to cut: cut
ka.rat denotes cutting, especially removing people or groups, while also describing covenant-making and physical severing.
The supplied verses most often use the term for removing or eliminating persons, houses, inhabitants, or a person’s standing within a people; they also use it for making a covenant and for concrete cutting of trees, garments, body parts, and cultic objects.
Senses in use
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Remove, eliminate, or be excluded · dominant
In 1 Kings 9:7, the Hiphil form occurs in the announcement that Israel will be removed from the land; in Amos 1:5 the clause concerns removing an inhabitant and ruler. Niphal forms describe someone not being removed from David’s throne line in 1 Kings 8:25, while Exodus 12:15 describes a soul being excluded from Israel after eating leavened bread.
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Make a covenant · common
Qal forms occur where parties enter a covenant: David does so with Israel’s elders in 1 Chronicles 11:3, Jonathan and David do so before the LORD in 1 Samuel 23:18, and a covenant is made with the fathers in 1 Kings 8:21. In 1 Samuel 11:1, the imperative stands in Jabesh-gilead’s request to Nahash for such an agreement.
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Physically cut down or sever · occasional
The term describes direct physical cutting: garments are cut in half in 1 Chronicles 19:4, nonfruit trees are cut down in Deuteronomy 20:20, and Zipporah cuts her son’s foreskin in Exodus 4:25. It also describes Dagon’s hands as cut off in 1 Samuel 5:4 and the uncut umbilical cord in Ezekiel 16:4.
In the Anselm Project Bible: Across these verses, the APB commonly uses “cut off” for removal or exclusion, “made” or “make a covenant” in covenant clauses, and “cut down” or “cut” for physical actions. Because the APB is a whole-verse translation text, these renderings show the clauses’ presentation rather than fixed English equivalents.