
Jeremiah 31:25For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul.”
Genesis 25:29Jacob boiled stew. Esau came in from the field, and he was famished.
Genesis 25:30Esau said to Jacob, “Please feed me with some of that red stew, for I am famished.” Therefore his name was called Edom.
Deuteronomy 25:18how he met you by the way, and struck the rearmost of you, all who were feeble behind you, when you were faint and weary; and he didn’t fear God.
Judges 8:4Gideon came to the Jordan and passed over, he and the three hundred men who were with him, faint, yet pursuing.
Judges 8:5He said to the men of Succoth, “Please give loaves of bread to the people who follow me; for they are faint, and I am pursuing after Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian.”
2 Samuel 16:14The king, and all the people who were with him, came weary; and he refreshed himself there.
2 Samuel 17:29honey, butter, sheep, and cheese of the herd, for David, and for the people who were with him, to eat; for they said, “The people are hungry, weary, and thirsty in the wilderness.”