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Hebrew

To fall

נָפַלStrong’s H5307

naphal (na-phal)

Appears in 403 verses of the Old Testament

In short

Naphal is the Hebrew word usually translated “fall”, “fell” and “it fell”. It appears in 403 verses of the Old Testament.

“And it waxed great, even to the host of heaven; and it cast down some of the host and of the stars to the ground, and stamped upon them.”
Daniel 8:10 KJV
Meaning
  1. To fall, lie, be cast down, fail(Qal) · (Hiphil)
How it's translated
  • they will fall 31
  • and he fell 30
  • and they fell 28
  • and it fell 21
  • it will fall 18
  • he will fall 17
  • they have fallen 15
  • and it will fall 14

Word-by-word English from the STEPBible tagged text.

Where it's used most
  • Ezekiel 50
  • Jeremiah 40
  • Psalms 29
  • 2 Samuel 27
  • 1 Samuel 25
  • Isaiah 24

33 books in all.

Related words
Explore in Scripture
All 403 verses, by book
Ruth 2
2:103:18
Ezra 1
10:1
Nehemiah 3
6:1610:3411:1
Ecclesiastes 4
4:109:1210:811:3
Lamentations 3
1:72:215:16
Joel 1
2:8
Jonah 1
1:7
Micah 1
7:8
Nahum 1
3:12
Zechariah 1
11:2
Hebrew dictionary

נָפַל naphal · to fall

: fall/drop/fail 1) to fall, lie, be cast down, fail 1a) (Qal) 1a1) to fall 1a2) to fall (of violent death) 1a3) to fall prostrate, prostrate oneself before 1a4) to fall upon, attack, desert, fall away to, go away to, fall into the hand of 1a5) to fall short, fail, fall out, turn out, result 1a6) to settle, waste away, be offered, be inferior to 1a7) to lie, lie prostrate 1b) (Hiphil) 1b1) to cause to fall, fell, throw down, knock out, lay prostrate 1b2) to overthrow 1b3) to make the lot fall, assign by lot, apportion by lot 1b4) to let drop, cause to fail (fig.) 1b5) to cause to fall …

From STEPBible’s Hebrew lexicon (based on Brown-Driver-Briggs).

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

How the English word “fall” was understood when the King James Version was still the common Bible of English readers.

FALL, verb intransitive

preterit tense fell; participle passive fallen. [Latin fallo, to fail, to deceive, Gr.; Heb. to fall Fail agrees better with Heb., but these words may have had one primitive root, the sense of which was to move, to recede, to pass. See Foul.]

