Belial
be.liy.ya.al marks people as corrupt or worthless and can characterize harmful counsel, speech, and destructive forces.
The term most often marks people whose conduct is portrayed as corrupt, harmful, or worthless; it also characterizes harmful speech or counsel and appears in figurative descriptions of destructive forces.
Senses in use
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Corrupt or worthless people · dominant
The absolute masculine singular form is applied to people in clauses that portray misconduct or danger: in Judges 19:22 the APB renders the city men who surround a house as “worthless men,” and in Proverbs 6:12 it renders such a man as walking with crooked lips. In 1 Kings 21:13, the men so described testify against Naboth before the people, while Judges 20:13 identifies men in Gibeah whom Israel seeks to put to death and thereby purge evil.
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Harmful words, counsel, and destructive imagery · common
The same absolute masculine singular form occurs with non-personal expressions. In Deuteronomy 15:9 the APB renders a “word in your heart” that withholds help from a needy brother as a “word of Belial”; in Psalm 101:3 it similarly renders a rejected object before the speaker’s eyes as a “word of Belial.” In 2 Samuel 22:5 the APB renders destructive torrents as “torrents of Belial,” so the precise English contribution in these constructions is less directly isolated by the translation.
In the Anselm Project Bible: For people, the APB frequently uses “worthless men,” “worthless man,” or “worthless woman”; it also retains “Belial” in expressions such as “word of Belial” and “torrents of Belial.” Because the APB translates whole verses rather than aligning individual words, some occurrences are not explicitly represented in its English wording.