ala · oath, curse

What it means

ala (אָלָה) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “oath, curse”.

An oath that includes a curse on the one who does not keep it.

How to say it

Approximate pronunciation. Vowels sound as in Spanish (a as in father, e as in bed, i as in machine, o as in note, u as in rule); the syllable in bold is stressed. The voice is your device's.

Its senses in the Bible

1. An oath that brings a curse if broken.
2. Words of cursing.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

How it is translated

The words this translation uses for it, most frequent first.

• imprecation ×27
• curse ×4
• imprecations ×2
• cursing ×1
• make him swear ×1
• testify under oath ×1

Related words

Words of the same family, by Strong’s numbering.

Where it appears

• Genesis×3
• Leviticus×1
• Numbers×4
• Deuteronomy×6
• 1 Kings×2
• 2 Chronicles×3
• Nehemiah×1
• Job×1
• Psalms×2
• Proverbs×1
• Isaiah×1
• Jeremiah×4
• Ezekiel×5
• Daniel×1
• Zechariah×1

• Genesis 24:41

  Then you will be free from my imprecation, when you come to my family; and if they do not give her to you, you will be free from my imprecation.’

• Genesis 26:28

  They said, “We have clearly seen that YHWH has been with you; so we said, ‘Let there now be an imprecation between us, between us and you, and let us make a covenant with you,

• Leviticus 5:1

  If a person sins in that he hears the public call to testify under oath, and he is a witness, whether he has seen or known the matter, if he does not declare it, he shall bear his iniquity.

• Numbers 5:21

  then the priest shall make the woman swear the oath of imprecation, and the priest shall say to the woman, ‘May YHWH make you an imprecation and an oath among your people, when YHWH makes your thigh sag and your belly swell;

• Numbers 5:23

  And the priest shall write these imprecations in a scroll and wipe them off into the water of bitterness.

• Numbers 5:27

  When he has made her drink the water, then it shall be that if she has made herself unclean and been unfaithful to her husband, the water that brings a curse shall enter into her to become bitter, and her belly shall swell, and her thigh sag, and the woman shall become an imprecation among her people.

• Deuteronomy 29:12

  so that you may enter into the covenant of YHWH your Elohim and into his oath of imprecation, which YHWH your Elohim is making with you today,

• Deuteronomy 29:14

  And it is not with you alone that I am making this covenant and this oath of imprecation,

• Deuteronomy 29:19

  And it happen, when he hears the words of this oath of imprecation, that he blesses himself in his heart, saying, “I will have peace, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart,” so as to sweep away the watered with the thirsty.

• Deuteronomy 29:20

  YHWH will not be willing to forgive him, for then the anger of YHWH and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and every oath of imprecation written in this book will settle on him, and YHWH will blot out his name from under the heavens.

• Deuteronomy 29:21

  And YHWH will single him out for evil from all the tribes of Israel, according to all the oaths of imprecation of the covenant written in this book of the instruction.

• Deuteronomy 30:7

  And YHWH your Elohim will put all these oaths of imprecation on your enemies and on those who hate you, who persecuted you.

• 1 Kings 8:31

  If a man sins against his neighbor, and he lays on him an imprecation to make him swear, and the imprecation comes before your altar in this house,

• 2 Chronicles 6:22

  If a man sins against his neighbor and he lays on him an imprecation to make him swear, and the imprecation comes before your altar in this house,

• 2 Chronicles 34:24

  Thus says YHWH: Look, I am bringing evil upon this place and upon its inhabitants, all the imprecations that are written in the book that they have read before the king of Judah;

• Nehemiah 10:29

  were adhering to their brothers, their nobles, and entering into an imprecation and into an oath to walk in the law of Elohim, which was given by the hand of Moses the servant of Elohim, and to keep and do all the commandments of YHWH our Lord, and his rules and his statutes;

• Job 31:30

  —and I did not let my palate sin by asking for his life with an imprecation—

• Psalms 10:7

  His mouth is full of cursing and of deceit and oppression; under his tongue are suffering and wickedness.

• Psalms 59:12

  The sin of their mouth is the word of their lips; let them be caught in their pride, and for the imprecation and the lying that they recount.

• Proverbs 29:24

  Whoever shares with a thief hates his own soul; he hears the imprecation and does not declare anything.

• Isaiah 24:6

  Therefore a curse devours the earth, and those who dwell in it are held guilty; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are scorched, and few mortals are left.

• Jeremiah 23:10

  For the land is full of adulterers; for because of the curse the land mourns; the pastures of the wilderness have dried up; and their course is evil, and their might is not right.

• Jeremiah 29:18

  And I will pursue them with the sword, with the famine, and with the pestilence, and I will make them a terror to all the kingdoms of the earth, a curse and a horror and a hissing and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them,

• Jeremiah 42:18

  For thus says YHWH Tsevaot, the Elohim of Israel: As my anger and my fury were poured out on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so my fury will be poured out on you when you go to Egypt, and you will become an imprecation and a horror and a curse and a reproach, and you will not see this place again.

• Jeremiah 44:12

  And I will take the remnant of Judah who have set their faces to go to the land of Egypt to reside as aliens there, and they will all come to an end; in the land of Egypt they will fall; by the sword and by famine they will come to an end; from the small to the great, by the sword and by famine they will die; and they will become an imprecation, a horror, and a curse and a reproach.

• Ezekiel 16:59

  For thus says Adonai YHWH: I will deal with you as you have done, you who despised the imprecation by breaking a covenant.

• Ezekiel 17:13

  And he took one of the royal offspring and made a covenant with him, and brought him into an imprecation; and the mighty of the land he took away,

• Ezekiel 17:16

  As I live, declares Adonai YHWH, surely in the place of the king who made him king, whose imprecation he despised and whose covenant he broke, with him in the midst of Babylon he will die.

• Ezekiel 17:18

  And he despised the imprecation by breaking the covenant; and look, he had given his hand, and has done all these things; he will not escape.’

• Ezekiel 17:19

  Therefore thus says Adonai YHWH: ‘As I live, surely my imprecation that he despised and my covenant that he broke, I will put it on his head.

• Daniel 9:11

  And all Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, so as not to listen to your voice; and there has been poured out on us the curse and the oath that is written in the law of Moses, the servant of Elohim, because we have sinned against him.

• Zechariah 5:3

  And he said to me, “This is the imprecation that goes out over the face of all the land; for everyone who steals, from here, according to it, has gone unpunished; and everyone who swears, from here, according to it, has gone unpunished.

And 4 more times.