  1. To drop from a higher place; to descend by the power of gravity alone.“I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven” Luke 10:18
  2. To drop from an erect posture.“I fell at his feet to worship him” Revelation 19:10
  3. To disembogue; to pass at the outlet; to flow out of its channel into a pond, lake or sea, as a river.
  4. To depart from the faith, or from rectitude; to apostatize.“Labor to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief” Hebrews 4:11
All definitions and other forms of “fall”
  1. To die; particularly by violence.“Ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword” Leviticus 26:7“A thousand shall fall at thy side” Psalms 91:7
  2. To come to an end suddenly; to vanish; to perish.
  3. To be degraded; to sink into disrepute or disgrace; to be plunged into misery; as, to fall from an elevated station, or from a prosperous state.
  4. To decline in power, wealth or glory; to sink into weakness; to be overthrown or ruined.
  5. To pass into a worse state than the former; to come; as, to fall into difficulties; to fall under censure of imputation; to fall into error or absurdity; to fall into a snare.
  6. To sink; to be lowered.
  7. To decrease; to be diminished in weight or value.
  8. To sink; not to amount to the full.
  9. To be rejected; to sink into disrepute.
  10. To decline from violence to calmness from intensity to remission.
  11. To pass into a new state of body or mind; to become; as, to fall asleep; to fall distracted; to fall sick; to fall into rage or passion; to fall in love; to fall into temptation.
  12. To sink into an air of dejection, discontent, anger, sorrow or shame; applied to the countenance or look.“Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell” Genesis 4:5
  13. To happen; to befall; to come.
  14. To light on; to come by chance.
  15. To come; to rush on; to assail.“Fear and dread shall fall on them” Exodus 15:16“And fear fell on them all” Acts 19:17
  16. To come; to arrive.
  17. To come unexpectedly.
  18. To begin with haste, ardor or vehemence; to rush or hurry to.“The mixt multitude fell to lusting” Numbers 11:4
  19. To pass or be transferred by chance, lot, distribution, inheritance or otherwise, as possession or property.
  20. To become the property of; to belong or appertain to.
  21. To be dropped or uttered carelessly.
  22. To sink; to languish; to become feeble or faint.
  23. To be brought forth.
  24. To issue; to terminate.“Sit still, my daughter, till thou knowest how the matter will fall” Ruth 3:18
  25. To fall away, to lose flesh; to become lean or emaciated; to pine.
  26. To renounce or desert allegiance; to revolt or rebel.
  27. To renounce or desert the faith; to apostatize; to sink into wickedness.“These for awhile believe, and in time of temptation fall away” Luke 8:13
  28. To perish; to be ruined; to be lost.
  29. To decline gradually; to fade; to languish, or become faint.
  30. To fall back, to recede; to give way.
  31. To fail of performing a promise or purpose; not to fulfill.
  32. To fall down, to prostrate one's self in worship.“All nations shall fall down before him” Psalms 72:11
  33. To sink; to come to the ground.
  34. To bend or bow as a suppliant.
  35. To sail or pass towards the mouth of a river, or other outlet.
  36. To fall from, to recede from; to depart; not to adhere; as, to fall from an agreement or engagement.
  37. To depart from allegiance or duty; to revolt.
  38. To fall in, to concur; to agree with.
  39. To comply; to yield to.
  40. To come in; to join; to enter. fall into the ranks; fall in on the right.
  41. To fall off, to withdraw; to separate; to be broken or detached. friends fall off in adversity.
  42. To perish; to die away.
  43. To apostatize; to forsake; to withdraw from the faith, or from allegiance or duty.
  44. To forsake; to abandon.
  45. To drop.
  46. To depreciate; to depart from former excellence; to become less valuable or interesting.
  47. To deviate or depart from the course directed, or to which the head of the ship was before directed; to fall to leeward.
  48. To fall on, to begin suddenly and eagerly.
  49. To begin an attack; to assault; to assail.
  50. To drop on; to descend on.
  51. To fall out, to quarrel; to begin to contend.
  52. To happen; to befall; to chance.
  53. To fall over, to revolt; to desert from one side to another.
  54. To fall beyond.
  55. To fall to, to begin hastily and eagerly.
  56. To apply one's self to.
  57. To fall under, to come under, or within the limits of; to be subjected to.
  58. To come under; to become the subject of.
  59. To come within; to be ranged or reckoned with.
  60. To upon, to attack. [See to fall on.]
  61. To rush against.

FALL, verb transitive

  1. To let fall; to drop.
  2. To sink; to depress; as, to raise or fall the voice.
  3. To diminish; to lessen or lower; as, to fall the price of commodities. [Little used.]
  4. To bring forth; as, to fall lambs. [Little used.]
  5. To fell; to cut down; as, to fall a tree. [This use is now common in America, and fell and fall are probably from a common root.]

FALL, noun

  1. The act of dropping or descending from a higher to a lower place by gravity; descent; as a fall from a horse or from the yard of a ship.
  2. The act of dropping or tumbling from an erect posture. he was walking on ice and had a fall
  3. Death; destruction; overthrow.
  4. Ruin; destruction.
  5. Downfall; degradation; loss of greatness or office; as the fall of Cardinal Wolsey.
  6. Declension of greatness, power or dominion; ruin; as the fall of the Roman empire.
  7. Diminution; decrease of price or value; depreciation; as the fall of prices; the fall of rents; the fall of interest.
  8. Declination of sound; a sinking of tone; cadence; as the fall of the voice at the close of a sentence.
  9. Declivity; the descent of land or a hill; a slope.
  10. Descent of water; a cascade; a cataract; a rush of water down a steep place; usually in the plural; sometimes in the singular; as the falls of Niagara, or the Mohawk; the fall of the Hoosatonuc at Canaan. fall is applied to a perpendicular descent, or to one that is very steep.
  11. The outlet or discharge of a river or current of water into the ocean, or into a lake or pond; as the fall of the Po into the gulf of Venice.
  12. Extent of descent; the distance which any thing falls; as, the water of a pond has a fall of five feet.
  13. The fall of the leaf; the season when leaves fall from trees; autumn.
  14. That which falls; a falling; as a fall of rain or snow.
  15. The act of felling or cutting down; as the fall of timber.
  16. fall or the fall by way of distinction, the apostasy; the act of our first parents in eating the forbidden fruit; also, the apostasy of the rebellious angels.
  17. Formerly, a kind of vail.
  18. In seamen's language, the loose end of a tackle.
  19. In Great Britain, a term applied to several measures, linear, superficial and solid.

Noah Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828). Verse references are checked against the KJV. Read the full entry.

Verses are from the King James Version. Word meanings come from the original Hebrew, not from any one translation.