to smite
ha.lam chiefly denotes striking a person, object, or target, including blows described in corrective or figurative settings.
The verbal forms chiefly occur where horses, workers, attackers, or groups strike a target: hooves strike, a woman strikes Sisera, workers strike an object, and attackers strike engravings. Two clauses place the action in figurative or corrective settings—those “struck down by wine” and the righteous person who smites alongside rebuke—while one adverbial occurrence has an unclear specific contribution in the translation.
Senses in use
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Striking a person or object · dominant
Qal verbal forms describe concrete striking actions. In Judges 5:22 the APB renders the horses’ hooves as having “struck”; in Judges 5:26 it renders the woman’s action against Sisera as “she struck Sisera”; and in Psalm 74:6 it describes people striking engravings with axes. Isaiah 16:8, Isaiah 41:7, and Proverbs 23:35 likewise place the forms in clauses about striking tendrils, hammer work, and people being struck.
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Striking in corrective or figurative clauses · occasional
In Isaiah 28:1 the passive participle occurs in the description of people rendered by the APB as “the ones struck down by wine.” In Psalm 141:5 the Qal imperfect appears in a request that the righteous “smite me with kindness” and rebuke me; the verse frames the action with rebuke rather than identifying a literal blow.
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Adverbial occurrence with unclear contribution · rare
In 1 Samuel 14:16 the supplied form is tagged as an adverb. The APB renders the surrounding report as the crowd “was melting away and going on and striking,” but the translation does not isolate the adverb’s specific contribution.
In the Anselm Project Bible: Across the verbal clauses, the APB uses “struck,” “smite,” “beat,” and “striking,” while Isaiah 28:1 has “struck down.” These renderings show the verse-level presentation rather than a fixed English equivalent for every form.